Not sure if I am the only one in the world who had this notion that traditional food, or to be precise, the recipes that were originated in my homeland long long ago – were either too complicated to make or time consuming, and the ingredients required to prepare those dishes are too exotic to be easily available. Yes, I used to think that those delicious age-old masterpieces that my mother used to cook, will remain with her and cannot be recreated by me, or for that matter, by the entire current generation. According to me, those were the dishes which could be prepared only when you had ample time and ample number of people around you, which is practically not relevant in today’s nuclear family world.
But gradually, as I ventured into my kitchen owing to my submission towards the urge to have great food (can’t help, heart always comes before mind in all things ‘food’ 😉), I started realizing that this notion is not completely true. In fact, there are couple of age-old traditional dishes, passed from generation to generation, which can actually be cooked in no time with the least number of ingredients. And boy, they are so delicious! One such dish is the Narkeler Nadu(‘d’ pronounced as ‘r’) as we call in Bengali or ‘Nariyal Laddoo’ or ‘Coconut Laddoo’ which can actually be prepared with just two ingredients.
I am not sure when I fell in love with Coconut Laddoo, but so far as my memory goes, I only remember how much I had to plead with my Mom not to reveal those laddoos in front of others, so that I did not have to share. I also remember that I never used to take these Coconut laddoos to school. After all, wasn’t it really difficult to share your favourites with your class mates during lunch hour? My love for these Narkeler Nadu is so eternal that even today whenever I visit my parents, or my parents visit me, a dabba of Narkeler Nadu will be waiting for me.
Although, one can add couple of ingredients to enhance the taste of ‘Narkeler Nadu’, but, there is something special about the basic Narkeler Nadu that my mother used to make. The sweet aroma of coconut cooked in sugar is so mesmerizing that one can have this for the rest of his or her life without any complaints. And the best part of this sweet delicacy is, you just need only two ingredients ‘coconut’ and ‘sugar’, and you are good to go. And no, you are not compromising on taste. You should make it to believe it.
So, considering our commitment towards creating masterpieces with everyday ingredients, this dish is the perfect testimony which I can proudly share with the entire world.
Now, no further procrastination – ring out the perfect cook in you!
Not sure why I am craving for sweet so much. This is my third back to back dessert recipe. Nevermind, you can enjoy the other dessert recipes through this link.
Recipe: Narkeler Nadu/Nariyal Laddoo/Coconut Laddoos
Preparation Time: Around 40 minutes (includes manual grating of coconut) Cooking Time: Around 10 minutes Yield: Medium sized 8 Laddoos Equipments used: Coconut hand grater/scraper, a pan and a turner
Ingredients:
- 1 fresh coconut
- ½ cup sugar
- Pinch of camphor powder or camphor tablet crushed to powder (optional)
Method:
- Take a fresh coconut, clean it and break it in two halves
- Grate the coconut
- Cook the grated coconut in a heated pan along with ½ cup sugar
- Stir the coconut till the sugar particles dissolve and the coconut mixture thickens
- Remove the pan from heat once the coconut mixture thickens and become sticky
- Add a pinch of camphor powder and stir the mixture to spread the aroma of camphor powder
- Let the mixture cool down a bit
- When the mixture is still warm, take small portion of mixture from the pan, squeeze and roll to small balls to give the shape of laddoos
Break a fresh coconut into two halves.
Grate the coconut.
Cook the grated coconut along with sugar.
Remove from heat and add a pinch of camphor powder, once the coconut mixture is thick and sticky.
Squeeze and roll the mixture to give the shape of laddoos.
Tips:
- Once you put coconut and sugar into the pan, don’t stop stirring until the mixture is done
- Don’t overcool the mixture, else it would be difficult to roll the mixture to laddoos
- Add camphor powder immediately after the pan is removed from heat, so that the aroma of camphor spreads evenly
- To avoid breakage, squeeze the coconut mixture hard while rolling the mixture to laddoos
- These coconut laddoos can also be made with jaggery
