I love making desserts with fruits and vegetables.  It’s my kind of way to ease the guilt of eating sweets.  Off course, desserts made of fruits and vegetables are much healthier(well, depending on how it’s made) than the kinds made of sugar, butter and refined flour only.  Candied winter melon or chal kumrar morobba is one of such dessert.

Winter melon, or chal kumra as we call it in Bangladesh, is also known as white gourd, winter gourd, or ash gourd.  These are very large vine grown fruits(or vegetables?) that have white waxy flesh when matured.  Winter melons have many medicinal use especially in Ayurveda treatment for kidney stone, intestinal infection, hair growth, regaining appetite, etc.  Wouldn’t you feel better to eat a dessert made of a fruit that has so much medicinal value than those made of refined flour, sugar and butter only?

Morobba, also known as murabba, murraba or murrabo is an arabic word meaning fruit preserves.  Morobba is soft, delicious, chewy to hard candied sweets that can be preserves for almost three months to six months depending on its composition.  In Bangladesh, morobba is often added to bread and cakes, specialty desserts and off course served as dessert.  Winter melons are widely available in oriental and Indian stores and the matured winter melons are the best kinds for morobba making.  It must have been at least 20 years since I’ve had candied winter melon or chal kumra morobba until I started making last year.  My grandmother used to make winter melon morobba and bring for us.

My grandmother’s morobba was always semi hard candy like and dry.  The morobbas would have a thick layer of crystallized sugar and if you ask me to guess, she must have had used about 6-7 cups of sugar for the recipe.  Most of the traditional morobba recipes actually call for that much sugar.  Her morobba could have been preserved easily for six months because of the sugar crystallization layer on the pieces.

On the contrary, I like morobba to be chewy and the syrup sticky rather than completely crystallizing the sugar.  Since I do not like so much crystallized sugar on each bite, I only use one cup of sugar.  Feel free to add more if you like your desserts very sweet.  Also, I pan fry the winter melon pieces on butter or ghee for few minutes, often.  This step can be totally skipped but I find the small amount of butter on the morobba makes a huge difference in taste adding an added fragrance of caramel to the sticky syrup.  Last but not least, I add few strands of saffron to transform the snow-white chal kumra flesh to a very light luminous yellow-orange color.

Candied Winter Melon - Chal Kumrar Morobba

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

40 mins

Total time

50 mins

 

Morobba, also known as murabba, murraba or murrabo is an arabic word meaning fruit preserves. Morobba is soft, delicious, chewy to hard candied sweets that can be preserves for almost three months to six months depending on its composition.

Author: Lail Hossain

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: Bangladeshi

Serves: 8-10

Ingredients

• 2 lb winter melon
• 1 cup water
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 2-3 cardamom pods
• pinch of Saffron (optional)

Instructions

1. Peel the winter melon and cut into approximate 3 inches by 1 inch pieces.
2. With a fork, pin/tender the winter melon pieces couple of times on each side.
3. Boil water in a deep pan and add the winter melon pieces until semi tender. About 10-12 minutes.
4. Remove from heat and drain water properly.
5. Heat butter in a pan and pan-fry the winter melon pieces for 1-2 minutes on each side.
6. Heat sugar and water together on medium heat.
7. Add cinnamon and cardamom. Add saffron, if using.
8. Add the winter melon pieces.
9. Stir gently making sure that the pieces do not break in the syrup.
10. Continue cooking until the syrup becomes very thick and coats the winter melon pieces very well.

Notes

The morobba size shrinks to about ¾ of the original winter melon pieces after cooking. Adjust pieces accordingly if you want them bigger or smaller.
Adjust sugar if you like morobba sweeter.
The morobba pieces should be soft and cooked through, but not falling apart.
Step 5 can be skipped if you do not want to use butter.

3.4.3177

রেসিপি : চাল কুমড়ার মোরব্বা

উপকরন :
২ পাউন্ড চাল কুমড়া
১ কাপ পানি
১ কাপ চিনি
১ টি দারুচিনি লাঠি
২-৩ টি সাদা এলাচ
জাফরান এর চিম্টি (ঐচ্ছিক)

২টেবিল চামচ ঘি

প্রণালী:
১. চাল কুমড়া আনুমানিক ৩ ইঞ্চি  লম্বা ১ ইঞ্চি চওড়া টুকরা করুন।
২. একটি কাঁটাচামচ দিয়ে প্রতিটি পাশ কয়েকবার খুচিয়ে নিন।
৩. একটি গভীর প্যােন চাল কুমড়ার টুকরা ১০-১২ মিনিট আধা সেদ্ধ করুন।.
৪. সব পানি ফেলে দিন।
৫. ঘিয়ে সেদ্ধ চাল কুমড়ার টুকরা ১-২ মিনিট হালকা ভাবে ভাজুন।
৬. মাঝারি তােপ চিনি এবং পানি গরম করুন।
৭. দারুচিনি ও এলাচ যোগ করুন।  জাফরান দিন।
৮. চাল কুমড়ার টুকরা যোগ করুন।
৯. মাঝেমাঝে আলতো করে এমনভাবে নাড়ুন যেন টুকরা গুলো ভেঙ্গে না যায়।
১0. সিরা ঘন হয়ে চিটকা হলে নামিয়ে নিন।

প্রয়োজনিও কিছু টিপস্ এর জনে্য দয়াকরে আটির্কেল অথবা ইংরেজি রেসিপির নোট সেকশন টা একটু দেখে নেবেন।