Carrot kheer / payasam

If you are looking to make a simple, quick treat/ dessert with the least ingredients, then look no further! Carrot payasam is a go-to dessert in our household. Amma made this for most occasions ranging from pandigais (festivals) to birthdays. I prefer this over the more traditional paal payasam (milk & rice kheer) and semiya payasam (vermicelli kheer). It has this wholesome nutty flavour to it and hey it’s got veggies in it, so it’s healthy too 🙂

Let’s quickly jump to the recipe.

Carrot payasam / kheer

What you need:

Carrots – 3-4 small ones or 2 big ones
Milk – 1 litre (full fat always works best – pls no skimmed milk here)
Sugar – 3-4 tbsps
Ghee – 1 tbsp
Cardamom – 3 pods
A few strands of saffron (optional)
A handful of nuts – I prefer almonds/ pistachios in this recipe but cashews work too (optional)

How to:

Peel & grate carrots. To a sauce pan, add some ghee and fry the carrots till the raw smell cooks off. Take a minute to enjoy the most amazing scent of roasting carrots in ghee – there are very few things that match this 🙂

If you are adding nuts, you may want to roast them in the ghee first and keep them aside before adding the carrots.

Pour milk into the saucepan and let simmer for around 20-25 mins. By this time the carrots will be well cooked and the milk reduced a bit with the flavour of the carrots infused in it.

Add sugar, powdered cardamom and saffron. Let the kheer simmer for a few more minutes until it has reached the desired consistency. And you are done!

Serve warm or cold topped with nuts if using. I personally like it cold when it doesn’t taste too sweet.

Notes:

The measurements are not to be taken too seriously. Please use your discretion and taste buds to determine how much sugar or cardamom you need to add in your kheer. The quantity of sugar mentioned here is on the lower side.

You can soak the saffron strands in warm milk before adding to the kheer. That is, if you feel the recipe is too simple and want to add an additional step 😉

You could also pressure cook the carrots and mash/ grind them instead of grating. I personally like the bite from the pieces of carrot in the payasam. It’s all about texture, you see.

Do let me know how you liked this recipe or if there’s any other way you prefer to make your payasam.