Hello Friends!
Over the last two weekends I have been attending some interesting sessions and am all excited to share it with you all!
9th and 10th Feb:
Over this weekend I had a lovely opportunity to volunteer for a very informative and eye opening session on "Reversing Diabetes and Hypertension" and "Peas v/s Pill" by Dr. Nandita Shah from SHARAN.
The session helped me understand and appreciate what my parents and well wishers had been telling me since all these years ;)
Basically the session gave me the logic behind all those advices and now am more inclined to follow them!
This session was hosted at an awesome place - Carrots, The Healthy Kitchen and Store.
Carrots is the first 100% vegan restaurant in Bangalore with a focus on promoting healthy eating and sustainable living.
The food prepared at Carrots is based on whole plant food diet and no dairy products are used.
Carrots prepare most of their vegan equivalents of dairy products in house and are much healthier and yummier.
I sincerely recommend that You try the food at Carrots and am sure you won't be disappointed!
In fact you might be just surprised on how yummy healthy vegan food can be!
My personal favorites amongst all the food preparations were the German Chocolate Cake, Chocolate icecream, Rajma and Tofu Palak.
16th Feb:
Over this weekend I visited the Oota from your Thota event.
The event showcased how everyone can grow their own foods and made it feel so simple.
All you need is some place and the intent to do it! :)
The event had
- farmers selling organic produce
- various organizations selling organic products like hair and skin products, floor cleaners
- managing your kitchen waste by DailyDump
- recycling waste products at home
- garden equipments and seeds and lovely saplings to get you started
- eco friendly flower pots
- two free introductory sessions on how to do terrace gardening
and much more!
Carrots also had a food stall there with some delicious and mouth watering dishes!
Mini burgers, baked dal wada, jowar cookies, German chocolate cake, Chick pea salad, Veg Pulav, Curd Rice and the yummy Chocolate icecream.
Kids happily gorged on the burgers, chocolate cake and icecream.
Adults enjoyed on the dal wada, salad and rice items.
The surprise elements of the day was a couple of health conscious kids who opted for chick pea salad and curd rice over burgers!
And a cutie girl who said no to chocolate cake and icecream... interesting generation!
God, please bless me with such kids too.. Its so very tough to share chocolates, you see ;)
That's all for now!
Enjoy!
Hello! Belated Sankranti wishes to all :)
As part of the extended celebrations of the lovely and lively festival, participated in a Rangoli competition in office alongwith my friend. (Dimensions - 3.5 x 3.5 feet)
Am quite happy with the way it turned out considering both of us hardly had experience of doing Rangoli.
Results of the competition will be shared in couple of days.. Keeping fingers crossed!
Will keep you updated on the results!
Credits:
Sankranti Chukke Rangoli Design
Enjoy!
Updates, 23rd Jan 2014: We won the first prize in Rangoli competition!! Feeling awesome!!
Wishing you all a very Happy New Year! May your new year fill your life with lots of joy, happiness and peace :)
Hello!
In the last blog, had shared the recipe for Pesto Sauce. You can find it here.
Sharing the recipe of how I enjoy the Pesto Sauce and Arrabiata sauce with lots of vegetables.
Feel free to add as many as as less vegetables as you like. :)
Preparation Time: 20 mins
Cooking Time: 15 mins
Ingredients:
Pasta
1 Bottle Arrabiata Sauce (I prefer Barilla brand)
10 - 15 garlic cloves
15 - 20 black olives
2 medium size onions, diced
1 yellow capsicum, diced
1 red capsicum, diced
4 - 5 green beans, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
1 packet of mushrooms, cooked
few broccoli florets
1 small cup green peas, cooked
1 small cup boiled sweet corn
4 - 5 Italian or Thai basil leaves, roughly chopped
Olive Oil
Salt
Dry / Fresh Oregano
Preparing the Pasta
Boil the pasta of your choice in plenty of water with salt and a teaspoon of oil till al dante which means till just cooked.
Drain and set aside to cool.
The amount of time taken for pasta to cook will depend upon the brand you are using. Most of the brands mention about the time on the packets. But at times it can take even more or less, so keep checking the pasta.
Tip: Don't let the pasta stay in the hot water for longer, else it will get mushy while mixing it with sauce.
Steps:
- In a pan, add around 2 - 3 tablespoon of olive oil and let it heat just a little
- Add all of the garlic to it and fry till garlic is light golden
- Add the vegetables that need a little more time to cook like carrot, beans and broccoli
- Once the first set of vegetables are done, add other set of vegetables that have to be cooked but should still be crunchy like onion, yellow capsicum and red capsicum
- Add salt to taste
- Add the final set of already cooked vegetables like green peas, sweet corn and mushrooms
- Add black olives and dry/fresh oregano
- Add the Arrabiata sauce (I put in the contents of the whole bottle.)
- Add small portion of pesto sauce and mix it with the Arrabiata sauce. Keep adding more Pesto sauce to taste.
- Once the sauce mix with vegetables is ready, add the pasta
- A nice generous drizzle of olive oil to enhance the flavors
Sit back and enjoy the nice yummy pasta! :)
If you try it out, do share the experience!!
Enjoy!
Hello!
On special request (and after many reminders ;)) sharing the pesto sauce recipe.
I don't have pictures of the cooking process as of now, but will plan to take it and share when I make the sauce next time :)
Preparation Time: 20 mins
Cooking Time: 10 mins
Ingredients:
1 packet of Italian or Thai Basil, washed and roughly chopped (I like the Italian more :))
2 medium size onions, chopped
15 - 20 cloves of garlic (whole garlic cloves is also fine. chop them up for extra garlic flavor)
1 teaspoon of milk cream / 2 teaspoon of milk
Salt
Olive Oil
Optional ones:
5 - 6 olives (green is preferable, else black is also fine)
2 - 3 capers
2 - 3 jalapeno (if you want the sauce to be a little hot)
dry or fresh oregano
Steps:
- In a pan, add around 2 - 3 tablespoon of olive oil and let it heat just a little
- Add all of the garlic to it and fry till garlic is light golden
- Now add the chopped onion and fry till it is nice light pink and translucent. They should be cooked but still crunchy
- Add salt to taste
(If you have added less salt at this stage, then don't worry. You will still be able to correct it later during grinding process)
- Then add olives, capers and jalapeno if available
- Turn off the heat
- Add chopped basil and milk cream / milk
- Sprinkle dry/fresh oregano if you like
- You can now add a 2 - 3 tablespoon of olive oil again if you like.
- Let it cool down for a minute or two.
- Grind it in a mixer. It should be a little coarse in texture and not fine like coconut chutney.
If needed add just a little bit of milk in the mixer to aid the grinding process.
That's it! Your Pesto sauce is ready! Enjoy it with pasta or even with bread too.
Enjoy!
