Sweet Pongal or Chakkara Pongal | Sakkarai Pongal – Prasadam Recipe

Today is the second day of Pongal or sankranthi, a harvest festival celebrated over four days. As I already mentioned in my previous post, on this day Pongal or Ven Pongal (hot version) and Sweet pongal or Chakkara Pongal (sweet version) will be prepared. Today I’m going to quickly share what I prepared at home.

Sweet pongal or chakkara pongal is a delicacy, traditionally made from freshly harvested rice cooked with dal, jaggery and spiced up with some special ingredients like edible camphor and cardamom, which gives a divine taste to this recipe. It is finally garnished with fried coconut pieces, raisins and cashews. It is the sweet version of Ven Pongal with a dash of flavourful spices. This is one of my favourite sweets, especially the one they serve in temples as prasadam. Hope you enjoy this scrumptious sweet with this simple recipe for Sweet pongal.

Step-by-Step process for

Sweet Pongal or chakkara Pongal:

• Dry roast moong dal in a pan over medium heat for about 5 minutes till it slightly changes colour and a nice aroma arises. Similarly dry road rice also separately. I’m using regular raw rice.

• Wash and pressure cook rice dal mixture along with 2 ½ to 3 cups of water for 2 whistles and then simmer for about 5 minutes and turn off the heat. The rice has to be cooked in such a way that it should be mushy.

• In the mean time dissolve jaggery in some water (use hot water so that it’s easy to dissolve). Heat this over medium heat until it totally dissolves and it comes to boil. Turn off the heat and strain it to remove any impurities and keep it aside.

• Now melt the 2 teaspoons of ghee in a small skillet over medium heat and fry raisins till they puff up, cashews and coconut pieces till golden brown in the same ghee one after the other. Turn off the heat and keep the fried stuff aside. Crush the cardamom seeds and edible camphor to a fine powder.

• Once the pressure subsides, open the lid of the pressure cooker and mash it well.

• Add strained jaggery syrup and cook well on medium heat for 5 minutes. When it starts getting dry add ghee little by little and keep stirring till you get the right consistency. It my take another 5 minutes. It shouldn’t be too hard or too watery.

• Turn off the heat, add the cardamom and camphor powder.
• Finally add the fried cashews, raisins and coconut pieces and mix.

• Serve hot drizzled with some ghee.

Print Recipe

Sweet Pongal or Chakkara Pongal

Sweet pongal or chakkara pongal is a delicacy, traditionally made from freshly harvested rice cooked with dal, jaggery and spiced up with edible camphor and cardamom

Prep Time20 minutes mins

Cook Time20 minutes mins

Total Time40 minutes mins

Course: Dessert / Festival Sweet, Prasadam / Festive offering

Cuisine: Indian (South Indian)

Keyword: Chakkara Pongali, Sweet Pongal, Sakkarai Pongal

Servings: 5

Author: Padma Veeranki

Ingredients

• ¾ Cup Raw Rice dry roasted
• ¼ Cup Split green gram/moong dal dry roasted
• 3 Cups of water to pressure cook rice
• 1 Cup Jaggery dissolved in ½ cup hot water
• ¼ Cup Ghee Clarified butter, divided
• 10 Cashews
• 10 Raisins
• Some Dry Coconut Pieces Cubed
• 1/2 tsp Cardamom Powder
• A tiny pinch of edible camphor Crushed

Instructions

• Wash dry roasted rice and dal, pressure cook along with 3 cups of water for 2 whistles and then simmer for about 5 minutes and turn off the heat.
• In the mean time, heat dissolved jaggery over medium heat until it comes to boil. Turn off the heat and strain it to remove any impurities.
• Now melt the 2 teaspoons of ghee in a small skillet over medium heat and fry raisins till they puff up. Next fry cashews and coconut pieces till golden brown in the 2 teaspoons of ghee one after the other. Turn off the heat and keep the fried stuff aside.
• Once the pressure subsides, open the lid of the pressure cooker and mash it well.
• Add strained jaggery syrup and cook well on medium heat for 5 minutes. When it starts getting dry add ghee little by little and keep stirring till you get the right consistency.
• Turn off the heat, add the cardamom and camphor powder.
• Finally add the fried cashews, raisins and coconut pieces, mix well.
• Serve hot drizzled with some ghee.

Recipe Video

Notes

• Amount of ghee is purely individual taste. The only major difference would be that the sweet pongal may not melt in your mouth. If you are health conscious, you can reduce the amount of ghee and still enjoy without compromising completely on the taste.
• If the rice dal mixture is too thick once it is cooked, you can add some water or milk and mash.
• Adjust water quantity depending on the quality of rice- new or old. New rice need less water to get cooked when compared to old rice.
• The colour of pongal differs with colour of jaggery.
• Do not boil jaggery to string consistency.
• Ensure very little use of camphor (less than a tiny pinch), otherwise the sweet pongal becomes bitter and dominates the taste of pongal.

Check out other FESTIVAL RECIPES  and DESSERT RECIPES. 

Below are some popular festival recipes from blog:

• Rava Kesari Bath
• Rava Puri or Sojjappalu
• Mango Kesari or Sheera
• Bobbatlu or Puran Poli
• Coconut Obbattu
• Kobbari Poornam
• Rajma Sundal
• Allam Garelu

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Happy Cooking 

Cheers!!

Padma.