Kokum Juice

Today is the last day of the BM#7 edition. As part of the Maharashtrian cuisine for the series, I thought of finishing the series with the kokum juice. I have heard of kokum juice before but never had a chance to taste. I tasted it after we moved to Pune. The taste of kokum is hard to define. It doesn't go well with everyone.  I liked to it. My husband is a juice person and can have juice any time. For him, juices are not just  thirst quenchers for summer.  During summer, I bought a packet of kokum and tried making the juice at home. I have seen many recipes for this and found it very easy to make. From then on, its made more often at home. Do check out this post at Aayis Recipes to see the pictures of kokum tree and fresh fruits. 

Now on to the recipe

You need

• Dried kokum rinds - 10 nos
• Sugar - 3 tblspn
• Water - 3 cups
• Salt - a pinch
• Cumin powder -1/4 tsp ( optional). I don't add.

Method

Soak the kokum rinds in lukewarm water for half an hour. Crush the kokum lightly and filter to remove the kokum rinds. The water would have turned to a lovely pink. Stir in sugar and salt. Stir till the sugar is dissolved well. Chill and serve. 

Here is the picture of Maharashtrian Thali, which we had in a hotel during our Kolhapur trip.

Do check out what my fellow marathoners have cooked.

Sambharam /Spiced Buttermilk - Ultimate Thirst Quencher and Summer Cooler

Sambharam/Morum Vellam is buttermilk thinned with water spiced with curry leaves, limes leaves, hing, chilly and salt. In the olden days when fridge was not part of the kitchen, buttermilk was stored in the china pot/bharani. This will ensure that the buttermilk doesn't turn sour faster. Buttermilk and curd are different. Buttermilk is obtained after churning the curd and the butter is removed. Buttermilk is healthier than curd, with the butter removed. Buttermilk has many healing properties and Ayurveda always recommends the use buttermilk . You can read here to know more.

During the summer months, most homes in Kerala, will prepare the sambharam in large quantities and will be offered to any guests who drop in. In some homes, you can find an earthen pot filled with sambharam in their courtyard. Any passerby can partake the sambharam. In Kerala, summer is the period which the annual temple festivals (pooram/vela)  is celebrated. The celebrations will be through the day and participation of people will be in huge numbers, despite the scorching heat. And you can definitely find at least  one outlet where sambharam will be distributed free to the people. 

A glass of sambharam will instantly quench the thirst and can give a run for the money to any of the bottled drinks, available in the market. A sambharam need not be chilled. The inherent cooling effect of buttermilk is enough to cool your body. The chilled bottled drinks may cool your senses while drinking it, it may not cool the body. The buttermilk cools the senses and the body too.

Each house has their way of making this sambharam and there is no standard recipe for this. You can just go by your taste and availability of ingredients.

You need

• Buttermilk -1 cup
• Water - 3 cups
• Green chilly - 2 nos, slit
• Curry leaves - few sprigs
• Lime leaves/Narakathila - 2 nos
• Hing - few shakes
• Salt to taste

Method

Take all the ingredients in a bowl. Crush the leaves and chilly between your fingers. This will release the flavors into the buttermilk. Enjoy the spicy, flavorful buttermilk. You can't stop with one glass. 

Check out the Blogging Marathoners doing BM#5 along with me 

Curry in a hurry under 30 min: Aarthi, Divya, Jayashree, Kaveri, Pavani,
Seven Days of Indian Sweets:Gayathri, Priya Suresh,
Seven Days of Microwave Meals: Monika,
Seven Days of Regional Specials:Harini, Vaishali, Suma, PJ
Seven Days of Colorful Dishes Kid's Special: Kalyani
Summer Coolers: Jayasree, Kamalika, Srivalli

Aam Ka Panna - Perfect Summer Drink

The summer vacation, during my school days, was always with my maternal grand parents. Those were the days without TV. All the day we used to play various games. While playing, we used to snack on cut raw mangoes sprinkled with salt and red chilli powder.  We used to smear the mangoes pieces with a paste mixed from red chilli powder, salt and coconut oil.   My mouth is watering as I type these.  The sour taste of the raw mangoes were balanced by the chilli and salt and coconut oil to reduce the heat of the chilli. Do try it once to know what I am talking about.

Now coming to the recipe of the post, its a drink made from the raw mangoes, perfect cooler to beat the summer heat.  The mangoes are cooked and the pulp is mixed with sugar and other spices to create a harmony of various flavors. The mangoes can be cooked with the skin on and later the skin has to be removed to extract the pulp. I find cooking the mangoes after removing the skin easier. You can choose either method according to your convenience.

