Sweet Potato Gulab Jamun – Ranga Alur Pantua

Sweet potatoes are a go to winter thing in my house. I love using them to make these sweet potato gulab jamuns or dumplings. Ranga Alur Pantua in Bengali.

Over time, I have simplified the recipe further and further. The net result is 4 ingredients with optional garnishes. And as desserts go, a relatively healthy creation. The operative word being relatively. So, read along to see how I do it, and discover a fun new treat along the way.

In our rush to often complain about the weather, we sometimes miss out the finer things. AKA, the silver lining. Indeed, when I saw the snow yesterday, I was not happy! Make that unhappy! I went to sleep with this vegan  gulab jamun on my mind.  I had promised Sharanya a vegan version.

The silver lining here was that the snow made me reach for comfort. In turn, my reward is a sweet treat.

The bright sunshine this morning cheered me a little, bringing home some winter memories. The Kolkata winter that is. Expressed beautifully, in this post by Anindya I remembered my own thoughts of winter. Winters in India indeed are synonymous with the lep or bengali comforter. It is a Bengali ritual to sun the comforter, before winter. After the season is over, it is sunned again and put away after winter. One of the things, I used to do with my grandmother was snuggle under the covers in the afternoon and listen to radio dramas. I am not even sure if such a thing exists anymore.

Some of the lines were rather melodramatic, and sometimes lost me (I was probably 4 or 5) but the memories of spending time between my grandparents remained. This dessert is very closely adapted from my cookbook.

Hence, I call these dumplings pantua, which is the Bengali word for Gulab Jamun.

It is worth trying to find the pale creamy sweet potato, essentially the Asian variety, which is available in most Indian grocery stores, and for Westchester readers you will find it in H-Mart. This variety is naturally sweeter and also, with a few trial and errors I have found that baking or microwaving. the sweet potato actually results in less moisture and holds better.

Now, it is not always possible to find the white sweet potato, so a regular yam or orange sweet potato works as well. It is a little moister in texture than its Asian counterpart.  It also needs a little more care while frying.

This was one of the last things I learned to make from Dida, and she of course used nolen gur, or date palm jaggery for the syrup. In other recipes, I have used maple syrup in this case I actually use extra cardamoms in the sugar syrup. Now the dish is naturally quite sweet, so I just dunk it very lightly in the syrup and serve it warm.

Six ingredients and optional almonds to garnish- sweet potatoes, coconut, cardamoms, water, sugar and rice flour that is it! Naturally vegan and gluten-free!

Other variations of gulab jamun include this air fryer variety and then this gulab jamun cake.