Balooza is a mouth watering dessert. In Palestine there are street vendors who sell it during spring and summer, and families flock to enjoy this sweet treat in the evenings. It’s a light and healthy dessert, made from milk infused with orange blossom water and topped with honey or home made syrup and garnished with pistachios or any favorite nuts.
The chopped pistachios are raw and unsalted, and can be found at health food stores or any Arabic or Middle Eastern store. Traditionally balooza is topped with carmelized qatr, but honey is also a great substitute. Sahtain!
Ingredients:
- 4 1/4 cups milk
- 4 Tbsp corn starch
- 2 Tbsp orange blossom water
- chopped pistachios for garnishing
- For the syrup: 1 cup sugar, 1/4 cup water
Instructions:
- Dissolve the corn starch in 1/4 cup of milk, put the rest of the milk in a pot on the stove on medium-low heat
- When the milk gets close to boiling, add the corn starch mix to it. Keep stirring the milk until it thickens, and is smooth. When it starts bubbling, add the orange blossom water to the milk pudding and mix it well.
- Remove it from the stove, pour the milk pudding in small bowls. Once the bowls cool to room temperature, transfer the bowls to the fridge.
For the syrup:
- Put a couple of spoons of water with the sugar in a saucepan over medium heat.
- Keep it on the stove and allow it to start bubbling and carmelize.
- As soon as it gets the golden color remove it from the stove and let it set for a couple of minutes, and then mix in the rest of the water.
- It should be a thick syrup. It it’s too thick, add a little more water and heat it back up on the stove. If too watery, put it back on the stove and allow it to thicken a bit more.
For serving:
Invert the pudding onto a dessert plate, drizzle with the syrup or honey, and garnish with pistachios!
Seasons of Palestine - فصول فلسطين 