450grams of chicken

2 tablespoon of yoghurt

1 packet of Maggi Tandoori Mix

Ghee

1. Marinate 450grams of chicken with 2 tablespoon of yoghurt and 1 packet of Maggi Tandoori Mix.Mix well.(I usually prepare and put the mixture in the fridge at 9.00pm night before going to bed and bake it at 6.oo in the eveing the very next day.)

2. Prepare a baking dish covered with alumium foil (to prevent the chicken from sticking).

3. Place the marinated chicken on baking dish.

4. Place a small of amount of ghee on each of the chicken. (optional)

5. Preheat oven at 180′C (for fan type oven) and bake for 30 minutes or chicken turns into golden brown.

6. Serve with Instant Kraft Roti Canai (available in supermarkets -frozen division).

Bhatoora

As I mentioned in my Kheema post, the first time I had bhatoora was in an Indian shop in Singapore. Before then I had tasted several kinds of naan. Naan is pretty popular now in North America and is now manufactured by companies like President’s Choice and Dempster’s (don’t ever buy these if you’re craving Indian breads – they probably won’t taste the way you want them to) but India offers many kinds of breads that aren’t normally offered at buffet lines (which was, at the time, the only place I had ever had naan) and are not available commercially in most Western supermarkets including bhatoora, a fluffy, deep-fried bread served often with chana masala (spiced chickpeas).

The problem with making these at home, for me, is two-fold. One, I don’t have access to a restaurant-sized deep-fryer, so I could never produce bhatoora the same size (about 8-10 inches in length, 6-8 inches wide) as a restaurant would make. Two, I’ve never been very good with yeast. Here’s the thing – I love bread. No hyperbole. However, I have attempted to make many kinds of breads at home and mostly failed. Miserably. Even this recipe needed to be modified over several preparations to get something close to what I wanted. It is not the bhatoora you’ll find in a restaurant, but it’s quick, easy, and delicious with all kinds of ghee-laced curries. I’m removing the yeast and yeast-procedures in favour of baking powder, so there’s no waiting for dough to rise, etc but this also means the bhatoora won’t inflate like a balloon as it’s supposed to. But it’s close enough and will taste pretty much the same. Making the dough and dividing it into portions takes about the same time as the oil will take to get to frying temperature. What a happy coincidence.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups white bread flour (or all-purpose white flour)
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 egg yolk (you do know how to separate eggs, right?)
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt
• 1 tbsp ghee, softened
• enough vegetable oil to cover the bottom of a wok with 1 1/2 – 2 inches of oil

Serve with: chana masala, kheema mattar

What you will need: wok or deep-frying pan, medium to large-sized mixing bowl, measuring cups and spoons, whisk, metal or wood tongs, paper-towel lined plate to drain the cooked breads

Directions:

1. Pour the oil for deep-frying into the wok and turn the burner to medium-high heat (around 6 on my dial usually does the trick)
2. In the mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, sugar, and baking powder. You’ll want to whisk this for a solid 20-30 seconds to make sure the ingredients are evenly distributed through the flour. The baking powder specifically, since baking powder is responsible for creating the fluffy air pockets in the cooked dough. Science tastes great.
3. Add the egg yolk and the yogurt and mix them into the dough using your hands. It doesn’t have to be mixed all the way through at this point – the yogurt isn’t moist enough to absorb all that flour, so on to the next step.
4. Start adding warm water 1 tbsp at a time and gently working the water into the flour with your hand. Continue doing this (it may take over 4 tbsp) until a light dough forms. This means there’s no more loose, dry flour in there (it’s all gotten damp with water) and it holds together in a little floury ball. This can be tricky for a dough-virgin, so go slow, don’t work the dough too hard, and try to have fun. If it all goes to hell, remember: there’s always next time.
5. Smear the softened ghee all over the dough. Then work the ghee into the dough with your fingers. This will make the dough ball pretty greasy, yellow and mushy, but also buttery and flavourful. After this is done, wash your hands. You’re all buttery.
6. On a clean countertop, sprinkle some loose flour onto the surface and put the dough ball on it. Separate the dough ball into 8 roughly equal-sized pieces. It doesn’t have to be perfect by any means. Then, with the palm of your hand, flatten the pieces one-by-one into rough disc shapes about 1/4 inch thick. You could using a rolling pin for this, but I prefer the rougher texture doing it by hand provides. If the dough becomes tacky while you’re doing this, dust it lightly with more flour and contine.
7. Once they’re flat, you’re ready to start deep-frying. The oil is hot by now (don’t leave it heating up longer than 15 minutes. If steps 1-6 feel like they’re taking longer than 15 minutes to finish, don’t turn the oil on at all. Wait until now to start heating the oil, and let the dough discs rest for that time) Remember that hot oil hurts a lot and that you should be really careful working anywhere near a wok full of oil that’s well within the temperature range to burn skin. Before you put the dough into the oil, try to remove any loose flour from the surface by brushing it with your hand. Loose flour will burn in the oil and you’ll end up with watery eyes and a burning sensation in about 10 minutes as the smoke circulates your kitchen.
8. Carefully slide the first bhatoora disc into the oil. Don’t just drop it, for shit’s sake. It will splash if you do that and then you’ll lose your face. Woks have angled sides, so use them. Slide it down the side into the oil.
9. These won’t take long to cook. No more than 2 minutes per side, and pull them out when both sides have browned bubbles on the surface and the edges are golden. Undercooking them is probably a bit better than overcooking them (which will dry the dough out completely), in this case. The oil will be hot enough to cook the egg almost instantly, so don’t worry about raw eggs, in any case.
10. Use the tongs to flip the discs when needed, and then remove the discs when they’re done. Put them on the plate to let the paper towels soak off the excess oil (use about 5 stacked paper towels for this)
11. Repeat until all the discs have been cooked. If they’re small you could probably do two at a time, but better safe than sorry, right?

Now you have fresh, fried Indian bread. Serve immediately with your curry.

AFLATOON – A Nourishing Winter Dessert

A Rare Baked Delight

By

VIKRAM KARVE

Here is a recipe for Aflatoon – a rich fortified sweet ideal for winter. Aflatoon is a rare baked delight.

Cooking is more a qualitative art, rather than a quantitative science.

The other day, a friend of ours dropped home a packet of scrumptious Dharwadi Pedhas.

My dear wife [who does not believe in the dictum: “There is no greater love than the love of eating”] promptly put them in the fridge and forgot about it.

Now what greater inanity can be there than consigning fresh soft flavorsome mellifluous Pedhas to harden up in some remote cold corner of the fridge?

So when I first discovered the packet of cold hard Pedhas lying hidden deep inside my fridge during one of my surreptitious midnight raids, when my better half was fast asleep, I was first miffed, then improvising, decided to soften them up in my microwave oven.

I put a piece of warm softened-up Pedha in my mouth – Lo and Behold! – The Dharwadi Pedha had metamorphosed into a Lal Peda.

Yes, it tasted like genuine Banarasi Lal Peda with its unique wholesome “crispy roasted milky taste”. Now that’s serendipity. I’ve searched for Lal Peda all over but nothing could match the authentic Lal Peda I used to enjoy near Sankat Mochan in Varanasi.

I love sweets – especially Indian Sweets – Pedhas, Barfis, Rosogulla, Gulab Jamun, Kala Jamun, Cham Cham, Sandesh, Jilebi, Imrati, Son Papdi, Mysore Pak, Petha, Mahim Halwa, Malpua, Karanji, Anarse, Chirote, Lavang Lata, Ladoos – you name it, I love it – and one of favorites is a superb wholesome treat called “Aflatoon”.

Now the only place I’ve had Aflatoon is on Mohammed Ali Road in Mumbai, at Suleman Mithaiwala near Minara Masjid, and I think also at Zam Zam a little distance down the road.

Aflatoon not only satisfies your sweet-tooth; it provides rich nourishment and is blissfully satiating too.

I’m in Pune now.

Like my search for Lal Peda, my search for Aflatoon also remained elusive, so I decided to improvise and hope for the best.

Now remember, My Dear Reader, I’m no great cook, nor am I a high-falutin connoisseur, nor a culinary expert; I’m just a simple down-to-earth trencherman, an avid foodie, so I asked around, searched around, explored, extrapolated, reverse-engineered, and here is what I improvised, a purely ingenious adventurous concocted experimental recipe.

