Navarathri and Caramel Aval Payasam | Caramel Poha Kheer |

Happy Navrathri to all of you. Lots of interlaced memories around this festival. Navrathri a sanskrit word meaning nine nights(ten days) to worship Goddess in her different forms The first three days as Durga , the next three days as Lakshmi and the last three days Saraswathi. The tenth day is celebrated asVijaya Dasami .Every region in India has its own tradition . The city turns colorful and you'll notice more liveliness. You can read this post about Durga puja from my dear friend Dolphia to know about the Bengali traditions associated with this puja.

In Tamil Nadu ,  we start our preparations a week before as we arrange idols of god and related for the nine days pooja and we call it Golu. As kids we will look forward to this as we will be enjoying our quarterly holidays. The real fun begins when we get to open the idols wrapped in old clothes and papers from the trunk box. Some will be sparkling and some will need little bit touches. And the other fun is to set your garden set up to make an interesting golu. Amma used to allow us to bring in some soil and happily we will throw in some mustard seeds to get a natural grass set up.

The first three days we worship Goddess as Durga to destroy the evil mind and gain noble thoughts.
The next three days as Lakshmi to gain purification of mind and the last 3 days as Saraswathi to biuld knowledge on our purified mind. I remember Amma chanting slokas all day long and finally ending the morning pooja with Lalitha Shobanam and offering prashad to Goddess.Usually the morning neivedyams will be some form of sweets . Evening a simple arathi with another prasad , usually sundals ( lentils / beans boiled and sauted with simple tadka).

The most interesting part would be in the evenings you can plan and dress up in different costumes and visit other golu's (other houses) to show case your costume and taste some sundals and all accross the walk you get to discuss and compare about costumes with friends...You get to see so any police man , musicians, some kids dressed up as women with saree and boys with dhotis.... so much fun ... those were the days....

The eighth days is worshiped as Ayutha Pooja and the ninth day as Saraswathi pooja. We arrange all uour books before Goddess Saraswathi and is a norm that we don't read that day. The tenth day is Vijaya Dasami ... meaning victory by gaining good knowledge. I remember my Paati ( Grandma) saying , first you throw all bad thoghts, clean your mind so that you can gain knowledge....This is the day we pray Goddess and take a book from the set and read.

Now for the recipe, it is a quick version of payasam , you can make this in under 30 minutes from start to finish.


Ingredients

Aval / poha/ beaten rice................1/4 cup
Sugar ............................................1/2 cup or little lesser
Whole milk ..................................2 cups
Saffron......................................... few strands
Cashews and raisins ................... few
Green Cardamom....................... 3 , crushed
Nutmeg Powder .......................... a pinch
Salt ............................................. a tiny pinch
Ghee ......................................... 2 tbsp

Method

• Warm the milk and add saffron strands and set aside.
• Heat a tablespoon ghee in a heavy bottom pan and roast the cashews and raisins separately,set aside.
• Add remaining ghee to the pan and roast the poha/ avan/ beaten rice and roast until a nice aroma comes , just for about a minute or so and set aside.
• Now add the sugar to the same pan and keep cooking until it is caramelised and a beautiful color is achived.
• Now slowly remove the caramel from heat and stir in the milk with saffron whisking continuously.
• This is the right time to add in nutmeg powder.Let the milk come to a full boil and reduce a bit. 
• Now add in the poha/ aval and cook until it is cooked well and the mixture comes to a kheer / payasam consistency. 
• Add the crushed cardamom just before taking it off the heat.
• Finally add in the roasted cashews and raisins. Enjoy hot or cold.