Pumpkin Halwa

In an attempt to eat lot of vegetables Dad has piled up the fridge. One can't be eating all types of gourds in a single week. A little pumpkin looks lovely on the shelves of the green grocer but I find it tasteless to make a subzi. Now that I am off sugar I thought of trying pumpkin halwa expecting that the vegetable has an inherent sweetness and a substitute for sugar should give a dessert that Dad and I both can enjoy. My Dad loves his sugar quotient in food even today at 69yrs though I have to put a check on myself.

Here is what I did.

Ingredients

2 cups peeled and shredded pumpkin

1/4 cup of Sugar free Natura

1 teaspoon of ghee

7-8 cloves

1/2 cup milk

Roasted pumpkin seeds for garnish

Heat the ghee for till molten. Add the cloves. Let them pop. Stir in the shredded pumpkin. Cook till translucent. Now add the sugar free natura and top up with milk. Let it simmer till the ghee separates and pumpkin looks glazed. Stir intermittently to avoid sticking to the vessel.

Enjoy warm sprinkled with roasted pumpkin seeds. Its cold in Bangalore so warm is good for us.

Roasted Potato Rolls

Today was the lightest birthday celebration in my entire life. Birthdays in the family always meant calorie rich food. I made lot of stuff today but have never been so conscious about what to cook for a Birthday. I am a foodie at heart and a some one who loves to cook for people. I enjoy my food and so I share. However having gone thru the health alerts in the last couple of months I am aware about even the smallest morsel of food that I consume. I need to know how many calories it will give me. I am not blind to what I eat now. 

In the morning I made idli and chutney for breakfast. The tea was without sugar but with a sugar replacement. For the team I roasted kothimbir vadi with a wee bit of oil and took it to office. My lunch made up of carrot cucumber salad, Maa di dal, stuffed chilies, phulka and a shared cup of cold coffee with sugar, on a normal day I would have had a full glass without thinking twice. I was tempting my friend for a brownie but she resisted, may be I have scared everyone enough around me that they have become wise eaters :P :)

I ate the most in the evening, dinner was Tomato rice, Roasted Potato rolls and fruit salad with Lichee ice cream. The sum was a good 2000 cals almost 600 cals more than prescribed! Ok. I'll make up for it. 100 cals less for next 6 days.

These rolls I am sharing here would have been generously shallow fried Aloo tikis but I prefered to roast and I loved them. I think if I bake them they will be more delectable. It was a small batch so did not use the oven instead roasted them in a greased non stick pan. You may like to try.

Ingredients

3-4 boiled potatoes
1/4 teaspoon amchur powder
1/8 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon red chili powder
salt to taste
handful of chopped cilantro

3 slices of bread

Mash everything together in a bowl. Roll them up. Grease the non stick pan. Lay them in it so they don't touch each other. Cook for 7-8 mins till they firm up. Then keep rolling them in the pan by flipping the pan. Cook till nice golden and crisp on the outside.

Serve hot with ketchup or chutney. Aloo in its basic form is really harmless and this is a nice lean recipe. Make it and enjoy your party.

Appeal: Construction of Annexure to Sri Brahma Chaitanya Mandira Trust

|| Sri Rama Samartha ||

Sri Rama Jayarama Jaya Jaya Rama

This is an  appeal made by the Trust: 

With the blessings of Sri Pampapathi Narayanappa Maharaj, Sri Brahma Chaitanya Mandir, came into being in a small rented house at Gavipuram Guttahalli on 11-02-1959. Later on, with the blessings of Sri. R. C. Ketkar Maharaj and Sri. Narayanappa Maharaj, the holy paduka were installed on 25-05-1972, at its own building at no.1692, Banashankari 1st stage, Bangalore. Further, a marble idol of Sri. Lord Gopalakrishna was installled on 18-05-1983, by Pujya Prof. K.V. Belsare, over the Samadhi to make it similar to Gondavale. Since the inception of the Mandir, daily upasana and other activities of this tradition, are being performed regularly.

 However, as the present accommodation is inadequate for devotees coming from outside places and the present building it too old, the neccessity for having a spacious hall, a kitchen and a few rooms is felt.

It is therefore, decided to build a new annexure for the Mandir, with better amenities. We request all the devotees of Sri Sri Maharaj to participate in the holy cause.

Sri Brahma Chaitanya Mandira Trust, Bengaluru.
Registration no. 3503 dtd. 9-9-1960

No.1692, Banashankari 1st stage, 

2nd Block, 5th Cross, 16th Main, 

Bengaluru - 560 050

Contact Persons:

B.L. Satyanarayan : 080 26699611

K.L. Srinivasa Murthy : +91 9741038109

Nagesh : +91 9241296013

Send in your donations through online fund transfer to:

CORPORATION BANK

SRINAGAR BRANCH

S.B. ACCOUNT NO. SB01016110

IFSC: CORP 0000215

I will be updating this blog with photos of the site once in a month.

