KALKALS / KULKULS

KALKALS or KULKULS are prepared all over India at Christmas time. A variant of ‘Filhoses Enroladas’ a Portuguese Christmas Sweet, Kalkals, (always referred to in the plural) are crunchy inch-long curled or shell shaped sweetened fried dough Sweets. Sugar and flour are combined with eggs, milk and butter to a soft dough and then small marble sized balls of this dough are rolled on the tines of a fork or a comb to form a shell or a scroll, then deep fried in hot oil. The dough is sometimes rolled out and cut into different shapes such as hearts, spades, diamonds etc with cutters or a knife and then deep fried in hot oil. The Kalkals / Kulkuls are later frosted or coated in hot melted sugar syrup.

Making Kalkals is a time consuming process and thus requires many hands in its preparation. Hence a few days before Christmas, a separate day is designated as ‘Kalkal Day’ when every member of the family spends a few hours rolling out his/her portion of the kalkal dough. While one doesn’t know how the name ‘Kalkals / Kulkuls’ got its nomenclature it is probably because of the “curls” of this particular Christmas Sweet.

KALKALS  (Fried sweetened balls of dough)

Serves 6  Preparation time 1 hour

Ingredients

I kg refined flour 

6 eggs beaten well

2 cups thick coconut milk                

½ teaspoon salt                              

300 grams sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder             

Oil for deep frying

Mix the flour, salt, sugar and baking powder together. Add the coconut milk and eggs and knead to a soft dough. Keep aside for an hour. Form kalkals by taking small lumps of the dough and roll on the back of a fork or a wooden kalkal mould, to form a scroll. Alternately, roll out the dough and cut into fancy shapes with kalkal or cookie cutters. Heat oil in a deep pan and fry as many kalkals as possible at a time. Keep aside.

To frost the kalkals, melt 1 cup of sugar with ½ cup of water and when the sugar syrup crystallizes pour over the kalkals and mix well. Store in airtight boxes when cold.

COCONUT SWEETS

COCONUT SWEETS
2 cups scraped coconut
2 ½ cups sugar
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon butter or ghee
½ teaspoon vanilla essence
½ teaspoon food colouring (pink or green)

Take a thick -bottomed vessel and heat the sugar and ¼ cup water on high heat. When the sugar melts, add the cocoanut, vanilla essence, ghee or butter and the milk. Cook on medium or low heat till the mixture thickens and leaves the sides of the vessel. Drop a teaspoon of the mixture in a cup of water and if it forms a ball when rolled between the fingers, the right consistency is reached. Grease a flat plate well and pour the mixture on to it. Cool and cut into shapes.