Soft, creamy, sweet, warm or chilled, some of the ways we remember a traditional Kheeri. A rice pudding made with the richness of milk and sugar. Simple yet delicious. Made so often that it’s impossible for anybody not know this dish.
Be it a birthday party or a wedding feast, a festival or a naming ceremony, as a child, my heart has always looked forward to the most-served dessert in any Indian celebration. You want to know why? It’s because it’s the creamy delicious sweet & warm Kheeri. That’s a must-have Indian desert in any Indian celebration. I would literally walk half a kilometre just to binge on kheeri.
Kheeri, Kheer, Payesh, Payasa, Payasam or Phirni are all the various names of this desert from different parts of India. It is basically a type of pudding, made by slow cooking 3 core ingredients - milk, sugar, and rice together. I guess that’s probably the reason why it is made so frequently in any household. Rice can be substituted with bulgar wheat, millet, tapioca, vermicelli, or sweet corn. It is typically flavoured with desiccated coconut, cardamom, raisins, saffron, cashews, pistachios, almonds, or other dry fruits and nuts. It is typically served during a meal or as a dessert.
The word "kheer" is derived from the Sanskrit word for milk, Ksheer(क्षीर). Ksheer is also the archaic name for sweet rice pudding. Kheeri was a part of the ancient Indian diet and it has found a mention in the ancient Ayurveda too.
Today, I am going to show you one of my favourite ways of making kheeri. So let’s get started.
Prep time | 30mins
Cooking time | 1.5 hrs
Difficulty level | beginner
Base Ingredients
Broken white rice 1 cup
Sugar 1 tbsp for caramelisation, 3/4th cup for sweetness
Whole milk 1 ½ ltr
Ghee/ clarified butter 2 tbsp
Cashews 1/4th cup
Raisin 1/4th cup
Dried Bayleaf, 1 unit
Condensed milk 1-2 tbsp based on personal taste
Cardamom powder ½ tsp
Soak the broken rice in water for 30 minutes. Place a deep saucepan on a low to medium flame. Once the pan is hot, add 1 tablespoon of ghee. Once the ghee is hot, add the cashews and fry them until they turn golden brown. Once the cashews are done, take them out and throw in the raisins in the remaining ghee and fry them until they puff up. Once done, take them out and keep aside.
Pour one more tablespoon of ghee onto the pan. Add the sugar to caramelise. Keep stirring it until the sugar turns dark brown. Drain the water out of the rice and add it to the pan. This helps in getting a slight caramelised colour to this whole pudding and visually looks much better as well. Fry the rice until the grains separate from each other.
Add the dried bayleaf to the pan and fry them for one more minute. Add milk and turn the flame to low. Let the rice cook in the milk slowly. Keep stirring the pudding every 10 minutes. It will take more than 60 minutes for the rice to cook and come together with the milk to create a rich creamy texture.
Follow the video to understand the consistency you should look for. You can keep it thicker or thinner depending on your preference. Once you’re happy with the consistency, add sugar and let it cook for another 10 minutes for the sugar to melt. Add the condensed milk and cardamom powder and mix it well. Once the kheeri is ready, add the cashew nuts and the raisins.
Now, you can serve it warm or chilled. Indulge the way you like.
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