Ingredients for 20 Nankhatai Cookies

• 120 g Maida (all-purpose flour)
• 60 g Besan (chickpea flour)
• 30 g Rava (semolina)
• 80 g sugar, powdered
• 1 tsp cardamom powder
• ¼ tsp salt
• 115 g Ghee
• 1 tbsp almond slivers and pistachios
• Dried rose petals for garnish (optional)
   

Instructions

In a mixing bowl, sift together Maida (all-purpose flour), Besan (chickpea flour), Rava (semolina), powdered sugar, cardamom powder, and salt.

Add ghee and knead into a dough. At first, the dough is very crumbly, but try not to add any extra liquid. Just keep mixing, the warmth of your hands will melt the ghee, which acts as a binding agent.

The dough is ready when you can form a smooth, crack-free ball from a portion of it.

At this stage, you can either divide the dough by eye or, if you want to be more precise, use a scale to form 20 balls, each weighing 24 g.

Make an indentation in the ball with your index finger and place it on a baking tray lined with baking paper.

Put some almond or pistachio slivers in the indentation and chill the tray in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 190°C.

After 20 minutes, turn a separate baking tray upside down and place it on the middle rack. Then place the chilled tray with the cookies on top of this baking tray and bake in the preheated oven at 190°C for 10 to 12 minutes.

The cookies are done when they develop nice cracks in the middle, with a pale color on top and a slightly golden brown color on the bottom.

Once out of the oven and still warm, I like to add a few pistachio slivers and rose petals to create a color contrast, but this is completely optional.

Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 to 10 minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely. The cookies will firm up as they cool.

Nankhatai goes perfectly with a warm cup of Masala Chai.

Tips

• Consistency: Melted Ghee can make your dough too runny and with ghee that is too firm, you will have to knead the dough much more than necessary. To avoid both, use semi-solid ghee at room temperature, which is neither melted nor solid.
• Adjustments: If you find that your dough is runny, place the mixing bowl in the refrigerator for a few minutes, the ghee will firm up a bit and you can then combine it into a dough.
• Indentation: An indentation in the shaped Nankhatai dough ensures that the cookies have room to expand, develop cracks, and bake nicely from the center while holding their shape.
• Chilling: Chilling the dough is advisable so that the cookies rise nicely when baking and do not become flat, but it is not absolutely necessary.