Crunchy Bunches of Goodness!

Breakfast cereal has been a regular on our shopping cart for as long as I can remember. It is hard to beat the convenience in the morning. Then there came a light bulb moment in life, when I started reading ingredient labels, and started seeing my regular cereals for what they really are. Honey bunches of oats, should really be called "High Fructose corn syrup clusters with a sprinkling of Oats". Honey nut cheerios, is really  "GMO sugar, artificial nut flavor, oats with GMO corn". And to think all the marketing dollars behind cheerios has earned it a reputation of being part of a heart healthy diet! There are good brands of cereal out there, you just need to read the labels Ensure sugar or corn are not on the ingredient list. But, really folks, cereal or granola is one of those things that once you start making at home, you will wonder why you ever bothered with the store bought kind. Once you have a basic recipe down, you can vary it based on seasonal ingredients or your personal whims.

This recipe is inspired from "Ultimate Nutty Granola" from a superlative book called Oh She Glows by Angela Liddon. I have modified it for my family's tastes and preferences. For the original recipe (which is an addictive snack), do refer to the above book, which is an incredible collection of go-to recipes!

Crunchy Bunches of Goodness Cereal

Prep time: 10 mins

Cooking Time: 45 mins

Makes about 6 cups of cereal

Ingredients:

1 cup raw almonds

1/2 cup walnuts

1/2 cup other mixed raw nuts (I used cashews and hazelnuts)

1 cup rolled oats

1/2 cup raw buckwheat groats (easily found in health food stores, or just use more rolled oats)

1/2 cup mixed dried fruit (cranberries, raisins, goji berries, apricots etc)

3/4 cup raw seeds (mix of sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds)

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/4 cup melted coconut oil

Method

- Preheat oven to 275F

- Grind 1/2 cup of almonds into a coarse almond meal. Add to a bowl.

- Add remaining almonds, walnuts and other nuts to a food processor and pulse until chopped. I used a spice grinder to process the nuts in small batches. Add them to your mixing bowl.

- Add oats, buckwheat groats, dried fruit and seeds. And in the salt and combine.

- Add the maple syrup and coconut oil and stir the mixture well.

- Spread this mixture on a large cookie sheet and press down so everything sticks together.

- Bake in the preheated oven for 20 mins. Rotate the pan and bake for another 20-25 mins.

- Take it out of the oven and allow it to cool completely (atleast 1 hr) before breaking up into clusters!

You could mix it up by adding cinnamon or vanilla extract. As other superfoods make their rounds into your pantry, you can add chia seeds, ground flax seeds or cacao nibs. Please take the time to share your variations with me. 

It is time to take control of breakfast. Thank you General Mills and Post. We won't be needing your services anymore. 

The whole scoop on Chyawanprash

Some advertising slogans are so powerful, their message just sticks with you even after years. One such instance is a very popular Chyawanprash ad with the punchline - 'Saath Saal ke Bhoodhe ya Saath Saal Ke Javan (60 year old aged man or a 60 year old youth?' The ad classically pitts the energy levels of  a seasoned senior citizen against a young sedentary office worker. The old man climbs several flights of stairs and even helps the poor next gen make it to the the top. The secret of his energy .... was Chyawanprash, the ancient Indian Ayurvedic jam.  Ayurveda in its infinite ancient wisdom has developed a recipe for rejuvenating the body and rendering it ageless. If you like me are curious about the origins of chyawanprash, you have reached the right place on the internet. It has all the elements of Bollywood movie. Chyawan was an aging Rishi, said to be touching his nineties. At this ripe old age, he was presented with an opportunity to marry a young princess and carry his blood line forward. He consulted with two Ayurvedic Vaids, who developed a recipe for longevity and rejuvenation. Chyawan rishi got his youthful vitality back and went on to father his children. It was 10,000 years ago that Chyawanprash is first said to be made and today, several pharma companies stake their claim on the recipe. 

Amla (amalaki in Sanskrit, gooseberry in english) is the key ingredient in Chyawanprash. This herb is the jewel of Ayurveda, considered one of the most powerful rejuvenating ingredients that supports a healthy digestive system and ensures coronary health. It is one of the ingredients in Triphala which is a very important tonic in Ayurveda. Even modern medicine identifies Amla for its high antioxidant levels notably vitamin C which is crucial for immunity. In addition to amla, Chyawanprash contains two classic ayurvedic ingredients - ghee and sugar which are believed to carry the medicinal properties through the cell boundary.

What's concerning to me is that most commercial Chyawanprash recipes are over 50% sugar. The refined kind of cane sugar. Now, I am sure when Chyawanprash was first made, sugar in the modern form did not exist. Amla has a very complex taste, I don't think there would be a word in the english language to explain it. It is quite sour at first bite, then it tastes cool, and then a certain astringent taste in the back of your palate. If you drink a glass of water after biting into amla you get a wonderful cooling sensation all over your mouth. So, a fair amount of sugar gets added to make the amla palatable. There is no reason why you can't make Chyawanprash with the likes of jaggery and honey. Just how sweet you want it to be should be up to you. 

Then there are all the herbs that go into Chyawanprash. I don't think there is a record of what the Ashwin brothers used to make the first concoction. But Dabur and Himalaya have their secret recipes and their high profile marketing claims the benefits from 100s of herbs. While I am sure that the herbs are quite beneficial, I can't fathom the complex interactions of the bouquet of herbs. If you are interested in learning about some of the herbs that go into Chyawanprash, I encourage you to watch this video. 

As you can see Amla is still the star of Chyawanprash, and the herbs just play a supporting role. Amla is cooked in a soup of herbs, then strained out and cooked. So for my first batch of Chyawanprash, I decided to use spices and herbs commonly found in an Indian kitchen and are known to have anti-inflammatory properties - like cinnamon, black pepper, cloves and fennel.  I just don't know enough about the other herbs - where they are grown, how they are sourced, how to prepare them and what effect they have on our system. Until I enlighten myself, here is my 'vanilla' chyawanprash recipe.

A note about buying fresh Amla - you should be able to find these in well stocked Indian grocery stores in major North American cities in the winter months. Amla season in India starts in winter and extends into spring (March/April). Incidentally, my maternal grandmothers house in India housed a gooseberry tree. How visionary of my ancestors to invest in the family's future health and vitality. Unfortunately, in the name of urbanization, that tree (among others) in that flourishing backyard was cut down, to make way for a sprawling community. Even the least blemished amla fruit from the grocery store today, doesn't match up to the fresh taste of the fruit from my grandmothers tree. Lament!

Ingredients:

20-25 fresh amla

1/2 cup ghee

1 cup jaggery

3 tablespoons non-pasteurized honey (or to taste)

1/2 black pepper corns

2 inch stick of cinnamon

1 tsp roasted fennel seeds

4-5 cloves

Preparation:

1. Wash and clean the amla and steam it in a pressure cooker. Allow it to come to full steam and cook under pressure for 4-5 minutes. You can use another device to steam the amla, but note that cooking time will be longer. 

2. Let the amla cool to room temperature. The amla should fall apart on touching. Take out the seed from the amla and place the pulp into a blender. Blend it till all the fibers are incorporated. I have seen some recipes that call for running the pulp through a fine mesh to discard the stem and flesh. But that seems unnecessary, running everything through a high speed blender gave a very smooth texture. 

3. Now take a heavy bottomed pan, heat 1/2 cup of ghee. Add the amla puree to the ghee. On low heat, fry the amla for 6-7 minutes stirring often until the water evaporates and the mixture comes together and stops sticking to the pan/spoon.

4. Grind the pepper corns, cinnamon, fennel seeds and cloves into a fine powder. Add this to the amla.Turn off the heat and add the grated jaggery to the pan. Use the heat of the pan to melt and combine the jaggery. Let this mixture cool down.

5. Taste for sweetness and flavor. At this point the chyawanprash is more sour than sweet. You can add honey to your taste when the mixture is completely cooled. I prefer to use non pasteurized honey which preserves the natural enzymes, so it should not be heated after this. I added about 3 table spoons of honey and got to my desired sweetness. 

Transfer to a jar and enjoy a spoonful each day!

Verdict - The chyawanprash is more brown in color due to the use of jaggery and also due to the absence of all the herbs that give the deep dark color to commercial counterparts.  But, it has all the complex amla flavor. My two year old didn't fall in love with the taste, but toddlers don't fall in love at first bite. I will be trying every trick in the parenting book to get him to eat a half a teaspoon a day.