You need

Large sized mangoes - 2 nos
Sugar - 1/2 cup
Roasted and powdered cumin - 2 tspn
Crushed pepper - 1/2tspn
Black salt - 1/2tspn


Method

Peel the skin of the mangoes and chop into big pieces. Take the chopped mangoes and the seeds in a pressure cooker. Add water enough to cover the mango pieces. Pressure cook for two whistles.  Meanwhile take half cup of sugar and 2 cups of water in a bowl and bring it to boil, till the sugar is dissolved fully. Leave it to cool. Open the pressure cooker and transfer the cooked mango pieces in a blender jar and pulse to get fine puree. Add the mango pulp to the sugar syrup. Stir in the cumin powder, crushed pepper and black salt. Stir well.  The concentrate is ready. The panna concentrate needs to be refrigerated else it will ferment faster.  Since no other preservative is added, this will have a maximum shelf life of one week, on refrigeration.

To serve, take one part of the concentrate, and mix in 3 parts of chilled water and stir well. Serve with a garnish of mint.

Check out the Blogging Marathoners doing BM#5 along with me 

Curry in a hurry under 30 min: Aarthi, Divya, Jayashree, Kaveri, Pavani,
Seven Days of Indian Sweets:Gayathri, Priya Suresh,
Seven Days of Microwave Meals: Monika,
Seven Days of Regional Specials:Harini, Vaishali, Suma, PJ
Seven Days of Colorful Dishes Kid's Special: Kalyani
Summer Coolers: Jayasree, Kamalika, Srivalli

Beet Treats

Beetroot in my kitchen, is often cooked as a side, for my usual traditional lunch of sambhar, morukootan etc. Sometimes its added along with other veggies prepared for sandwich filling. I came across the beet juice at Tarla Dalal. At the same time, Viji Akka of Vcuisine (private blog) posted the recipe for beet syrup. The syrup recipe interested me and decided to make it. I didn't quite follow Viji Akka's recipe exactly. On searching for the benefits of beets, I found the following info.

Never drink beet juice by itself. Beet juice should always be mixed with other vegetables and/or apple juice. Pure beet juice (from the bulb or greens) can temporarily paralyze your vocal chords, make you break out in hives, increase your heart rate, cause chills or a fever. Consider mixing beets with apples, cucumber, carrots, etc.

Beets are best used in small amounts. Use moderately. Both the roots and greens are powerful cleansers of the body. Beets are said to really cleanse the blood and kidneys and this is why it is suggested you use beets moderately.

Ingredients
Beet roots - 2 big

Medium carrot - 1
Citric acid -1/4 tspn ( can use lime juice instead)
Brown sugar - 1/4 cup (I used damerara sugar)
White sugar -1/4 cup
Water -1/4 cup
Dried ginger powder (Chukku) - 1/2 tspn

Method
Wash, peel and cut beetroot and carrot into cubes. Take juice of beetroot and carrot by adding
water. Strain and keep it aside.
Mix both the sugars with 1/4 cup of water and prepare sugar syrup. Add juice, ginger powder and citric acid. Simmer for 5 minutes. Skim the foam on the top. Bottle it and refrigerate.

Beet Drink

To make beet drink, add 3 parts of cold water to one part of syrup and serve. Makes an excellent summer cooler loaded with vitamins. You can add soda instead of water and you will not for Coke again.

Now some other ways you can make use of the beet syrup.

Carrot cucumber in beet yogurt

Stir in a tablespoon of syrup in a cup of yogurt. Whip well and mix in grated carrot, cucumber and a slit green chilly. Add salt and pepper to taste. Garnish with fresh coriander. A yummy salad is ready.

Beet flavoured milk.

Stir in a tablespoon of beet syrup in a glass of cold milk and enjoy. I am not sure if it will curdle when added to warm milk. To this if you add a drop of rose essence, it will make delicious rosemilk.

Beet Lassi

Curds - 1 1/2 cup

Milk - 1/2 cup

Beet syrup - 1 tablespoon

Water - 1/2 cup

Whip all the ingredients with a blender until smooth. Serve Chilled. Adjust water according to how smooth you want your lassi to be. No need to add extra sugar.

All the preparation with beet syrup tasted very delicious. Its very versatile and you can use it according to your creativity. Let me know any other ways, this can be used. I will be glad to try those.

I am sending the three pink treats to FIC: Pink/Rose hosted by Priya, an event started by Sunshinemom.

