Jackfruit payasam — chakka payasam, and in its grandest form chakka pradhaman — is the sweet Kerala waits all year for: the short season when the fruit ripens so perfumed and honeyed that half the neighbourhood tree seems to end up in somebody’s kitchen. Ripe jackfruit, cooked down until it turns jammy, meets the deep caramel of melted jaggery and the gentle richness of coconut milk, and the result is a payasam the colour of polished teak, smelling of fruit and festival in equal measure. It is the crown of the sadya leaf, but it asks for nothing exotic — jaggery, coconut milk, cardamom, a spoonful of ghee — and it rewards the cook with a dessert that tastes like the season itself, caught in a bowl.
Ingredients
Method
- Cook the jackfruit: put the chopped bulbs in a heavy pan with the thin coconut milk (or water) and cook on medium heat for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring now and then, until the pieces are completely soft and translucent at the edges. Mash them roughly in the pan with the back of a ladle, or blend about half of them to a coarse puree and stir it back in — the nicest texture is mostly smooth with a few soft pieces of fruit still holding their shape.
- While the fruit cooks, melt the jaggery in a small pan with 1/4 cup of water, just until it dissolves into a syrup. Strain it through a fine sieve into a bowl to catch any grit or fibre, which jaggery almost always carries, and set it aside.
- Pour the strained jaggery syrup into the cooked jackfruit and stir well. Simmer on medium-low heat for 6 to 8 minutes, stirring often, until the mixture turns glossy, deepens to a rich caramel brown and thickens enough to coat the ladle — and the raw, sharp smell of the jaggery has mellowed into the fruit. This simmer is where the payasam’s flavour is built, so do not shortcut it.
- Lower the heat to the minimum and stir in the thick coconut milk. Warm the payasam through for 2 to 3 minutes, stirring, until it is steaming and unified — but do not let it come to a boil from this point. Boiling thick coconut milk can split it and turn the payasam grainy, which no amount of stirring will undo.
- Take the pan off the heat and stir in the cardamom, the dry ginger powder and the pinch of salt. Rest the payasam for at least 5 minutes before serving — it will thicken slightly as it stands, and the flavours need those minutes to settle into each other.
- For the garnish, heat the ghee (or coconut oil) in a small pan, add the coconut pieces and fry until they turn golden at the edges, then add the cashews and fry until golden, and finally the raisins until they puff. Pour the whole sizzling garnish, ghee and all, over the payasam. Serve warm, ladled into small bowls or tumblers — or serve it the sadya way, in a ladleful straight onto the banana leaf.
Notes
Taste your fruit before you sweeten. A truly ripe jackfruit is already intensely sweet and may need less jaggery, while a paler, firmer fruit will want the full amount and a minute or two of extra cooking. The jaggery is there to deepen the fruit, not to bury it.
The order matters: jackfruit and jaggery are cooked together first, thick coconut milk goes in last and never boils. Reverse the order and the coconut milk can curdle against the hot jaggery syrup.
This payasam thickens as it cools, like all coconut-milk payasams. If it has set thicker than you like by serving time, loosen it with a little warm thin coconut milk stirred in gently — not water, which dilutes the flavour.
Leftovers keep well in the fridge for up to 2 days and are excellent served chilled. For a head start in jackfruit season, some households cook the fruit down with the jaggery into a thick jam (chakka varatti) and freeze it — a few spoonfuls warmed through with coconut milk make this payasam in ten minutes, any time of year.