[Try it at your own risk!].

First, with a fork, I thoroughly beat three fresh eggs till fluffy, added one cup [vati or katori] of sugar (add more if you like it sweeter) and then vigorously whisked away till all the sugar dissolved and the mixture was nice and fluffy.

I had already switched on my oven – yes, Aflatoon is a baked delight – one of the rare Indian sweets which are baked in an oven.

I rubbed pure ghee on the palms of my hands and kneaded half a kilo of fresh Khoya [khava, mawa made from buffalo milk] till it was slippery smooth.

Then I blended in and coalesced the Khoya into the feathery egg-sugar emulsion and whipped strongly with my hands till my wrists pained, and my biceps and triceps strained, and the khoya had fully dissolved and merged into the mélange and the fusion was complete, the rich blend velvety smooth.

Now in a plate, I mixed together one cup of rawa, half cup of maida, and a pinch of baking powder, and gently folded this mixture, spoon by spoon, into the egg-sugar-khoya amalgamation and robustly swirled and pasted the batter with my hands, till my hands got tired again and my muscles ached.

Here, there is no exact proportion of how much rawa- maida mixture is to be added to the batter; my hands tell me when to stop – later I can always add a bit as and when required to get the right baking consistency.

Now the interesting part – I lovingly blended in three katories or vaties [yes, three full cups – one cup per egg] of pure ghee and churned with my hands for a long time till the ghee fully dissolved into the delectable mixture, indiscernible.

Now here is the difference in sequence of ingredients – while baking a cake you start of with creaming the butter, than blend in the sugar, then eggs, then maida; here you start off with beating the eggs, then the sugar, the khoya, the rawa-maida flour, and now comes the pure ghee (clarified butter).

Hey, remember to lick your fingers from time to time and taste the delightful mélange at each stage and plus-minus the proportions accordingly.

Also, your fingers will tell you when the consistency is perfect.

That is why I never use mixers, blenders, juicers, measuring cups and all those hi-fi gadgets when preparing dough and batter for baked delights, or cooking dishes – I always rely on my own tongue to tell me the precise taste, use my hands to cream, blend, the concoction to the right consistency, improvise the ingredients and proportions accordingly – if you want to cook creatively, there is nothing to beat your own sensory perception, isn’t it?

And yes, don’t forget to use your nose too – food must be fragrant, appetizingly aromatic, besides looking deliciously mouthwatering and tempting to feel and touch!

Now I mixed in the spices – powdered jaiphal, dalchini, elaichi, lavang – and, while gently stirring with my hand, slowly poured in yummy thick creamy buffalo milk, about half a cup, till the consistency of the smooth paste becomes soft and silky, and ready for baking.

Remember to always have the rawa-maida flour ready in stand-by mode to even up the batter, if required.

Then I mix in kismis, manuka, crushed pasted khajur, squeezing my fingers.

Oh, just a minute, I thoroughly mix in a few drops of vanilla essence to make even the slightest trace of the smell of eggs go away.

Finally I embellish with crushed dry fruit like badam, pista, kaju etc.

I now pour in the rich creamy dough into pure-ghee greased baking trays and bake it in my conventional pre-heated oven at medium heat till the characteristic mouthwatering aroma wafts through the kitchen and the Aflatoons looked appetizingly brown.

With all the khoya, creamy milk and rich ingredients it sometimes takes almost an hour or so to be done. Time doesn’t matter, when cooking, as in eating, I like to be unhurried – the slower the cooking the tastier the food. I always like to keep the heat moderate and my senses, especially olfactory, alert.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating.

I was dying to sample the result of my culinary experiment, so I didn’t even wait till it cooled – Oh yes, it tasted wholesome, sumptuous, appetizing, good.

Just imagine if you fortify milk-cake with eggs, enrich it, spice it up, and roast it well – that’s the nearest I can describe how aflatoon tastes.

I wonder if aflatoon can be made by roasting it on a tawa instead of baking it!

I relished my homemade “aflatoon” – but then nothing can beat the original aflatoon for which I’ll have to head to Mumbai.

Till then, I’ll keep savoring these – I’m sure with all the pure ghee imbibed in them these aflatoons will last for days – provided I keep them hidden away from craving children and other insatiable trenchermen like me!

Dear Reader, and fellow Foodie – why don’t you too improvise, be creative, experiment, use your own ingredients and proportions, conjure up your very own aflatoon, savor it, try it out on your family and friends, and tell us all about it.

And if you happen to live in Mumbai, why take all this trouble – just go ahead and relish the original.

Happy Baking!

Dear Reader and Fellow Foodie: For more such appetizing dishes do read APPETITE FOR A STROLL, a treatise on The Art of Eating, Easy to Cook Recipes and Foodie Adventures in Pune and Mumbai.

Click the links below to know more about this delicious book:
http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Food-for-soul/358363/#

http://books.sulekha.com/book/appetite-for-a-stroll/default.htm

http://www.indiaplaza.in/finalpage.aspx?storename=books&sku=9788190690096&ct=2

http://www.flipkart.com/appetite-stroll-vikram-karve/8190690094-gw23f9mr2o

Happy Eating

VIKRAM KARVE

Copyright © Vikram Karve 2009

Vikram Karve has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

http://vikramkarve.sulekha.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/karve

Appetite for a Stroll

vikramkarve@sify.com

http://books.sulekha.com/book/appetite-for-a-stroll/default.htm

Here is a delicious spin on the classic holiday crisp.  I’m making this unique crumble for our family Christmas celebration and I can’t wait for everyone to taste this gluten-free, dairy-free holiday dessert.

Don’t have enough of any one fruit to create a crisp?  Not to worry, simply peel and slice a combination of fresh pears, plums, apricots, nectarines or peaches.  Any combination will create a deliciously sweet crumble for your holiday guests.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup sugar or stevia
• 3/4 cup GF Flour Mix
• 2 Tbsp. rice flour
• 1 tsp. dried orange peel
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• 2 cups fresh rhubarb, sliced
• 2 cups fresh Rome apples, sliced

Topping

• 3/4 rice flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• 6 Tbsp. ghee or butter substitute
• 3/4 cup rice bread crumbs or gluten free cereal
• Optional: Greek plain yogurt
• Optional: Agave nectar
• Optional: Fresh mint leaves

Directions

• Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
• Combine sugar or stevia, flours, orange peel, cinnamon and lemon juice in a small dish.  Mix this with the rhubarb slices and place into a shallow Pyrex 9 x 9 baking pan.
• For the topping, combine flour, sugar and salt.  Cut in the ghee or butter substitute.  Slowly add in bread crumbs.
• Sprinkle this mixture over rhubarb.
• Bake for 45-60 min or until lightly brown and cooked.
• Serve warm with a dollop of Greek plain yogurt, a drizzle of agave nectar and mint leaves.
• Enjoy!

Happy Holidays from The Healthy Apple!

Ghee

Ghee is a type of clarified butter. What is clarified butter? It’s regular unsalted butter that’s had all the milk solids and water removed. The butter you buy at the store is around 15% water, and you need to store it in the fridge because it will go rancid (it’s fridge-life is several months). Ghee is almost pure butterfat (no water, no milk proteins). The thing in butter that actually goes rancid are the milk solids and since they have been removed from the ghee, ghee can be stored safely for over half a year outside of the fridge (storing it in the fridge makes little or no difference depending who you ask). At room temperature it will be yellow and very soft. When heated, it’s clear. In the fridge it will be a lighter yellow and very solid (like cold butter but a bit more brittle).

Ghee is used for a lot of things, but all you need to know is that it functions like most other cooking fats and oils. You can put some in a frying pan and fry onions. You can brush it on oven breads. You can add it to rice, and so on.

A lot of Western recipes for Indian food that may have originally called for ghee to be used will ask for vegetable oil instead. I think this is because in most places, ghee is simply not available. In Toronto, however, this is not the case. Ghee can be found somewhat easily if you know where to look. For one thing, it won’t be stored in the dairy aisle. It will be with the cooking oils, or in the “international” sections of the store. I have found it in Loblaws, Metro, St. Lawrence Market and hey, there’s ghee in one of these photos from House of Spices in Kensington Market. You can also, obviously, find it just about everywhere in Gerrard St’s Little India (I love you BJ Supermarket). In short, it’s pretty easy to find, and it costs roughly the same, by weight, as butter does.

