Since yesterday was Diwali, here’s a sweet recipe to sweeten your lives. Happy Diwali folks!

As the name suggests, it is a milk kheer or milk sweet. In its very basic form, this is the simplest of the south Indian sweets and hardly needs 3-4 ingredients to make. It’s fairly easy to make with the only effort being in reducing the milk.

Pal Payasam

Ingredients:

• 1-litre milk
• 1 tbsp basmati rice (or any long grained rice)
• 4-6 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp ghee
• A pinch of cardamom powder (optional)

Method:

• In a large pan, boil the milk and when the milk starts to boil over and bubble, reduce the heat and continue to boil the milk.
• In a smaller pan, heat the ghee and fry the rice for around 30 seconds.
• Pour the rice into the boiling milk and keep stirring till it reduces to half the original quantity.
• When the rice has completely cooked, add the sugar and the cardamom powder (if you are using it).
• At this point, you can also use a few strands of saffron as well as some fried cashew nuts and raisins.
• Continue boiling until the sugar gets absorbed into the milk.
• Switch off the flame and serve hot or cold.