Carrot 'no-bake' Pie

Indians love warm Carrot pudding or Gajar halwa specially in winters which is the best time to enjoy it. Some relish it with ice cream and some like to eat it plain and warm.

I had seen this recipe somewhere long back but tried recently. So thought of sharing with you because I feel that everyone look for some different ways of presentations whenever it comes to serve a traditional dessert.

For Carrot halwa:

Ingredients:

1 kg grated carrots
1 cup milk (just to make sure that it is not too dry to stick to the bottom)
½ cup powdered sugar
or
1 tin sweetened condensed milk
½ cup crushed nuts (cashew/almond/pistachio)
1 tbsp clarified butter/ghee
A few raisins
1 tsp. cardamom powder

Method: 

Wash and grate carrots. Heat clarified butter/ghee in a heavy bottom vessel. Add grated carrots and sauté for a few minutes.

Add milk and keep cooking at slow flame till all the liquid is absorbed and the carrots look like a semi solid ball.

Add sugar, the pudding will become liquid again. Cook for 5-10 minutes till it all the liquid is dried off.

Take off the flame and add powder cardamom, nuts and raisins. Serve it as a dessert with a dollop of ice cream or just plain.
This halwa can be made in pressure cooker too for quicker version which reduces the cooking time for carrot and made the whole process lot easier without much compromising with taste(but taste of traditionally made halwa will always be the best and supreme).

For the pie crusts you can use different bases like:

1. Cookie Crust;

1 cup digestive biscuits
1 tbsp. powder sugar
4 tbsp. butter
A few drops of mil

2. Cornflakes Crust
1 cup crushed cornflakes/wheat flakes
2 tbsp. butter
1 tbsp. honey

3. Nutty Crust
 1 cup Almond meal flour
10-12 juicy Dates
A few drops of water

I have used digestive biscuits for this recipe.
All the recipes above follow the same process. Just grind all the ingredients in a blender and make dough. Use more liquid if the dough is too dry to make pies.

Arrange paper cup liners in a muffin tray and fill each with half of the pie crust mix. Press the crumbles slightly to make a firm pie crust.

Top it with carrot pudding and press it with the back of a spoon. Garnish it with more crushed nuts if you desire and serve.

For best results let the guests guess what is the crust made up of!  :-)

Notes:

You could use khoya or mawa in place of condensed milk to make it into more exotic and rich treat but it is subject to availability.
Fry the nuts and raisins in a little clarified butter/ghee, it gives a crunch and wonderful aroma to the nuts.
You can replace bottle gourd, sweet potato and pumpkin with carrots to make the same pudding.
These pies stay good for 5-6 days as there is no water in the recipe.
Try the same dessert recipe with Apple pudding. Replace the grated carrots with apples.
Cup measurements is same as US standard.

Like to experiment with biscuits?

Here you have one more to try out ;)

Kex/biscuit cake(vegetarian,eggs free)