You can even make ghee yourself by slowly heating a pile of unsalted butter to about 250 F, cooking off all the water (into steam) and browning the milk solids. The solids will separate from the oil and settle on the bottom. Then you can spoon off the pure butterfat ghee into a jar, leaving the solids at the bottom of the pan. Let the ghee cool in the jar uncovered (so all steam has had a chance to escape / no water or condensation is trapped with the ghee, which will speed rancidity) then add the lid and store with your oils.

It’s not all good news, though. Ghee is basically solid saturated fat. So, if you care about things like that (you only live once, come on) you may want to space out the ghee-drenched cooking sessions a little bit.

The whole world celebrates birth days. We namboodiries observe shradh or death anniversary.

When we were living together, every month there will be some somebody’s shradh which we call chatham in Malayalam. The whole room where the ceremony is conducted has to be extra pure. Essentially it is feeding the dead man’s soul. All dishes are made in pure ghee, obtained from our cows’ milk. It is very tasty. A special dish is made by boiling sour curd and coconut gratings ground to a paste along with pepper. This pulisseri is a must and I like it. A namboodiri is invited to eat the food. He is given dakshina (money) too. After that we all eat.

Before that, a conical ball of rice mixed with ghee and black thil is given to a crow. If the crow eats it, we feel that the deceased person’s soul has eaten and is satisfied.

Now, the crow has disappeared from most villages.

On birth days, we simply make some better dishes. The hero is specially seated and offered food ceremoniously, with the “best man” seated on the right side.  As children we used to enjoy it.

Survived Day One and Zero on to Day 3.

Breakfast at Mamak stalls

Start your day with some light breakfast either in the hotel or by the streets, if you opt for the later keep an open eye for roadside stalls or mamak stalls. If you fail to locate any, then head on to Lorong Perak. This is not the greatest of mamak stalls, but I usually frequent these stalls prior to getting to work every morning back in Malaysia. Word of caution, mamak stalls can lack a little by hygene standards. Read all about it here. So approach with caution.

Batu Caves

After your breakfast. Hob onto a taxi and make your way to Batu Caves. It is rather unfortunate that you’ll be in KL in December and not 30 Jan as 30th Jan is Thaipusam. Nonetheless, it should not deter one from visiting the Batu Caves.

Spend some time exploring the area. By all means make your way up the stairs.

Lunch at Foong Foong Restaurant
613, Jalan 21. Off Jalan Merdeka in Ampang
One of my personal favourite Malaysian Chinese food is “Yong Tau Fu“. The best place to go for “Yong Tau Fu” has got to be the Foong Foong Restaurant. My understanding is that Yong Tau Fu are always stuffed with fish paste. However wikipedia suggests that it may also contain pork. So approach with caution with what you order.

Mid Valley Mega Mall

From Foong Foong restaurant, grab a taxi to the nearest Putra LRT station called Damai. You’ll be taking a pretty long LRT ride, so sit back relax and rest your legs. You want to get off at University Station. From University station, hob onto a taxi and head to Mid Valley Mega Mall. You’ll probably want to spend some time at the Mall. Catch a movie, shop around or eat more food.
Sri Paandi Banana Leaf rice
Section 11, Petaling Jaya, just off the road from Jalan Universiti.

Sri Paandi Restaurant is another of my favourites. Its and Indian restaurant that serves a variety of food. Their business acquisition skills are pretty agressive something that we could all learn i suppose.

If I were to go to Sri Paandi in the evenings, I would definitely go for the Banana Leaf rice. Alternatively, if you wish to have something light, try the Thosai. There are many variations of the Thosai. But my favourite by far is the “Ghee Thosai” as the name describes, Thosai with “lots” of Ghee. Works for me everytime. If you’re feeling a little health cautious, then go for the “Thosai Garing” which means extra crunchy Thosai. Or if you feel like having something sweet ask for the “Paper Thosai” you’ll be in for a pleasant surprise

Petaling Street

When you’re done with dinner, it’s time to head back. But before that make your way to “Petaling Street” otherwise known as “Chinatown”. You hop on a taxi or if you’re feeling adventurous, try the LRT again from Universiti station to Medan Tuanku Monorail (that’s the closest station to Petaling Street).

This is an excellent opportunity to get ripped-off. But heck that’s why we’re called tourist isn’t it? Anyway, but on your bargaining hat on and start negotiating.

Watch out for the roasted chestnuts stall dead at the center of Petaling Street. None of my trips to Petaling Street will be complete without the roasted chestnuts.

The allopathic system is the product of science.

There was the Unani system, the Acupuncture system and Indian Ayurvedic system etc. which came up automatically, after thousands of  years of experience and observation. Our doctors simply reject it. This is unfortunate, to say the least.

The recognised system treats the human body as a car or as a computer, without soft ware. Surgery is miraculously advanced. The surgeon can work wonders. But they are helpless when it comes to the mind, our soft ware for making the human computer work.

THE MIND CAN DAMAGE THE BODY.

It is like the computer virus. This can be removed by curing the mind of the virus. The importance of gold has been commented in my blog. Our babies were given gold with vashampu (vayampu) and ghee for some years. Ghee is a compulsory item in namboodiri diet. Unless it is served with a small quantity of rice, we cannot begin eating our food. Afterwards it became a farce. A strip of plantain leaf is dipped in a spoonful of ghee and hundred people served, by just shaking the leafy spatula over the rice to show that ghee has been served!

Snehapanam is a course of treatment in Keralam. Ghee is served in small quantity initially. The doze is increased slowly under medical supervision, till as much as one  hundred gms. a day. I have only heard. They say even the sweat smells of ghee! It is worth experimenting in ayurvedic hospitals.

Kizharnelli, a plant which grows in plenty, during rainy season, is the only treatment for jaundice. In the north, a special variety of sugar cane is normally given. The juice of the middle white cylinder of the plantain tree after the fruits are cut, dissolves kidney stone.

Sorry for the digression.

I was speaking of the mind.

As a computer is damaged by voltage fluctuations, our mind gets upset by emotions. Even an otherwise healthy person, may be subjected to emotional voltage disruption, inducing even suicide. Under happy surroundigs one may never even think of it.

An eighty year old namboodiri, well versed equally in Engish and Samskrutam, now helping Calicut University, in cataloguing old Samskrutam books written on palm leaves, obtained from the palace of Samoothiripad, with whom I had the good luck of travelling in car, told me one thing: if the origin of the disease is in the mind (read software) the latter should receive treatment. How wise a statement!

He told me another fact: if a floating substance is placed deep down in the sea, it will sink! Some university can experiment it. Why are dead bodies of whales etc. not floating in the seas? Are they not sinking down?

He could easily respond to my new theories in science. May He give him long life to serve the university.

The present system of dumping “mental patients” in godforsaken hospitals is a case of Human Rights Violation. We treat our animals better than the unfortunate lunatics.

Even the body of all people is not alike. In our Ayurvedic system, the patients are of three types: vatham, pitham or kapham. Some have combinations of both. So, before prescribing medicines, the doctor first decides to which type a patient belongs.The individuality of a person is taken into consideration in homoepathy too.

When it comes to mental cases, allopathy is helpless. The yoga may help in reducing tensions unavoidable in modern life. Tension can cause any number of diseases from cancer to depression.

The large number of devotees thronging the temples at Vaishnodevi,Tirupathy, Sabarimala, Guruvayoor etc. where they get only a glimpse of the Lord, after waiting indefinitely for hours, travelling for days, undergoing all sorts of hardships gladly, is a proof of the agonies of the generation of our times.

I suggest a combined approach by the varios branches of medicine, taking into account the age old wisdom of natives, including tribals, to find the Indian way as opposed to blind imitation of the West.

This morning, I saw the woman who is my absolute kitchen heroine deftly roll out the most amazing parathas. Here’s a confession — I’ve tried to make parathas, which are really rotis stuffed with stuff and fried on the griddle, with varying degrees of success. Rather, it would be more accurate to say, varying degrees of failure.

