A sweet delicacy made of fresh Chena and condensed milk. Paneer is an Indian cottage cheese which we use in making many Indian dishes and desserts. One of the desserts is peda; we can make it very easily in no time. Paneer adds rich and grainy texture to it. I have made malai peda using milk powder earlier, they were delicious too. Now I am sharing the Paneer version of peda, I hope you will love it. So let's see the recipe.
Some other peda recipe available on blog
Ingredients
Milk Powder - 1 cups
Condensed Milk - 1 can
Paneer- 2 cup (crumbled)
Butter - ¼ cup (1/2 a stick)
Ghee - to grease
Cherries- to garnish
Cardamom Powder - ½ tea spoon
Nutmeg Powder - ¼ tea spoon
Step by step how to make peda
Step 1. First pour milk in a pan and allow it to get a boil. Meanwhile you can lineup a cotton kitchen towel or muslin cloth in a strainer.
Stir the milk occasionally so that milk doesn't stick to the bottom. Then add 1 tbsp lemon juice in the center and stir, repeat this for 1 time more. Now milk must have curdled, if not, you may repeat the same for 1 time more.
Once milk has curdled properly, pour the milk to the lined strainer Gather the kitchen towel from the sides and rinse the chena very well in running water.
Step 2. It will remove the tangy flavor from the chena (coagulated milk. Squeeze the water as much as possible with hand and hang chena for about 30 minutes. If you are in hurry, you may place a heavy weight on the chena for 10 minutes.
Step 3. Heat the frying pan on medium and melt butter in it.
Step 4. To the butter pour condensed milk and cook for a minute.
Step 5. Next add milk powder and crumbled chena which we prepared earlier. Mix it well.
Step 6. Cook mixture on medium heat, by stirring continuously until mixture starts leaving the sides of the frying pan and becomes like dough. This should take about 8 minutes (depending on the type of pan, amount of heat and quantity of the mixture). Now this is known as khoya/Mawa.
Step 7. Add cardamom powder, nutmeg powder, saffron milk and cook for another minute and remove from heat and mix it well.
Step 8. Mixture should look like as shown in picture below.
Step 9. Transfer the khoya or mawa into a bowl and let it cool off until khoya becomes just lukewarm. Allow it to cool for 3 - 4 minutes. Now the mixture is ready to make a pedas out of it.
Step 10. Grease a plate with ghee and your palms to shape the peda.
Decorate with cherries. Garnish with cherries when still warm.
Serve on room temperature. Paneer peda can be kept for few days at room temperature and about a month refrigerated.
Make these paneer peda for pooja/festivals or simply enjoy them with a glass of chilled milk.
Tips - How to make peda
- You can also cook the whole mixture in a microwave instead of the pan. So when you microwave the milk peda, keep an eye so that the mixture does not get overcooked.
- You can prepare the paneer at home or use the ready made paneer for making this sweets, both will work great.
Recipe card - how to make peda
