“Rasgulla” or “Rasogolla” is a popular Bengali sweet made with cottage cheese. These are my favorites and I guess no one can resist these soft, juicy and spongy sweet.
I always thought they are very difficult to make but somehow wanted to try it out. Browsed through a lot of recipes and most of them were with 1 gallon of milk and found various method for cooking rasgullas. Din’t want to try the first time with so much milk as I have already mentioned in few other posts that most of my first attempts in making Indian sweets are big disasters. Tried making them yesterday, the cheese was ready, the dough was soft, the syrup had the right amount of sweetness, the spheres were cooking in the pressure cooker and the time it took to depressurize, that 10 minutes seemed to be the longest time I had to wait, even the 2 hours the cheese took to drain all the water was just an eyeblink. The results were amazing, they were soft and juicy just like the ones in a mithai shop 
Rasgulla
Ingredients:
* Whole Milk – 1 litre (Four 250ml cups)
* Lemon Juice – 3 to 4 tbsp
* All Purpose Flour – 2 tsp
* Sugar – 1 1/2 cups*
* Cardamom – 3 to 4, peeled and powdered
* Water – 3 cups
Method:
Boil whole milk in a big pot on low-medium heat, stirring occasionally. When the milk starts to boil, add 3tbsp of lemon juice and stir. Add more if needed.
After the milk starts to curdle.Turn off the stove and pour them into a cheese cloth. Wash four or five times in cold water to rinse out all the lemon juice from curdled milk.
Tie a knot and hang them over a kitchen sink to drain out the whey. This should take about 1 to 2 hours. The cheese should be dry.
Add cheese and 2 tsp of flour to a food processor. Proccess them for 30 to 40 seconds.
Pour 3 cups of water in a pressure cooker. Add sugar and bring them to a boil on medium heat.
Meanwhile knead the cheese mixture again for 40 seconds using hands. Divide them to 15 equal sized portions and roll them to spheres.
When the sugar comes to a boil gently drop the cheese balls to the sugar syrup**. Close the cooker.
After the pressure cooker starts to hiss loud and clear, wait for 5 minutes and turn off the stove.
Open the cooker after 10 minutes and add the cardamom powder to the syrup and stir gently. Let them cool before transferring them to a container and refrigerate.
Serve cold.
Notes:
* * I used 1 1/2 cups of sugar according to my taste, not too sweet and I guess 1 1/4 cup of sugar would be perfect for people who prefer less sweetness.
* ** If you are using one gallon of milk which will yield about 40 to 45 sphere, make sure u cook only by batches of 12 to 15 depending on the size of your pressure cooker, because the spheres double in volume when cooked. And do not use the same syrup for the second batch.
* Make sure you do not overcook the rasgullas, they might break apart.
* For syrup you can use rose essence or cardamom powder.
* The pressure cooker I use (Mantrra) doesnt have the whistle sytem(were the cooking time is known by number of whistles). When my PC starts to hiss/release the steam, I can hear a loud and clear hissing sound and calculate the number of minutes to determine the cooking time. If you are using a PC with whistles then I cant tell you the exact number of whistles but what I can suggest is, after the first whistle count 2 to 3 minutes(let it remain on the same heat settings) and turn off the stove. And if the cheese balls have not increased double in size or if you feel they are not well cooked, cover the lid and cook for 2 or 3 minutes more without the whistle.
–> Recipes for Rasgulla referred mostly from Random vibrations and Bawarchi helped me with few tips on pressure cooking. For making paneer, Indira’s step by step method was very useful.