The process requires a level of skill that in my opinion comes from actually doing it for upward of 20 years. All champion paratha makers I have come across fit this bill. The younger ‘uns, not so good. Unless you are a professional chef and have already rolled out 20 years worth of parathas in a couple of years. Yes, there I’d concede you the point. But, there’s no substitute for sheer experience when it comes to coaxing gooey dough into crisp, even, no-stuffing-peeking-out, yummy parathas.

How did my heroine do it this morning? I can share the process, not the expertise.

Pull out balls of dough kneaded out of coarsely ground wheat flour and water until it is spongy if you poke it with your finger. Take one ball and roll it into a flat circle, using dry flour if it sticks to the rolling surface. Now, fill it right in the centre with a mixture of mashed potatoes, finely chopped onions and chillies, and salt, and any other spices you might find interesting. Draw up the sides of the rolled out circle so that they bunch up like a pouch with the filling inside.

Now comes the tricky part. Pat the fattened ball down and use the rolling pin to again roll it out into a circle. I can never get this step right, because the filling starts to leak out the moment the rolling pin presses down on the ball, and everything becomes a mash. The way my heroine did this was to put lots of dry flour on the board, and basically take enough dough right at the beginning so it doesn’t develop a very thin skin by the time the second roll occurs. And then, of course, there’s the 20-year-old-skill and chutzpah — you basically don’t care if some of the stuffing breaks through the skin, and just put it on the griddle with large amounts of ghee, and get the sizzle going!

FYI: If you are crazy enough to try this (without the 20 years of experience in already doing this — I know, I know, it’s a vicious circle — how do you get the experience without trying it and being bad at it), you can vary this primarily potatoes filling with crumbled cottage cheese, or finely grated cauliflower or radish, or even just onions. Serve hot with yoghurt, pickles and chutneys of your choice.

Recently I was contacted by Musselman’s Apple Sauce to create a holiday side dish using their apple sauce.  To say the least, I pretty much inhaled the complimentary 2 jars they sent to me.  Delicious is an understatement and I had a fabulous time in my new kitchen devising a holiday recipe side dish.

And the best news is that the kind folks over at Musselman’s are offering a Musselman’s Gift Basket to one of my readers. Simply leave a comment on this post with your favorite ways to eat apple sauce and I will be choosing a winner tomorrow!  Good Luck!

Basil Pumpkin Muffins

Ingredients

• 2 cups light brown sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1 cup Musselman’s Apple Sauce
• 1 1/2 cup Libby’s canned pumpkin
• 3 cups whole wheat flour or gluten-free flour
• 2 Tbsp. ground flax seeds
• 1/4 cup walnuts
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. agave nectar
• 1/4 cup fresh basil, finely chopped
• 2 tsp. cinnamon
• Dash of nutmeg
• 4 Tbsp. ghee or butter alternative
• Stevia for topping

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350°F.
• Combine ghee, agave nectar and sugar in a large bowl; beat with an electric mixer.
• Add eggs, vanilla, chopped basil, applesauce, and pumpkin to sugar mixture; mix on low speed.
• Combine all dry ingredients in a separate bowl.
• Slowly add to the wet ingredients while continuing to mix on low speed.
• Spray a muffin pan with non-stick cooking spray.
• Fill muffin pan with batter 3/4 way full.
• Sprinkle each muffin with stevia.
• Bake for 18-20 minutes. Muffins are done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Located on Gerrard in Little India, Lahore brings you Pakistani Vs. North Indian cuisine. If you seek an explosion of flavour in your mouth, and maybe somewhere else, this is the spot. Because North India is so close to Pakistan, many of the dishes have elements in common. These commonalities make for a fusion orgasm.

From the Pakistani side you are graced with various karahi’s and nihari (curries), tawa qeema mutter (minced beef w/ peas), and various kebabs and biryanis. Lahore boasts the best kebabs in Toronto. Yea I said it. Order seekh, beef, lamb or chicken kebabs, they will arrive at your table minutes later popping and sizzling with heat from the tandoor (clay oven), covered in caramelized onions and glorious seasonings. Their kebabs are so good, that I just drooled a bit into the keyboard.

From the North Indian side you are graced with the classics: Butter chicken, chicken tikka masala, channa masala (pea curry) aloo gobi (potato/cauliflower), & matter paneer (peas/cheese) just to name a few. Take my word, Lahore has some of the best butter chicken I have ever had, and I have eaten butter chicken from all over the GTA to India itself. Remember I spoke of how powerful the fusion can be? Well this dish is the perfect example of that. It arrives at your table bubbling in cast iron skillets, so silky, so rich and has a smoke infused taste. Not sure if it’s all the ghee or almond butter (2 key semi-secret ingredients to making amazing butter chicken) the tandoor or just plain love, but this BC is phenomenal. Many will argue Moti Mahal down the road has better butter chicken, but see for yourself and you be the judge. My vote remains with Lahore.

My ideal order for 4.

2 orders of Seekh Kebab (4 total)
2 orders of Lahori Beef Kebab (4)
2 Lamb Kebab Rice Sizzler.
2 Butter Chickens
1 Karahi Beef
1 Matter Paneer
4 Butter naans

After the meal I recommend grabbing a pistachio kulfi (ice cream) on your way out to cool down.

In your research of this restaurant you may find a fair amount of negative reviews; however I feel these reviews are based on individuals ordering the wrong items and one off experiences that I feel every restaurant has. If you stick close to my ideal order above, you too will catch yourself drooling into your keyboard. “Lahore Tikka House pwns kebabs and butter chicken, simply ghee-licious ” – Me

*Lahore has been under renovations for only god knows how long now. Washrooms are new and well maintained.

EAT IT

I think I’m the first woman in my family, the first generation, to not cook their kohl. I buy mine. It’s not messy to use, the fine tip gliding over the tips and edges of my eyes effortlessly. It doesn’t smudge so much. And in the 40 degree celsius heat of the Delhi summer, it doesn’t melt quite so easily. This is what I tell myself whenever I feel less of a woman for having bought my kohl. Instead of cooking it.

My grandmother, and my mother when she was interested in it, cooked their kohl on one particular night every year. It was the night of the festival of lights, Deepavali, which used to be celebrated with clay lamps until made-in-China electric lights flooded our markets and took over the business.

Celebrated on a moonless night, Deepavali was perfect for making your kohl. One, you already had the clay lamps for the deed. Second, the temperatures had turned decisively away from the mugginess of the end of the monsoon, and so your kohl had better chances of ’setting’. And three, well, I suppose the auspiciousness of Deepavali might have played on their minds too.

So, here’s what my ancestresses did every Deepavali night of their lives, once they were grown up and kohl had become sufficiently important in their scheme of things. They filled a clay lamp with pure ghee, dipped a clean cotton wick in it, and engineered some way of placing a vessel over the mouth of the flame without putting it off. At regular intervals, they peeked into the vessel and wiped away the soot that had collected in it, carefully storing it in a jar. I guess that’s why it’s called lampblack too. How much kohl you made depended on your perseverance, and how much time you got to yourself on a big festival night when the family and its relatives expected to be fed an elaborate, extensive meal by you, the woman of the home.

I’m sure women made their kohl on other nights as well, and that my mother was indulging my need for the dramatic with her once-in-a-year-we-made-it story. She did make it for me once, on a moonfull night, the ghee aromatically melting away as the wick warmed it, steadily transforming its pristine, transparent self into a sooty, dark-as-Krishna one.

When I dipped my finger into the kaajal, as we call kohl, pulled my lower lid down and tried to put it in, it made huge smears around my eyes, making me look like a raccoon.  Clearly, I had lost the art of applying homemade kaajal, along with cooking it.

One of the most potent and versatile foods in Ayurvedic cooking is ghee, made by cooking high quality butter over a low flame until the proteins and sugars cook out and water evaporates. The pure fat is left behind, fragrant and delicious; it doesn’t need to be refrigerated as the fat is fully saturated and thus cannot become rancid. Properly made ghee tastes better as it ages.

