Helloooo friends!  Ttoday’s recipe is nuts!  But not just any nuts.  These are devilled cashew nuts and damn they are the tastiest, most more-ish little morsels around!

The recipe for my devilled cashew nuts is based on a recipe from The Daily News Cookery Book.  First published in 1929, this book is probably the book of Sri Lankan cooking.  It’s also bonkers in parts.  I have two copies of the Daily News Cookery book – one that was given to my mum as a wedding present and a new version that I bought in Sri Lanka a few years ago.  I would have loved to do a Julia and Julia cook through of this book but there are ingredients I would not be able to get hold of and some of the measurements are based on weird Sri Lankan things that no longer exist.  Chhudu anyone?  So I might take you all on a limited express  rather than a stopping all stations journey through this book.  

These devilled cashew nuts ( or cadjunuts as Sri Lankans call them) are relatively straightforward to make so are a good introduction to this book.  

They are also a  great little snack, but when combined with a beverage?  PER-FEC-TION!!!  😍

Here is the recipe from the Daily News. 

The recipe calls for ground saffron.  I tried to do this but I only had a small bit of saffron and it just disappeared into nothing while I was  grinding it.   So, what I did was to soak the saffron in a small dish of warm water and then, after about 20 minutes, I tipped the saffrony flavoured water over the nuts.   I’m sure this activated them or some such too.  I let them soak in the saffron water for about 4 hours then tipped them onto a sheet of paper towels and let them dry for around the same amount of time. 

Once dry, I rubbed in salt and cayenne pepper and then followed the recipe to cook them.  If you were in a hurry, you could grind the saffron as per the recipe or leave it out. 

The smell of the toasting cashews was heavenly!

And eating them still warm from the pan was a moment of pure joy!  It was hard to save some for my cocktail but, it was going to be a long while between drinks as I am doing dry February so I did my best to save a few for the sipping. And it was worth it!

Match made in heaven!  

I’ll post the cocktail recipe separately but damn it was good too!

These Devilled Cashew Nuts are so easy to make and definitely something you’ll go nuts for

Enjoy!

And have a great week,