Rasgulla or Roshagulla is an Indian/Bangladeshi sweet with origins in Bengal. Made from freshly made Chenna, Rasgulla are really easy to make right at home and are perfect for those family gatherings. I love making these for festivals!

What is Rasgulla?

Whilst the true origin of Rasgulla remains in contention, the basic make-up of this fabulous dessert differs very little (if at all) across India and Bangladesh. Quite simply, Rasgulla is a milk based dumpling made from Chenna. The dumplings are then boiled and soaked in a delicious sugar syrup. This syrup is often flavoured using rose (petals or water), orange blossom water, kewra (screw pine water), cardamom or even saffron.

Making Chenna

The first part of this recipe is to prepare Chenna, or strained milk solids. It’s quite straight forward to make at home, and I highly recommend doing so instead of opting for store purchased. My recipe makes enough Chenna to prepare 8 rasgullas which is enough for about 4 people.

You can prepare Chenna beforehand and keep it in the fridge for about a week, but fresh made Chenna is the best to use every time.

What milk should I use?

Full. Cream. Milk.

I’m talking packed with fat, cream and all the goodness. You won’t be able to make good quality Paneer or Chenna using anything less. Unfortunately there isn’t an adequate plant based substitute to get you the same result.

Boiling the Milk

What seems like an easy task can actually be very difficult. Whilst boiling the milk you need to be extra careful to ensure that the milk doesn’t burn (particularly at the base of the pot) and to make sure the milk does not boil over. Both of these things can occur quite easily if you don’t watch the pot carefully. The best way to prevent burning the milk or boiling the milk over is to keep a close eye on the pot and stir the contents continuously using a spatula or wooden spoon. Once the milk reaches a rolling boil, it is time to move on to curdling the milk

Not many people realise that Paneer and Chenna is made by curdling full cream milk. To do this we need to simply squeeze some lemon juice into the boiling milk and stir it through. Depending on the acidity of the lemon and the milk you are using, the amount of lemon juice required will vary. Only add as much as is required to cause the solids to float to the top of the pot.

Typically for 1 litre of milk, I require the juice of 1 and a half lemons to get the solids floating. Too much lemon and there will be a strong acidic flavour to your paneer/chenna so be careful not to add too much!

Straining the Chenna

Aside from getting the curdling perfect, the straining component to making the Chenna is extremely important. To strain the curdled milk you will need a cheesecloth.

I use this one from Amazon, but there are plenty of other options available online. You can also find cheesecloths at Target.

If you cannot source a cheesecloth, there are a couple of substitutes. This article from Spruce Eats provides some good information on alternatives. The best substitutes for cheesecloth for this recipe are a sheet of cotton fabric (which is what we used at home! We legitimately had a cotton fabric dedicated for straining of yogurt and chenna/paneer), CLEAN pantyhose, a very fine mesh sieve or a very fine mesh bag.

Once you have the material to strain the liquid, you need the right set up. Pour the curdled milk (solids and whey liquid) into the cheesecloth (or alternative) with a large bowl to collect the whey liquid. You can also do this first step over the sink. Now you need to tie the cheesecloth (or alternative) onto a large wooden spoon or stick such that you can set this rod over the diameter of the large bowl and raise the cloth with its contents. This will allow the excess liquid to continue to drain away.

Kneading the Chenna

For making Chenna, you don’t need to strain the solids for too long. I normally leave it to strain for roughly 1 hour because for the purposes of preparing the Chenna, you need just a little bit of moisture. After the 1 hour, I gently squeeze out any further liquid and remove the solids in the cheesecloth onto a plate or into a bowl.

Now it’s time to knead! You could do this with a dough hook attachment in a stand mixer, but by hand is also fine. Depending on the amount of Chenna you have collected this could take anywhere between 15 minutes to half an hour. Here we are trying to make the crumbly solids into one smooth and homogenous dough-like ball.

Making the Rasgulla

Chenna Balls & Syrup

Roll the prepared Chenna into small balls. My recipe should yield about 8 small balls. These shouldn’t be overly large as they do expand during the boiling process. Once these are ready, set them aside under a damp tea towel and move on to making the sugar syrup.

For the rasgulla you need a really thin sugar syrup working with a 1:4 ratio of sugar to water. This is quite unlike a regular sugar syrup that uses a 1:1 ratio with the result quite rich. In this case all we need to do is bring the mixture to a gentle boil and then add in the Chenna balls. These are cooked in the syrup, and remain in the syrup to cool to infuse. Now my recipe is a little unique in that I like to flavour my syrup with cardamom and some rose water or orange blossom water or kewra (depending on how I feel that day I make it!), but these are basically optional. Rasgulla can be made just with a simple syrup mixture and still taste amazing.

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Tips & Tricks

What seems like a very daunting sweet to make is actually very very simple. The trick is in perfecting the Chenna and getting that beautifully smooth texture after kneading it through. To get this recipe perfect every time here are my top tips

1. Take your time to boil the milk – There are no points for taking shortcuts here. Boil the milk low and slow and keep watching the pot to make sure nothing spills over. This happens so quickly! If the milk is boiled at a higher temperature you can easily cause the milk to burn, and trust me there is nothing worse than burnt milk.
2. Slowly add the lemon to boiled milk – adding 1 tbsp. at a time is crucial. Each time you add lemon wait for 10-15 seconds such that you can see if the milk curdles and the solids float. Remember, too much lemon will flavour the curdled milk which is the last thing you want!
3. Knead the Chenna smooth – This might take some time, but you need to give it all the time it needs. Sometimes the process is quick and sometimes it takes me a while to knead the Chenna into a smooth dough. The humidity and ambient temperature has a huge impact so don’t tell time prescribe this. Let the feeling of the dough govern the time needed
4. Boil the Rasgulla for at least 15 minutes – Whilst they might seem ready to remove, and they may appear like they have doubled, but you absolutely need to give the rasgulla plenty of time in the syrup.
5. Let the Rasgulla chill for at least 2 hours – Let the Rasgulla absorb as much of the syrup as possible before serving them up! This will ensure that the Rasgulla are beautifully soft and spongy.
6. Let the Rasgulla reach room temperature before serving – again, this is super important so that the Rasgulla isn’t hardened or cold when you eat it. It should be at room temperature for the best experience!

Let’s make Rasgulla

And that is how you make the perfect Rasgulla, every single time. Like I said, it is quite an easy recipe but you just need to be patient and trust me when I say that homemade tastes infinitely better.

As always leave me a comment below and share your photos with me @theminiaturelife on Instagram!