Book Review - Many lives, Many Masters by Dr Brian L Weiss

I like to think of myself as a reader, who loves to curl up with a nice book and a cup of tea, eager to be led on by the book and happily resigning worldly cares for the next several hours.  However, ever since the birth of my daughter I have not had that luxury, what with being busy taking care of a very active baby and too tired to focus on the book when I get a little respite from all the chores.  With this book I went back to such an engrossed reading, completing the 16 chapters in about 30 hours, a personal feat of sorts.

I am a great believer of coincidences.  I had heard about this book a couple of years earlier and even though I had the time to read, I did not bother to get the book and start reading.  And then this week I happened to come across this book and immediately was intrigued, and till the last page was turned I was able to sustain my curiosity, primarily because of the subject matter.

It deals with reincarnations, communication in the spiritual plane etc.  This book is written by an eminent psychiatrist Dr. Weiss, who, in the course of therapy with a young patient makes some mind-blowing revelations, forcing him to question and change his well-accepted scientific views on understanding Life.  

Even though it may not be generally known, the concept of this book, i.e. reincarnation didn’t take me by surprise.  Because of my Hindu background (which believes in reincarnations of the soul, till it is finally released from such a birth and death circle and attains Moksha or "Release".  The release has to happen because the soul learns the lessons it has to learn, and if in one lifetime it is unable to do so, it takes another and then another till it finally has fulfilled its mission), I didn’t fall down from the chair in shock, the earth beneath me did not shatter when the author talked about messages being conveyed from in between births.  

To me the take home message was this: we are all busy with life, getting educated in early life, earning our living, stabilizing in our career; we get caught up in mundane existence and in the process we fail to understand our purpose for life, but all along getting rigid about our opinions and outlook: what were we put here for?  The sooner we understand and implement our learned lessons, the better it is, on a spiritual level; that would give us lasting peace.  And how do we achieve this harmony?  Only by introspection and meditation etc.

For me, on a personal level this book is momentous because I feel coming across this book now and reading it means that the time is just right for me to introspect and understand the purpose of my life, instead of shoving it under the carpet yet another time.

Sukku kaapi recipe

This is a great alternate to coffee or tea. I came across this recipe when I was looking for non-caffeinated hot beverage. Let me confess that I am great coffee-lover and if for any reason I have to avoid coffee, especially first thing in the morning, I just lose it, I am not myself, get irritable and cranky and end up spoiling my full day. So you may ask why can't I just have my coffee and get it over with, well, I am scared of taking that coffee when my OB said specifically that I needed to avoid it, don't want to jeopardize my baby with my coffee-drinking craze. So anyway here comes our sukku kaapi to the rescue. Though there is no 'kaapi' in this bevereage, having that word in the title did help me to lull myself into the false sense of security!!

Sukku (Dry ginger) powder 1/2 cup
Coriander seeds 1/4 cup
Milagu (peppercorns), jeeraham (Cumin seeds) 1/2 tsp each

Dry roast all ingredients except Ginger powder and grind.
Mix all and store in an dry, airtight container.

To make one cup 8 oz of sukku kaapi,

Boil 2 tsp of mixed powder in 2 cups of water. Add sweetener, preferably something herbal like panam kalkandu or karupaatti. If neither is available organic sugar/raw sugar works well too.

Add milk and enjoy it hot.

Mirchi ka salan

I was looking for a low key accompaniment for biryani and came across this recipe.  We always end up making cucumber raita for any kind of pulao/veg rice/biryani.  The combo is yummy and refreshing for sure, but in the way that a seasoned tongue demands more I was on the lookout for a wholesome accompaniment for rice dishes.  This fits the bill.  Apparently salan can be done from other vegetables as well (such as tomato/brinjal?) but this version is simply awesome. 


I got the recipe from this page http://www.cookingandme.com/ and of course tinkered with it a little bit.  The recipe can be found on this link: (http://www.cookingandme.com/2013/07/mirchi-ka-salan-mirchi-ka-salan-recipe.html)  The recipe here was very well presented and neat/concise instructions literally made it a cakewalk.

I used jalapenos instead of the type of mirchi recommended in this page, firstly because we love the toasted jalapenos, secondly because I only had the small green chillies with me and I am sure that would be way too spicy for us.

I omitted the jeera powder simply because I did not have it in my pantry.  Here's what I did.

I washed 5 jalapenos, wiped them dry with a paper towel, split them in half and roasted them with a tsp. of cooking oil on a tawa till they were uniform.  I could have taken out the seeds but let them be - this way the spice level was individualized - if you liked spicy you could bite into it.

On a dry pan I roasted 3 tbsp. freshly grated coconut, followed by 1 tbsp. of sesame seeds and 3 tbsp. of peeled peanuts.  This mixture toasts very easily and I had to constantly turn it around with a spoon so that they were uniformly brown.  When this cooled down I ground it into a fine paste and kept aside.

In the same pan I roasted jalapenos, I added 1 tbsp. cooking oil, added mustard and fenugreek; when mustard sputtered I added finely chopped onion (1 big onion) and curry leaves.  I added salt, turmeric, 1 tsp. of red chilly powder, 1 tbsp of coriander-chilly powder.  When onion was brown added 2 cups of water and let it simmer.  There was a nice aroma from the fenugreek seeds.  The recipe called for tamarind extract.  I have fresh tamarind, and since I had not soaked the tamarind ahead, I added an inch or so of fresh tamarind when this mixture was simmering.  We are not great fans of sweet/sour combination hence did not add the tsp. of sugar which the recipe calls for.

