SoupsAndSights: Dairy free Coconut-Cashew Burfi

Coconut burfi or thengai burbi or simply burbi is a famous South Indian sweet made with coconut and sugar. The one which I made is a sweet variation from the usual one with generous amount of cashew powder thrown in to the sugar syrup along with coconut. Cashew makes the burfis soft to bite and adds extra flavour to it.

I was very aprehensive about making the burfis as dealing with sugar syrup makes me jittery. I can never get the consistency correct. But with burfi, there is no consistency check for sugar syrup. Just need to remember 2 things.

1. Add coconut-cashew mixture after 5 minutes of sugar getting dissolved completely
2. Remove the mixture from heat as soon as it starts bubbling and starts leaving from sides and immediately transfer to a plate.

With these valuable inputs from my mother, I proceeded to make the burfis anyway. As you can see from the pictures it was a total success. :-)

Recipe Source: My mother

Coconut-cashew burfi recipe to make 25 pieces

Ingredients	Quantity	Notes/Comments
Grated Coconut	1 cup	-
Sugar	1 3/4 cups	I added 2 cups and it was too sweet even for a sweet toothed person like me.
Cashew Nut	1/2 cup
Cardamom/Elaichi	8 pods	-
Water	1/2 cup	I initially added 1/4 cup, but sugar started crystalizing. Then added another 1/4th cup.
Olive Oil	1 tbsp	Tradionally ghee is used.
Almond/Badam	1/4 cup	Optional, for garnish
Color powder	A pinch	Optional

Procedure
1. Coarsely powder cashew nuts and keep aside.
2. Dry roast almonds in a kadai/pan and pulse in a mixer for 2 seconds to get small broken pieces.
3. Powder cardamom seeds. As cardamom seeds are a bit moist, roasting the seeds and powdering is easier. To do this, remove seeds from pod, dry roast in a pan and tranfer to a mortar and powder with a pestle. Or after roasting, grind the seeds in a mixer.
4. Prepare a medium sized plate by applying a tsp of olive oil all over the plate.
5. In a kadai/pan, add sugar and water. Keep in low to medium flame until sugar is dissolved completely in water. Can stir occasionaly. This takes around 10 minutes.
6. After the sugar is dissolved, heat the sugar syrup in medium to high flame for 5 minutes.
7. Add a pinch of color powder(optional) to the syrup and mix well.
8. Add grated coconut, cashew powder and cardamom powder to sugar syrup and mix well.
9. Add a tbsp of oilive oil and keep stirring lighlty scrapping from the sides.
10. After 5 to 10 minutes, the mixture will start coming out from the sides and it starts bubbling at the bottom.
11. Immediately tranfer to the prepared plate. Mixture will spread by itself if the consistency is correct. If it does not spread, spread with a flat ladle with oil applied to the ladle.
12. Spread broken almonds all over the mixture and press lightly with fingers.
13. After 10 minutes, cut into pieces. Allow to cool and store in a container. It will keep good atleast for a week.