Recipe for 7 cup cake – an Indian fudge sweet suitable for any festive occasion
In case you see the picture and wonder why the cupcakes are flat, this is a 7 cup-cake and not 7 cupcakes. These are the ones that my mom, aunts and grandmom turn out into perfect little squares during festivals, in a jiffy. I’m always a bit wary about making them because of too much sugar and ghee and there’s the uncertainty of them turning out properly. These can be made with just milk and sugar – called ‘milk cake‘ or with chickpea flour, sugar and ghee called Mysore Pak, or even with nuts like almonds and cashews. As a child, these were the only cakes that were made at home apart from some failed sponge cake experiments conducted in the pressure cooker. I wanted to recreate some of that childhood magic for the festive season.
Traditional Indian ‘cakes’ need no baking, because they are not actually cakes, but fudgey sweets made using sugar, milk and some other ingredients, a bit of slaving over the stove, some elbow grease – and your ‘cake’ will be ready.
Small pieces of these goodies go a long way in satisfying your sweet tooth. Some of these ‘cakes’ require almost an hour of stirring over a hot stove. This one, on the other hand takes 20 minutes at the most, but the results make people think otherwise. If you need larger quantities, make this in batches, that way you can give your elbow some rest in between batches
Seven cup Cake
Category: Indian sweet, Milk sweet, Festival food
Time taken: Under 30 minutes
Makes: One 9 X 9 sheet 1/2″ thick, can be cut into 25 squares
- Grease a 9 X 9 baking sheet (or a deep dish) ghee and keep aside.
- In a heavy bottomed wok, place 2 tbsp ghee.
- Add the cup of besan to this and on a very low flame, roast it till fragrant - say around 4-5 minutes. Keep a close watch and saute constantly so as not to let the gram flour brown or burn.
- In a large bowl, mix all the remaining ingredients including flavouring of choice {saffron strands or cardamom.
- Once the gram flour is aromatic, tip the contents of the bowl into a wok. Keeping the flame low at all times, constantly keep stirring the contents till reduced to nearly half. For the quantities specified, this takes 15-17 minutes.
- At the end of 15 minutes, immediately transfer the contents of the wok onto the greased baking sheet.
- Smoothen out the surface with the edge of a flat spatula or by patting under few layers of foil, to make the heat bearable.
- Score into squares or diamonds using a pizza cutter /knife.
- Cut out when completely cool.
The recipe is traditionally called a seven cup cake or the seven heaven cake because of three cups of sugar and 1 each of other 4 ingredients, making it easy to remember. However, in my experience, 2 cups of sugar is more than enough for our generation's sweet tooth. And even my grandparents are quite happy with that 🙂
Hey… I’m going to substitute coconut with cashews and try 🙂 what do you think the result will be?
You can try cashew or almond powder, but I though coconut made it very fragrant..buy hey almond has a lovely fragrance too and you could substitute saffron with almond essence
Hi Nandita. Yeah these vadis are amazing even with wheat flour.Happy Ganesh Chaturthi!
True, this is so typically South Indian, come to think of it, I’ve heard about it only from Tamilians – supposed to be an emergency Mysore Paak recipe, I think!
Reminds me of my grandma’s amazing mysore pak! This actually looks more like the paal mysore paak we get at saravana bhavan.
Besan Laddu made into squares is a great idea.I always red palms rolling them with hot mix! Looks mouthwatering N. Have a great Gowri-Ganesha habba!:))
besan ladu is my roomi’s fave sweet.. recipe seems very similar 🙂
My MIL makes this very well and she made boxes of these for us while she was visiting us. Love it.
besan is a chana daal flour not chick pea flourKetan
Yummy Yummmy Yummy..:D
Ketan,Chana dal is split chick peas (like split mung and whole mung dals). So, chana dal flour and chick pea flour are the same.
Wow! looks amazing nandita! lovely sweet for festival. I will try this. Thanks for sharing.
nice one nandita! I was a bit flustered looking at the pic and the title 7-cup cakes:) and I still have to make something for tomorrow!!
7 cup cake looks delicious and not very challengin Nanditha! hey u look nice in that profile pic! so indian compared to the other pics so far! 🙂
The 7 cup sweet is great! These sweets, they assume a unique flavor during festivals! what with all the sharing and fun :).
Mansi- LOL thats why I specifically put hyphen between 7-cup and not cup-cake:D Firstly this wouldnt even be considered a ‘cake’ according to Western cooks, would be rather called a ‘bar’ or a fudge :DMusical – yes, im just quickly checking mails before leaving for parents’ place…after all they need help in devouring the loads of different kozhakattais mom makes :)Latha- thanks dear. Just feels good to dress up totally Indian for a change and get out of the jeans-tee routine- glad you noticed :)As regards comparing this to Mysore Pak (which is what I intended to make first) – this has one cup ghee as against 3 cups in mysore pak, which means I face the danger of blocking just one coronary as against all 3 🙂 You get the drift?WHile mysore pak is delicious, I cannot bring myself to use that much ghee in anything edible…even using this one cup was an almost heart-stopping experience ;D
I make this for the choice reagrds to mysorepak, the burfi looks excellent and have got a nice 🙂
Happy Ganesh Chaturthi!
The sweet looks very soft and yummy. I have sent you a mail mentioning my entry for WBB-15. Pls do have a look.
7 cup sweet looks yummy.
happy ganesh chadhurti! 🙂 I’ve only heard about this sweet. never tried it… sounds easy, I’ll try it soon and let you know.
Nice post…my mom makes them too. but i have never tried it still. thanks for the receipe
I tried this with powdered dry fruits instead of dessicated coconut. But somehow the vadis were too wet to retain shape. Should I have cooked it a little more?
First time visiting your blog. Your recipe sounds wonderful. Will try it out for sure!
Delurking to say that I tried this recipe and followed it to the ‘T’ and it came out just right! Thank you – you have a great blog going here.-Rashmi
Instead of coconut i add a mixture of cashew, badam and pistas finely powdered in the mixie. Try it will taste awesome!
it is actually 7-cup sweet, not cake
Hi,I’ve visited your blog many times but this is the first time to comment. I tried the 7 cup cake for Deepavali and it turned out very well. Thanks for the simple yet delicious recipe.Hema
I tried for Eid and it came out very well. Pursue with your task and help people cultive home made food
hi !! I tried this it was delicious but it came little chewy , can u advice on this.Nandu
I tried this last night and it came out a bit chewy like a toffee. The taste was good but. I used 3 cups of sugar. Did I take it out too soon?