Neypayasam | Aravana Payasam

Vrischikam Masam, is the highly auspicious malayalam month for God Ayyappa Devotees. The 41-day Sabarimala Vratham starts on Vrischikam 1 which is popularly known as Mandala Kalam. 

Neypayasam or Aravana payasam is one of the special dish prepared as an offering for God Ayyappa. 

Yesterday it was Vrischikam 1. So I thought of preparing Aravana payasam in the evening. And as it is my blog’s 2nd Anniversary I thought of posting it over here.

You need,

• Water – 1.5 cup
• Broken or normal red raw rice (unakkalari) – 1/2 cup
• Jaggery – 150 gm melted and strained(if you wish you could increase the quantity)
• Ghee – 2 tbsp + 1/2 tsp
• Green Cardamom – 1 crushed
• Fresh coconut cut into slices – 1 teaspoon (optional)
• Cashew nuts – 3 (optional)
• Fresh ginger  – 1 teaspoon gratted 

You have to,

• Boil the water in a thick bottomed pan
• Wash rice and add to the water. Cook the rice in medium flame. (It shouldn’t be soft as cooked rice. It should be just 3/4 cooked)
• Add the strained jaggery, ginger to the rice and stir continuously over a medium flame
• Add 2 tbsp of ghee.
• When the mix is thick enough (water is absorbed), add crushed cardamom , coconut pieces and fold in . remove from fire.
• Roast the cashew nuts in half teaspoon of ghee and add to the payasam.
• Ney Payasam is ready!

You could make 1 cup (sometimes a bit more) of payasam with the above recipe. As this is very sweet, this would be more than enough for at least 4 persons.

Notes:

• You add 2 small ripe plantain sliced to the payasam while serving.
• You could also add rock sugar (kalkandam) and raisans 
• You could replace fresh ginger with 1 tbsp of dry ginger powder
• The color of neypayasam depends on the jaggery we use.. The darker ones give the color like above.. and the lighter ones give like the below pics

Few old pics 🙂