Ghee is used not only in daily cooking, helping to convey the wonderful flavors of any spices used, but is considered a vehicle for delivering medicinal herbs to every cell in the body. As the body needs fat for lubrication of the joints, moisturizing the skin from the inside, and building and maintaining the structure of the cells themselves, ghee is a perfect food from the Sacred Cow, the representative of the Divine Mother Herself, the understanding that the Creator of the Universe provides for us everything we need to maintain vibrant health the way a mother provides for her children.

Making ghee can also be a metaphor for our own lives. We put ourselves to the test (or the universe does it for us), refining and purifying our bodies and minds so that we can become the vehicle for nourishing others’ journeys. If we push ourselves too hard we will burn out and others will not find us “palatable”. If we don’t strive enough we may hold onto memories, impressions, or habits that fester and prevent us from accomplishing our full potential. With patience and full attention we can cook ourselves just enough so that the impurities are removed (still nutritious but having served their purpose) and just the Divine Healing Presence remains.

Use organic unsalted butter (if you can get raw milk butter it’s even better); cook it over a low to medium flame in a stainless steel or other high quality pot. Listen to the interesting sounds it makes as it cooks, watch the foam rise to the surface and eventually sink down to the bottom. When things quiet down and the liquid begins to turn brown, turn off the heat and allow it to cool before pouring out the ghee into a clean jar (use a strainer to make sure the sediment doesn’t end up in it).

Mix some brown sugar, raw sugar, or maple sugar and cinnamon into the sediment and spread it on toast – it’s quite nutritious and tasty! And once your ghee cools you can put the lid on the jar and either store it for a while or begin using it right away…

Writing about dal reminded me of one of the most spectacular versions of the dish I have ever eaten. Sand entangled in my hair, hot desert wind in my face, thighs turned to jelly by an enthusiastic camel ride.

No, it wasn’t romantic at all.

I was deep in the Thar desert, one of the border outposts manned by the Indian border security force. It was nothing like the pretty comfort of Jaisalmer or Jaipur, and there weren’t any ‘royals’ lurking about either, ready to help you sample the delights of their erstwhile palaces converted into ‘heritage hotels’. Just tough, leather-faced men, their skin stroked into deep ravines by the hot desert wind. And bright-smiled, multi-bangled village women who so generously offered to feed the strange woman with short, men’s hair and her gracious, graceful mother.

What they turned out was a traditional meal – dalbatichurma – actually dal, bati and churma, but often spoken all together, unpunctuated, with no breaks for breath. Dal was hot, as in chilly-hot, a kind of level of chilly until then I imagined foreigners falsely accused Indian food of having. Bati were flour dumplings, insanely tasty, and churma was a kind of flour cooked in ghee. Ghee. Loads of it. The entire meal was a feast of ghee. No wonder the dal tastes so great, my mother remarked. Even lauki will taste awesome if you put so much ghee in it, she continued, forgetting that I no longer detested the watery gourd. And had travelled quite far from the childhood dislike.

We stuffed ourselves with enough dalbatichurma that would have stood a camel in good stead for at least a month, I wildly hoping I wouldn’t store the ghee in unfortunate bulges. Later, as we lay with the wind quietening around us and the stars glittering cold and hard, reflecting on life I suddenly hit upon the reason for all the ghee – all the chillies! Of course, it is believed that the ghee helps the chillies go down smoothly, and the chillies wouldn’t taste so good without the ghee. Having worked out this vicious circle, I went to sleep with satisfaction, the sand creeping into the crevices of my eyes and tinting my dreams golden.

Two days in a row, I cooked two dals most Indians cannot buy any longer. Arhar or tur, and moong. Simple, easy to cook, nutritious, and delicious, these dals now sell at more than Rs 100/kg in my city.

This morning, it was reported that the finance minister flew into a rage in parliament when some members alleged that the government is not serious about the rise in food prices. How does he suppose the homemaker feels, with steadily diminishing options of what she could put on the table for her family, that would not just fill their stomachs but nourish them as well?

Dals are the most easily available source of proteins for millions of Indians. In a diet that is usually richer in carbs than anything else, dals provide a crucial balance. Those of us who can afford it, liven it up with a tempering of ghee in which we fry some simple spices, like cumin and asafoetida, that help digestion. Even without this tempering, or tadka, just plain salted, dals are often quite tasty. The split moong dal is part of another staple — khichdi — the one dish wonder that combines dal with rice that I have cooked on many a lean day when nothing else stocked my fridge.

If there are no dals in the market, what can I do? Or something to that effect the beleagured finance minister is reported to have said.

Where are the dals? Where did they go? And please don’t give us the b-s about hoarders or blackmarketeers — that ’70s lore won’t work any more. In any case, things become lucrative for hoarders to hoard if they are in short supply to begin with.

Birth of KPC

I have to fill up some gap in the narrative.

About two centuries ago, a girl in my kk family fell in love with a boy in Kunnathur mana (Padinjaredath, after the split into Kizhakedath and Padinjaredath). As he was a younger brother, he should not have married from his own caste; but the lovers managed to marry.

In due course, a bonny boy was born to the couple who lived in-cognito. The boy was regularly brought to the Peruvanam temple for Darshan of Eratteppan (it was recently that I knew about it. Eratta = double; there is a big lingam and a small one, side by side). The smart boy invited the attention of Ittivasu-aphan (Brother-in-law of Shaktanthampuran) who was meditating in the mandapam.

 On being asked: which is your family?

The boy said: Padinjaredath which surprised the aphan!

A boy in my family, unknown to me?

When matters were clarified, he persuaded the elder brother to bring the young family and both lived happily ……till fate ordered almost a violent implosion. My uncle (eldest) and father of the present kpc generaion hated each other, like Duryodhana and Bhima. My brother may know all about it. A separate kitchen was set up. Maternal grandmother who knew Mahabharat so well failed to intervene. Her opposite number was a simple village girl. After protracted cold war, it was decided to partition the property. Neither party had enough money to pay compensation. So they approached Raja of Travancore who purchased the house. Now some social activities are going on there.

Uncle moved to Kuttapuzha which is very fresh in my memory, as construction of the new house at Naruvakulangara was going on under the supervision of my father. There were a number of wooden vessels used to store sambar etc during feast and we used  to play in them as boats !From Kuttapuzha house we would climb the broken corner wall of the temple and collect marod- a long flat piece of baked earth used as tile-rendered waste after the temple was renovated, with manglore tiles. We would make multi storey structures with marod. Krishnammaman, of my age, was my playmate. Ma’s father married a second time to dispose of my ma’s elder sister(here was a tragedy before which ma’s fate pales into insignificance; at least, ma enjoyed brief spells of affluence and happiness) Krishnammaman was son to the second wife.

One day there was a commotion. My stepsister was running towards the fence. Maheswaran’n elder brother, who was later to be closely associated to me, was trying to come down from a bamboo tree. A thorn had pierced his eye. They took him to Nambisan’s clinic at Trichur, but could not save the eye.

School

My guru died, followed by several of his brothers, on account of some epidemic, I think. Vedic education came to an end. I wanted to go to school inspired by the fact, perhaps, that all my cousins in ma’s house went to school.

Somehow, I had a half shirt and half trouser. I changed into this new dress and approached uncle Vasudevaphn, who was working at high school at Cherpu. He was reading something at his bungalow at kottical. When he heard me, he quietly gave me a four anna coin (25 paise) and dismissed me.

I went straight to ma’s house at Naruvakulangara and requested the one-eyed Aniettan (Neelakanthan)to help me. Next day at 9 am we started for the high school, where he was studying. In front of the Karayogam School, he asked me to wait and proceeded further. At 10 the bell rang. I panicked and followed the children who went into the first standard. I sat with them on a bench. There were no desks. Ramankutty master (there male teachers were called so) must have been surprised. He did not say anything. I immensely liked the new atmosphere .The masterji drew a fine pumpkin on the blackboard which looked like a real one.

At lunch break, he gave me a form and told me to get it filled by elders. I do not remember who signed it. Perhaps my second uncle. I dutifully handed over the form to masterji.

That was the happiest day in my life! Goddess Saraswatiy must have been very pleased. My parents or anybody in my family, probably, did not know about it, until I returned on Friday evening.