In a few minutes I added the ground paste and let it thicken till the desired consistency.  I added the jalapenos and let it simmer just for a minute or two.  We let it rest for about an hour. 

Since this was a super hit in my home, I "expanded" this recipe the next day by cutting the jalapenos into three or four pieces and pretty much did everything else afresh, the paste and the onions/masala etc.

The beauty of this recipe is its flexibility - your preference matters whether its the spice level or the consistency of the gravy(based on the coconut-sesame-peanut paste).  This was a reasonably simple and fun preparation. 

Rasmalai recipe

I have always been inspired yet intimidated by Rasmalai.  Inspired because of its simply divine taste and intimidated because I was under the assumption that it cannot be accomplished by amateurs like me.  Well, that has never stopped me from trying it out a couple of times; needless to say, those were culinary disasters.  Always the balls of paneer just disappeared into the water, that was it!  No more rasgullas or rasmalais for me.  What was more exasperating was the rasmalai guru would not even acknowledge such a possibility!  They would be totally oblivious to my plight and say with annoying calm, "it will puff up and float on the boiling water" as if I was imagining the paneer disappearing into the water! Whew!  

Another friend suggested using baked ricotta cheese.  This was probably a tried and tested method for her, but hey, when I tried to bake the ricotta, it ran flat and could not (and would not) get up from the baking sheet.  

Since then I have stopped wasting milk and cheese in the name of Rasmalai and resigned myself to eating store bought ones for life!

My Rasmalai destiny changed dramatically just a few days before Diwali 2014.  It was indeed divine intervention that I came across the vahchef video.

It was very clearly explained and in his customary style, he made it sound so simple.  Encouraged, I bought a little whole milk, religiously followed his recipe and made ten miniature paneer balls.  I was truly thrilled with the result!  that success spurred me to try on a bigger scale and wonder of wonders I had done my first (second, actually) batch of yummy mouth watering authentic Rasmalais!!  Yes!  that was an important day in my culinary history!

I am summarizing the recipe here, but you can get detailed instructions with video on the vahchef video on YouTube. (link provided at the end of this post)

Things I used:

1 gallon of whole milk

sugar - I used the brown variety - about 150 mg (one plastic tumbler) for boiling/steaming paneer and about the same quantity for the basandi/rabdi.

elaichi 7-10 medium ones - saved the skin for boiling purpose and used the powdered elaichi for the rabdi

pacha karpuram - just about a pinhead.

white vinegar - half tumbler diluted with water the rest of the way.

ice cubes from two trays, sieve, white cloth

On one burner I started rabdi by adding half gallon milk and one can evaporated milk and letting it evaporate.  I used a wide kadai for this purpose.

  

On another burner, I boiled milk and when it rose up, stopped heat and added the diluted vinegar.  Just about when the whey was separated, added the ice cubes.  Apparently this stops the separation further and is a crucial step to get soft dough like consistency of the paneer.

I was wondering what would happen to the ice cubes and how long I would have to wait before it can pour this into a sieve with the cloth lining.  I needn't have been concerned, the ice cubes melted almost immediately because of the heat. 

Then I tied up the paneer in the cloth and let it drain for a couple of hours.

In about an hour the rabdi had evaporated enough, I added sugar and turned off the heat a after it was completely melted.  Then added elaichi powder and camphor.  

In a couple of hours most of the water had drained.  There was still some moisture, which can be removed by rolling it in a clean kitchen towel.  This process also makes it into a soft dough.  I was able to make about 30 medium sized paneer balls.

Then I set the water boiling with sugar and water in the ratio of 1 is to 6.  I added elaichi skin to this pot.  When it started boiling, I put in about 6 balls and let it cook for 5 minutes with a covered lid.  (by this time they puffed up to double their size)  I took them onto a little bowl in which I had taken the sugar water before it reached boiling point.  Almost half way through, I added more cold water to the boiling pot to retain the sugar water ratio.  ( Apparently, this is another crucial point in rasmalai making - the water has to be boiling, and the sugar helps cook the paneer and prevents it from breaking down; and the ratio should be maintained, that's why we add water to prevent it from  thickening up in this process)

 When it was somewhat cool, I drained water slightly (about 50%) from the paneer balls (giving it the characteristic somewhat flat shape) and added them to rabdi.  Only when it soaked up the rabdi for nearly 24 hours had the rabdi had penetrated till the centre.  When we sampled it after a couple of hours of soaking, it was not quite ready then.  Then added some crushed badam and cashew for garnishing.

Vahchef youtube link:Vahchef Rasmalai then and now

Vanna Vanna pookkal - Tamil movie review

Prashanth, Vinothini and Mounica play lead roles in this love triangle. 

The good thing about this movie is there are umpteen shots of nature - snakes, monkeys, flowers, waterfalls etc  Mounica's love for Prasanth is one sided and he meets Vinothini and falls for her.  She too starts loving him but by a cruel twist of fate they cannot get married. 

Some fantastic songs and refreshing cinematography.

Garden diaries - Swiss chard

Our swiss chard's peak time was in mid to late spring.  We were able to harvest fresh large greens for our stirfry and soups.  After that the heat has been too much for this plant and its barely surviving now.

Garden diaries - Rose

A rose is the centerpiece in any garden!

This beauty came to our home just as a cutting without any leaves in early May.  Quickly leaves appeared all over in the next few weeks and two buds made their appearance in early June.  Since then there have been no flowers.  Guess we have to wait another year for the next set of flowers.