Badam Kheer / Almond Pudding

Badam Kheer / Almond Pudding

Let me start my blog with something sweet.The first and the most simple sweet that comes to my mind is "Badam Kheer".This is a milk based dessert where ground almonds are cooked in milk and sugar and flavored with saffron and cardamom.I personally dont like adding cardamom in any of my sweet dishes as i feel they dominate the rest of the ingredients.So you might not find elaichi in any of my dishes.But feel free to add 2-3 pods / powder if you like to.

Benefits of Badam/Almond:

 - Almonds help in fighting diabetes and heart Diseases

 - Almonds are the best source of alpha-tocopherol form of Vitamin-E

 - Almonds are a great cholestrol lowering food

 This is one of the most favorite desserts of my hubby. He usually prefers it with minimal sweet less sugar. So please dont mind my sugar measurements here.You can add more or less according to your taste palate.


Ingredients

1 cup Blanched Almonds
1/4 -1/2 cup sugar 
1.5  cups milk, as needed for consistency 
3 tsp ghee
1 tsp cardamom powder(optional)
Few strands of saffron
Few blanched almonds/pista for garnish (optional)

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• Method of Preparation
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• 1. Blanch the almonds.
• 2. Take the almonds in batches in a mixie along with little milk enough to grind them into a smooth paste.
• 3. Take a non stick pan and add ghee and add the almond paste.
• 4. Cook it in low heat till the mixture thickens and turns lightly golden.
• 5. Heat rest of the milk until hot and then slowly add it to the almond paste. 
• 6. Stir and cook for 2-3 minutes and then add sugar. Stir well.
• 7. Add the cardamom powder(which i dint).
• 8. Add some saffron strands to warm milk.Then add the milk to the kheer.
• 9. Cook for another few minutes until everything is well dissolved.
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• I prefer to serve it chilled, garnished with blanched almonds/pistachios.
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Hope you like it:-)!!!