Boil cake or boiled cheesecake is a healthy sweetmeat prepared by simply boiling the freshly prepared chhena with mild sugar and flavour. This sweet was quite common in the sweet shops here in our city almost until a decade ago, but nowadays its availability has remarkably reduced, perhaps due to the onslaught of more popular and pan-indian sweets with more and more fusion varieties that are gaining popularity recently. However, some of the traditional sweets in India are so unique that no fusion can beat the originality of their tastes. Boiled cake is one such unique sweet from Bengal where it is known as bhapa shondesh meaning steamed shondesh. The best part of this shondesh is that the range of its sweetness can be regulated from very low to moderate according to your choice. Even the very low sugar version tastes good enough to satiate your craving for shondesh. I still remember we used to buy this particular shondesh while visiting someone’s home where there were members on a low sugar diet.

These healthy, wholesome, low sugar shondesh can be your perfect companion for a mid-day tea time on a leisurely Sunday or holiday. I tried the low sugar version with infusion of nolen gur, to give a nice flavour to it & which really compensated for the less sugar in the sweet, for a nolen gur lover like me. So, try out these healthy delights with any flavour of your choice to make your tongue and tummy equally happy.☺

Follow the recipe below👇

RECIPE :

Ingredients :

1) Milk (for making chhena) – 750 ml.

2) Date palm jaggery (nolen gur) – 2 tbs (crushed or grated)

3) Pistachio (for garnishing) – few

Preparation :

1) Curdle the milk using vinegar or lemon juice.

2) Wash the curdled milk thoroughly under tap water to remove any traces of lemon or vinegar.

3) Tie and hang it in a muslin cloth for an hour to drain the water completely.

(Note : You may find the detailed steps for curdling of milk or chhena preparation in my previous post of kheertua).

4) Take the chhena in a dish or tray and knead it using your palm to make it smooth.

5) In a pan, heat the crushed jaggery to melt over a low to medium flame, stir continuously to dry the extra water contained in it. Switch off the flame when it turns thick and let it cool.

6) Add the jaggery to the kneaded chhena and mix well. Knead it slightly to blend the jaggery completely with the chhena so that no lumps or granules are left.

7) Spread the chhena uniformly over a tray or dish making a layer of average thickness of about 1 cm.

8) Garnish with pistachio over it.

9) Cover the dish with aluminium foil and put it in a steamer or pressure cooker containing water for about 20 minutes. ( Note : If using pressure cooker, remove the whistle and simply cover with the lid without closing it.)

10) Switch off the flame, remove the lid and let it cool for sometime.

11) Take out the dish carefully and let it cool down completely.

12) Remove the foil and cut out squares from the steamed cheesecake to get your bhapa shondesh or boiled cakes ready.