Mishti Doi..!!

The humble "mishti doi" doesn't includes much ingredients or any specific technique but whoever has it even once can never forget the taste for the rest of their life.

If you are in Kolkata you get this easily available everywhere. But if you are not.. then you can obviously recreate this at your home. And like I always say...making at home gives you advantage of controlling the quality of ingredients and the hygiene. So lets get on with the treat!!.

Given below are the step by step pictures for better understanding of the process.

Ingredients:

Milk : 1/2 Litre (full cream)
Curd : 4 teaspoon (generally to set half a litre of curd you would require one teaspoon but for mishti doi it is four times)
Sugar : 5 tablespoons ( Sweetness depends on individual preferences, you can increase or decrease the amount. 5 tablespoon gives you medium sweetness)
Cardamom : 1 (Elaichi or green cardamom always enhances the flavor of all the Indian desserts, hence I add this. Trust me you will love it too)


Procedure:

We need to drain the excess water from the curd, so let the curd pass through a strainer lined by a muslin cloth which will also absorb most of the water.

Set the milk to boil and once it boils, keep the flame low and let it boil for 10 minutes. You dont need to reduce the milk into half just boiling it for 10 minutes is enough.

While your milk is boiling, prepare the caramel sauce (this is the one which will give colour to your mishti doi). Take a pan and put the sugar in it, keep the flame on low and let the sugar melt into a syrup.

Once you see a golden syrup and no sugar crystals remaining then add around one fourth of milk from the boiling milk to the pan. (You can also add water, but adding milk just enhances the colour)

Keep stirring till all the sugar dissolves as it would form into solid lumps the moment you add milk, and all this while your flame should be low. Once the sugar melts and you get that beautiful caramelized colour syrup, add it to the milk and let it again boil for just 2 minutes.

Add the elaichi/ cardamom powder.

At this point if you see your milk has formed malai on top and you dont want that in your curd, you can strain the milk.

Now take the hung curd in a bowl and whisk it till you get a creamy texture.

Now time to add the milk, your milk should  not be too hot or too cold. So to know the perfect temperature, just dip your finger in the milk and if you can hold it for 5 seconds then your milk is ready to be poured.

Mix the milk little at a time and keep whisking because we want bubbles. The halwais drop the milk from a certain height to get the bubbles, but whisking does the job equally good too.

Once you have mixed all the milk now you can set the curd covered for 6-8 hours.

Weather at my place was not warm enough so I wrapped it in a towel and let it rest for 8 hours.

After 6-8 hours , put it in refrigerator for an hour because "mishti doi" tastes amazing when served little chilled.

You can set in earthen pots also but sets equally well in any utensil.

Please stick to the procedure and you will have the most creamiest and delicious mishti doi ever!!!

Do give it a try...!!