Anyone reading this, willing to point me towards resources to learn more about the herbs that can be cooked into chyawanprash, feel free to share your knowledge and get in touch using the comments below!

Banana Blueberry Kamut Muffins

Once upon a time, not too long ago, wheat was a staple grain in our diets. Depending on which part of the world you were in rice was a close contender as mankind's favorite grain. But we will tackle rice in another post. For better or for worse, the wheat crop has taken a battering all in the name of increasing production to feed the explosive human population. The poor humble wheat has apparently been hybridized by crossing it with different strains, crossing with non wheat plants and exposed to chemical rays to induce mutations. So, the latest nutrition studies report that wheat is no longer a complex carbohydrate, it has been reduced to the likes of simple sugars like *gasp* glucose. As if that wasn't bad enough, our food chain has been inundated with refined wheat also known as all purpose flour. To make us feel better about our choices, they are now marketing all purpose wheat as 'enriched'. Really?  Ever since, the controversial wheat belly book came out the gluten free food market has exploded in North America. Now, I personally know of individuals who have severe sensitivity to gluten - the wheat protein - and for them simple pleasures like bread and pasta can mean severe discomfort and questionable nutrition availability of food consumed and as a result poor immune system. For them gluten is poison. Then there are others who don't have any medical symptoms of gluten sensitivity, but they can feel a difference in their energy levels and well being once gluten is eliminated. What I find extremely disturbing are the gluten free products that sit on supermarket shelves like wolves in sheep's clothing. More than half the gluten free products are stuffed with all kinds of highly processed starches (potato starch, tapioca starch, corn starch to name a few) and many binders or edible gums. So we may be replacing one evil with another by going gluten free the wrong way.

Should we all be saying no to wheat? We should definitely be shunning the refined and 'enriched' varieties of wheat.  Apparently a lot of us already are. So way to go, us :) The worldwide sales of bread has dropped so much that even the French government is reportedly concerned about losing a sacred tradition. The good news is that there are so many other nutrition packed whole grain options available outside the realm of wheat. To me, adding a variety of grains to our diets seems to be the key. And, the world around us seems to be cycling back to making everything from scratch and at home. The pressure is on the businesses to churn out more food with real ingredients. I predict that sometime in the near future, we will see a supermarket brand of bread with 5 simple ingredients - 'non enriched' real whole flour, water, yeast, salt and sugar. So, to anyone reading this post with earnest, the take-away should be that we should make a variety of grains as part of our daily diets. Look beyond wheat and you will find a whole new set of options!

During a trip to the farmers market a few weekends ago, I discovered Kamut. It is a an ancient strain of wheat historically originating in Persia. It is currently cultivated mostly in the USA and western Canada as the growers need to adhere to strict 'brand' guidelines. It has a higher protein and fat content than traditional dwarf wheat. So, the grain naturally yields a better crumb to baked goods. Kamut is an excellent choice of grain to put in your morning muffin. I have tried many different combinations and have locked in the recipe below for Blueberry, banana kamut muffins. I do use a large number of eggs... I do so, because I want to get more of the good nutrition from eggs into my 19 month old. You could get away with using only 1 egg in the recipe. I have had success with the eggless version using a chia egg, read on below.

Blueberry Banana Kamut Muffins
Preparation time: 10 mins
Cooking time: 30 mins (+ cooling time)
Makes: 6 muffins

Ingredients
1 ripe banana
2 eggs ( or 1 chia egg - 1 tbsp ground chia seeds soaked in 1/4 cup warm water for 10 minutes)
1/2 cup kamut flour (preferably coarsely ground flour)
1/4 cup oat flour (1/4 cup oats ground in a spice grinder)
2 tbsp almond flour (handful of raw almonds ground in a spice grinder)
a pinch of cardamom powder
1/3 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup yogurt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup frozen wild blueberries

Blueberry Banana Kamut Muffins

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 deg F.

In a large bowl, mash the banana till smooth. Crack open the eggs (or chia egg) and whisk together. Add kamut flour, oat flour, almond flour, cardamom, maple syrup, yogurt and baking soda and mix with a large spoon till combined. Last, fold in the blueberries gently so that it doesn't bleed into the batter.

Line a muffin tin with good quality parchment baking cups or use a silicone muffin pan. Scoop out about 1/2 cup batter into each prepared  muffin mold and place in the oven for 30 mins or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Notes:
1. Please do make sure to use good quality baking cups. Or grease the cups as a precaution before putting the batter in. I once baked a batch which ended up sticking completely to the paper. Such a waste of good ingredients
2. You can substitute finely chopped apples for the blueberries and use cinnamon instead of cardamom for yummy apple-cinnamon muffins

And Oh my, I used kamut flour to make chappatis (the Indian flatbread), and I must say I was pleasantly surprised with the fantastic results. It must be the higher fat content that made the chappatis stay soft long after they came out of of the stove. If you are one of those who struggle to make soft chappatis on an induction stove you got to give kamut a try.

If you don't get kamut where you live... well... you can try using regular whole wheat flour. But I highly recommend going out of your way to source kamut for this recipe. You won't regret it!

Pass the mush, Baby!

Hello, Blogger! Can you believe this is my first post since I became a mommy? Ever since that day, the days seem to be have dragged on while the weeks and months have blurred past. We quickly got accustomed to the night wakings and weaved our lives to fit between the unrelenting feeding schedules. And how we (or maybe it was just me :) ) obsessed about everything! Every thing was an issue. And every issue quickly got escalated to crisis status. Every crisis deserved a google search. And every search yielded several opinions on a solution. Then there were the brainstorming sessions. For a long time, we were looking for a solution to transfer a sleeping baby from arms to crib without waking. Some solutions that were considered were preheating the crib, cross hand hold to have minimum body contact when holding the baby. We tiptoed in our own house to avoid waking our sleeping 'little terror' .

For a few days now my little terror has been terrorizing his wonderful daycare teachers. I miss him crawling around and gnawing at my toes. But this separation gives me some time to chart out a game plan before I go all corporate in a few weeks. I am always on the lookout for foods that pack a one-two punch of nutrition and flavor. My LO is not a very picky eater, but even at his age, he knows what he wants. I can't get him to eat beets or carrots no matter how cleverly I disguise them. Also, as Yoda might say, the curiosity is strong in this one. He wants to eat whatever we are eating no matter what. This means mom and dad also get to watch what they eat. Practice what we preach, in short.

For breakfast, I have been giving LO Ragi porridge or cereal. Ragi is the Indian (Hindi) name for finger millet. This is a very traditional Indian baby food that should really fit into grown up meals as well. It is chock full of nutrients especially calcium and the highly sought after mineral, iron. You can buy ragi powder from ethic Indian stores, dissolve them in cold water and boil them to make the porridge, but this yields a grainy  cereal which may be less palatable and more importantly too aggressive for the newly acquired set of infant gut bacteria. The elders advice you to soak the ragi for a few days, allow it to germinate and sprout, then dry in the sun and powder it. Now use it for making the porridge. With my two wonderfully black thumbs, I managed to make two moldy batches of ragi seeds, before somewhat admitting defeat. Until a good friend suggested another way of soaking and grinding the seeds for a happy middle ground.

For those not familiar with ragi or finger millet, it looks like dark brown mustard seeds and soaking them helps improve the bio availability of the nutrients.

To make the porridge, you need to soak about 3 table spoons of the millet seeds in ample water overnight. Do this after tucking your LO into bed. Actually more soaking time, upto 24 hours, is also said to be beneficial, because the seeds are then in the stage of near germination.

In the morning, drain the soaked seeds and place in a blender

Add 1/2 a cup of water to the blender and blend till the seeds are well pulverized

Pour the blended mixture into a fine cheese cloth or jelly strainer or nut milk bag and squeeze out the milk.

Add the milk to a saucepan and bring it to a boil on medium heat. Be sure to stire often otherwise, the mixture will get lumpy as it thickens.

Once it reaches a consistency your baby likes, turn off the stove and serve as is or with any toppings.

At this point your ragi porridge is a blank canvas to add different flavorings. Here are some of my little dumplings favorite toppings
- jaggery (unrefined Indian sugar, with molasses intact)
- stewed and pureed prunes
- stewed and pureed dates and goji berries
- salt, powdered cumin and a touch of yogurt

I have been giving this porridge or kanji to my LO since he was 7 months old. As he gets older and his digestion gets mature, I will transition to using store bought ragi powder.

I would love to learn about traditional baby foods in other cultures, so please share your recipes in the comments.

Almond Nankhatai: Indian shortbread cookies

Every cook needs to have that tried and tested recipe to fallback on during dire times.I have a cookie recipe that has come in handy during several emergencies. Say I need to impress the in-laws in a flash, or cook a last minute dish for a potluck, bring that a-ha cookie to a bake sale or fedex a mothers day gift that wont spoil in transit? Out pops the recipe of this unassuming cookie, all battered and bruised from the elements in my kitchen. I am talking of course of, Almond Nankhatai. No egg, Indian shortbread style cookie with the flavours of almonds and cardamom. Each cookie is feather light, crumbly and melts readily in the mouth. Ofcourse thats because of all the butter that goes into it. But hey, you don't have to eat them all. This recipe is meant for sharing.

You can customize the master recipe by replacing some of the almonds with other nut powders, adding a tad bit extra cardamom or saffron to please you palate. Roll our the dough and use a cookie cutter to shape the cookies any which way you please. Or just shape them into the traditional rounds and flatten them slightly between your palms. What ever you do, make sure all your cookies are evenly sized. And time them closely, since cooktime will vary based on the shape.

Almond Nankhatai (Indian Shortbread Cookies)
3 cups all purpose flour 1 cup sugar Pinch of salt 4 tablespoons ground almonds ½ lb or 2 sticks of butter 2 tsp baking powder 2 tsp vanilla extract 1 tsp freshly powdered cardamom	Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. Use your hands to bring everything together into a ball
	Shape your cookies anyway you want. I simply take about 2 tablespoons of dough, roll it into a round and lightly flatten in my palms.
	Bake at 350 degree F for 15 – 20 mins or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Note that the cookies will still be soft to the touch when they are hot/warm out of the oven.

The Chappati Heartache

How do normal people react to reading their own past work ? Everytime I re-read something I have written, I cringe a little bit. To me, my work always seems juvinile, with plenty of room for improvement. Recently, I stumbled upon a piece that was published about 7 years ago on Sulekha. This was back when postings on that site had to be edited and approved by a reviewing team. I titled the article 'The chappati heartache' and it was meant to be a sarcastic yet useful guide for the kitchen self-starter to make their own chappatis/rotis from scratch. I have come a long way in my kitchen experiences since then, yet many of my feelings about making rotis have not changed. I still enjoy the whole process and more so enjoy complaining about it. As I read this article, I had an instant urge to edit my own work. But the older and wiser me decided that any changes would just ruin the innocence and the sheer geekiness that shines so proudly from it. So here, for your reading pleasure and for my records, I present to you the unedited 'Chappati Heartache' -- an account of my culinary frustrations more than 7 years ago.

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The Chappati Heartache
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The soul of Indian food is composed of rotis. These complex carbohydrates form the staple food of a billion people worldwide. They are delicious to eat and highly nourishing for the body (proteins and fiber). So naturally, they are a delightful pain to make. The procedure is messy, time consuming, exhausting and at the end of it all, you are just glad there is something to eat! I would attribute getting consistent (good) chappati results over and over again to a stroke of pure luck. At every attempt at chappati making, you get closer to getting better. Which only means that you will never be perfect, just like an infinite series only promises to converge at infinity. Are you willing to wait till eternity to eat perfect chappatis made by you?

If you don't believe me, allow me to exemplify my theory with -- myself! I am your average girl next door, have been away from home for several years, eating copious amounts of rice and pasta during those years and close to being sick of rice and any form of beans. I greatly enjoy (and sorely miss) my mother's cooking. I have been trying to make chappatis for a while now but the art of chappati-making completely eludes me! Sure, every once in a while, I have the blessing to enjoy my own handmade steamy, puffy, soft, melt-in-my-mouth chappatis, but the sheer amount of times I have had to eat thick, hard, chewy chappatis just ruins the pleasure. It's like my chappatis are forever jinxed by a cosmic conspiracy. How else would you explain that in say, x number of times I have made chappatis, 10x! uniquely different things have gone wrong? Now, do I see some heads nodding in agreement? Haven't we all been there, ladies (and um... the real gentlemen)? Hence the chappati heartache -- consistency is the key in chappati making, but the lock is unfortunately password protected.

