Sesame Ladoo | Ellu Urundai | Til Ladoo | Black Sesame Balls Recipe | Karuppu Ellu Laddu

Happy to post calcium-rich Sesame/Til/Ellu ladoo specially for Women’s day(March 8) as women need more calcium than men. A perfect sweet to celebrate ! Happy women’s day…

When a girl attains puberty, this is given to strengthen her hip bones. For feeding moms, this is given to boost lactation. Even pregnant ladies can have this in moderation to meet their calcium demands. Women during Menopause, should have more calcium-rich food to stay away from Osteoporosis.

Experts advice to include sesame after 6 months for babies, if there is no family history of food/skin allergies. It is better to wait till 1 year of age as any allergic reactions could be dangerous for infants under one.

This traditional Ellu urundai(Sesame balls) are made using palm jaggery(Karupati). For jaggery(vellam) based sesame recipes, refer my earlier posts – Ellu Mittai/Sesame Chikki or Ragi Simili

Preparation

1.Dry roast sesame seeds until nicely pops up. Make sure not to burn it. Cool down and then transfer to mixie jar.2.Grind finely and transfer it to a mixing bowl. Add fried chana dal(Pottukadalai) to the same jar and grind to fine powder.3.Mix both ground stuffs well using fingers. In a kadai, take 1/2 cup of grated palm jaggery(Karupati) and add 1/4 cup of water to it.4.Add a generous pinch of dry ginger powder(Sukku thool). Allow it to boil well until the karupati dissolves fully and nicely bubbles up. Switch off when it looks like thick honey.5.Filter it and start adding to the powder mix. Pour incrementally and mix evenly with a spoon.6.Take a pinch and roll into a ball. It will look glossy and won’t take a perfect shape(as seen in middle thumbnail in the below pic). Still, make the balls and put it in a plate. Leave it open for 10-20 mins. Now, take each ladoo and roll again between palms. It could be rolled to perfect ladoos as in the last thumbnail.

Tasty Ellu urundai is ready ! Have a healthy bite !!

Tips/Tricks

• You shall grind sesame seeds coarsely if you like coarse, chewy ladoos. Traditional ones will be coarse as they use big hand mortar and pestle in place of mixie.
• The given water measurement always works perfect for me. Anyways, pour the syrup incrementally to the mix and stop, if you feel the mix is getting more watery.
• If your mix becomes too watery to pinch a ball, add some more fried chana dal(pottukadalai) powder to compensate.
• I usually wash sesame seeds in bulk and dry in sun or under fan until moisture disappears. Then, dry roast and store in air-tight container. This stored sesame seeds can be used in any sesame recipes, just skipping the roasting part as it is already roasted.