Paramannam also known as rice payasam is a traditional South Indian pudding sweetened with rice, milk and jaggery. It is a festive dessert and is offered to the Hindu deities during puja and religious ceremonies.

Recipe Snapshot

  • Prep time: 5 minutes
  • Cook time: 35 minutes
  • Total time: 40 minutes
  • Yield: 4 · 4 to 6
  • Category: Dessert / Sweet
  • Cuisine: South Indian

Ingredients

  • 4 cups whole milk ((use cow milk if making for naivedyam))
  • ½ cup rice
  • ½ teaspoon ground cardamom ((4 green cardamoms))
  • ¾ to 1 cup jaggery (or sugar or palm sugar (3/4 is moderately sweet))
  • ½ cup water ((to make syrup))
  • 2 tablespoons Ghee ((use cow ghee if making for naivedyam))
  • 10 to 15 cashews ((more if desired))
  • 1 to 2 tablespoon sweet raisins

Method

Preparation

  1. Wash rice several times and soak it in enough water until milk comes to a boil.
  2. Pour milk to a rinsed heavy bottom pot. Bring it to a boil on a medium flame.

Make Jaggery Syrup

  1. Add grated jaggery to a pan along with water. Boil on a medium flame until slightly thick and sticky. It doesn't need a string consistency but has to be sticky.
  2. Keep this aside to cool completely.

How to Make Rice Payasam

  1. When the milk comes to a boil, drain the water from the rice and add it here.
  2. Cook until the rice grains are mushy and soft. Stir every 4 to 5 minutes during this process to avoid the milk solids from getting burnt at the bottom.
  3. When the rice is soft cooked, gently mash some of the rice grains to thicken the payasam. Turn off the heat when it reaches a slightly thick yet of pouring consistency, (Check video)
  4. Add cardamom powder. Filter the cooled jaggery syrup to the cooked rice. (If using clean jaggery you can add the gratings now. Stir well until dissolved.)

Fry nuts

  1. Heat ghee in another small pan. Fry cashews till light golden, stir in the raisins & fry until they puff. Pour this all over the rice payasam.
  2. Serve rice payasam warm or cold.

Kiyaan Singh’s Kitchen Note

Keep this recipe as a working base: cook once as written, then adjust spice, texture, and serving style for your own table.