Don't get me wrong. I love the entire cooking process, but failure frustrates me. Repeated failure prompts me to write about it. It is my belief that cooking results directly indicate the mood and frustration level of the chef. I have noticed that if I am frustrated about something (other than cooking), my chappatis come out great. This I believe is because, frustration is good for the dough-making process, you have all the motivation to beat the crap out of it and the dough comes out soft and smooth. Ironically, if I am frustrated about how my chappatis are turning out, their quality just goes downhill from there.

For the benefit of the naive beginners and the entertainment of the (self-proclaimed) chappati experts, allow me to explain the nuances of the fine art of chappati-making. It is hoped that in spite of some not-so-subtle sarcastic (frustrated) statements, this will be considered a useful guide.

The chappati making process has 4 main steps:

Kneading the dough
Making small balls of the dough
Rolling out chappatis
Roasting the chappatis

It is difficult to judge which one of the above steps is the most idiot proof, because like I mentioned, I have goofed up every step of the way, and still discovering new goofs and mutations of old ones.

Step 1: Kneading the dough

This process is a little messy. Beginners, please remember to clip your nails and wash hands with soap and water! Use a nice broad mouthed vessel for this process, one that would have room for various violent arm movements.

Start with some atta (wheat flour) in the vessel, and add salt to it.

Then add 1 teaspoon of oil and rub into the mixture.

Now gradually add water, rub into the mixture. Continue adding water until the mixture looks like dry scrambled eggs.

Now sprinkle about a fistful (?) of water and combine into a single dough structure.

Knead and knead, till your knuckles give out, and your carpal tunneled wrists are permanently hanging at right angles to your arm.

Wash hands and cover and keep dough aside for at least 10 minutes.

Tips on kneading dough

Start making the dough when you are frustrated. Imagine the dough as the object of your frustration and vent it out. Start at the end of the long school/ workday for the ideal frustration level.

Salt is an important and easy-to-forget ingredient!

Keep in mind, the physics theories of relativity and the uncertainty principle.

Why? If you made nearly perfect dough today, measured the amount of ingredients with astronomical precision and the next day mixed up the exact astronomical amount to make the dough, the result will almost always never be perfect. According to my research, this is due to the fact that your experiments can be affected by the plethora of factors, your sense of measurement, instruments used, number of experimental trials, temperature, humidity, sweat level of the palms, magnitude and direction of the force vectors applied to the dough, quality of the mill that ground the flour, entropy of the atmosphere, pollen count etc., to name a few. In the big picture, all this boils down to the following factors: the speed of light, the speed of kneading relative to the speed of light, the orientation of the earth, its rotational speed and the resulting centripetal force and the gravitational pull of other celestial objects to name a few of them. That is how physics becomes involved. As you will soon realize, it is difficult for an uninformed mind to keep all these factors in mind. For a more detailed guide for this step, please refer to another guide that will be written after the completion of research: “No Two Dough Balls Are The Same – Why?”

Rare second chance opportunity, If dough turns out too dry/hard, try adding water and knead extra hard to incorporate in the dough.

If dough turns out too soft/sticky, You have messed up. You can try adding more dry flour and knead till you pass out, but I doubt if the situation is recoverable.

A word of confidence: Whatever the end doughy result is, try to continue with the following steps, because after all, you can always eat thick, ugly chappatis.

Step 2: Making balls from the dough

1. Break the dough into 'ping-pong size' balls, smooth, no cracks or gradations on the surface. Opinions vary among the chappati gurus, some say 'marble sized', some say 'lemon sized' and some others say 'small melon' sized. My short stint of experience seems to suggest that 1.45” would be more or less the precise diameter.

This sounds a little too easy but believe you me, if you mess up here this could jeopardize the next steps.

Step 3: Rolling out chappatis

Keep dry flour handy for dusting purposes (a little more if your dough is on the sticky side)

Take each ball from the previous step, flatten on the rolling board, apply flour and roll with the rolling pin. In the beginning, the rolling process would seem more like flattening. But this is a delicate process; one has got to respect the chappati.

Roll out into rounds of about 6-7 inches in diameter. And that's it!

Tips, Tricks and Strategies for rolling

You have to talk to the chappati, sometimes curse at it. Show who the boss is. At the same time, be gentle. Just like teaching a kid how to tie his/her shoelaces (except for the cursing part).

The trick is to roll such that the chappati rotates with your motions, so that it is even throughout.

