Ingredients

• Ingredients for Puri/Poori dough:

• 1 cup whole almonds to make almond powder. In UK, you can buy ready-made ground almond

• 1 1/2 cup plain flour or maida

• A generous pinch of salt

• 3 tbs. cold ghee (clarified butter)

• 1 tsp. baking powder

• Ice cold water to make dough

• Oil for deep frying

• Ingredients for layering paste:

• 3 tbs. rice flour (available from most Indian and some Western grocers)

• 1 tbs. ghee or clarified butter

• 2 tsp. thick yoghurt or dahi (like Greek yoghurt)

• Ingredients for syrup:

• 2 1/2 cup sugar

• 2 cups water

• A few saffron strands, soaked in 2 tbs. warm water

• 3/4 tsp. cardamom powder or seeds from 3-4 green cardamoms, ground

• For garnish:

• 2 tbs. unsalted pistachio nuts, coarsely ground or chopped

Instructions

1. Making Dough:

2. Blanch the almonds in hot water, remove skins and dry in low heated oven. Hot oven will make them oily. When cool, grind to a powder.

3. Sift the flour in a bowl, add baking powder, salt and powdered almonds and mix.

4. Rub the ghee in.

5. Gently mix enough ice-cold water to make dough that is neither too soft nor too stiff. Knead well and keep aside to rest, covered with a moist cloth or cling film. You can follow the step 3 to 5 in a food processor, like any other pastry.

6. Making Paste:

7. Simply mix the ingredients together and beat till you have a smooth, fairly thick mixture.

8. Making Syrup:

9. Mix water and sugar and bring to boil briskly to make sugar syrup of one-string consistency. To check when the syrup is ready, stretch a drop of it between you forefinger and thumb, you should get one wire stretching out.

10. Add the cardamom and saffron to the syrup, mix well and keep warm on minimum burner.

11. Making Poories:

12. Break off lemon-sized pieces of dough, roll them into balls and keep them covered with a damp towel or cloth.

13. Roll them out lightly, one at a time, into a circle of approximately 5 inch or 12 cm, on a greased board using a greased rolling pin. Roll out 3-4 poories at a time. You can be rolling the next batch of 3-4, while the first batch is frying.

14. Make a few dabs of the paste all over the circle, spread evenly and fold into half circle.

15. Now spread a little paste on the half circle and fold it again. You will now have a quarter-circle or a triangle shape.

16. Press it lightly with a roller, just to seal the layers, keeping the shape roughly triangular. Base of the triangle should be no more than 2 1/2 inch or 6-7 cm.

17. Prick each triangle all over, with a fork. This stops it from ballooning during frying.

18. Heat the oil in a wok or kadhai to medium heat and deep fry 3-4 or more poories at a time, until golden brown on both sides. Do not be tempted to fry them quickly, they will turn soggy if you do.

19. Take out and immediately immerse into the warm syrup. The poories must soak in the syrup for around 2 minutes only. Remove from the syrup with a slotted spoon and place on a wire rack, with a clean plate underneath to collect the dripping syrup. Repeat this process, until all poories are done.

20. Collect the dripped syrup and add to the sugar syrup in the pan, bring to boil, turn the heat down and simmer for 2 minutes only. This makes the syrup thicker than before but not thick enough to form a crystalline powder on the poori surface when it dries. Therefore, the syrup must not be allowed to get too thick. The purpose is to preserve the 'melt-in-the-mouth' texture of the fried pastry.

21. Dip poories again in the syrup quickly and take out. This second dipping should give the pastries a shiny glaze. I would suggest that the second dipping be done as quickly as possible - dip in, swirl around to coat, lift out to wire rack to dry.

22. Sprinkle a little of the pistachios on the centre of each triangle.

23. Cool and store in an airtight box.

24. These are best consumed within a few days of making.

25. Bon app?tit!

Notes

• This recipe becomes really easy to do, if you have another person to help. One person does the rolling and the other one takes care of the frying and dipping in the syrup.