Lahori Kulfi Falooda

Hello again, y’all!

This recipe is very close to my heart, my mother taught it to me. Easy to follow with a few simple steps! Here we go, let’s roll:

You will need:

Half a gallon of whole milk (which comes out to about 1.9 L)
One can condensed milk
1 piece of white bread (for binding)
32 oz half n’ half
16 oz heavy whipping cream
Kewra essence
1/2 teaspoon tukh malanga (chia seeds) soaked with the falooda (rice noodles)

That… is… it!

Directions:

First step is to make the khoya (extremely condensed form of whole milk without any sugar). It is frequently used in authentic south asian desserts.

Please note: Make sure the pan you’re planning on using to make the khoya in, hasn’t been used for ANY prior heavy duty cooking containing strong spices or meat.

Go ahead and pour the whole milk along with the half n’ half in a CLEAN non-stick pan like so:

Now, make sure you’re paying attention here. This is a CRUCIAL step. You have to let the milk mixture cook and reduce into a very thick/almost lumpy form (as pictured below) on low heat. Stirring constantly is a must or else there are chances of the milk burning/blackening. Make sure you pick a time when you are able to supervise the mixture without any disturbances. This process will take at least an hour or so, maybe an hour and a half… depending on the milk you’re using. Patience is key here.

This is what it should eventually look like:

Once you have reached the above consistency for the khoya, remove from heat and transfer it out in a container. Add the remaining ingredients (bread, condensed milk, heavy whipping cream). The picture below shows two cans of condensed milk, please disregard that! Initially I thought I would need two cans, but after tasting it I decided not to add the second can mainly because I don’t want to eventually die off from a diabetic coma.

Once you’ve added the above ingredients, it should look something like this:

Next: If you have a stick hand mixer on hand, use it to combine everything together. If not, it’s all good in the hood. Use a thoroughly clean blender instead. Do not over mix it! If you over mix it, it’ll start to look more like butter which we do not want. A few quick strokes should be good, just enough to incorporate the bread.

This is what it should look like:

Next: Get yourself a baking sheet and pour the entire mixture in it like so:

Wrap it securely and firmly with cellophane wrap multiple times. And I mean… multiple times. Keep in mind that this is about to go in the freezer for the entire night. Make sure you don’t have any meat or spices lying around near it, in your freezer. We wouldn’t want our kulfi smelling like garam masala now, do we?

Directions for the falooda (rice noodles):

If you’ve never bought falooda before, or don’t know where in the world to get it from… don’t panic. You can get it pretty easily from any specialty/grocery store. Personally, I am not a fan of the colorful falooda that is available at Pakistani and Indian stores. But if you have the liking for the colorful falooda, by all means go ahead and substitute the white falooda with the colored one!

Moving on:

This is the brand of falooda I used for this recipe which I purchased from my local Hong Kong market.

Cook according to package instructions (I used about half of the whole packet) Basically, just boil them in water until soft.

Drain under cold running water to stop the cooking process like so:

Place them in a bowl filled with cold water, add the tukh malanga and a few drops of kewra essence. Set aside.

Your kulfi that has been sitting in the freezer, should be set and ready to eat. This is how mine looked like, my silly self got too excited to take the picture and forgot to remove the cellophane wrap. Kulfi tends to do things to people…

You can either just dig in, cut cube sized portions and enjoy it in its rawest form. Or… serve it with falooda like I did. And that’s it y’all. You got yourself some ORIGINAL Lahori kulfi falooda!

I got a bit too carried away though with the presentation… Don’t judge me.