My husband says, “whatever is worth doing is worth overdoing”! Few years back we decided to plant kiwis. For all those who do not know this, kiwis grow on vines and the vines are either male or female, at least that is what we know of the variety that is hardy and does well in the PNW. So, we definitely had to plant 1 male and 1 female plant to get fruits. Keeping up with the tradition of overdoing instead, we planted 4 female vines and 1 male vine!
Firs couple of years the vines did not fruit, but for last three years, we have gotten crazy amount of fruit from our 4 female vines. When I say crazy amount, I mean at least 100 lbs. After giving some to family and friends, whoever we could see during the pandemic, we still had a lot of kiwis leftover.
Last year I made spiced kiwi fruit leather or kiwi pappar in my dehydrator. That was a pretty hit thing with the adults in my family, but kids did not care too much about it. I have tried dehydrated kiwis to munch on as a snack too. They ended up being too tart. So, this year I have decided to try a few different things with the kiwis.
Fun fact about kiwis: they do not ripen on the vine. You harvest them when they are still hard and store them in a brown paper bag to ripen. Adding a banana to the bag will help ripening them a bit faster. If you have too many kiwis, like we do, you can store them in a cool dry place, and they will stay fine for months.
Last weekend, I decided to make halwa with some of the kiwis that were ripening too fast. My first thought was to make it like pineapple sheera with suji/semolina, but I wanted to keep the carb count for the halwa as low as possible. So, I decided to make it with almond flour instead. To sweeten the halwa, I used golden erythritol, which is easily available online. You can use regular erythritol or even sugar (if you are not counting carbs).
I added a tablespoon of corn-starch dissolved in 1/3 cup of cold water to the halwa towards the end. That added another 7 g of carbs to the halwa, almost like adding another kiwi. It is totally optional.
The halwa turned out to be this amazingly delicious balance of tangy and sweet goodness that everyone in my family loved!
Ingredients:
20 kiwis, peeled
1 Cup almond flour
2 tbsp butter
½ cup golden erythritol
1 tbsp cornstarch mixed with 1/3 cup water
Crushed cardamom seeds (10 pods) or ½ tsp cardamom powder
Chopped Cashews/pistachios for garnish
Method:
- Puree the peeled kiwis and run them through a sieve to remove the seeds.
- At medium high heat, cook the pureed kiwis with 2 tbsp of butter for about 10 minutes.
- Add 1 cup of almond flour and continue cooking for another 5 minutes.
- Add sweetener of your choice and cook for another couple of minutes. The sweetener will make the halwa a bit runny, so add 1 tbsp of cornstarch that has been dissolved in 1/3 cup of cold water to the mix.
- Cook for another minute or 2. Add crushed cardamom and mix well.
- Garnish with chopped cashews and/or pistachios. Serve warm or cold!
Meri Rasoi Se 