Diwali Dhamaka #4 - Alo Jilo / Elo Jhelo

Diwali, as you all know is the festival of lights. Its an occasion to enjoy and celebrate.

We had seen about the Hindu's belief of the festival as well as the Jain's reason for celebration in the previous posts. Now lets know a little about the celebration by the Sikhs. :)

Diwali is particularly important for the Sikhs because it celebrates the release from prison of the sixth guru, Guru Hargobind Ji and 52 other princes from the Gwalior Fort in 1619. This occasion is also called "Bandi Chorr Devas".

The Mughal Emperor Jahangir had imprisoned Guru Har Gobind and 52 other Hindu princes fearing the Guru's growing power. The Emperor was asked to release Guru Har Gobind which he agreed to do. However, Guru Har Gobind requested that the Hindu princes to be released, too. The Emperor agreed, but said only those who could hold onto his cloak tail would be allowed to leave the prison. This was in order to limit the number of prisoners who could leave.

However, Guru Har Gobind had made a cloak with 52 tassels and so each King was able to hold onto one tassel and leave the prison.

The Sikhs celebrated the return of Guru Har Gobind by lighting the Golden Temple and this tradition continues even today. :)

Alo Jilo!!! Yup, I know the name sounds funny :) I am still trying to track the origin of the name ;)

Got reminded of this sweet when I visited my friend, Lakshmi aunty for Golu. Since then I have been waiting to make it at home :)

Just like its cute name, the dish is as such cute looking and extremely yummy :)

The shape makes it very interesting for the kids and ofcourse young hearted grownups like me love it too :P

Enjoy this diwali with delicious, crispy and crunchy Alo Jilo :)

Ingredients:

Maida(All purpose flour) - 2 cups
Vanaspati(Dalada) - 2 tblsp
Salt - a pinch
Cooking soda - 1/4 tsp
Powered Sugar - 1 cup
Oil - to fry

Method:

In a broad basin rub vanaspathi and soda together till it forms a frothy paste. Mix flour to this and blend well with finger tips till the mixture become crumbly.

Now add water little by little and kneed into a dough. leave it alone for ten mins.

Then, roll small balls of dough and flatten it out like roti. Now make around 5 slits on the roti using a sharp knife leaving alone a centimeter on the top and bottom. Carefully fold it twice and twist both the ends using your fingers. Hope the picture on top helps you to understand the pattern.

Make such pattern with all the dough you have made and leave them on a plastic sheet.

Now take oil in a pan and once it is medium hot, drop the alo jilo into the oil and fry them until they turn light brown on both the sides.

Spread powdered sugar on a flat plate. Drop the fried alo jilo on the powdered sugar and coat them with sugar on both the sides. Do this as soon as you take it out of the oil.

Alo jilo is ready to eat :)

Store it in an air tight box.

Alternative:

You can replace powdered sugar with sugar syrup.

Take 1 cup of sugar and 1/2 cup of water in a pan and allow it to boil till one string consistency.

Drop the alo jilo into the sugar syrup and coat it allover with syrup. Then remove it and keep it aside on a plate for a while. Alo jilo is ready :)

The quantity mentioned above gave me around 70 of them. :)

Happy making :)

Written by: Nithya
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