Sukku Vellam & Navaneetham - Krishna Janmashtami special

 Sukku Vellam and Navaneetham are two most important offerings made on Janmashtami or Gokulashtami . This year Janmashtami is on the 30th August 2021 and today we shall these two simple yet important offerings made to Krishna Kanhaiyya . 

I never thought of recording this as a blog post until a few of my friends kept asking me about these two recipes after they savored it as prasadam at my home .

It is said that if one is unable to make a huge and lavish spread of offering for Lord Krishna it is best to offer ChukkuVellam,Navaneetham and Thayir Aval (Gopalkaala) .

Most of the goodies made for Janmashtami are centered around ghee ,butter and aval (poha) as they are most loved by Krishna .

This time I plan to make Aval Ladoo from Narmadha's blog while you may want to try Poha Chiwda/Aval Mixture and Vegan Aval Payasam from my collection. 

Chukku Vellam or Sukku Vellam is a mixture of dry ginger powder and jaggery.   Needless to say ginger is very useful to aid digestion especially after eating a heavy meal . Since we normally offer a grand spread of goodies as prasad to Kutty Krishna, it is best to take one small portion of sukku vellam after the heavy indulgence.

A small folklore associated with sukku vellam which I have heard from my elders -  since Devaki was just in her post partum/delivery phase ,this ginger jaggery mix would help her in digestion. Hence it is included as part of Janmashtami special offering. 

Sukku /Chukku Vellam shouldn't be confused to a traditional drink from Kerala known as chukku vAllam which is ginger infused warm water . Vellam in Tamil is jaggery while VAllam in Malayalam means water .

 

Navaneetham is very simple but delicious prasadam made from butter .

Lord Krishna's love for milk,butter ,curd and all his pranks with the Gopikas to get hold of the fresh butter from their homes is well known and we all have loved reading those. To make navaneetham ,you have to do is mix the butter ,powdered sugar , cardamom powder and offer it to baby Nandalaala .

Some more savories which we make at home unfailingly for Janmashtami 

Uppu Seedai

Butter Murukku/Benne Murukku

Mucchore / Moong dhall Chakli / Manam Kombu

Thenguzhal 

Kodubale

Ribbon Pakoda

Ingredients 

Sukku Vellam

2 tsp dry ginger powder 

1/4 cup powdered jaggery 

1 cardamom /elaichi

1 tsp melted ghee 

Navaneetham

4 tbsp soft unsalted butter 

3 tsp powdered sugar 

1/4 tsp cardamom powder

Method

Sukku Vellam

• Pulse the ginger powder,jaggery and cardamom in the blender for a minute .
• Transfer it to a plate,add the melted ghee ,mix well and roll it into small balls .

Notes

• Donot consume more than one ball in a day as ginger has a tendency to increase body heat and may leave you feeling uneasy. 
• You can also use dried ginger (shunti) .in that case first powder the whole dried ginger in the mixie and then add the jaggery to it .

Navaneetham 

• Let the butter to soften at room temperature. 
• Mix in the powder sugar,cardamom powder with butter and offer it. 

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