Thandai is a traditional North Indian beverage. serve during Holi festival. It is a milk based beverage made with nuts and spices.
Thandai is a cold, refreshing Indian beverage made from a blend of milk, sugar, nuts, and a fragrant mix of seeds and spices.
It is served to combat rising summer heat. Ingredients in the recipe are carefully selected in traditional ayurveda for their cooling and digestive properties.
Ingredients like fennel seeds and rose petals helps in lowering the body temperature and soothing the stomach.
Nuts like almonds, cashews use in thandai recipe helps in providing instant energy.
Peppercorns and cardamom we use in the recipe act as natural detoxifiers and fight throat infections.
The procedure is very easy and we can make it in two ways.
- Soak all the ingredients and make a smooth paste of them. Mix this paste into warm milk with added sugar and cardamom powder. Cool it and serve.
- We can dry roast all the ingredients and make a fine powder of it. We can use it as and when feel like having it.
But I always prefer the fresh one only. Now a days with advent of internet and innovation there are different varieties of thandai are available like mango thandai and chocolate thandai.
Rose petals are also one of the most important ingredient in the recipe. But I skip using them as the taste and flavour is not liked by my family.
Key ingredients in Thandai:
- Nuts: Soak cashew nuts, almonds, pistachio. They give a rich taste to the recipe.
- Seeds: Poppy, fennel, melon gives a nice flavor and also helps in digestion.
- Rose petals: Use organic, dried edible petals. They help in boosting digestive system and also cooling agents.
- Milk: It is the main base ingredient. We can use either full fat or normal one too.
- Sugar: Add sweetener to enhance the taste.
Preparation steps:
- Soak all the nuts, seeds and rose petals.
- Boil milk in a wide pan.
- Blend all the nuts, seeds and make fine paste of it.
- Add sugar and the paste.
- Let the milk cool and refrigerate before serving.
Thandai | Thandai Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 ltr Whole Milk
- 1 cup Cashew Nuts
- 1/2 cup Almonds
- 1/4 cup Pistachio
- 1 tbsp Poppy Seeds
- 7 Cardamom
- 5 to 7 Black Pepper
- 1 Tbsp Fennel Seeds
- 1 Tbsp Melon Seeds
- 4 or 6 Saffron
- 1/4 cup Sugar
Instructions
- Soak almonds, cashew nuts, pistachios and poppy seeds in warm water for an hour.
- Remove the skin of almonds and pistachios.
- Add cardamoms and grind them to a fine and smooth paste.
- Bring milk to boiling.
- Add a pinch of saffron and sugar to it.
- Now add the almonds paste to the boiling milk.
- Mix well and switch off the flame.
- Let the milk come to room temperature, add the pepper powder and rose essence to the milk.
- Cool the milk completely and refrigerate it for 1 to 2 hours.
- Serve chilled thandai.