Halwa Puri Recipe
A comforting and hearty meal with sweetened flavourful dessert, topped with nuts and raisins for weekend breakfast or during festival season. Yes, you guessed it right. Halwa Puri is a tempting dish with spicy-sweet, deep-fried goodness that makes you ask for more.
This delicious breakfast platter of halwa puri originated in the Northern Indian subcontinent and is popular across India and Pakistan.
Suji halwa with puri is a must-try dish during the Navami pooja of the Navratri festival or a religious ceremony like Diwali, Ganesh Chaturthi, etc. Suji (semolina) halwa recipe is often made in bulk in Indian culture on festive occasions and served in temples as prasadam for auspicious occasions.
Even Halwa Puri is an essential part of Pakistani wedding tradition, sent to the groom’s family from the bride’s side with other breakfast food items in the morning.
Halwa puri is the most exclusive breakfast treat that reminds me of my childhood days amid the cacophony of car horns, shops, and street-cart vendors.
Preparing halwa poori at home is a bit adventurous, and the result is none less than boom. I am beyond excited to present my tweaked recipe to perfection. I hope you love and enjoy them as much as my family does.
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
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Time saver recipe: This recipe gets you one of the easiest sweets in the minimum time you could ever make and tastes amazing, too. All you need are 40 minutes from start to finish to get your hands on this delicious meal.
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Easy-to-find Ingredients: The recipe is super-affordable and highly convenient. The ingredients might be already available in the pantry, making it your budget-friendly recipe.
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Delicious yet healthy: This easy-to-make halwa is so tasty and nutritious. Now, satisfy your sweet cravings without counting the calories. It offers calcium, iron, vitamins B and E, and zinc, which help in boosting bone health and immunity.
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Crowd Pleaser: You can make a huge amount of halwa puri with no fancy ingredients and appease every person on the table.
Ingredients
For puri
All-purpose flour: All-purpose flour is a versatile wheat flour that helps make perfect puffy puri. Puri made with all-purpose flour, tastes softer and becomes chewier as it cools.
Salt: Salt to taste is essential for any savory dish.
Soda: A pinch of baking soda produces crispy fried puri. Baking soda blends with moisture and an acidic ingredient, like yogurt, resulting in fluffier goods.
Oil: I use a little splash of refined oil to the dough at the beginning of mixing. It helps to improve the puffy texture of the poori and flavor the finished crust.
Yogurt: Yogurt improves the expansion and softening of dough. It also helps lock the moisture in the dough.
Cooking oil (adjustable for frying): I used refined oil to fry puris. Any flavorless cooking oil, such as sesame, avocado, and safflower oil which can withstand higher temperatures is best for deep-frying foods like pooris.
For halwa
Ghee: Ghee offers an irresistible flavor to your halwa. For me, 3 tbsp is a good amount of ghee. You can reduce or increase its quantity according to your preference.
Semolina: semolina is one of the essential ingredients, used in various Indian and Pakistani dishes, including breakfast, sweets, dessert, and even main course meals.
Sugar: The primary ingredient that gives a sweet taste.
Pinch of food color: It gives the halwa an orange hue with the touch of South Asian cooking while offering the same suji halwa you get at the dhabas.
Cardamom: is an aromatic Indian spice that adds a wonderful taste and fragrance to any halwa recipe. You can substitute cardamom with cloves or saffron.
Kewra essence: It offers an aromatic taste and is mostly used for flavoring sweets in the form of syrup.
Instructions
For Puri:
- Take a mixing bowl. Add all-purpose flour, salt, soda, yogurt, and oil. Mix it well. Add a bit of water at a time as you begin to form a stiff dough, making sure not to oversaturate the mixture. Leave it for 20 minutes, covered with a wet cloth at room temperature.
- Divide the dough into smaller even-sized portions. Make sure this part is smaller than your ordinary roti. Take one part and make a ball.
- Press this ball between your fingers to make it smooth. Apply a bit of oil to the entire surface.
- Then roll it between your palms to flatten the dough ball, making it round and smooth. There should be no cracks otherwise, the oil will seep into the dough as it cooks and get soggy. Start rolling it with a rolling pin to form small discs.
- Cover this rolled puri loosely with a clean kitchen towel to prevent drying out. Make puri with other balls using the same process.
- Heat oil in the pan, check its temperature by putting puri, and see if it puffs up quickly. If it does, the temperature is perfect.
- Gently press the puri on the sides with a spider spoon. Fry the puris for two minutes or until it turns light golden. A perfectly made puri puffs as it hits the hot oil. Flip the side and fry it for a few seconds.
- Take it onto a plate with a paper towel to drain excess oil.
For Halwa
- Let us start by making sheera (sweetener). I added two cups of water to a pot and let it simmer. Then add sugar and cardamom. Stir it well until it gets a dropping consistency (porridge-like) to make the perfect sweetener for suji halwa. Keep it aside.
- Heat ghee in a deep pan, and add semolina (suji) on low flame. It’s essential to keep stirring suji with a spatula while roasting so grains do not stick to the pan otherwise, it will burn.
- Stir for 5 minutes until you see the suji color turn brown and the ghee get separated.
- Add the sweetener that we just prepared. At this point, I added kewra essence for aromatic flavor and a pinch of food color.
- Keep stirring for 8-ten minutes until it turns gooey. You get the best-textured halwa ready for breakfast
Nabeela Pro Tips
- Don’t substitute the ghee with cooking oil to get a delectable taste.
- Keep the dough covered in a warm spot, and let it sit for some time. It relaxes the gluten, making the rolling process convenient.
- Grease the surface while rolling the dough. Avoid dry flour; it will burn while frying puris, and the oil color becomes dark.
- Want to make your puris crispy? It is necessary to get rid of excess moisture in puri.
- Stirring the suji while roasting is inevitable. It ensures it’s evenly cooked until the grains’ color turns lighter and smells aromatic.
- The trick to make perfect suji halwa is to get it without lumping. Avoid one-pot and call for adding sugar and water together directly over fried semolina. Instead, add the warm sheera in the gently puffed suji to help get a smooth and melting texture.
FAQS
How to Serve Halwa Puri
An array of deep-fried puris and semolina halwa is served with complementary savory yellow chickpea gravy, tangy and slightly spicy potato curry and spicy pickles.
You can have arbi sabzi, saag paneer, and mango pickle that add a subtle color contrast to the curry. You will love making homemade puri and enjoy it with your favorite meals!
Halwa Puri Recipe
Ingredients
For Puri
- 2 cup All purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp Salt
- 1/2 tsp Soda
- 1 tsp oil
- 1 tsp Yogurt
- Cooking oil (adjustable) – for frying
For Halwa
- 3 tsp Ghee
- 1 cup Semolina (Suji)
- 2 cup water
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 4 cardamom
- 1/3 tsp Kewra essence (for aromatic taste)
Instructions
For Puri
- In a mixing bowl, combine all-purpose flour, salt, soda, yogurt, and oil. Gradually add water to form a stiff dough.
- Cover the dough with a wet cloth and let it rest for 20 minutes at room temperature.
- Divide the dough into small portions, roll each into a smooth ball, and flatten it with your palms.
- Use a rolling pin to roll each ball into small discs. Cover them with a towel to prevent drying.
- Heat oil in a pan and fry the puris until they puff and turn golden, flipping once. Drain on a paper towel.
For Halwa
- First we will make a sweetner. For this simmer two cups of water in a pot, then add sugar and cardamom. Stir until it reaches a porridge-like consistency, then set aside.
- Heat ghee in a pan and roast semolina (suji) on low flame, stirring continuously until it turns brown and separates from the ghee.
- Add the prepared sweetener, kewra essence, and food color. Stir for 8-10 minutes until the mixture becomes gooey, and the halwa is ready.
