We moved on from Buenos Aires to Rio. We got scammed right outside the airport where a fake Uber showed up to pick us up... after some tense moments once in the car, we did get out close to where we needed and after the local Airbnb lady negotiated in Portugese we got out.
Brazil is a sharp contrast to Argentina. You cannot trust folks on the road. Scammers everywhere. Everything is expensive and the locals are not exactly the welcoming type.
The Airbnb itself was very good. A walking distance from the Ipanema beach and close enough to grocery stores.
The kids had had enough and decided to stay in after doing groceries. San and me decided to go to the beach for a short time to see the sunset. There was so much fog that we didn't really get orange hues that day and it just started drizzling when we made it back to cook dinner!
We called it a night.. there were a lot of interesting art books in the Airbnb and we just decided to crash early after watching Rebel moon on Netflix!
The next day was going to be spent touring Rio!
We already got a glimpse of the Redeemer statue on the way from the airport. The plan was to see him up close the next day!
Last weekend I had gone for a grocery run and saw the empty samosa area in the Indian store. They used to have piping hot samosas there all the time.
San or me would always get two samosas from any desi store run.. it was something we both do and it invariably makes the other person happy.. we share it with chai.
When I told my kids how I missed samosas and it has been a long time since we had any, they piled up on me by saying they miss a lot of things like Chipotle too.. so I should shut up and make my own samosas just like how they are making their own mexican food at home!
Samosas are labor intensive and not easy to make on a small scale. Still having been encouraged (challenged if you take it in another way) by some fellow yogis.. decided to make it the weekend project.
there is a lot of ground work required. I got 15 samosas after almost 90 minutes of effort.. guessing you can make 30 of these in 2 hours with same oil.
Ended up with 1/2 the masala leftover which we plan to use to make parathas tomorrow.
Recipe used (scaled everything down to 15 samosas)
1. 3 aaloos (potato) boiled, peeled, mushed
2. 1/2 cup peas
3. one clove garlic (dont need it actually), 1/2 onion (again you can skip this), 1 red chilli, 1 spoon of corriander seeds (dhaniya) - two spoons water and make into a paste.
4. small bunch of cilantro
fry a spoon of jeera (cumin) in two spoons oil and add the paste, then add the cilantro, peas, potato and make the curry.
Separately made the dough with 2 cups all purpose flour and 2 spoons of clarified butter (ghee).. think oil will be okay as well if you are vegan. Let the dough sit for 30 minutes under wrap.
Make the samosas by using water to seal the dough after flattening and filling it with a spoon and a half of the potato masala.
Trick is in the frying. Keep it at medium high to begin with.. after 30 seconds, drop heat to medium low and wait for a good 3-4 minutes before taking the samosas out.. Then set it medium high again, wait for 5 minutes before adding next batch in. The temperature toggling is what takes time.. so it makes sense to do 50 samosas at one time in a large kadai like in the street vendors.. Bihari (our tea shop from college days in Varanasi) used to make 25 at a time in his large kadai.. they would all come with a consistant golden brown color and a smooth texture..
One thing I realized.. the second batch came out with smooth surface like in store samosas simply because the moisture had gone a little bit as they waited. That is one trick I will use next time. That was not mentioned in any video...
there are many recipes that use flour tortillas or pastry sheets to make samosas ... but if you are going to do something..... go for it with all your heart. No short cuts.
The samosas came out very well. The feedback from family "masala is really good. The skin of the samosa is really thick in some places, but taste is really good."
They all liked the second batch better than the first batch.
Had fun doing this.. have allergies thanks to the gardening effort earlier in the day.. so you can hear me sniffling all the time..
Now I am late for yoga class. Fortunately yoga class is only 20 steps away now instead of a 15 minute drive.. and we are on a flexi schedule.
Here is a video of how this was made..
If I can do this, so can you.. so try it from scratch. It is intimidating when you watch all those videos. For a first attempt this came out well !
The little one and her friend had done a "cook for family" thing during lunch last year and I missed it. They repeated the "cook for family" and this time it was dinner.
The two seventh graders had planned this over a week. They cooked for four plus hours yesterday and we were treated to an amazing dinner.
The macaroons were just amazing and they made the tomato soup just for me because the butternut squash soup had some ingredients that were on my allergy list.
Every dish was made with so much care and served with precision and love!
We thoroughly enjoyed the food and the effort put into this by the kids. I had happy tears, when I saw the tomato soup and their reason for it..
