1 Take a pan, pour in 1 litre of milk, let the milk boil. Keep the flame in full mode.

Let the milk boil for some time and become little thick.

2 Place another pan on the burner, turn the flame.

• Pour in 2 tablespoons of ghee
• Badam – 10
• Cashew – 30

Fry the nuts in high flame till they turn light brown. Then let’s turn the flame to low mode and add –

• Dry grapes – 30

Fry for 10 seconds. Then transfer the fried nuts to a small bowl.

3 Place the same pan used in previous step on the burner. Turn on the flame.

Pour in 2 tablespoons of ghee, let the ghee get a little warm.

4 Put in the bottle gourd paste and start stirring in low flame for the next 5 minutes.

The bottle gourd will get 75% cooked.

Then take down the pan from burner.

5 Place the pan with milk on the burner now, turn on the flame.

Put in –

• Cardamom – 5 (crush it with fingers and then add)
• Bay leaf – 2
• Clove – 3

Stir a little and let the milk boil for 2 minutes.

6 Now let’s put 250 grams of sugar into the milk (we can put in 200g or 300g of sugar as per our need).

Stir well to dissolve sugar.

7 Let’s add the half cooked bottle gourd (prepared in step 4) into the milk. Stir for 2 minutes.

If needed, we can sprinkle a little of saffron, stir for 5 seconds.

8 Now, lets add the fried nuts (prepared in step 2) to the milk.

Stir for 10 seconds.

Our delicious bottle gourd payasum is ready. Serve with family and friends and enjoy the recipe!