Pidikaparambu

After partition of property between Vasudevaphan and our family, when we came away, we became refugees in our own village. Who would take responsibility of a young widow and her four children without any wherewithal? We were housed in an old uninhabited cottage. A faithful maidservant remained with mother even in her woes. Across the fields my brother and I would run to join our cousins who are children of Ramaphan, who happened to be patrnal great grandfather’s youngest son. Recently I happened to see the latter’s cousin, something like a character from history. I did not know that such a person ever lived. This is a peculiar nature. I never cared to know anything about anyone. Now I want to have a record of each member of our clan. Living ones are more than sixty in number.

Ramaphan’s son Unni (KRS) is only slightly elder to me. At that time, we were about thirteen. Next comes Vasudevan and Raman. Their orchard is very large and has a big pond and two or three wells. In the night we all used to sleep together.

At the Shiva temple Othootu was going on. Yajurveda would be recited every day for forty one days continuously, from morning till midnight with lunch break of an hour or so.

Morning breakfast at 8, lunch at 1p.m., evening light food at 6, and dinner at midnight .There were oil and vaka (powdered bark of a tree) and crushed leaves of hedge for shampoo (what a healthy life style !) at the temple tank for our use (only for Namboodiris) Our bath may take a long time, massaging, talking and swimming…..

Practically we children enjoyed the time.

Poor ma once woke up in the night and saw something hanging from the roof .The only light was from a small bottle lamp (filled with kerosene and fitted with a perforated lid through which a wick is inserted) She woke up the maid. It was a SNAKE, probably poisonless (Rat snake) chera, but remember that father died of snakebite !All through the night, they kept vigil lest it may harm the sleeping girls…

Thiruvallakavu temple, now famous for initiating kids into the world of letters, is only two miles from our house. People offer appam (rice powder and jaggery mixed and made into balls which are then fried in pure cows’ ghee) We walk the distance , circumventing the hill, with hardly any dwelling in that are (now there is bus service, tarred road, plenty of terrace buildings and Santa Maria School) and stray dogs with menacing looks, reach the main Trichur-Kodungallor road. At 3pm is the pooja. The appetizing fragrance of ghee diverts our attention while praying for sadbudhi (wisdom). We may eat the appam then and there.

One day a stranger appeared, wearing khaki trousers and half-sleeved shirt. He smiled at us and started talking, as if he knew us. He was hefty and well built and had leadership qualities. He organized local farmers to form a Kisan Sabha.We were easily entangled into a Balasangham.He became a hero-comrade M.N., later; a warrier also became an activist.

Our Cochin state was an independent entity, ruled by a king, area comprising of the land south of Bharatapuzha and Travancore state in the South, beyond Ernakulum district. There was demand for peoples’ representation in the administration and people were becoming politically conscious. A private road leading to a temple was closed to lower castes. They were agitating for the right to use the road. Police mercilessly beat them up. M.N. was among them. We saw him coming with several injuries. Our tender hearts melted, we gave the appams we were carrying, to comrade.

At that time I took Savithri, my sister to Vallachira School and enrolled her there. I do not remember any of our relatives visiting us. Not even maternal grandmother!

Avanavil mana had three elephants. The youngest Ramachandran became out of control and refused to come out of the temple tank. We all went to see the fun. It was spectacle worth watching. The animal was swimming and diving, sometimes only the four feet visible above water, moving from corner to corner within seconds, muddying the water, putting the mahouts to an ordeal. They taught him a lesson, after he was ultimately enticed with a bunch of plantains, beating him right and left. The poor creature was simply enjoying a dip in water. He was a waterfriend. I almost wept. Why do we not allow these forest animals their freedom?

Pazhai

Ultimately Veembur kadalayil mana adopted us and we moved to a cottage adjoining their’s, purchased from a nair family, marking the beginning of a lifelong relationship with V.B.S, my guide and mentor until I left Keralam for good.

The lady in white, my maternal grandma ,belonged to this house which was earlier located at Thalore.

 Pazhai(gone waste)

 The very name is a thrill. In the village library, I found my first novel(Translation of  “The Wreck by Tagore “), I devoured every word, like a thirsty man drinking dew drops. I was disappointed, when Kamala returned to her lawful husband, whom she had never seen! The love between her and  Romesh, the hero, was pure and devoid of selfishness. Alas, such love wilts under the heat of married life!

There was an ashram of Vivekananda Mission, near the river (now under RSS).The plot was donated by maternal grandma’s uncle. The library had children’s English books which I greedily read, though half the words were unknown to me.

VBS’s cousins and their children, my maternal uncles and occasionally, politicians used to frequent the VK house and, in short, a certain intellectual air prevailed there, very stimulating and invigorating. There, I learned the basics of Marxism. Gorky’s books were a favourite. Ralph Fox, Steinbeck, Howard Fast etc. were too familiar, even though, Trotsky’s autobiography was read only recently in Dyal Singh Library (he was unjustly maligned by Stalinists. He was a genius of the rank of Lenin, M.N.Roy, Mao etc).

Last night, instead of heating up my Turkey Day leftovers…I decided to whip up a tasty cauliflower soup with crunchy gluten-free croutons.  The vegetable stand on my corner had the most beautiful heads of cauliflower this morning on my way to work and I simply couldn’t resist…

Ingredients

• 3 Tbsp.olive oil
• 1 onion, sliced
• 3 cloves garlic, sliced
• 2 heads cauliflower, cut into florets
• 1 Tbsp. agave nectar
• Dash of cinnamon
• Dash of red pepper flakes
• ½ cup white wine
• 1½ quarts vegetable stock
• 4 thyme leaves
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 cup Greek plain yogurt
• 2 Tbsp. white balsamic vinegar
• Sea salt and fresh ground pepper, to taste

Toppings

• 2 cups gluten free bread, cut into cubes
• 1 cup reserved cauliflower, cut into florets
• ¼ cup golden raisins
• 4 Tbsp. ghee

Directions

• In a large saucepan or soup pot, heat the oil over moderate heat. Add the onions and garlic and cook until translucent, about 5 minutes.
• Add the cauliflower; set aside 1 cup for the topping.
• Season with sea salt, pepper, cinnamon and pepper flakes and cook for 5 minutes longer. Add the white wine and enough vegetable stock to cover the cauliflower; add the thyme and bay leaves. Cover and simmer until the cauliflower. Discard the bay leaves and remove 2 cups of the cooking liquid to set aside.
• In a blender, puree the cauliflower mixture a little bit at a time. Add the reserved cooking liquid as needed if the mixture is too thick.
• After pureeing, return mixture to a clean pot and cook over low heat. Stir in the ghee and Greek yogurt, then adjust seasonings.
• For the topping, melt the ghee over medium heat in a skillet. As it starts to brown, add the bread cubes and gently toss. Season with sea salt and pepper.
• Add the cauliflower and cook until bread is crispy and cauliflower is soft, then add the golden raisins.
• Serve warm with the crouton mixture topping.

(Clears Throat)

Ya Know, I was just Thinking — “My opinion on Money as been ALLL messed up virtuAlly my entire Life.”   I have never hated Money, and I actuAlly have almost always respected Money, however, recently I have been Seeing Money as a prison, a farce, a distraction.   Ever since I Became a “Spiritual” man.   I AM Now almost entirely finished reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad for my First time.   I say my First time, Because I AM going to read Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki many times in my Life — I AM SURE.   Why???   Because Rich Dad, Poor Dad is a great book!!!   Thanks to Me reading my Rich Dad, Poor Dad book, I have been awoken from my retarded ass irrational Belief about Money — ever since I Became a “Spiritual” man, that is. I Love Money.   And I AM Now UNafraid of yet another thing — and that is, speaking yet another One of my TRUTHS.   I LOVE MONEY!!!   One more time — I LOOOOOOVE MONEYYYYYY!!!!!!   And You are a Broke Liar if You Believe Money is bad.

Money is Not bad.   Money is empty.   Money is neutral.   Money is a tool…in fact, Money is a universal tool.   Tools are Not inherently bad or good or anything for that matter.   Tools … just …  ARE what they ARE.   Period. Here I AM Thinking that Now that Because I AM “Spiritual”, I do Not focus on Money, nooo, Money is a trap, Money is the root of All evil, Money is THEE anti-”Spiritual”.   Forget that.   You Know what Money is???   Get ready Because You are going to Be using and Hearing what I AM about to say for years to come.   Ready?!?!?!

