Some Quick-fixes from my Kitchen

Carrot Kanji- a probiotic drink   Ingredients-

250 gms red carrots

1 small size beetroot

2 tbsp powdered rai/mustard seeds

1/2 tsp red chilli powder

salt to taste

Method-

Place 2l of water in a saucepan for boiling.

Peel, wash and cut carrots and beetroot into 2inch long and thin pieces.

When the water is boiling, put vegetables in it, cover the pan and switch off the heat.

Add dry spices to it and keep covered. Let it cool. When at room temp, fill the preparation in an air-tight glass jar.

Place the jar in sunlight and stir the contents daily twice.

On the third or the fourth day, just taste some kaanji, if it tastes sour and not bitter raw rai, your kanji is ready to be savoured.

It can be served as a welcome drink or just sit in the sun and relish a glassful of it [discard the vegetables].

Sometimes, I use it to fill Panipuris for a change.

7- Steps to Make Your Own Beer

While in St. Louis, Missouri, I had the opportunity to visit the headquarters of Budweiser and their beer-making plant. I noticed a display board in the reception area that described the various steps involved in their beer-making process. It sounds easy but requires the highest degree of accuracy and precision in timing, temperature and quantity and the optimum conditions for producing the right quality of beer.

I share here  the 7-steps recipe of beer making. :)  Do you want to give it a try? If yes, then follow the step-by-step process as shown in the pics ---

On a serious note, my visit to the brewery was awaited with excitement as I had never visited a brewery before, and I am a teetotaller. Budweiser (Anheuser Busch) manufactures one of the top-selling beers of the country and is known for its aggressive and humorous marketing all over the world. A few of the advertising slogans, used by the owners, are`The Real Men of Genius' and `The Beer of Kings', which was later changed  to `The King of Beers'.

Since the plant is very old, the buildings, which have undergone renovations post the repeal of prohibition, are beautiful and have an aristocratic touch. The, well-bred horses, the entire process from brewing to packaging and even the delivery trucks, all make the colossal plant a place worth visiting. And, to top it all, there’s a  beer- drinking session complete with snacks, on the house, at the end of the tour--a very welcome conclusion to an almost 2 hour excursion. You are invited to tour this place through this photo album--

World Heritage Day-18th of April

Today is Universal World Heritage Day and when I saw the advertisements in the morning newspapers, I was immediately reminded of a list of world heritage properties in India which I saw at one of the heritage places recently. I felt proud and lucky to have seen most of the cultural properties in India listed with UNESCO. I was, at the same time, shocked to know that I have not been to a single natural heritage property despite the fact that I am a Biology person (post-graduate in Zoology). I am wondering what has kept me away from seeing these places? 

This year’s (18th Apr’11) theme for the day is `The cultural Heritage of Water’ and the purpose obviously, is to save and preserve water which is the very basis of life.

I present below a list of World Heritage Properties in India (as of today), and my check list indicateing the places I have been to so far. How about you? Want to check?

Cultural/Architechtural Properties

Under care of ASI –

1.Ajanta Caves (1983), Maharashtra

2.Ellora Caves (1983), Maharashtra

3.Agra Fort (1983), UP

4.Taj Mahal (1982), UP

5.Sun Temple, Konark (1984), Orissa

6.Group of Monuments at Mahabalipuram (1984), Tamil Nadu

7.Churches and convents of Goa (1986), goa

8.Khajuraho Group of Monuments (1986), MP

9.Group of Monuments at Hampi (1986), Karnataka

10.Group of Monuments at Fatehpur Sikri (1986), UP

11.Group of Monuments at Pattadakal (1987), Karnataka

12.Elephanta Caves (19870,Maharashtra

13.Great Living Chola temples at Thanjavur (1987), Gangaikondacholapuram and Darasuram (2004), TN

