Mysore Pak/ Besan Flour Fudge

         Diwali is going to be here in just two weeks time, and I know many of us are busy, be it preparing sweets and savories or buying clothes and gifts for the family. I am also seeing lots of festival recipes in the other blogs too, so today I thought I'll post a sweet recipe, Mysore Pak. The main ingredient here is besan flour/ chickpea flour, ghee and of course sugar, and there are two varieties of this very famous sweet, the soft burfi type and the other semi-hard one. I like both of them, but the semi-hard one is a little more special for me. Though the ingredients are simple, the process is a little tricky, which I think one can master with practice. I have watched this video of Vahchef so many times and every time I am fascinated at seeing the finished mysore pak at the end, so perfect with the famous honeycomb texture. I have tried to make it, I know I have not done it perfectly, I am sure, the next time I'll do it even better, but for the first time, I am happy with the result..

Need To Have

• Besan Flour - 3/4 cup
• Ghee - 1/2 cup
• Oil - 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons
• Sugar - 3/4 cup

Method

          Heat the 2 tablespoons of oil and add it to the besan flour, when you add it you'll here a sizzling sound. Mix it with the flour to get a crumbly mixture. Then sieve it to remove any lumps.

          Add the sugar and 1/4 cup water in a heavy bottom pan and heat it, at the same time heat the ghee and the 1/4 cup oil in another pan and keep it ready.

          When the sugar is completely dissolved, keep stirring till you get the 1 string consistency, when you take the spoon from the sugar, it should form a sticky string and it will be bubbling. at this stage, add the besan flour, little by little and keep mixing continuously till you get a smooth mixture. At the same time, heat the ghee and oil mixture, add the hot ghee to the flour mixture, a spoon at a time and keep mixing with the other hand, do this till all the ghee is done and the flour mixture starts to leave the sides of the pan and tending to solidify.

          Remove it and pour it immediately in a greased plate, wait for 5 minutes and slice it into pieces. Wait for another 10 minutes till it's fully cooled, then remove the slices carefully.

Note
When you add the ghee mixture, it should be really hot, when you add it to the flour, it should foam up.
The mysore pak came out well, but I made a mistake of using a shallow plate when I poured the final mixture, it should be a little deeper, at least 2 inches, that way you can get the honeycomb texture very nicely. My pieces were only about 1/2" to 3/4" tall.
You can add another 2 tablespoons ghee, if needed, I felt the above measurements are good enough.
While sieving the flour, keep pressing with a spoon, because it'll be sticky from the oil added and will not fall through easily.