MONEY      IS      WILL      POWER      IN      FORM.

Got it?!!

SpirituAllity is Nothing but developing your inner “Money” Source.   The Source that does Not run out.   “SpirituAllity” is developing your ability to Become YOUR OWN FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM — — — Creating “Money” i.e. — Choices, Free Will, Capability — — — OUT OF THIN  — FREAKIN —- AIR —— also Known as — THE VOID. Get this.   “SpirituAllity” & “MateriAllity” are Two so-called “opposite” masks on the SAME FACE.   NIETHER of them is Real.   BUT!!! “SpirituAllity” is RealER. Why???   Because SpirituAllity is Always Here.   SpirituAllity is the relatively invisible Source from which All relatively visible ‘Things’ are Formed.   Thought.   Emotion.   Imagination. — — —      — — —      — — — Books.   Speeches.   Cities.   Spiritual Always comes first AND material is Always on it’s way OUT of existence.   Once Spirit Becomes matter, it is in its latest cycles of growth and therefore is inching closer and ever closer to Death — return to Spirit.   The more material anything Becomes, the more immaterial that thing Becomes.   Cycles necessitate paradox.

So Spirit is just the better Form of Choice, Freedom and Will Power.   Why???   Because Spirit is the Source, which means that Spirit gets first dibs, Spirit runs out last and Spirit is Always fresh (i.e. “Present”).   Money is the Form Form of Choice, Freedom and Will Power & Spirit is the Formless Form of Choice, Freedom and Will Power.   That’s it.   Also, Money is the dependent Way do achieve greater and ever greater Free Will.   You must depend on something outside of You in Order to receive your Money……UNLESS……YOU are a Central Bank of the sort that can and does CREATE its OWN Money — THEN, THAT is the closest that You could EVER get to Spirit on the ‘Material’ Plane.   THAT is Material magic — pulling from The VOID — like a Shaman, Magus or New Age Manifestation SUPER Expert.

In conclusion, let Me TELL YOU that your Belief about Money is trash, UNless You Love Money ALMOST as much as You Love your Soul.   Why are You broke???   ARE You broke???   Why are You living from paycheck to paycheck to paycheck like a dog chasing its own tale???   Because Money is “bad” ???   Because “I Don’t Care about Money” ???   Because You are lying out your ass??? HINT: Always go for the Number 3.   Where on Earth did you LEARN about Money???   DID You learn about Money???   Where could You possibly have gotten your Self-sabotaging, insane, delusional Beliefs about Money???   Probably School.   Probably University.   Probably Society.   Probably Parents.   Probably stupid dumb ass poor ass “UNlucky” helpless broke folk that You are foolishly emulating.   Our gap between Rich and errrBody else is is widening like a Mother’s vagina during delivery.   That’s wide, dude.   EVERYTHING around You costs Money.   EVERYTHING. SO DO YOU THINK THAT IT IS TIME TO LEARN ABOUT MONEY AND START LIVING AS THE RICH FOOL THAT YOU DREAM ABOUT???   “Hell Yeah!!!!!!”, says my other Self.

So where o where do we start.   Well how bout, somewhere other than — FORMAL EDUCATION.   YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO LEARN HOW TO BE FINANCIALLY IN-DEPENDENT IN SCHOOL.   YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO LEARN HOW TO BE EXCEEDINGLY FINANCIALLY OUT-DEPENDENT IN SCHOOL.      Duh!!!      FinanciAlly in-dependent people with Minds capable of critical analysis and financial genius are PLAGUE to their Slave-Masters.   Thus, KILL THEIR SPIRITUAL WILL POWER FIRST — — — THENNN KILL THEIR MATERIAL WILL POWER SECOND (that Way they NEVER tap into their capacity for Infinite IN-dependence).   Perfect Plan.   And everyBody around You, except for those “special” few (few = 3), canNot THINK for themselves, canNot PAY for themselves, and canNot BE for themselves — — — just to have what they deserve, desire and are thus, destined to realize … … … but destiny can last forever, and Infinity is a pretty long time to Be patient, passive and imPerfect.

Just research.   Search for Financial Truth.

1)   DEFINE your financial goal.

2)   SEEK your financial goal.

3)   ENJOY your financial goal.

Simple.

Also, what I AM about to say is somewhat UNrelated to my most recent points, but this is just wunuh dem thangs that is pissin Me off Because it is just so stupid.   I AM a Salesman.   “Oooooo, Run AWay!!!   Ahhhhhh!!!!!!   Fuck You!!!   You HEARTless lying crook!!!   You scumbag!!!”   Yeah, yeah, yeah, Why don’t You go sleep in your empty bank account…and Trust Me, it only takes One Per Cent more than Ten Per Cent of us to take out All of our Money from our bank accounts and You would See just how empty your bank account REALLY is.   Regardless, I AM a SalesMAN.   People EXPECT and most importantly, people “KNOW” that I AM only interested in their Money and would sell them their own feces if I could.   People Know that I do Not really Believe in what I sell — “Sales people are Hustlers, don’t You “Know” that??????“   Wrong!!!   Hustlers are Hustlers.   Sales people do what got You everything that You own and everything around You…UNless You were stupid enough to get tricked by a Hustler, which happens to ALL of us — it’s Name is GOVERNMENT, & HEALTHCARE & PHARMACEUTICAL DRUG DEALERS.

Let Me tell You somethin.   If You and your people that YOU Know, would apply your  Same principles about Money and anything from a Sales person Being a mixture for INSTANT Say-tanic ‘Conflict of Interest’, then y’All would Not Trust … …. …

1. POLITICIANS — (“Trust” Sales Person)
2. FOOD & DRINK SUPPLIERS & PRODUCERS — (“Energy” Sales Person)
3. TOBACCO INDUSTRY — (“False Inner Peace” Sales Person)
4. MUSICIANS — (“Sound” Sales Person)
5. PHARMACEUTICAL CORPORATIONS — (Mutha F**k*n “DRUG Dealers” — “Lack of Inner Strength” Sales Person)
6. DOCTORS — (“Health” Sales Person)
7. EMPLOYERS — (“Carrot On A Stick” Sales Person)
8. SOCIETY — (“Identity” Sales Person)
9. ‘NEWS’ MEDIUMS — (“InFormation/Thought” Sales Person)
10. BANKS — (Insatiable Loan Sharks — “Credit, i.e. Empty Confidence” Sales Person)
11. CHILDREN’S MEDIA — (Toys, Cartoons, Movies… — “Kick ‘Em While They’re Down” Sales Person)
12. UNIVERSITY — (“Good Employee/Slave Mentality” Sales Person)
13. MILITARY & POLICE — (“Fight for Peace” & “Security” Sales Person)
14. WOMEN — (“Look at Me, Look at Me, Don’t Look at Me!” Sales Person)
15. YOUR SELF — (“Competition” Sales Person)

See what I mean???   Hahahahahahahahaha.

AnyWay, take that smile on your face and brighten someBody’s day with it.   Learn how to achieve, maintain and expand your financial in-dependence.   Remember how to achieve, maintain and expand your Spiritual in-dependence, i.e. DUST OF YOUR FREE WILL and Be easy.   Live YOUR most Perfect Life, so that You don’t project your discontent on your environment and perpetuate UNnecessary dis-ease resulting from Self-sabotage and foolish Ignorance of Self-Reflection.

“If another ‘I’ can See something in You that You canNot See in yourSelf — — — — — — You got work to do.“

— Me, mutha$^#%@

I AM posting SIX of my best Sources of Financial Consciousness at my bottom.

Thank You,

In the NAME of my BALANCE, the WORD of my LOVE,

Jelani Asar

Void) THIS is how IIIIII make Money.   ONE Way, that I make my Money.   I SELL OxySilver.   Join with Me and Sell Life-Saving and Sustaining Solutions to non-Super Success!!!   OxySilver is the MOST AMAZING supplement that exists outside of You, (and thus, is based on a System of out-dependence,) THAT I HAVE FOUND THUS FAR — and I AM a DEVOTED researcher and Mind-Body-Spirit NUT.

