Chilly weather requires foods that take longer to digest and warm you up.
Alcohol can do that too, which is why on European ski slopes, hot mulled and spiced wine is the drink of choice. Wine, whiskey etc achieve that slighty differently by causing blood capillaries to expand and that in turn brings more blood supply to beneath your skin and boosts the warmth.
Hot beverages and warm soup are also important winter warmers.
Many types of slow-digest sweets can work this magic. Gond or gum-laced delicacies particularly fit the bill. Chef Kunal Kapoor offers a recipe for Honey Gond Pak for days when temperatures dip.
Photograph: Chef Kunal Kapoor
Honey Gond Pak
Serves: 4
Ingredients
- 3 tbsp oil + 1½ tbsp extra
- 300 gm gond or edible gum
- ½ cup desiccated coconut
- 400 gm khoya or mawa or milk solids
- 2 bara elaichi or black cardamom, seeds crushed
- ¼ cup chopped almonds
- ¼ cup chopped cashews
- ¼ cup chopped walnuts
- ¾ cup honey
- Handful cashews, for decoration
Method
- In a deep-bottomed saucepan or a kadhai, fry the gond with the oil over medium heat until it puffs up.
Then, transfer from the pan to a plate and keep aside.
- In the same pan, fry the desiccated coconut with the khoya until it melts and becomes soft.
Add in crushed black cardamom seeds to the mixture.
- Then, add the chopped almonds, cashews, walnuts and continue stirring and cooking the mixture for a few minutes until the nuts are slightly roasted.
Pour in the honey and mix well and cook for a few more minutes until the mixture thickens.
Now add in the fried edible gum, and mix until the gum well coats the other ingredients
- Grease a thali with the remaining 1½ tbsp oil.
- Transfer the gond pak into the thali and press it down evenly.
Allow it to rest for 10-15 minutes.
- Cut into equal cubes.
Decorate each cube with a cashew nut on top and serve.
