Recipe: Dates & dry fruit laddu | antina unde
A sweet sinful bite of your Grandma's laddu!

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Who wouldn’t love our Grandma’s old traditional laddu recipe?! It brings back those precious memories of your grandmother preparing lovely looking laddus with complete precision to make the most amazing desserts that you would have ever tried.

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Here is a Karnataka delicacy that you would definitely not want to miss. We have named it as an energy ball, made from dates, poppy seeds, dry fruits, toasted dry coconut, sweetened with jaggery. The whole mixture comes together with the usage of edible gum. It is rich in nutrition and has some amazing medicinal value as well.

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Date and Nut Energy Balls/Antina Unde
PrintIngredients
FOR THE DATE & NUT ENERGY BALL
- 2 tbsps Poppy Seeds / Khus Khus
- ¼ cup Cashewnuts (coarsely chopped)
- ¼ cup Almonds (coarsely chopped)
- ¼ cup Raisins
- ¼ cup Dates (pitted and finely chopped)
- 1 cup Dry Coconut (grated)
- ½ cup Jaggery (crushed )
- 2 tbsps Edible gum
- ½ tsp Green Cardamom Powder
- ½ cup Ghee
- 100 ml Water (lukewarm )
EQUIPMENT USED
- Frying pan
Instructions
- Soak the pitted dates that are chopped in 100ml of lukewarm water. This will help in softening the dates and it will be easy to bind the mixture.
ROASTING THE INGRIDIENTS
- Heat a large frying pan on medium heat, dry roast poppy seeds over a low flame until it starts to let out an aroma
- Once done transfer to a plate and keep aside
- Add 2 tbsps of ghee to the same pan, and let it heat over a medium flame for a minute
- Add cashew nuts and almonds and fry them until they turn light golden brown, transfer to a bowl and keep aside
- Add raisins to the same pan and roast them until they swell up and transfer to the bowl with nuts
- Repeat the process for the edible gum, for which you can add a bit more ghee and fry again. The edible gum will puff a little as you fry them.Â
- Transfer the edible gum to a mortar and pestle, and break it apart. Mix it with the dates and keep it aside.
- Lastly, fry the dry coconut for 5 minutes over a medium flame and transfer to the other nuts and raisins
MAKING THE DATE & NUT ENERGY BALL
- In the same pan, add in the remaining ghee and jaggery and heat both over a medium flame. Keep stirring throughout, until the jaggery is fully dissolved and reaches a soft ball stage
- Once it’s melted, add the fried dry fruits and raisins along with some cardamom powder. Add in soaked dates, gum, roasted poppy seeds, and dry coconut.
- Mix it well together and turn off the flame. Allow it to cool till you are able to roll into balls
ROLLING THE ENERGY BALL
- Wet your hands well with water(the mixture will be quiet sticky), take a little bit of the mixture in your hand and shape it into a ball.
- Repeat the process until the entire dry fruit mixture is made into ballsÂ
- Store in air-tight containers, and enjoy as an indulgent yet nutritious treat!
To all the mothers out there, try this laddu recipe with your daughter or your son, ask them to come in to the kitchen and you can prepare it together.Â
It will be a wonderful time to spend by making this sticky energy snack for them and the legacy of the laddu recipe will surely pass on as well!
‘Antu’ literally translates to ‘Gum’ in Kannada and ‘Unde’ on the other hand refers to balls or ‘Laddu’ in common terms, thus the whole name has been derived from the usage of this Edible Gum also known as Acacia Gum and Gondi in various languages. Isn’t it wonderful to know this?!
These sweet laddus are a great energy booster as your after gym snack. They can also be packed in your kids lunch box to secretly sneak in some of the nutrition into their diet.
Make sure you fry each ingredient separately. As each ingredient will take its own time to roast.Â
You can skip the dry fruits which are not available for you.
You can use butter for frying if you are not a ghee lover.
Try to use dates or jaggery, any one of them if you don’t want it too sweet.Â
Make sure the jaggery is melted and boiled till it has reached a soft boil stage. To test, you can drop a few drops of the melted jaggery into a bowl of water, once you take it out, you must be able to roll it to form a soft ball.Â
Serve these yummy looking laddus with tea in the evenings for kids or after meals.
You can also pack these laddus as your energy snack after you hit the gym.Â
Store the laddus in an air tight container at room temperature or store it in a refrigerator for a weeks time.