Til Gul Poli

Til Gul Poli is a special sweet dish prepared in Maharashtra on Makar Sankrant, the harvest festival of India. This sweet dish is also prepared in other states differently. In Maharashtra, we use sesame seed, jaggery, gram flour, dry coconut, peanut and wheat flour. The main ingredients are Sesame seeds and Jaggery, which keeps our body warm during cold weather.

We also prepare other sweets dishes such as Til Gul Vadi & Til Ladoo during this festival. We wish our family members, neighbours, friends by saying “Til Gul Ghya Goad Goad Bola” which means “Take Tilgul and Talk Sweetly”.

Preparation Time – 30 mins

Cook Time – 30 mins

Total Time – 1 hour

Ingredients:

• 1 bowl Gram Flour / Chickpea flour (Besan)
• 1 small bowl dry coconut pieces or grated dry coconut
• 1 small bowl Sesame seed (Til)
• 1 bowl roasted Peanut
• 2 ½ bowl grated Jaggery
• 2 bowl Wheat flour
• 1 bowl Wheat flour for dusting
• 3-4 teaspoon hot oil
• ½ bowl ghee
• Water as required
• Salt to taste

Serves:  5 persons (2/3 for each person)

Directions / Procedure :

A. Process to prepare Puran (stuffing of gul poli)

1. Heat the kadai, add sesame seed in it and roast the sesame seed on medium flame for about 2-3 minutes. Keep aside.
2. In the same kadai, heat the ghee and add besan in it. Mix the besan well with ghee.
3. Keep the flame low and roast the besan until it turns golden light brown colour and gets aromatic fragrance of roasting.
4. Turn off the flame and allow it to cool down.
5. Now grind above ingredients like roasted Sesame seed, Peanut, Gram flour, dry coconut in mixer. Make a coarse paste.
6. Add grated jaggery in it and mix everything very well. If required again grind it. This puran / filling have rough texture.
7. Here your til gul poli filling is ready. Keep aside the puran/ filling of til gul poli.

B. Process to make the dough –

1. In mixing bowl / big deep plate, take Wheat flour, add hot oil and salt to taste. Mix everything very well. Now slowly add water in mixture and knead the mixture properly. Knead the mixture till oil and water completely absorbed by the dough.
2. While kneading makes ensure that the dough should be smooth and soft. Cover the dough with lid and keep aside for at least 15 minutes.
3. After that pour remaining oil on dough (if required add little extra oil) and again knead the dough very well. Now your soft dough is ready for making the Teel Gul polis.

C. Process to prepare Til Gul Poli

1. Take the lemon size dough and roll it on dusted rolling board. Make small puri / roll of dough.
2. Fill the puran in centre of the roll of dough and closed the roll properly. Now softly roll the poli on the dusted rolling board and make 2-3-inch poli, like chapati.
3. Heat the iron tawa or griddle pan on low flame, initially spread some ghee (½ teaspoon) else sometimes Teel Gul poli may stick on tawa. Always roast the Gul poli on low flame.
4. Roast the poli from both sides until some light brown spot on poli appears means it is cooked well. Then using spatula carefully remove it from tawa.
5. Now your Til gul poli is ready to serve hot with ghee during lunch or dinner

Tips / suggestions:

• Use half grated jaggery and half sugar as per your choice
• Always roll the poli softly because sometimes outer cover may crack and puran will comes out.
• Gul poli can be stored 4-5 days in air tight container without refrigerator

Photos for reference: