Thursday 30 June 2011

TAMARIND JAGGERY SAUCE.

This is a delicious sauce 
It can be used with curds\yogurt
Puffed rice (bhel puri)
Nachos
Chips
Bread
Whatever
Ingredients
1.    250 gms  jaggery
2.    100 gms  tamarind.
3.    a pinch of asafoetida .
4.    4tsp . of cumin seeds
5.    1 tsp of dried ginger powder.
6.    3 tsp red chilli powder.
7.    black salt 1 tsp
8.    half tsp regular salt.(optional)
Recipe
Soak the jaggery in a bowl of water for 5 hours
Soak  the tamarind in another bowl of water.’’”
Mash the tamarind and mix that water with the
liquid jaggery water.
Put the mixture of the 2 on the stove\gas   and put in
 ingredients 3,4,5,6 and 7and 8.
Boil and simmer for 15 minutes or till the mixture
thickens a little.
Strain the mixture through the soup strainer.
Bottle it when cold.
And that’s your lip smacking sauce!


Tuesday 28 June 2011

RABINDRANATH TAGORE ON GURU NANAK DEVJI'S ARTI.


Anthem of the universe by  Guru Nanak .
I came across this article in the Hindustan Times….
 Balraj Sahani an Indian actor asked the nobel laureate
Rabindranath Tagore that he had written the National Anthem
for India and could he write an international anthem for the
 whole world?To this Rabindranath replied that  it has already
been written ,not only international but for the entire universe!
In the sixteenth century by Guru Nanak.
Every evening in all the Gurudwaras after the recitation of
Rehras Sahib, arti(ceremony of light) is sung by the raagis in
Raag Dhanasri .
As legend has it ,in 1508 A.D.Guru Nanak Devji visited the
famous temple of Jagannath at Puri in Orissa,which was well known
for its arti for Lord Krishna.In the evening the priests broughtva platterfull
of many lighted lamps ,flowers ,incense and pearls and began the arti .Nanak
meanwhile spontaneously gave words to the wonderful arti which was being
hummed by nature before the invisible altar of God ,the creator of this universe:
GAGAN MEIN THAL RAV CHAND DIPAK
BANE TARIKA MANDAL JANAK MOTI
DHOOP MALYANLO PAWAN CHAWRO KARE
SAGAL BANRAYE PHULANT  JYOTI
KAISI AARTI HO-AY BHAV KHANDANA
TERI AARTI…
“The sky is the puja thaal , in which the sun and the moon are the diyas .
The stars in the contellation are jewels.
The wind laden with sandle-fragrance , is the celestial fan
All the flowering fields forests are the radiance!
What wonderful worship this is ,O destroyer of fear ,
This is you arti!”
JO TIS BHAVAI SO ARTI HO-AY.
That which pleases Him is true worship!


Monday 20 June 2011

TURMERIC THE GOLDEN SPICE!


The wonder spice helps you keep healthy!
Turmeric or Haldi adds colour flavour purity and health to life!
It prevents cholestrol oxidation and it’s high levels of
Vitamin B6 protects the heart .It strengthens and improves digestion
thereby reducing gas and bloating .Promotes healthy metabolism,
elimination of wastes and toxins ,and  weight management.It
supports healthy liver function and detoxification by increasing
bile flow and cleansing ,rejuvenating and recharging the liver
cells .It also purifies the blood!
Haldi contains curcuminoids(plant- based powerful anti-oxidant
and anti-inflamatory nutrients .)that……
1)relieve arthritis pain and stiffness.
2)inhibit cancer initiation,promotion and invasion,angiogenesis
and metasis.
3)prevent and help treat Alzheimer’s and depression.
4)add to these what you know about this yellow gold!
Using It As A Protective Shield:
Use it as a spice in cooking which we all do .
For better digestion ,eat a mixture of 1 tsp.of turmeric in
One cup of yogurt/curds right after lunch.
For relief from asthama ,allergies ,muscle aches and pains
And for anti-ageing and anti inlamatory effects boil 1 cup
Of milk with 1 tsp.of turmeric powder and drink it before
 going to sleep!
For detoxification of the blood and liver take 1 tsp.of raw turmeric
Rhizome juice mixed with honey everyday .
For superior medicinal or cosmetic results, use kasturi haldi .
which is a special aromatic haldi.
For a beautiful complexion ,and for getting rid of unwanted facial
hair ,apply a paste of turmeric and honey on the skin near bed time.
Wash off well after 5 minutes .In the morning remove any yellow
tinge if remaining with  a paste of besan (black gram powder)and
oil .
Looks like it’s a panacea of all ills!
Take the information with apinch of salt!...and do your research too!



Monday 13 June 2011

PICASSO OF INDIA:MAQBOOL FIDA HUSSAIN


I quite liked the editorial in today’s  Hindustan Times newspaper.
M.F Hussain may have inhabited India  far more passionately than most hard-boiled patriots .But towards the end of his life ,he had to suffer the  ignominy of being cast away from India because of persecution from a small but racuous section of Indian society. A writer’s \artist’s occupational hazard is that he takes the mob reacting to his work as given.However someone somewhere gets offended by one of their different strokes (that an artists paints or a writer writes) .And  more so if an artists is a high profile one like Hussain .Decrying against him and his works outside the bonds of critic’s feedback  is a sure shot platform to get one’s “ 15 minutes to fame”.It is here that the modern mature society/govrment is supposed to step in .
 A bigoted restriction of M.F Hussain’s artistic freedom that led him to a painful self imposed exile.He accepted the citizenship of Qatar ,lucky country I must say!Though India was in his being .He is India’s face every where . His work has a distinct flavour of India. One cannot just separate him from India!
The law only mumbled when the a section of people started their programmes of vandalising his work .
As a society we too backed off worried about the ‘communal din ’.
Even liberals usually at the forefront of defending the ‘freedom of expression ’ ,took a detour asking sotto voice why was he so bent on ‘shocking’ people in a country of maximum people ‘not attuned ’ to nude depictions of deities , whose places of worship are replete with such figurines!
He captured India’s expansive soul in the depictions of horses,Ganeshas,Bollywood stars ,female forms ,epics,Mother Teresa …India’s sights and sounds of the streets and roads…
India sure let him down …even towards the end what he wanted to eat most was Bombay’s Faluda!
He indeed was a genius most of his paintings impromptu sitting casually in hotels clubs etc He worked with speed very sure of his strokes to his well thought out paintings  on subjects that touched him .He was an extraordinary man who travelled the world and would visit numerous exhibitions to check out current trends.He played a pivotal role in positioning modern Indian painting nationally and internationally.
His admires ‘Fida’ on the Barefoot Maestro!!!!!

Thursday 9 June 2011

SOLAR FLARE IN THE OFFING!


Read an alarming piece of information in today’s paper.
Solar flare to affect the Earth.Size of the earth is miniscule as compared to the solar flare .
What is a  solar flare?
Solar flares are giant explosions of gas and magnetic energy that erupt from the Sun’s surface .The largest flare was recorded in 1859 that set ablaze telegraph poles all over the world!
The cloud of particles produced by the flare seems to have covered half of the Sun’s surface.
The U.S.National Weather Service says the flare unleashed a firestorm of radiation .It could disrupt satellite communicaions and power transmission.
“Material that is blasting out is gas and magnetic field combined …we are expecting some of it  to impact the Earth and create a geomagnetic storm… ”says scientist Bill Murtagh.
NASA’s solar dynamics observatory noted since the erruption was not  pointed directly at Earth ,the effects would be fairly small .
 Tsunamis ,Cyclonic Winds and what not…looks like the Earth is in the Eye of a storm!
Lets keep our fingers crossed!

Sunday 5 June 2011

ECOFEMINISM


Reading about environment and women’s concern about environment I came across this term and I referred the Wikipedia .
In 1974 the term ecofeminism was coined by Francoise d’ Eaubonne.It points to the co-existence of considerable common ground between environmentalist and women. Ecology and women ….
Some ecofeminist point to the linguists links between opression of women and land such as terms’ rape of the land’.Terms also express nature as feminine such as using the terms ‘she’ and ‘mother nature’.
Vandana Shiva an Indian activist makes it clear that one of the  missions of ecofeminism is the redefine hoe societies lookb at productivity and activity.Both women and nature have mistakenly been deemed passive allowing themselves to be ill used .e.g.she draws a picture of a stream in a forest .According to her in our  society it is perceived as unproductive ,if it is simply there ,fulfilling the needs for water for women’s families and communities  until engineers come along and tinker with it perhaps damming it and using it for generating  hydro-power.
The same is true of a forest unless it is planted with a monoculture plantation of a commercial venture.  A forest may very well be productive …protecting ground water ,creating oxygen,allowing villagers to harvest fuel and craft minerals and creating a habitat for animals that are also a valuable resource.However for many if it is not for export or contribution to G.D.P.(Gross Domestic Product)without dollar value attached to it cannot be seen as a productive resource.
Ecofeminist criticise western lifestyle choices such as consuming food that has travelled thousands of miles!
Playing sports such as golf and downhill skiing which inherently requires ecological destruction.
In their book ‘Reweaving the world’:The emergence of ecofeminism(1990) the editors Irene Diamond and Gloria .F.Orenstein lay out 3 strands in ecofeminism….One strand emphasises that social justice has to be
achieved in concert with the well-being of the earth since human life is dependent on the earth.Another strand in ecofeminism is spiritual emphasisng that earth sacred onto itself.A third strand emphasises the necessity of sustainability ..a need to learn the many ways people can walk the fine line between using the earth as a resouce while respecting the earth’s need!
Ecofeminists are  explicitly anti-war and anti-capitalist … the untold devastation of the earth by the corporate warriors and the threat of anhilation of man and eco system by military warriors ,have organised them to voice their discontent by numerous protests and activities against environmental destruction!
It’s time we all take a pledge to protect our precious earth in whatever little way we can….every little step makes a difference!
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