I ALSO make my Money by Writing my Blogs, Writing my Freelance Articles and Writing my Book on … … … You guessed it … Mind-Body-Spirit — FREEDOM & SECURITY & BLISS. I also have Created my very own GOURMET Cookie company Named — Jelani’s Signature Gourmet Cookies — look out for Jelani’s Signature Gourmet Cookies over (y)our Holidays!!!   I AM still developing my website to Perfection, however, I can certainly direct You to my Business Partner —Mr. Kevin “Delicious Delights & Catered Cakes” Ashford’s — Website — http://www.cateredcakes.com/home.cfm?view=main&link=3. Just so You Know, I bake my cookies with my finest glorious golden Ghee (look it up if You are UNfamiliar with “Ghee” — Ghee is our greatest and most UNIVERSALLY beneficial OIL – ON OUR PLANET.   See if I AM lying.) , my Honey, my Agave Nectar, my Natural& Organic Ingredients and my Love, and my FREE SPIRIT —— All for You babay. I AM ready to grace, add to or SAVE your “Thanks Giving.”   I give Thanks to You.

LOOK into OxySilver and You can See what I AM All about — — — OxySilver — — — by Dr. Leonard Horowitz, Mr. Jelani Asar DuBois Snipes & Mrs. Healthy World LLC — MY Homesite — www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

People with RICHES in their EYE do Not ally with poor products, of any sort.   See Why I chose OxySilver as ONE of my THREE main means of Cash Flow generation.   Thank You.   — www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

1)   Great Intro to Thinking like the RICH B**CH that You are destined to Become — — — Rich Dad, Poor Dad — — — by Mr. Robert T. Kiyosaki — Amazon.com — http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_0_7?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=rich+dad+poor+dad&x=0&y=0&sprefix=rich+da

2)   Great Way to dissolving your Beliefs that make You AFRAID of Money instead of IN LOVE with your Money — — — Breaking The Money Barriers (and Workbook) — — — by Dr. Michael J. Duckett — Amazon.com — http://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Money-Barriers-Michael-Duckett/dp/0966810708/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1258298173&sr=1-1

THREE)   Great Way to Know how You get when You get Money and property in your hands and how HIGH You get off Money — — — Monopoly — — — by The Parker Brothers — GameHouse.com – Computer Ed. — http://www.gamehouse.com/mac-games/macintosh-monopoly-here-now-edition

4)   Great Way to really really really LEARN how You and your BeLoved MONEY treat each other as You play this Game of Life and do your best to fly aWay from ‘The Rat Race’ — — — CashFlow 101: How to Get Out of The Rat Race — by Mr. Robert T. Kiyosaki & his Wifey — Homesite — http://www.cashflowboardgame.com/

5)   BEST Way to Know the TRUTH about Money, Banking and World Government — — — The Creature from Jekyll Island & (Book & Seminar) — — — by Mr. Edward G. Griffin — Homesites — (Book) – http://www.realityzone.com/creature.html — — — (Seminar) – http://www.realityzone.com/cr4.html

SIX)   Hardcore Truth about Money, but DO NOT allow these Words and Sounds and scenes to draw You back into your conditioned Money hole.   Number 5 and Number SIX reMind You that everything, even Money is Illusory and ULTIMATELY Not Real, which is Why I AM posting this Knowledge LAST.   HOWEVER, regardless of how “UNReal” Money is, it is God on your “Material” plane, REMEMBER THAT — — — What Is Money? — — — by Mr. David Icke — YouTube — 

Void) THIS is how IIIIII make Money.   ONE Way, that I make my Money.   I SELL OxySilver.   Join with Me and Sell Life-Saving and Sustaining Solutions to non-Super Success!!!   OxySilver is the MOST AMAZING supplement that exists outside of You,( and thus, is based on a System of out-dependence,) THAT I HAVE FOUND THUS FAR — and I AM a DEVOTED researcher and Mind-Body-Spirit NUT.

I ALSO make my Money by Writing my Blogs, Writing my Freelance Articles and Writing my Book on … … … You guessed it … Mind-Body-Spirit — FREEDOM & SECURITY & BLISS. I also have Created my very own GOURMET Cookie company Named — Jelani’s Signature Gourmet Cookies — look out for Jelani’s Signature Gourmet Cookies over (y)our Holidays!!!   I AM still developing my website to Perfection, however, I can certainly direct You to my Business Partner — Mr. Kevin “Delicious Delights & Catered Cakes” Ashford’s — Website — http://www.cateredcakes.com/home.cfm?view=main&link=3 — — — Click on the sub-title — “Specialty & Gourmet Desserts” under the “Menu” title. I bake my cookies with my finest glorious golden Ghee (look it up if You are UNfamiliar with “Ghee” — Ghee is our greatest and most UNIVERSALLY beneficial OIL – ON OUR PLANET.   See if I AM lying.) , Honey, Agave Nectar, Natural& Organic Ingredients and my Love, and my FREE SPIRIT —— All for You babay. I AM ready to grace, add too or SAVE your “Thanks Giving.”   I give Thanks to You.

LOOK into OxySilver and You can See what I AM All about — — — OxySilver — — — by Dr. Leonard Horowitz, Mr. Jelani Asar DuBois Snipes & Mrs. Healthy World LLC — MY Homesite — www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

People with RICHES in their EYE do Not ally with poor products, of any sort.   See Why I chose OxySilver as ONE of my THREE main means of Cash Flow generation.   Thank You.   — www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

www.OXYSILVER.com/1319

Freebee (Numer-ology – Our Study of  Letters & NUMBERS):

M – O – N – E – Y

M = 4

O = 6

N = 5

E = 5

Y = 7

MONEY = 4 + 6 + 5 + 5 + 7 = 27

27 = 2 + 7 = 9

MONEY = 9 =Universal Service

REMEMBER That.

The elders in the village tell us, that the river was full of sand, when they were dhildren. In  summer, they used to dig the sand, about two feet deep, and find enough water for taking bath. Today there is hardly any sand left. 
The river bed is a rather steep gradient, causing swift flow of water , suddenly appearing and pushing violently, every thing in its way.

Once, three brahmins went to the village, not far on the opposite bank of the river, to attend a marriage or so. There was no water in the river.On their return, in the afternoon, carrying papadam, ripe bananas and chips etc. with them in a bath towel, as was their habit, they saw some flow in the river , but thought they could cross it, before the water level rose higher. As they shuffled across, through the sand , their movement was hampered by the flow of water, which started rising every second. When the level reached their waiste, they began to stumble and fall. Somehow, two of them managed to make it, but the last man was carried away by the current. His body was located a few miles down the river, after the flash floods retreated. There is a saying: don’t cross the river if you see clouds in the sky! Every year, the river claims a few lives.
Sudhir was very popular in the village. He was managing his work in in the photo studio well and his boss, the owner, was very pleased.
One day, during lunch break, the other workers were seeing some blue film. Sudhir objected. When they ignored him, he told the owner, when the latter returned. The workers were reprimanded severely.There after, they threatened  to throw him out of the studio.

One morning, when he reached the studio for opening it, he saw a lemon and some items used for black magic and he became restless. We took him to Poomkudil, where they treat mental cases in their own traditional way. They gave some madicated ghee etc.
Afterwards when his condition became worse, he refused to go to work. Then we took him to Kolancherry Hospital, where  a Namboodiri doctor has a reputation for treating such cases. I alone went with him as he was irritated by his mother’s presence.
First we camped at Mangalapilly Narayanan’s house at Kalady, as I was not confident of handling him alone. Narayanan is my niece’s  husband, working in the Bank of India. He is a hard working intelligent guy, starting his career as a bus condutor, and reaching to top level managment in the bank.
 He came with us to the hospital and did all formalities, of which I am somewhat scared. After a week or so, I brought my wife. Sudhir was extremely pleased and told every body: my mother.
There were many families like ours for company. But the food was unpalatable. Brahmins’ restaurants are very popular in our area.

While we were at Kalady we saw the original home of Adi Sankaracharya, on the bank of the River Periar, where great seer was caught by a crocodile, when he was but a child. The boy exrated his mother’s consent for him to become a sanyasi, while still in the animalis clutches. She agreed and the crocodile left him. Her  name was Sharada. The place where she was cremated is a math now.
There is a Krishna temple near by.