A Family Recipe for Paal Kozhukattai with Jaggery and Coconut Milk

Viji Sridhar shares her family’s recipe for paal kozhukattai — the star ingredient of which is home-made jaggery.

 My family's estate produces an abundant harvest of sugarcane. Appa would run the manual crusher and pour the sweet juices into the jaggery-maker — a simple machine that churned and cooked the sugarcane juices, until the sugar solidified.

Blocks of freshly made jaggery were brought home, and stacked in large brass vessels lined with paper. A pail of water propped under the vessel, and a hand-drawn perimeter of turmeric, was employed to keep the fat black ants away. But it wasn’t just the ants that were drawn to the heady smell of jaggery; my cousins, siblings and I would sneak into the store room, helping ourselves to the jaggery again and again. We’d wait eagerly for Ammama to make paal kozhukattai. 

Paal kozhukattai is a festival dish, traditionally made during Ganesh Chathurthi as an offering to the elephant god. Though it is believed the dish originated in Karaikudi, it is also popular in Madurai, and made by Keralites and Thanjavur Tamil families. Variations include cow milk, raw rice flour, and flavourings like saffron.

Recipe: Paal Kozhukattai

Serves 4 
Ingredients
1/2 cup grated coconut 
1 cup thick coconut milk
2 cups thin coconut milk
1/2 cup raw rice
1 1/2 cup jaggery 
4-5 pods cardamom, crushed

Method
Soak the rice in water for 2 hours. Grind the soaked rice with the grated coconut and two cardamom pods to a stiff, yet smooth, dough-like consistency. Add a few drops of water if necessary.
In a heavy bottomed pot, add the jaggery and a cup of thin coconut milk, and allow the jaggery to melt. 
Next, make lime-sized rounds from the ground rice and coconut dough. 
Drop a few into the pot and wait for it to cook, and float up to the top. Do not stir, or the rounds will disintegrate.
Cook the remaining balls in two more batches. 
Now add the second cup of thin coconut milk, reduce the heat and allow to simmer for two minutes. 
Finally, add in the thick coconut milk and as soon as it comes to a boil, turn off the heat. 
Add in the crushed cardamom. 
Enjoy warm with a little grated coconut, or as is.

Vijayalakshmi Sridhar is a features writer and a published fiction author currently based out of Bengaluru.

ALSO ON THE GOYA JOURNAL