Ramnavmi Recipe - Chalimidi

Ingredients
1cup raw rice
2-3 tbsp chopped coconuts
1tbsp ghee
½ cup sugar or jaggery
Water for syrup
½ tsp crushed cardamom
Preparation
There are 2 methods for making this chalimidi.
One is called the Pachi chalimidi (Raw or uncooked chalimidi).
For this the raw rice is soaked for 2-3 hours in warm water.
The rice is then drained and dried in a dry cloth untill completely dry and powdered coarsely.
This rice powder is then mixed with sugar or jaggery adding 1-2tsp water.
Add grated coconut and crushed cardamom.Mix well to make a dough. See the picture.
This is the basic recipe. I used ready-made rice powder and it came out very well. There are lot of variations from this one.
The second method is the cooked chalimidi where the rice powder is added to the warm sugar or jaggery syrup and cooked in low heat to form the dough.It is very carefully stirred so that no lumps are formed. Then the rest of the ingredients are added.But the traditional way to make it is the very first method.