14.Buddhist Monuments at sanchi (1989), MP

15.Humayun’s Tomb (1993), Delhi

16.Group of Monuments at Qutb Complex (1993), Delhi

17.Rock Gardens of Bhimbetka (2003), MP

18.Champaner-Pavagarh Archaeological Park (2004), Gujarat

19.Red Fort Complex (2007), Delhi

 Under Protection of Ministry of Railways –

20. Mountain Railways of India, Darjeeling (1999) WB: Nilgiri (2005), TN; Kalka simla (2008), HP

21. Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus Or CST ( formerly Victoria Terminus or VT ), (2004), Maharashtra

Under Protection of Bodhgaya Temple Managament Committee –

22.Mahabodhi Temple Complex at Bodhgaya (2002), Bihar

Under Protection of Rajasthan State Archaeology and museum Department  –

23.Jantar Mantar (2010), Rajasthan

Natural Properties

Under Protection of Ministry of Environment and Forest –

24. Kaziranga National Park (1985), Assam

25. Manas Wildlife sanctuary (1985), Assam

26. Keoladeo National Park (1985), Rajasthaan

27. Sunderbans National Park (1987), WB

28. Nanda devi and valley of Flowers National parks (1988, 20050, Uttaranchal

My score is 16/28 [1 to 7,10,12, 14 to 16, 19-21, 23] and one more is on the cards. Feels good. Honestly speaking, it is 15.67/28, as I haven't been to Darjeeling part of the Mountain railways. If you have got `chakras' under your feet and are an avid traveller, mark your list and get your travel quotient! I will keep updating this list, as and when I will get to go to these places or when a new property will be listed with  the UNESCO.

Pictures
 of some of the places I have seen

 For more information on heritage sites, you may visit these official sites-

http://www.unesco.org/    and  http://www.asi.nic.in/

Update- My score on 01/04/2012 is 18/28. Khajuraho and Mahabodhi complex :)
Update- Rock shelters of Bhimbetka, It is 19/28

`My Coffee- table Travelogue’

We all have yesteryears’ family photos that we treasure greatly. For many of us, these photos mostly lay forgotten in albums until, once in a while, we are reminded of them, either by an old friend or by an overwhelming memory of an event from the days gone by. As reassuring as it was to have all my photo albums stacked neatly in one place, I thought that my vast collection deserved a better place in my life. Let me share with you some ideas on recycling old print photos and making them more accessible to those who matter to us.

My association with photography goes back to my school and college days. I always found myself drawn to the idea of clicking photos and getting clicked. That photography was a `hobby’ of mine, is a realisation that dawned upon me much later in my life. In retrospect, this realisation explains a strange childhood habit of mine; when my siblings would spend their pocket money on buying gifts for visiting nephews and nieces during their summer vacations, I would hold on to my savings until the perfect summer noon arrived; then I would quietly slip out of the house with the little ones and take them to a small studio in our neighbourhood to get them photographed. Why this stealth, you would ask? When the temp. would be above 40oC, everyone else in the house would be enjoying their afternoon siesta, leaving me with an unrefuted freedom of movement. If my intentions were to be discovered, I knew, there would be resistance to the idea. In 1970s getting photographed was considered a luxury in a middle class home.

People would go to a studio only for strict purposes-- for a passport/Id card, or if it were a marriageable girl, to obtain photos that would be fit to send to the prospective groom’s family, or even rarer, in the case of some ‘modern’ parents, to capture their son’s image on his first birthday. In any case, the expectations were high from the photographer for the simple reason that everyone wants to look better in one’s photo. The expectations were even higher on the second case as every girl’s parents would want their daughter to appear `fair, tall, sharp-featured and well-disposed’, in her photo at least.  With little advancement in trick photography, it used to be a bigger challenge for the photographer and in some cases, an impossible task. Knowing well that nothing ruins a business like an unhappy customer, an experienced and smart photographer would even turn the subject away on some flimsy excuse if the girl was incurably plain. The risk was not so high in the third category, as a child, that too a son was to his parents their best creation on earth; how could any image of their son not warm their hearts?