Got back to US last Sunday. Traveling again tomorrow. It is an interesting life when airports, lounges, planes become a routine part of your life. I spent more time talking to Uber drivers sometimes than people I love and care about. All this will change soon when some accomplishments take a grander stage.
In the meantime, one has to do what one can to cope with this "lifestyle". My recent trip to India following a business trip, albeit short and sweet has 1000's of photographs and videos, great memories, places of interest, conversations with friends and family that went from sweet to bizarre. All great blog topics, but they have to wait.
In the last 7 days, my plan was to do as much yoga as possible to make up for the last three weeks and the coming week, have only home cooked meals and resist the temptation to eat out at least for this week when I am home and catch up on everything else.
The home cooked meal part was a success. . .
I can now make a tomato rasam and a cabbage curry with reasonable consistancy. Cooking can be cathartic and have decided that from now on, will be subjecting the family to my cooking at least once a week. There was also some Podalangai Kootu (no pictures) that turned out very well!
Cooking part was okay. The catch up on everything else was not. I did go to the hospital to get a wart treated and that kept me in an irritated state for almost two days. No pain.. but just plain irritation. Don't know who came up with the idea of treating warts with liquid nitrogen, but we should come up with better ways. This was my first wart and first such treatment. While it was interesting and funny when they did the treatment, it was not funny after I came home. Just plain annoying, like you have an alligator clip squeezing your finger constantly and biting into it. Then caught a bug from a co-worker on Thrusday to the point where my nose was blocked completely.
Decided to go to Yoga class anyways as usual and things opened up a bit. Today my nose and lungs feel normal again. My morning class went so swimmingly well that I decided to go back in the evening. Both the teachers knew what I was up against and both of them promptly ignored it like good teachers do and proceeded to kick my ass.
As usual learned a lot in todays class. Sometimes I think I have fixed a mistake only to realize that nothing has been fixed. Have a rule at work for myself and people who work with me. It is okay to make mistakes, but it is not okay to make the same mistake over and over again. Somehow that rule was not followed in Yoga class today.
It is time to videotape myself doing some poses to see how I change from aligned to crooked. I check at the start of the pose and the guy in the mirror is perfectly aligned. When coming out of the pose, something has horribly gone wrong. Where and how this happens is a mystery that will soon be resolved. There is lot of time in hotel rooms and an iPhone camera handy!
On a side note, I finally managed to get my hands on this book that was out of print for a long time "A systematic course in the Ancient Tantric Techniques of Yoga and Kriya" by Swami Satyananda Saraswati of the Bihar school of Yoga. It is by far the most comprehensive book on Yoga that I have come across. It is a Ph.D. thesis on Yoga and Kriya. It reads like one for sure!
My college library has records of how many people check out a certain book. My doctoral thesis was checked out only 8 times in the 10 years since I wrote it (that was the last I checked). Doctoral thesis make for dry reading. Maybe this book while thorough and technical and detailed is lost on folks who are not into Yoga terminology and that is why it went out of print. Nevertheless, strongly recommend this book to get a perpective on why condition the body and the mind and the purpose behind it all.
Will start blogging about our recent adventures next week. Until then, ta ta!
Jr. is in India. The first thing she requests from me after reaching there? Daddy, can you tell me how you make ghee fry ?
She meant noodles and she knew I understood her request without mentioning noodles!
Was going to ask her Chitti to make it for her. They say kids will go crave for foods when they go to college.
Mine is in India and gets to eat home cooked food from my sister in law and mom and still craves ghee fried noodles. I have done something right! (or wrong if you ask all the women in either side of the phone conversation)
So here is a videoblog.
We use Maggi noodles in the house, lead or otherwise. If lead poisoning from Maggi is happening to anyone, yours truly should be hit, having eaten Maggi at least twice a week for a good 20 years. Many patents, papers, presentations later, not to mention a moderately successful stint as hubby and daddy over the same time frame, one can conclude that the brain is still functioning after all that Maggi! However, I dont use the masala packet that comes with Maggi and I always put Peas, carrots and Potato in the noodles. Potato is a questionable "Veggie" in our household, but it is one by my definition (for that matter, Maggi is questionable "food" in our household).
Hope the kids watch this years from now and realize that the best ingredient in the noodles was not the ghee but daddy's love.. okay.. that is asking for too much.
It is Ghee! You can make anything taste better with some Ghee!
Tuesday, March 5, 2024 at 8:36AM ;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)