Imarti

ave you ever wondered what the royalty of yesteryears ate. Especially in India where the land has seen its fair share of kings and queens of over the last couple of thousand years. If you think what they ate had to be rich, tricky to make, used expensive ingredients and extremely delicious, you are absolutely right.
The Imarti is one such sweet dish. It originated as a dessert for the royals in the ornate state of Rajasthan. Legend has it that this delectable sweet dish was created as a gift by the Rajput kings for the Moghuls during the Moghul invasion of India over four hundred years ago. The dish is now ever popular all over the country although in some parts of the country it is known as Jangri. It is almost as popular as its even more popular cousin the Jalebi. So much so that every sweet shop around the corner of every street that makes jalebi will most certainly also have imarti.

As I mentioned earlier, it sure is a little tricky to make. Many of you probably know that making Jalebi is tricky, well imarti makes Jalebi look a little easy. I have made jalebis a couple of times but this was my first time around trying imartis.The texture of the batter must be right, the oil temperature, the syrup consistency and the like. But don't lose heart if it doesn't work out rightaway, it all boils down to trying it a couple of times and you surely will get it right. I basically followed the recipe from Sanjeev Kapoor with some tips and tricks from the video of our very own Vah Chef.

Ingredients:
Urad Dal .............................. 1 cup
Rice ................................... 1/4 cup
Orange food color .................. 1/4 tsp
For Syrup -
Sugar .................................. 1 1/2 cups
Water ................................. 1 cup
Rose extract/essence ............... 6-7 drops
Green cardamom powder .......... 1/4 tsp
Lemon juice .......................... 2 tsp
Oil for deep frying

Method:
1. Soak dal and rice together for about 2 hours, drain and grind with very little water (less than 1 cup) in a food processor. The batter should be fluffy, smooth with a little coarse texture. Add the food color and mix well.  
2. Heat the sugar with water. Let it boil for 5-7 minutes. Add lemon juice, rose essence and boil for 1 more minute. Mix well and switch off the stove. The sugar syrup must not be too thin and also not too thick. Make the Imarti while the syrup is hot.
3. Take a ziploc bag or a piping bag and make a hole with a slightly hot nail. The hole should be about 3 mm in diameter. Fill half the bag with the batter. First practice making the imarti pattern in a plate. Draw a circle as shown and draw small swirl like circles around the perimeter of the circle. Practice 2-3 times and you will get it right.

4. Heat the oil (about 1" deep), in a heavy flat bottomed pan. The oil should not get very hot, it should be barely hot enough to form some bubbles at the bottom when you drop some batter in it. Hold the piping bag tightly and pipe into the hot oil in the pattern described in the step above. For the traditional design, make a small circle around which make another circle and over these two make scallops in anti-clockwise direction ending at the starting point.
5. Deep fry on both the sides till crisp and light golden brown on low to medium low heat. Keep the syrup on very low heat, it should not be cold.
6. Take out of the oil using a skewer. Drain the oil from the hot imarti and dip into the sugar syrup. Let them remain immersed in the syrup till they absorb enough syrup about a minute. Drain and place the imarti on a flat plate. Repeat this process till all the batter is used up. Serve hot.ENJOY!

Notes :
1. Don't be disheartened if you cannot get the shape right the first time around, they still taste the same :)

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