Rabdi Recipe

Any festival is incomplete without a sweet dish. I had made this rabdi for Diwali and thought of updating this post with new images. Rabdi is a North Indian sweet dish. It is made by boiling milk on low heat by reducing its content to less than half the quantity. While preparing rabdi sweet, the color of milk changes from white to off-white or pale yellow. Different types of dry fruits and spices like cardamom are added to give a nice flavor to this dessert.

Difference between rabdi and basundi:

Rabdi is also known as basundi in some places. But both are different. The method of preparation and texture is different. In rabdi, we scrape the milk cream that settles on sides of the pan while boiling the milk. But in basundi, we allow the milk contents to reduce to half while stirring continuously. The texture of both is also different. Basundi is smooth and thinner than rabdi.

Ingredients to make rabdi:

• Milk – The main ingredient to make easy rabdi recipe is milk.
• Sugar – Sugar adds sweetness to this recipe.
• Saffron strands – Saffron strands add color and flavor to the recipe. Soak saffron strands in little milk to get saffron flavor infused milk.
• Pistachios, Almonds – Add these dry fruits to make the dessert rich.
• Cardamom – Cardamom pods are crushed and added to this sweet. This adds a nice aroma to the dish being prepared. Most of the Indian desserts have cardamom added to it.
• Cornflour – Optional ingredient. This is used to thicken the milk faster while making rabdi kheer

Related posts: Banana fritters in rabdi, Apple kheer, Carrot kheer

Let us see how to make rabdi at home:

1. Pour the milk in a deep heavy bottom pan and start boiling it.
2. When the cream starts forming on the milk, stir and mix it in the milk. Keep the flame low and occasionally (every 5 minutes) stir the milk in the pan. If the cream sticks to the sides, gently scrape it from the sides and mix it with the milk in pan.
3.  You will need a deep bottomed pan because the milk has to be boiled till it reduces to half of the original quantity.
4. When the boiling process is on you can do the following parallely:
5. De-shell the pistachios. Boil the pistas and almonds in 1/2 cup water or microwave it for 4 minutes. Let it cool.
   After cooling peel the dry fruits and slice them. Optionally you can use pista and almod slivers too.
6. Powder the sugar in a mixer.
7. Soak the saffron strands in 2 tablespoon milk so that the saffron flavor gets infused in the milk.
8. Mix the cornflour in 2 tablespoon milk separately.
9. Since I used cardamom pods, I powdered this using mortar-pestle.
10. Do not forget to stir the boiling milk every 4-5 minutes while keeping the other ingredients ready.
11. Once the milk reduces to half the original quantity, mix the powdered sugar and stir.
12. Add the saffron infused milk to the boiling milk.
13. Now add the cardamom powder and chopped dry fruits.
14. Add the rose water.
15. Finally add the cornflour mixed milk.
16. Now stir this continuously for another 10 minutes taking care that the milk does not stick to the bottom of the pan.

How to serve rabdi?

• You can serve it with gulab jamun or malpua or jalebi.
• Use the same  sweet to prepare shahi tukra or rasmalai.
• You can serve it hot or chilled. I prefer eating cold rabdi from freeze with some pooris.

How many days does rabdi last?

You should consume recipes made with milk products immediately. But if you prepared excess, then you can store it in fridge for 2 to 3 days.

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5 from 1 vote

Rabdi

Rabdi is a North Indian sweet dish. It is made by boiling milk on low heat by reducing its content to less than half the quantity. While preparing rabdi, the color of milk changes from white to off-white or pale yellow. Different types of dry fruits and spices like cardamom are added to give a nice flavor to rabdi.

Prep Time10 mins

Cook Time1 hr

Course: Dessert, Desserts, sweets

Cuisine: Indian

Servings: 4 people

Author: Raksha Kamat

Equipment

• Deep botton pan

Ingredients

• 1 litre milk
• 5 tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 tablespoon cardamom powder or 6-7 cardamom pods
• 5-6 saffron strands
• 10-14 Pistachio
• 12 almonds
• 1/4 teaspoon cornflour
• 1/2 teaspoon rose water

Instructions

• Pour the milk in a deep heavy bottom pan and start boiling it.
• When the cream starts forming on the milk, stir and mix it in the milk. Keep the flame low and occasionally (every 5 minutes) stir the milk in the pan. If the cream sticks to the sides, gently scrape it from the sides and put it at on the edge of the pan.
• You will need a deep bottomed pan because the milk has to be boiled till it reduces to half of the original quantity.
• When the boiling process is on you can do the following parallely:
• De-shell the pistachios. Boil the pistas and almonds in 1/2 cup water or microwave it for 4 minutes. Let it cool.
• After cooling peel the dry fruits and slice them.
• Powder the sugar in a mixer.
• Soak the saffron strands in 2 tablespoon milk so that the saffron flavor gets infused in the milk.
• Mix the cornflour in 2 tablespoon milk separately.
• Since I used cardamom pods, I powdered them using mortar-pestle.
• Do not forget to stir the boiling milk every 4-5 minutes while keeping the other ingredients ready.
• Once the milk reduces to half the original quantity, mix the powdered sugar and stir.
• Add the saffron infused milk to the boiling milk.
• Now add the cardamom powder and chopped dry fruits.
• Add the rose water.
• Finally add the cornflour mixed milk.
• Now stir this continuously for another 10 minutes taking care that the milk does not stick to the bottom of the pan.

Notes

Addition of cornflour is optional. But if used the rabdi gets cooked faster.

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Note: This recipe was first published on 22nd Oct 2014. Today on 2nd Nov 2019, I have re-published it with new images.