Watermelon mint cooler

Watermelon is mainly used as a thirst quencher. Vendors with small carts filled with water melons and few glasses under a tree's shade is a common sight during summer. The vendor would scoop the sweet, juicy melon into a glass. He will add some crushed ice and slightly whisk with a spoon. Sipping a glass of iced melons on a hot summer afternoon is purely heaven.

Watermelon is loaded with vitamins too. It is an excellent source of vitamin C and a very good source of vitamin A and vitamin B6. In addition, watermelon it contains thiamin, potassium and magnesium.

I have the memories of my hostel days in college associated with watermelon. The summers were unbearable. In the hostel premises, watermelons and tender coconuts were sold. March being the last month of the semester,many of us felt the cash crunch. We would have spent most of our money in arranging farewell for our roommates, buying gifts, developing photos etc. None of our parents gave money for spending lavishly. We all were given just the amount needed for hostel fees and other normal expenses. So we had to save every penny for the farewell parties and gifts. Apart from that, we had to find money for watermelons. Those were the simple pleasures we enjoyed. In my room, we were 8 of us. We took turns in buying watermelon. So everyday one melon will be brought and we will cut in the evening. And it was my duty to cut it and I enjoyed doing it. Those days one watermelon would cost around Rs.8. It will be big enough that all of us would get a fairly big slice. Even now, whenever I cut watermelons, those memories rush back like it was yesterday.

I prefer to eat watermelons as it is. But my husband prefers juice. So I make this. There isn't any fixed recipe for this. Taking the cue, you can make as you like.

You will need
Watermelon cubes - 4 cup
fresh/dried mint - 1 tspn
honey - 1 tablespoon
lime juice - 1 tspn
Few pieces of watermelon for garnish.

Method

Liquidize the watermelon cubes, mint,honey and lime juice in a mixer grinder or a juicer. Pour into a glass. Garnish with bite sized cubes and sprinkle mint if desired. This yields two glasses of juice.

This is my rose entry to FIC-Pink/Rose hosted by Priya, an event started by Sunshinemom.

Nannari Syrup Prepration

Earlier, I had posted Nannari Sarbath and had promised to post the syrup prepration. This is the first time I am preparing it. Never thought it was so simple and easy too. After tasting sarbath with my syrup, S rate it as Pro. So what more can I say. Here is the ingredient list and method.

Ingredients

Nannari root - 50 gms

Sugar - 1/2 Kg

Water - 1 litre

Jaggery(powdered) - 2 tblspn

milk - 1 tspn

Method

Nannari root resembles very much like the mahagony root, which is used for pickling.

Wash and clean the roots well. Slightly crush the roots using a stone mortar and pestle. The roots are very hard, so slight crushing is enough. Crushing is for better penetration of the nannari essence to the water.

Boil half the quantity of water. When it starts boiling, add the crushed roots to it and boil for 2 minutes. Remove from fire. Keep it aside.

Take another vessel with the remaining water. Add sugar to it.

When the sugar is fully dissolved and it starts boiling, add a teaspoon of milk to remove the scum if any.

Strain the water boiled with the root and add to the syrup.

Add jaggery and boil the syrup to one string consistency. Jaggery is added to get that golden hue to the syrup and it also adds to the thickness of the syrup.
Cool and bottle it.

Enjoy homemade sarbath during the summer.

Nannari Sarbath

Nannari known as Indian Sarasaparilla, is a wonder herb, with its natural cooling property. It has the medicinal properties to protect one from common summer ailments. Nannari root is used to prepare the concentrate. Shall blog about the syrup preparation later. To know more about nannari sarbath's cooling effects, read The Hindu's metroplus article.

Nannari Sarbath /Sarbath is a very popular summer drink in Kerala and TamilNadu. Here, the word Sarbath is synonymous with Nannari. Many temporary shops selling sarbath come up, under the tree's shade near roads. The existing shops will add a new shelf lined with bottles of home made nannari syrup. I bought one bottle from a nearby shop. All the shops in my place, use home made syrups, with no preservatives added. Here we have started feeling the heat and through out the summer, I never fail to stock my fridge with a bottle of the syrup. Nannari syrup with fresh lime juice and ice soda will be really a treat on a hot summer day. You can use cold water instead of soda. I have a soda maker at home.

Nannari syrup - 3 tbl spn
Juice of a medium sized Lemon
Water/Soda - 1 glass

No need to add any sugar, since the concentrate has adequate sugar in it.
Mix all the three in a bowl with a spoon and serve in a tall glass.

This refreshing summer drink goes to cool Coffee, who is hosting JFI this month, which is the brain child of Indira of Mahanandi.