It is this wonderful time of the year when my blog reaches new levels of deliciousness. As the festivals line up in queue in between the monotonous monsoon rain we all Indians become extra active and energetic. NAGARA PANCHAMI : A festival of snakes when we worship serpents with all auspiciousness and honor which is just a week ahead, So I obviously keep myself realistic with festival by posting a festival specific recipe.

I’m going to start this post by convincing you that this wheat halbai is one of the delicious ways you could ever eat wheat. Halbai, a very traditional dessert prepared using raw rice and jaggery during this festival has been innovatively made using whole wheat today. So named it as wheat halbai, sounds similar to halwa but it is not.

The whole preparation of wheat halbai is bit tedious which is cooked to perfection of thick porridge consistency with all the constant stirring involved. But never mind, it’s worth the effort feeling when you devour the soft and pleasantly smooth halbai.

I appreciate this dessert halbai for many reasons: one of them being it is the food inspiration for my blog. The first ever post on this udupi-recipes blog happened to be on July 29th 2012 narrating on this lovely dessert halbai. Since then I am so passionate about this so called BLOG WORLD that I nurtured mine with almost 270 posts till now. Meaning 270 recipes documented with step-wise photoes which makes me super happy.

Back on track with the recipe, The wholewheat grains are soaked overnight, grind to fine puree and strained only to get the thick wheat puree discarding the fibre. This extra water content has to be thrown out retaining only thick mass of wheat which is then cooked with grated coconut, jaggery, water and cardamom flavor.
Then with constant stirring, you should get the whole mixture to thick porridge like consistency. Whenever the mixture sticks to bottom, add ghee and continue cooking. Finally the smooth and non-sticky mixture is what obtained which is then transferred to tray and marked to pieces.

Print Recipe

Wheat Halbai | Godhi Halbai Recipe | Nagarapanchami Special

Prep Time8 10

Cook Time50

Total Time9

Servings: 10 -12

Author: Sumana

Ingredients

Whole wheat- 1 cup
Fresh grated coconut- 1/2 cup
Jaggery - 3/4 cup
Ghee- 1/4 cup
Cardamoms- 4 to 5 pods
Water- 3 cups

Instructions

Preparation

Rinse and soak whole wheat in enough water for about 8 hours or overnight.
De-seed cardamoms and powder them finely.

Method

Grind the soaked whole wheat in a mixer or wet grinder to a fine puree adding water as needed. Strain this puree and squeeze to extract it's thick juice.
Once again add the squeezed wheat puree in to mixer and grind finely adding a cup of water. Re-strain the puree and extract the juice completely discarding the residue.
Pour this strained puree in to a vessel and add one more cup of water. Let this vessel sit for 2 hours so that the thick wheat puree settles down. Carefully discard the floating plain water and reserve only the thick puree.
Heat a thick bottom wok adding jaggery and half cup of water. Let the jaggery dissolve completely. Meanwhile grind grated coconut to fine paste adding half cup of water.
Combine coconut paste and wheat puree from step 3 with the dissolved jaggery in the wok. Also add 2 cups of water and cardamom powder. In medium flame cook this mixture stirring continuously with a ladle.
When the mixture turns little thick add some ghee and continue stirring. The process of stirring and adding ghee every now and then should continue for about 40-50 minutes. The mixture turns in to thick porridge consistency and it will not stick to your teeth when you chew. That is the stage when you have to switch off the flame.
Grease a tray with little ghee and pour the wheat halbai mixture in to it. Let it cool down and then you can mark pieces using sharp knife.
Very soft and melt in mouth textured wheat halbai is ready to serve.

Notes

As wheat has lots of fiber and gluten it may need few extra minutes to grind it finely. Use enough water to grind the same.
You can grind the wheat early in the morning as it needs some resting time before starting the actual cooking. Do not rest the ground wheat more than 3 hours as it may begin fermenting.
The wheat to water ratio is very very important which is 1 : 3. I have added 3 cups of water in total. Half cup for dissolving the jaggery, half cup in grinding the coconut and 2 cups while cooking the mixture.
Stirring continuously the wheat mixture till it thickens is hardest part of whole process which will take 40 to 50 minutes.
Remember the mixture will not turn thick like halwa, it will be slightly thinner like thick porridge.
You can store in refrigerator and relish for a week. At room temperature it lasts for a day.