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This year, Ganesh Chaturthi falls on August 31, Wednesday and the Ganesh Visarjan will take place on Anant Chaturdashi, September 9, Friday. The Hindu festival is also known as Vinayaka Chaturthi and is an extravaganza in which prayers are offered and special food is prepared for bhog.

The festival is celebrated to mark the birth anniversary of Ganesha. While modaks are the most popular food item that is prepared during Ganesh Chaturthi, here are 10 bhog recipe ideas to serve for the 10 days of Ganesh Utsav:

Recipe 1: Healthy Jaggery- Oats quick Modak

1/2 cup jaggery, powdered or finely chopped

Optional: Almonds, walnuts, cashews, raisins, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, and flaxseeds

Roast oats for three to four minutes over a medium heat. After the oats have completely cooled, combine them with a handful of dried fruits and seeds in a mixer grinder to create a powder.

Add jaggery and continue grinding. In a bowl, bind the powdered ingredients with desi ghee or milk. Prepare modaks by greasing a modak mould. The modaks can be stored in an airtight container for up to 12-14 days.

Recipe 2: Ginger, cinnamon, clove Sugar-free Immunity Barfi

Finely chopped jaggery or date paste: 70 gram

Optional: Dry Fruits and seeds

Note: Do not add water in any form to this recipe.

Using ghee, grease a steel Thali or tray and set it aside. Put a non-stick pan on the stove over medium heat, add milk, and bring it to a boil. Then, thoroughly combine jaggery powder or date paste with the milk.

Add clove powder, ginger powder, cinnamon powder, milk powder, and ginger paste one by one while constantly stirring to prevent burning.

Spread the mixture on a greased tray, garnish with dry fruits and seeds and let it cool or set in the fridge. Give it the desired form with a knife, and enjoy it at any time.

Recipe 3: Sweet Potato Sugar-free healthy Laddoo

2 cups boiled and mashed sweet potatoes

1/4 cup jaggery powder (or as per taste)

3 tablespoons grated coconut (for the filling) plus 1 tablespoon (for garnish)

2 tbsp almonds and cashews (crumbled)

Heat ghee in a non-stick pan. Sauté the mashed sweet potatoes for 12-15 minutes on medium heat. Add coconut, cardamom, almonds, cashews, raisins, and jaggery. Then stir well until the mixture comes together as a single mass, then turn off the heat.

Form the mixture into little balls while it is still warm. Put grated coconut on a plate and roll the balls over it. Place them in the fridge for 10-15 minutes and serve.

Recipe 4: Pointed Gourd and Oat Kheer

Parwals (Pointed Gourd) -150 Grams

Khoya (Condensed Milk)-1/2 cup

Saffron—a few stands soaked with 3 Tbsp of warm milk

Boil the pointed gourd for three minutes after peeling, cutting and deseeding. Drain the water and set it aside. To create the filling, toast the khoya over medium heat until it softens, then stir in 2 tbs of jaggery powder, chopped cashews, 1 tbs of oats powder, and 1 green cardamom powder. Continue roasting for one minute.

Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the milk powder. Cool the mixture. In another pan, heat 3 tablespoons of jaggery and water to create a thin paste. Soften parvals in jaggery syrup, then allow them to cool and then stuff each parval with khoya mixture.

In another pan, heat milk with cardamom and cloves, then stir in ghee, jaggery, and oat powder until the mixture coats a spoon. Add stuffed parwal and simmer until the mixture becomes as thick as kheer. Decorate with saffron milk. Serve chilled.

To a mixer grinder, add chopped paan leaves and condensed milk, grind well and set aside. Heat ghee in a pan on medium heat. Add desiccated coconut and roast for 2-3 minutes on medium-low heat.

Add the condensed milk-paan mixture and stir to combine. You may add a few drops of green food colour at this point. Cook for another 2 minutes on low heat. The mixture will thicken. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool slightly.

Grease your hands with a little ghee, take a small portion from the coconut mixture, flatten it and add 1/2 teaspoon of gulkand in the centre. Bring the edges together and roll to form a laddoo.

Roll the prepared laddoo in desiccated coconut and keep the laddoo refrigerated.

1/8 teaspoon Nutmug powder and cardamom

In a non-stick skillet over medium heat, combine grated beets, condensed milk, gulkhand, and milk. Continuously stir it for 15 to 20 minutes.

Now turn off the heat and add the nutmug, cardamom, and dry fruit. Transfer to a bowl and refrigerate for two to three hours before serving.

1/2 cup Jaggery Powder(or as per taste)

1 tsp vanilla essence/saffron strands (optional)

Soak sabudana for 30 minutes in water. Cook the soaked sabudana in water that is boiling until the pearls become translucent and the water becomes sticky. Boil milk until it thickens and is reduced by half. Add jaggery, raisins, and cashews.

Add cooked sabudana to milk after draining. Add vanilla essence or saffron threads (optional). Mix thoroughly and turn off the heat. Pour the cooled mixture of sabudana and milk into kulfi moulds. Refrigerate kulfi for 2 hours till stiff. Provide chilled. Serve chilled.

2 cups guava, grated and deseeded

In chenna, combine jaggery and milk powder. For 3–4 minutes, sauté grated guava in ghee. Next, mix in chhena. Simmer the mixture until it thickens and add cardamom, almonds, and pistachios. Transfer the mixture to a bowl and allow to cool at room temperature or in the refrigerator.

Grease the modak mould with a little ghee. Take a small portion of the kalakand mixture and put it into the modak mold. Keep the guava kalakand modaks in the refrigerator and serve them chilled!

For 5-7 minutes, boil sugar, cardamom powder, and saffron powder in water to form a syrup. In a large bowl, combine flour, curd, boiling and mashed potatoes, and salt to create a batter that is thick and consistent.

Pour the solution into a cloth and create a hole in the fabric. Begin by frying jalebis in a spiral form in heated oil until golden brown. Soak the jalebi for two to three minutes in the sugar syrup and enjoy.

Cucumber skin peeled and grated: 500 g

In a non-stick pan on a medium flame, melt ghee. Add the cucumber and sauté it until there is no remaining moisture. Add condensed milk and whisk continually till the halwa thickens. While stirring, gradually add cardamom powder and ghee. Halwa will begin to float and appear shiny. Serve hot or cold, garnished with dry fruits.

(Recipes by psychologist and culinarian Dr Malini Saba)

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