A neat little trick that my mom once taught me: Once the chappatis are about 1 inch in diameter, roll with even pressure (not measurements again), trying to roll out the edges to prevent overworking the center.

If you worry too much about the shape, it will never come out round.

Remember that you cannot get the round shape by tricky rolling pin movements in the end. That is why step 2 is so important; you have to make the balls such that if you flatten it, it is a perfect round. Now rotate it and roll evenly to try and maintain that as far as possible.

Step 4: Roasting the chappati

Preheat the tawa/griddle.

Wait till small bubbles are formed and the surface facing the tawa has small brown spots.

Use a paper towel or clean kitchen cloth and apply pressure on the chappati to cook it from within.

Remove and apply ghee to the surface that has just left the tawa. As a wise man once said, “It is very important to realize that in the real world, everything has a right side and a wrong side.” Truer words have never been spoken.

If you followed all the above steps 100% correctly, there is about 50% probability that the chappati will puff up nicely. Tips and Tricks for roasting

Keep your eyes peeled at the chappatis; they love to burn.

When in doubt, turn the chappati over to check for doneness. If it is not done, flip it back. Defense is the best strategy you can use here.

Keep the flame on 'high' while cooking the chappatis. This is supposed to prevent them from becoming hard on cooling.

Now that the process is outlined, do you feel you are up to it yet? Here is the final twister that adds slight complications – multiplexing.

Yes, you are expected to perform the rolling, toasting and greasing processes in a parallel, pipelined fashion for optimum time and fuel efficiency. By the time you lovingly roll out the chappati at hand into a semi-circle with Australia on top, the one on the tawa has turned to coal and the ones piled up waiting to be greased have turned to stone.

As with most things in life, one should start with this adventure simple and add the multiplexing to give themselves a challenge along the way. Unfortunately, such people are considered lowly novices among the chappati elites.

I can almost see those chappati experts rolling their eyes saying, well, Rome wasn't built in a day! My answer to them would be, of course that makes sense, Romans were so preoccupied with making pizza dough that they procrastinated building Rome!

They say perseverance pays and practice makes perfect (or nearly perfect in this case). In the meantime, misery loves company, so I am sharing my whines and complaints. Then again, a new day will come and I will go through the process once more, and maybe one day I will be close to getting better at it. Remember, he who says he is perfect, lies. She, who says she is perfect, usually lies.

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Spicy Granola aka Bhel Puri

You know, we Indians may not be born sophisticated like the French, or have a sexy accent like the Spanish or Italians, or be as athletic as the Chinese or Americans, but dammit, we can eat really spicy food! We would put spice on our morning cereal if it didn't curdle the milk! Occasionally you get the rare Indian with a sweet tooth, but by golly we love our steaming stack of spicy aloo parathas. Our dosas aren't the same with out being smeared with spicy gunpowder masala. And, no experience with Indian food is complete without getting a taste of our Chaat.

Chaat is the blanket name given to all kinds of heavenly street food in India and quite aptly, the word 'chaat' literally means 'to lick' in Hindi. While 'chaat' stalls are easy to spot in any busy marketplace or street corner, the best 'feast for the eyes' experience comes from eating from a

chaat vendor at the beach. There are several dishes that make the chaat category chief among them are:

• The tiny, round, puffy, crisp semolina puris that are stuffed with warm boiled potatoes and silky legumes, then filled with a cold, minty, spicy and tangy, green liquid. Once filled with the liquid you move really quickly and put the puri as a whole into a wide open mouth. As your teeth sink into it, there is a gush of warm meeting the cold. The crisp meeting the soft. The spicy and tangy meeting a very satisfied palate. A complete balanced meal if you asked me! This is called the Pani Puri -- and undoubtedly my favorite in the chaat family. One day, I will tell you more about the experience if you have never had the good fortune of enjoying this at an Indian street corner.
• Then there is the Pav bhaji. A spicy medley of vegetables - potatoes, cauliflower, green peppers etc, simmered in a tomato based sauce with a special blend of spices. This is served with a slab of butter melting on top with a side of pillows of soft bread rolls toasted slightly on a hot griddle. Here is a picture of a the street side chef cooking up a batch of Pav Bhaji, taken during a recent trip to Mumbai.
• Next, there is the Ragda Pattice. A layered dish of crisp potato cutlets, with a generous helping of spicy chickpea/white pigeon pea curry (similar your usual chana masala from the neighborhood Indian restaurant), topped with condiments such as spicy mint and tangy tamarind chutneys, chopped raw onions and crispy fried chickpea flour noodles. The aroma of the cutlets frying up on the extra large griddle is not easily resisted. Neither can you miss the metallic din of the stainless spatula used to flip and cook the Pattice or cutlet on the cast iron griddle the size of Texas.
• Vada Pavs are to Mumbai what Hot Dogs are to New York City. The original veggie burger, simply dressed in fresh out the frying pan warmth. A spicy mixture of mashed potatoes with onions, garlic and spices are formed to round balls. They are then dipped in a thick chick pea batter and fried to crispy goodness to form the vada. Then, the softest imaginable dinner rolls called Pav are split and slathered with a red chili garlic powder. The beloved vada is held between two halves of the Pav. The whole snack is only palm sized, and is devoured in only a few bites but packs a devastating punch in flavor. No need for any other fancy toppings, or dipping sauces, this is the on the go snack for the city that truly never sleeps. Just watching the efficient supply chain management of one of the vada pav vendors can easily form a case study lesson for business schools. Not Kidding!
• The most popular and easily portable snack among the masses is undoubtedly the bhel puri. You could think of it as the Indian trail mix. It is a mixture of churmura or puffed rice, sev or crispy fried noodles, papdi or flat fried chick pea disks and mungfalli or peanuts, roasted together with seasonings and spices. Just before serving, this is folded in with mint and tamarind chutneys, minced vegetables onions, tomatoes, boiled potatoes green chili (yes, ofcourse it counts as a vegetable!).

The bhel puri man is by extension, the most portable snack man in India. He carries a tall wicker stool on top of which he transports all the ingredients. He will settle himself at different strategic spots depending on the time of the day. During lean periods, he will mince onions, tomatoes, boiled potatoes, green chilis, coriander leaves into the finest confetti you can imagine using a tiny paring knife. All the knife skills prized by the modern culinary world are shattered as you watch this man at work [without using a cutting board]. Then when a customer approaches him, he portions out a serving of the dry bhel puri mix into a little container. Then the adds the onions, tomato, chili, coriander and the spices. At this point, he will let you interject if you want to customize your serving with extra spice or additional crunch or another shot of chutney. He will give this mixture a squeeze of lemon, then mix it with great pomp and show attracting passer-bys. Then he forms a rectangular piece of newspaper into a cone and fills it with the bhel puri and hands it over to you. You then walk away, munching in happiness.

If you don't live in India, you can still replicate the Bhel puri as close as possible, with the ingredients available in ethnic stores. Here is a link to a basic traditional recipe video for bhel puri. Now, not to defy tradition, but I don't always shop at ethnic stores or sometimes I am unhappy with the products they carry, and occasionally I get bitten by the healthy eating bug. So I make this healthier version of bhel puri, which can be made from ingredients available at your regular North American grocery stores.

For the Bhel Puri Mix:

Bhel Puri Mix
2 tsps vegetable oil 1/8 tsp mustard seeds A few sprigs of curry leaves A dash of asafetida 4 green chilis, minced	Heat the oil in a pan. Add the mustard seeds, once they pop, add the remaining ingredients and fry for a 30 secs or so.
2 cups Kashi 7 Grain Puffed cereal 1 cup baked salted pita chips, broken up ¼ cup roasted peanuts	Add the puffed cereal, peanuts and the pita chips and roast till the mixture is crispy

Once cooled, store this mixture in a airtight container. Just snack as is or make into bhel puri.

For the Bhel Puri:

Bhel Puri
1 cup of bhel mix ½ onion, minced ½ tomato, minced 1 small cucumber, minced 1 ear of corn, separated and roasted A generous handful of coriander, minced finely 1 tbsp of mint, green chili chutney 1 tsp lemon juice	Toss together all the ingredients on the left!

Thats it. A healthier, unorthodox way of enjoying Bhel Puri. Not the same as the street side counterpart, but a close nostalgic fusion.

Of course during my rather long discourse on chaat, I have not included other chaat items like Frankie rolls, chole bhatura, snow cones, and beverages like chai, sugar cane juice and many others that I will remember with extreme, inexplicable guilt once this post is published.