My yearly visits to that lone studio in my neighbourhood, helped establish a good rapport with the studio owner. Then came the era of coloured photos and I was irresistibly impressed by this invention. Initially, it was not in the printing and developing that the change occurred, rather, the photographer coloured the photograph post-development, not unlike a painter. I too wanted one of my nephew’s pictures to be coloured but the price was simply unaffordable. Undaunted, I dared to paint one of the black and white photos myself equipped merely with a prior interest in drawing and painting. The result, in my opinion, was quite encouraging. I couldn’t wait to show my handiwork to my friend, the the studio uncle and till today I remember the surprised and appreciative look on his face.

Seeing my interest in the photography, one of my brothers-in-law voluntarily parted with his box-camera. I took the gesture in a big way and participated in ‘Photo Exhibition Competition’, organized in my college, and submitted my entire collection of photographs. I won a consolation prize, not for the quality of photography but for the highest number of the entries made by a single contestant!

To keep up with the rapid pace of technology, I kept upgrading my camera --- a Kodak box-camera to Isoly II to National auto-click, and with age, my subjects changed as well. From cousins, nieces and nephews in the family, my camera had now shifted focus to my own lovely (no photography trick here) daughters, family, friends, parties and travel.

Then came the digital camera, and this caused a major setback to my interest in photography. Perhaps, it was the ease that digital photography lent to this activity. Where was the fun and challenge of good photography, I thought. More importantly, the thought of parting with my dearest and highly advanced Nikon SLR, which was surely to become obsolete soon, was unbearable. I resisted the situation as long as possible and seeing my dilemma, one fine day, my just-married daughter and son-in-law gifted, rather, forced upon me, a digital camera. After using the camera for some time, I became even more possessive about my collection of old print photos as I realized that the advent of the digital age spelled doom for the art of print photography. With this began my exercise of rearranging and reusing photos in an attempt to save them for posterity.

collage for my home

Collage for my daughter

 With the help of my daughter,I got all the photos scanned. With all the photos secured so, I was free to use the prints the way I wanted to. First of all, I segregated the pics to make three collages, one each for my two daughters and one for my own house. The choice of pics for each collage was easy to make as the aim was to capture occasions, people and places that were landmarks in the life of the person in question. The final results were truly amazing, and together with their immense sentimental value, they made great surprise-gifts for both my daughters.

 Then came the idea of recycling my travel pictures, of both long tours with family and weekend-getaways with friends. These photos always got my friends nostalgic and I wanted them all in one place. I decided to make a coffee-table book or `my coffee-table travelogue’ as I call it. It is basically an album. I have arranged the pics in a chronological order in collage-form on individual sheets with small foot-notes. Arranging pics this way made the album more interesting to see and saved the bulk of multiple albums. There are 3-4 types of albums available in the market. I used a loose one in which additional sheets can be added, if need be. The sheet has a self-adhesive surface, where you can stick the chosen photos. When the page is ready, there is a thin transparent film that you must place on the photograph-laden page. This step requires extreme care as you need to press this film from one end to another avoiding air bubbles and creasing. It is a tricky thing but not impossible. The result is there before you to see.

Coffee-table book when open

My Coffee-table Travelogue

 

Recycling invitation and Greeting Cards

Wedding bells are in the air. Invitations have already been pouring in by the dozen a week. Most of the cards are so beautiful and innovative in design that I don’t feel like throwing them away after the wedding is over. I have found a way to recycle them by using my art and craft skills. I put these cards to different use depending on the design, size and material of the card. I share here a few of my creations—

This picture of Ganesha in the frame was the front cover of an invitation card. I carefully removed all the thin sheets attached inside it. I was left with this neat, square and thick sheet with a Ganesha embedded on it. I knew what I had to do and I just did that. I got it framed!

 

Most of the card covers I have been using to make gift envelopes to put cash, cheque, or gift vouchers. It just requires a pair of scissors to cut out the right portion with the best design possible for the envelope, an adhesive to seal or paste sides and a fancy thread to tie on the cover. This is very easy and as you can see yields interesting and eco-friendly results.

The leftover parts and cuttings of the cards can be used to make book-marks and compliments/message cards.

My creations are also up for your purchase and proceeds will go to charity. Please leave a comment if interested.