Ek din Zindagi ke naam

It was planned that I would be in Delhi during the weekend of 21-22June. Then Husband dropped the bomb that he would be working full day on Saturday 21st June. Now that's wrong. What do I do in Delhi on a hot summer Saturday in June? As a blessing from the skies there landed a mail from IndiBlogger in my inbox informing about a interactive session with the team of the new Channel which was to be started from Monday. Zindagi from the family of Zee. The uniqueness of this channel - It will show some wonderful stories from across the border; from Pakistan. This meet was to be held in both Mumbai and Delhi simultaneously.Howzzat. In Delhi the venue was Taj Palace hotel in Man Singh road.

I registered myself for Delhi meet. Even though I was slightly apprehensive at first as I didn't know anyone in Delhi whereas in Mumbai many of my blogger friends would have attended. But then it reminded me of the day when I went for my first IndiBlogger meet without knowing anyone and now I have some really lovely bunch of fellow bloggers as friends.

The event started a little late. But please donot let that dampen your spirits. We were connected with the bloggers in Mumbai by a huge screen. Nihal, from IndiBlogger Delhi and Anoop from Mumbai did a wonderful job of connecting the bloggers from both the cities. There was a fun debate. The perennial debate between Delhiwale and Mumbaikars.
Q.Which city has the best public transport? ; Which city has more number of good looking men; Which city has the best weather.
Both Delhi and Mumbai came up with interesting details in support of their respective cities. All the while everyone had loads of fun. I, for one, a Mumbaikar sitting amidst Delhiwalon was having a good laugh.
Then came the creative head of Zee Zindagi TV and came along with her one of the lead actors from Pakistan Imran Abbas.   We all can surely hear the loud welcoming given to them all the way Delhi. Also joined us on the screen was Ms. Sultana Siddiqui. A very respected and well known TV producer and director. It was really wonderful to hear them talk about the life and the stories inspired by life in our neighborhood country with whom we share a bitter sweet relationship. Imran Abbas sang " Dharti sunehri" from Veer Zara which said so much of both the countries. While looking at the promos of the serials from Pakistan, one thing which I find heart warming is that we are so strikingly similar. They just look, talk , walk, wear, eat just like the way we do. There was no need of dubbing the serials because we speak the same language.

Few weeks ago I had the opportunity to watch a very wonderful little film called " Filmistaan" There the protagonist Sunny Arora who got kidnapped by terrorists by mistake and has been kept a hostage in one of the villages there says " Kaisa pata chalta ke Pakistan main hoon. Ghar, rehna, khana sab same hai" ( How would I know that I was in Pakistan. The homes, living, food everything is same)
That's what I felt when I saw the promos of the serials from across the border. Everything is same!

Zindagi comes with the message of Joday Dilon Ko - to unite the hearts.I hope Zindagi manages to bring a "Aman Ki Aasha " between the two countries and unite the hearts someday.

Another reason to watch the channel and serials : they end in 25-26 episodes. Beat that!!


 

Being A Global Vegetarian

I admit I am not a Vegetarian. I love fish specifically river fish. I am from Assam where fish is considered a " regular vegetable" to have with either lunch or dinner every day. Besides that, I love Chicken and Duck too. Red meat I have to avoid because of my health reasons. Having said that, I also admit that I do not consider people who donot eat fish and meat as a bunch of losers. I respect their food choice and I expect everyone to respect mine.

My kitchen experiments have not been limited only to Non Vegetarians dishes. Proof - All links in my page " My Experiments in the Kitchen " Last week I got hold of the book " The Global Vegetarian " published in India by Body and Soul Books of Leadstart . The book is a compilation of Vegetarian dishes from across the Globe by 3 enthusiastic ladies -  Mridu Shailaj Thanki , Juhee Prabha Rathor and Vandana Shailaj Thanki. As mentioned in the gist outside of the book - " This book brings together international flavours, foods, and cooking techniques , culled from the world travels of the three authors and their passionate interest in gastronomy , one of the finest spices of life....This vegetarian collection of delicious dishes is an integral part of the mainstream, culinary experience."


The Global Vegetarian

In the Introduction of the book the authors provide a glimpse into what to expect as one turns the pages. They very honestly admit that the book " provides neither an extensive nor an exhaustive list of vegetarian recipes. It is simply a selection of dishes we consider an appropriate reflection of various places and people,and the food they relish, as we have come to do" The recipes can be placed in 3 categories.

1. Travelogue recipe
2.Recipes from our doorstep
3.Recipes of creative imagination

For anyone who goes through the book and find the ingredients unfamiliar and hence hesitate to try it out, please do not worry. The book provides the Techniques and has a list of Tips & Suggestions. This sure helps amateurs like me. They even have listed a glossary on select ingredients. This helped me in finding out what was required or atleast the close substitute.

I have started with one recipe at a time from this book. Today I have made ShakShuka for breakfast. This is a popular dish in the Mediterranean, parts of Middle East and some North African countries. Shakshuka is eggs in a savoury tomato sauce.

Here is the simple recipe for you.

INGREDIENTS :

1 each of red and yellow capsicum, finely chopped.
1 small onion finely chopped
4 - 6 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
3 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 tsp sugar
A small bunch of parsley, finely chopped
1 tsp paprika
200 gms canned tomatoes, chopped.
2 -3 eggs
Salt as per taste
Feta cheese ( optional)

METHOD:

Warm the oil in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Add the onions, peppers and garlic and sauté until they are soft but not brown
Add in the chopped tomatoes, paprika, salt and sugar. Stir and then simmer over low medium heat for10 - 15 mins. Stir occasionally until the mixture becomes a thick but still runny sauce.
with the back of a spoon, create a couple of shallow dips in the sauce and crack the eggs in to the dips. Do not stir. Cook and cover for 4 min, until the egg yolk become semi - firm.
Remove from heat, sprinkle with parsley and feta cheese ( if using) Serve with either some crusty bread or warmed pitta pieces.

That's my version without the greens..sorry but I didn't have any parsley or coriander in the my fridge today!

My version of Shakshuka

Although I would have loved had there been actual images of the dishes prepared rather than illustrations,  I do not miss them while going through the recipe. In a way it eased me off the tension of matching the perfect photograph of the final dish.

I will surely be trying out many dishes from the book. I will keep sharing them in my blog.

Priced at Rs. 399, this book will surely help you, if you love to experiment with Global cuisine in your kitchen.
 

Raw Mango Juice / Aam Panna

This year the heat is getting unbearable. I think I say that every year! But this summer Mumbai is turning to a furnace. In my endeavor of avoiding bottled juices and any kind of aerated drinks, I had to stick to Nimbu paani. Other juices like water melon,mausambi etc need time prepare. Lazy me , peeling, cutting, swicthing on the juicer every time I want to have a glass of Water Melon juice seem too much. I would prefer something which can be stored for atleast 4 - 5 days. So oneday I decided to try Aam Panna or raw mango juice. This one is one of my favourite summer drinks too.

I checked with one of my colleague how she makes Aam Panna at home. She shared the recipe of her mother. I tried the same. Trust me it is easy to prepare and tastes super.

Here's the recipe :

One kilo Raw Mango - I got 2 big sized Mangoes weighing a kilo.

2 Cups of Sugar or same amount of jaggery.

One table spoon of salt.

50 gm black pepper

20 gm cumin seeds

Few mint leaves.

Wash the mangoes thoroughly. Put them in the pressure cooker and cook till 2 whistles. Let them cool.

Dry roast the cumin seeds and black pepper for 3-5 mins.Crush them in a mortar using the pestle or you can give a quick whirl in the mixer too.

Now back to the cooled and boiled mangoes. Scrape the mango pulp completely. Mix the sugar or jaggery and salt into this and mix well with a spoon.

Put this mixture into the blender, pour a cup of water, put the mint leaves and whirl into a smooth paste. Mix the spice mixture of cumin seeds and black pepper in this and give another quick whirl making it even a finer paste. Taadaa..your aam panna is ready.

Dissolve 3-4 tea spoon of aam panna with into a glass of water and enjoy the cool drink completely chilled.

The Chilled Glass of Aam Panna

Alternatively , if there is anyone in the family with sugar and jaggery restrictions, dont add either. Later while preparing one glass, a tea spoon of sugar can be added into the water always.

 


The Dove Play Date

The time was set for 3.30pm; the venue JW Marriott; the date 11th May and The Event - A play date with Dove for the bloggers. Organised by Dove and Indiblogger. Fun part - Its ONLY for girls!!

So there I was along with 100+ other beautiful women bloggers, all in whites; different shades of it!! Few of the bloggers were flown in to Mumbai by indiblogger team from other cities like Kolkata, Indore, Delhi too. That's so cool. I even got to tweet from the Dove official handle too.

The event started with registration and we were handed over the itinerary and a ribbon mentioning team numbers. I along with 2 of the lovely ladies whom I had just met there got the same Green coloured ribbon with Team 1 mentioned.At least we knew 3 of the members of Team 1. The activites began with the emcee on stage dividing the teams officially. We had to name our groups in hairstyles and we named our Team 1 as Waves. And the fun evening began.

The stage is set

2 Zoomba instructors took the stage and urged all of us to join when they swayed to perfection. What energy.... what moves. Most of us were doing Zoomba for the first time and we all managed Oppa Gangam Style. The mood was set; everybody was geared for some fun. The first game was Hoola Hoop; which I failed miserably but had absolute fun trying. We found and threw white Dove balls among pools of colourful balls;tried our hands at hair styling each other; race against time to complete the pieces of a puzzle. We laughed, giggled , behaved like little school girls out on picnic.

