Nankhatai is the Indian version of shortbread cookies or biscuits. Flavored with cardamom, they are a match made in heaven when served with hot coffee or tea. You can also flavor this with almond or pistachio powder. One thing in common between all the versions of nankhatai is their melt in your mouth deliciousness.
Ingredients:
Ghee (Melted Clarified Butter) – 1 cup
Sugar blended into fine powder – 1 cup
All Purpose Flour (Maida) sieved – 2 cups
Chick Pea Flour (Gram Flour) – 1 cup
Semolina (Sooji Rawa) – 1 tbsp
Cardamom Powder – ½ tsp
Method:
Take the Ghee and powdered Sugar in a large mixing bowl. Whisk them smooth and soft with a wire whisk or an electric whisk.
Add the dry ingredients (All Purpose Flour), Gram Flour, Semolina and Cardamom Powder). Mix well with a whisk.
Now, mix well with hand and make dough. (If the dough becomes too much greasy, add 1 to 2 tbsp of flour. If the dough is too dry, add 2 tbsp of melted Ghee.)
Pre heat the oven to 200 degree Celsius (392 degree Fahrenheit).
Grease the Baking tray.
Take small lemon sized balls from the dough and press it gently with the palm. Keep them in the greased baking tray keeping enough space between each of them as they will grow in size while baking. Make criss cross cuts using a knife or make impressions by pressing a fork on each of them.
Place the baking tray in the pre heated oven and bake for 12 to 15 minutes at 200 degree Celsius (392 degree Fahrenheit) or till the cookies starts to become light golden brown. Keep a watch.
Cookies will be soft when you remove the tray from the oven, but they will turn crispy, but soft when they cool down.
Enjoy the cookies.
You can store them in air tight containers for a week or so.
Note:
Adjust the quantity of Sugar to suit your taste.
You can use Butter instead of Ghee, but the Butter should be at room temperature. If you remove butter from the refrigerator, microwave it for 20 to 30 seconds to bring it to the room temperature.
Generally NanKhatai is made with All Purpose Flour, Butter and Sugar only. We add Sooji to make the NanKhatai crispy.
For a change, I added Gram Flour to give the nice aroma to the NanKhatai. You can avoid Gram Flour. If so, replace it with one more cup of All Purpose Flour.
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