Manoharam

Manoharam

Manoharam is a sweet version of Thenkuzhal. This is one of the traditional and conventional sweet made in most of the Tamil Brahmin houses.

Manoharam is one of the yummiest and easiest sweet we can make for Diwali. Most of us make Thenkuzhal regularly. We can easily prepare using rice flour, urad dal flour, salt, butter and then we need to deep fry the thenkuzhal till they are crispy and then we have to break the fried thenkuzhal it roughly. Then once we prepare the jaggery syrup in a right consistency, we have to add it to the broken thenkuzhal and then mix well and then make lemon sized balls out of the mixture and the Manoharam will be ready!

Ingredients

Ingredients for Manoharam

3 cups Rice flour

1/2 cup Urad dal flour

3 tablespoon Butter

3/4 cup Water, ice cold (more if required)

1 teaspoon Cooking oil

Ingredients for the jaggery syrup

1 cup Jaggery, (for approximately 2 cups of murukku)

1/4 cup Fresh coconut, diced into small bits

1-1/2 teaspoons Dry ginger powder

2 cups Water

How to make Manoharam

To prepare the manoharam, mix together rice flour, urad dal flour and salt into a large bowl. Add in the butter and ice cold water and knead everything together well to make soft and smooth dough. The consistency of the dough should be malleable.

1. Place this dough in a murukku press to churn out the murukku into the hot oil below. 
2. Next, preheat the cooking oil in a medium sized frying pan or kadai. Once the oil is medium hot, squeeze out the dough through the press to form small murukkus which should be deep fried. Once they turn golden colour, remove them from the oil.
3. Drain the excess oil by placing these murukkus on a paper towel and allow them to cool. Finally, transfer them to a large serving bowl.
4. To prepare the jaggery syrup, combine the jaggery and water in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Heat them on medium flame, doing this until all the jaggery dissolves completely in water. Strain the thick syrup using a fine strainer, to remove any suspended particles.
5. Now, taking the same pan, add in the drained syrup and the tiny coconut bits and continue to stir this on low heat. It will take about 15 minutes to cook the mixture. In the meanwhile, prepare a cup of water to test whether the syrup is done.
6. An important part of the recipe, is the testing of the jaggery syrup, to know when it is done. For this, you first need to take a spoonful of the syrup, and drop it into the water. See whether it comes together to form a round blob. Then, stir in the dry ginger powder to the water and mix together all the ingredients well. The jaggery syrup is ready to be combined with the murukku.
7. Finally, pour the hot jaggery syrup little by little into the murukku, until it gets coated evenly.
8. The Manoharam Murukku should be served piping hot, or even cool them down thoroughly before transferring to an airtight container to be eaten later.
9. Serve the Manoharam Murukku Recipe (South Indian Diwali Special) as an evening time snack.