After all these, we got our hairs pampered by the Dove hair stylists. Sipping into a glass of White Wine I got my hair done. Bliss.

The Team 1 -- Waves



Then there was an announcement of another fun activity by the poolside. The poolside At JW Marriott is the place to be during evening. One member of each the teams had to make a drink and name it. The in house Bartender gave us tips on mixology. Full on Mixology gyaan, we all enjoyed the fun contest to the core.
Now again back in the main hall. Dinner was served. JW Marriott put a wonderful buffet with a live pasta counter. The Bar was open too. It was the time to enjoy food, drink and wait for the announcement of the winning team. The prize vouchers of Rs. 5000 for each of the 10 team members. Team 2 won as we all cheered on. Well deserved I must say.

As we all were sitting back just sipping our glasses of cocktail or with the dessert plates; there was a flash mob. Whoa..few girls went to the middle of the hall and started dancing to Pharrel Williams' "Happy"..Girls..Weren't we happy to clap along like a room without a roof.

Clap Along Happy

Kudos to team Dove and team Indiblogger for such a wonder event. They even took care of the transportation back home too. Thats not all; while leaving we were handed over a lovely goodie bag with Dove products, a hair straightener, Indiblogger Tee shirt and a cute Dove pin. Thank you so much for this lovely Play Date.

The Goodies :D

I reached home happily singing. Husband loved my hair style and I loved the look on his face.
I declared " Yes it is Dove !"





My Big Leap in Baking - A Stromboli

All this while I was taking those baby steps in baking; but this time I gathered up the courage to take a big leap and try out Stromboli. A stromboli is a turnover sandwhich / pizza which is filled with various cheeses - as described by Wikipedia. This for someone like me was a big experiment as that also happen to be husband's birthday. He was working since 7am till 11pm. I decided to make something different , something special for dinner and tried out stromboli.

I opted for whatever was available in the kitchen and hence the filling was vegetarian.

THE DOUGH:

Mix one tea spoon of sugar and one tea spoon of salt in warm water. The water must not be boiling hot.
Once sugar and salt are diluted, add one and half tea spoon of dry yeast and stir the water vigorously. Keep this aside for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, the water will be foamy and a smell will start coming out of it. This is the sign that the yeast is active now.

Mix either refined flour / Maida or Whole wheat flour or equal mixture of both in the Yeast - water mixture and kneed to a smooth and soft dough. I used one cup of whole wheat flour and one cup of refined flour each. If the dough is too sticky, put some more flour till it comes to a smooth consistency. Pour 2 tea spoons of Olive oil on the dough and kneed for 2 - 3 minutes. Now cover the dough by a clean muslin cloth and let it rest for 1 and 1/2 hours in a warm and dry place in the kitchen.

THE FILLING:

Boil 2 - 3 medium sized potatoes and mash them. Cut yellow and green bell peppers into small cubes. Saute one thinly sliced onion in some oil and add the cut peppers in it. Once the vegetable cool down add the mashed potatoes, some salt, some black pepper powder and mix well.If you have paneer, that can be used too. Similarly chicken or mutton can also be used as filling.

THE STROMBOLI:

After 1 and 1/2 hours, the dough will rise to twice the size. Put your fist into the dough to let the air out. Do this atleast 3 - 4 times. Now separate the dough into 3 medium sized balls. 2 if you like the crust thick and 3 if you prefer a thinner crust. Use a rolling pin to roll out one ball into an oval shaped roti. Maintain even thickness in this step. Spread tomato pasta sauce or mayonnaise in the middle of the oval base. Keep the sides dry. Pour the filling in the oval shape and grate a cheese cube on it. Use a butter knife or a table knife to cut the sides of the oval base. Cut diagonally about 1 inch each stripe. Now gently fold the stripes over the filling in a criss cross manner. I used a beaten egg to glue one stripe on the other. One can use milk too. 

Ready to go to oven

Now brush the beaten egg over the stromboli and sprinkle some white sesame. I forgot the sesames in the first one. 

Pre heat the oven in 200 C for 20 minutes. Place the stromboli in the baking tray over a parchment / butter paper or a silver foil. Bake it for 20 minutes at 200 C. Take it from the oven and let it cool for 5 - 7 minutes before serving. 






With my dough I managed 2 full sized strombolis and one small one. The whole house was smelling of freshly baked pizza and i was extremely excited with the result. When husband got home and on dinner table he saw these, he gaped at me with surprise and sheer disbelieve that I managed to bake strombolis at home.That was for him on his special day. That look on his face made all the effort worth. I feel more confident with the OTG now. Do try this out and share your feedback / suggestions. 

The Final 3.