Narkel Naru or coconut laddoo - Traditional Bengali sweet with coconut and jaggery

Narkel Naru in Durga Puja is etched in every Bengali’s memory as a childhood favourite. It is traditionally prepared after Dashami or Dussehra and it has two varieties – Gurer Naru or Chinir Naru depending upon whether jaggery or sugar is used to prepare this wonderful dessert. There is another variety where we use palm jaggery to prepare more brown laddoos but it is generally prepared in winter as thepalm jaggery is available in winter only. Now-a-days this recipe is prepared in some form or other in all over India during festival or even in normal time. Please check it out:-

Preparation Time: - 10 min

 

Cooking Time: - 20 min

 

Servings: - 3~4 persons but really depends upon the personal capacity or your affinity of sweets

 

Ingredients:- 

1. 1 ½ cup Freshly grated coconut
2. ¾ cup Jaggery powder or finely grated Jaggery
3. ½ tsp Cardamom powder
4. Little bit Ghee or clarified butter
5. Chopped dry fruits (optional)
   
   

Preparation:-

1.  Scrap two or more coconuts to have 1 ½ cup of grated coconut. You can use a blender to smoothen the coconut.

2.  Take a heavy bottomed vessel / kadai and heat it dry.

3.  Turn the burner to low flame and add coconut.

4.  Sauté for 3~4 min to evaporate the moisture from coconut.

5.  Add a little water to scraped jaggery and heat it in a separate bowl to melt it. Use a strainer to remove the impurities from the solution. Keep aside. Alternatively you can use organic jaggery or jaggery powder.

6.  Now add the jaggery to the dry coconut. Mix it well.

7. Continue stirring for 5~6 minutes. Melted jaggery will mix with the coconut and form a thick solution.

8.  Switch off the flame and keep the vessel on countertop.

9.  Add cardamom powder and mix.

10.Let the mixture cool down.

11.Use ghee to grease your palm and take a portion of the mixture to form laddoos of size of your choice. You should have made 12~14 laddoos of medium size.

12.You can garnish the laddoos with raisin or almond pieces optionally.

Your delicious Bengali dessert is ready now. You can eat separately as snacks or after a meal. You can store them in an air-tight container and refrigerate. You should be able to eat them for about a month.

Please note the following:-

1.    Instead of cardamom powder you can smash 3~4 green cardamom pods by pestle and mortar and use that instead of powder.

2.    You can use Palm jaggery instead of plain jaggery to make the laddoos tastier. The colour of such naru /laddoos will be darker.

3.    If you do not want to use jaggery you can use ¾ cup of condensed milk or same amount of plain vanilla sugar instead.

4.    You can use coconut oil to grease your palm instead of ghee.

As always please feel free to comment, criticize and seek if any help is required. I am all ears.