View Bramha Chaitanya Mandir in a larger map

Thanking My Doctors

I had a blast with my friend Sangita today! Shopping at our favorite brand BIBA at the Inorbit Mall in Vashi. We returned tired and a dinner of Veg Pulao with mixed veg pickle and roasted papad was awaiting us made by my Dad! I made some fruit chat for desert. It was the first time this week the entire family sat down for dinner together. It feels so great to feel normal after 2 months of bad health. To feel like cooking, to feel like feeding, to feeling like going out and above all enjoy simple things in life.

Just before I started writing this post I filled up my calorie tracking sheet and I realized I had consumed almost 2000 calories today! Way beyond my prescribed 1400 intake. While filling the activity line I filled in 4hrs of walking which means 1200 calories burnt! Now will some one answer if mall walking can be considered as exercise? My legs are aching so I safely presumed I must have exerted myself enough to label it as some calorie burning activity which can be filled in my tracking sheet.

Well those who follow this blog know that I had a scare. Since 10th May I have been falling ill with small ailments. Was on antibiotics for first 2 weeks. It made me so weak and I felt very low.  I am in Mumbai for last 2 months had gone back to Blr for a short while in between but had to come back. 

In the first month I was struggling with family pressures and bad health. I was working from home, that is what kept my mind occupied. I made an attempt to get back to office in Blr but in vain. Then on returning to Mumbai I just lost immunity completely. An infection came back stronger. My family doctor was thrilled to see me, I was meeting him after 4-5 yrs. Dr. Akali suggested I undergo some investigations. I was depressed and that was unusual he said. He has been our doctor for 13years and he knows our medical histories. So off I was sent for urine tests, sonography, blood tests and after that sent straight to the hospital for treatment and further investigation. I am now able to write this lightheartedly that I have been overhauled in the last 2 months.

While this low immunity and health complexities I underwent Dental treatment, 1 root canal and some cavities. I am ashamed to mention the number. If I open my mouth now you can spot 3 metal islands! credit to Dr. Asif.

After I returned from Blr and went to the hospital and came back met other 2 new Docs a Gyanac and an Endocrinologist! Got the bombing of my life from Dr. P. S. Lamba!! I was shaken and threatened. If I wanted to live I had to loose a lot of the weight I had acquired over the years. The sonography revealed every organ was yelping for attention and had to be attended to! Dr. Lamba in his characteristic sarcasm said "You have someone in your life who loves you a lot so you are in hospital today! I said weakly but doc I'm not married. You don't cook a lot do you? Eating out or ordering a take out it easier, isn't it? I stayed mum, almost like a sheep of sacrifice. There is history in the family of cancer and stroke and I see money when I see people like YOU!"

You are going to get better and healthier! You will do it! I was laughing along with the doctor as he took a dig at me but inside I was ashamed that I had neglected my health and I had no choice now but to LOOSE A LOT OF MY WEIGHT.

Dr. Lamba does not know my medical history but the one person Dr. Akali knows it. He is such a sweet doc. He was more sympathetic towards me. He was on the phone with me all through the ordeal I went thru. It brought back memories of 8yrs ago when he suspected I might have spondilitis initiating and I went to him with a stiff neck and a frozen shoulder, he gave a medicated rub. The relief was from the medicine as much as the care and nursing!

In the last six years I have rarely gone to a doctor and I am so loyal to my doctors in Mumbai that I choose not to go for cough or fever to a local doc in Blr. My medicine for these has always been home remedies and over the counter medicine if I use, that too rarely.

My Dentist Dr. Asif is a friend and neighbor, only he has the privileged to pry open my oral cavity. LOL!!! He is now one of the well doing Dentists in Navi Mumbai but never forgets that we were his first few patients when he started out practice as a fresher just out of college. On other days we share high teas, Diwali sweets at ours and atleast once Iftar with him and Seema, his wife. When a party is to be organized he is generous to help with finalizing venues, menus and other things.

Then there is one Doctor the eye specialist Dr. K.L. Rao who we fear. He is the authority on eye treatment, a gold medalist of his times in medical college. When everyone else suggested eye surgery to correct my vision he strongly opposed it, that was way back in 1986. It was the time when eye surgeries were not without risk. I have been doing well with specs since then. He said no contact lenses for you, get used to wearing specs and I did and survived all thru my growing years and working years! Just yesterday I went for check up. There was no power and doc asked me and Dad to sit and chat while we waited for the electricians to fix the transformer down the lane. Chatting with Doc was unheard of! We did and we went down memory lane together. He remembered every detail of not only my case history but family too. We inquired about each others family. When the power was restored and as the check up was in progress I got a little too comfortable with the doc and just then I was asked to shut up and answer only to the point. That is old Dr. Rao! He did a thorough check up and wrote a couple of drug prescriptions for me and explained why I needed them. The prescription for specs was for 2 sets, one near and one distance. No variance glasses for me, says doc. Even the optician shook a bit or so I thought when he saw a prescription by Dr. K.L. Rao. Here is a Doc who has done a lot of charity, now only sees his old patients and you will not find a board outside his Clinic. His regret, only if one of his daughters had taken up his field he would have trained them with his rich experience. As I thanked him he warmly wished me goodnight and said I must visit him next when I am back in Mumbai. Yes doc I will.

Would like to hear from my readers the stories of their relationships with their doctors. Do such relationships exist with the new generation doctors?

Thanking all my Doctors old and new!