Pista Kulfi (Pistachio Ice Cream)
July 22nd, 2008 filed under Desserts, Gluten Free
Kulfi is a very popular Indian ice cream. Kulfi comes in a variety of different flavors. Traditional kulfi is flavored with cardamom; this recipe is flavored with cardamom and pistachios.
Serves 6.
Ingredients:
- 4 cups whole milk
- 1 slice of white bread
- 1 teaspoon cornstarch
- 1/4 cup sugar, adjust to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon coarsely ground cardamom (ilachi)
- 10 pistachios sliced
Method
- Remove the crust from all sides of the bread and cut the bread in small pieces.
- Blend bread pieces, cornstarch, and a 1/2 cup of milk, making smooth paste and set aside.
- Boil remaining milk (3.5 cups) in nonstick frying pan on medium high heat.
- Stir milk as needed to keep milk from burning on the bottom of the frying pan. Stir the sides of the pan to avoid scalding.
- After milk comes to boil, let the milk boil for another 12 minutes. The goal is to boil the milk from 3 1/2 cups to 2 1/2 cups.
- Add the bread mixture to the milk in frying the pan and cook for another 4 minutes, reducing the heat to medium. Bread and cornstarch are added to reduce the water crystallizing in kulfi during freezing.
- Next add sugar and pistachios and cook for 2 more minutes.
- Turn off the heat and add cardamom powder.
- Cool the milk to room temperature and pour into a bowl,
- Take cellophane wrap and place it right over the milk covering it completely. Note: It is important that the cellophane wrap touches the milk.
- Put it in freezer. It will take about 7 hours for the kulfi to be ready to serve.
Variations
- Replace pistachios with almond or coconut powder.
- Replace pistachios with finally chopped fruits like mangos or strawberries. Add fruits in the end after turning off the heat.
- Many people enjoy eating kulfi like a Popsicle. Before freezing, pour the milk mixture in to a Popsicle mold. If you don’t have Popsicle mold use small paper cups and place cellophane wrap on top of the milk and place a Popsicle stick in center of cup and freeze.
Hi there, just wondering can you substitute regular cow’s milk with goat’s milk in this recipe? Thanks.
The kulfi turns excellent …!!
To prevent the kulfi from becoming hard
Then once the mixture is all done, you put the mixture in a food processor and add 1-2 bread slices cut them up and grind it together then freeze
The bread stops it from becoming rock hard
Munjala I appreciate the effort it must take for you to share your recipes with everyone. More folks are able to utilize your cooking skills because you speak English. You also say “Namastey” in your videos which is exclusive greeting for Indian/hindu culture. It would have been different if your program was in your native language and targeted to Indian audience only. Your program is for English speaking audience who are from all cultures and all walks of lives and feel excluded with your greeting. I hope you can consider something more inclusive. Thank You
I believe Manjula merely wishes to greet the viewers in a customary manner. If you are interested in Indian food, there is no reason why a bit of exposure to the culture should insult you. Criticizing her for saying ‘Namaste’ is like watching a video on Japanese cooking and being horrified when the host says ‘Konnichiwa’ or other Japanese terms. So who really should be worried about not being inclusive enough…?
Just relax and enjoy the food!
hi manjula, can you make a simple recipe that doesnt include like using a pan?
Hi Manjula,
I tried your kulfi recipe and it came out verry well. thanks a ton..hubby liked it very much.
thanks! i did kulfi & stirfry arbi.both were good.
i make kulfi really in an easy way…
one can condensed milk 250 ml appraximately
one can evaporated milk 300 ml apx
one half and half cream 200 ml apx
Add these in a bowl, add pistachios and a bit of crushed ilaichi….
put them in molds n freeze….
it comes out so creamy n without ice pallets….
my kid loves it n can be made witout any hassle of boiling anything…
hey wat is evaporated milk n whole milk can i use nestle pure milk instead of evaporated or whole milk
i tried making kulfi twice. it came out good but it was rock hard . difficult to scopp it out. what could be the reason?
i made kulfi on the weekend.came out real good. however i had two problems
1) there were ice crystals in the ice cream, and
2) it was rock hard when frozen
i did a second batch with whipping cream instead of whole milk
was a little better but still rock hard
what did i do wrong for it to be so hard that i could not even scoop it out of the bowl?
Jasdev,
may be you added too much corn starch.