Nan Kathai

Nan kathai is the only biscuit which my mom used to prepare at home. She made the round balls from the dough and handed it over to the bakery for baking. I was preparing the same in the round oven previously and moved to the other automatic baking oven. Now that I finally moved to the microwave, I realized that Nan Kathai ( and many other bakery items that I make )  bakes really really well in the microwave and while you don’t need one, if you can use, do use it.

What you need to have

Maida /All purpose flour  –            350 grams/2and1/2cups

Chick peas Atta               –             100 grams/2/3cup

Sun flower oil or Pure ghee   –        200 ml(Approxi)

Sugar powder                        –       300 gm/1and1/4cup

Baking soda                           –      1 level  teaspoon

Cashews                                –      15-20

Cloves                                   –      10

Cardamom                            –      15-20

Ingredients of Nan Kathai

What you do with what you have:

1. Sieve Maida, chick peas atta and Baking soda around 3 times so that it mixes in both the atta well.

2. Powder sugar, cardamom , cloves together to a fine consistency in the dry grinder.

3. Mix powdered sugar to the sieved atta from step-1 in a bowl and mix thoroughly with your hands  adding oil /ghee in steps  –  the Nan kathai mix is ready.

4. Make small balls from the above mix  and just flatten a little with your palm and it is as shown in the image below.

Nan Kathai balls ready to be baked

5. Place the balls in a tray and bake in the oven at 325 F or 180 C for around 20 minutes keeping them fairly apart from each other.  Decorate it with kishmish and small pieces of cashews.

Ready to serve Nan Kathai is as shown in the image below light and crispy.

Ready to serve Nan Kathai

How long it takes: 30 minutes

Number of servings: 35-40 Nan kathai ( of above size )

What to remember:

1. I normally use only sun flower oil since it is good from the health point.  Many people even use pure ghee which I avoid since its relatively richer in fat. In any case, it remains afresh for more than 15-20 days if you use fresh oil/ghee.

2. You may even use a pinch of food colour while sieving the attas to give a colourful look to the cookies.