Rainbow karanjis

I was browsing thru my recipe books trying to decide what faraal to make this Diwali, when these rainbow karanjis caught my eye and my fancy in Kamlabai Ogle's Ruchira. I had never heard or seen such karanjis before, so I decided to make a trial batch this weekend. Here's how I made them.

For the filling:

2 cups shredded coconut (I used frozen)

2 cups brown sugar or jaggery

1/2 tsp cardamom pwd

Cook the sugar and coconut on medium low heat until well mixed. Add the cardamom pwd and mix well. Allow to cool before stuffing in the karanjis.

For the covering:

1 cup fine sooji (rawa)

1 cup plain flour (maida)

About 4 heaped tsp ghee

4 tsp cornflour

Food colors - I used red, blue, yellow and green

Mix the sooji, maida and half the ghee. Divide the mix into 5 parts (more or less depending on the colors you use). Leave one part white and knead into a stiff dough with water or milk. Mix the colors in the other parts and knead those into stiff doughs too. Leave aside for 2 hrs. Then knead each piece of dough separately again. Mix the cornflour with the remianing ghee and whip till light. Roll each dough into a roti. All the rotis should be of about the same size. Take one roti, smear some cornflour-ghee mix on it, cover with another roti. Repeat with all the rotis. Then roll this stack of rotis into a tight roll. Cut this roll into 2 inch pieces. Roll each peice into a round puri, keeping the colored side down. Fill with the coconut-sugar mix. Fold over. Seal the edges together with some water. Deep fry these karanjis in moderately hot oil.

This made 8 karanjis and 2 modaks for me.

These karanjis are off to the Diwali Festival Feast at All Thingz Yummy.

I'm also sending these to the Festival JFI event at Srivalli's Cooking 4 All Seasons.