Dedicated to “preggo” friends

1 chopped banana

1 cup diced pineapple chunks

1/2 cup mango chunks if available

1/2 apple diced into chunks

hand ful of grapes

1 cup non-fat yoghurt mixed with 2-3 tsps of sugar and a little bit of vanilla essence whipped into it

1/4 cup chopped assorted nuts

1. Mix all the fruits in a big serving bowl.

2. Pour the vanilla flavored sweet yoghurt mix onto the fruits.

3. Sprinkle chopped assorted nuts. If you have dried cranberries or like raisins get generous with those. Pistachio + almond + raisin mix should be nice.

4. Optional: A scoop of vanilla icecream. (To make this a fatful version).

Yennjai like yennything.

Apple milkshake and Papaya Juice

I get so many hits on the web site thanks to searches for the following terms that I feel I owe it to the visitors to write about the following items:

- baby squirrels (already written about this)

- papaya juice/milkshake

- apple milkshake/juice

Well what can I say:

Papaya is an amazing tropical fruit packed with Vitamin C, that grows in really lucky countries and gets imported into even luckier countries. Unfortunately – the quality of fruit reaching the luckier countries is really bad because of the limited limited shelf life of a papaya fruit that is off the tree. They start to wilt away and rot.

Papayas are great for weight loss (citation required) but if you substitute half a meal with a papaya every day, you are bound to see results. Why? coz it’s a natural cleanse agent. You will be excavating your intestines and taking the greatest shits of your life if you eat Papaya everyday.

It is also a fruit that ayurveda considers “hot” meaning it imparts heat to a body – so when you have cold or the flue, it’s okay to eat papaya not only coz it’s packed with Vitamin C.

Cut a papaya into half, the best kind will be nearly orange with few if any green spots. And not vice versa. Cut it into half, discard the seeds, scrape the fibrous innards off to expose the actual flesh, slice, peel (optional) and enjoy.

Optionally, blend with 4-6 ice cubes for juice or smoothie.Squeeze some lemon juice and drizzle with a little bit of sugar if the papaya is super bland. Calorie count: 140 odd per cup (200 ml).

Combine frozen papaya chunks with frozen pineapple chunks, berries, banana, nonfat yogurt about 6-8 ice cubes (I get all these from Trader Joe’s) to make a power packed smoothie. Also optional is a big chunk of protein powder blended in with the smoothie ingredients.

Apple Milkshake:

Yea I have never had this outside of Bangalore city. Two great ways of consuming Apple Milkshake:

- Go to any of the Empire chain of restaurants in the city and order an amazing glass of fruitful bliss.

OR

- Chop, deseed, and peel one apple so that all the stuff left is white.

- Blend with 1 big tbsp of sugar, 3-4 ice cubes, and a cup of milk. Throw in a little bit of vanilla ice cream but you won’t get the apply taste then.

Yennjaai like yennything.

Whew.

______________________________

Although the real reason why I named this blog thusly was that I had never had a papaya juice sold to me and apple milkshake before I went to Bangalore or Goa. New things that I would never have experienced at the time of writing this blog had I not been hungry for experience outside my toad well. This blog is dedicated to all experiences that can awe the deep Turtle with occasional deviations to things that also upset her.

I bought a polarized set of sun glasses in Bangalore and uncountable trashy sunglasses in Goa thanks to the Shaman. Allowed me to see new things in the right light.

Whatever we do will never be enough

Unless we keep doing it all day. Here’s what I heard:

“If you make an effort to get in 30-60 minutes of moderate exercise a day, but you spend much of the rest of the day sitting, you may be at increased risk of metabolic syndrome and death, according to an editorial in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.”

More at: Dangers of sitting too much

Bring on the beer, I am going to get a stapler!

Easy Bhindi

I love Bhindi. I also love it most when it is cooked in the typical high-calorie style: fried. My grandmom devised this recipe for my dad when he was battling cholestrol and it has bumped fried bhindi to the number 2 slot.

What you need:

• Bhindi (okra) – 400 grams, diced into small pieces
• Tomato – 1 large, diced into little pieces
• Green chillies – 2, chopped as big as your bhindi pieces
• Salt to taste
• Oil – 2 tsp
• That’s all really!!

What you need to do:

1. Heat the oil in a nonstick kadhai.
2. Throw in the bhindi and green chillies and stir on high flame till all the bhindi becomes coated with a sheen.
3. Add the salt, tomato, and saute for a minute.
4. Lower flame, cover and steam for 10 mins. Stir occasionally.

Best served with crisp hot phulkas.

Servings: 2

ILikes: ****

What it looks like:

Banjare Murgh ka Salad

After realizing how much of a difference pictures make, I was compelled to take pictures of any other concoctions I devise to put up on my blog.

So today I really felt like eating some succulent chicken. I can’t cook non-veg at home. Landlady’s request and restrictions. However, I can call for it. So I did. Banjara chicken kabab. Of course that couldn’t have been an entire meal. So I made a delicious salad out of it. How much oil did I use. None. Except whatever was there in the Chicken Banjara Kabab. I am sure it was lower than or equal to a teaspoon coz I only used two tikkas for this one.

What you need:

• 3 boiled eggs, sliced into strips, minus the yolk of course
• Lettuce, 4-5 leaves, cut or torn into bite size strips
• Tomato – 1 huge, sliced into strips
• Mint and coriander chutney – mint, green chilli, coriander, garlic, salt, ground
• Curd – 1 tablespoon
• Chicken tikka kabab – tandoori type, not the fried kind (I called for Chicken Banjara, hence the name of the salad – 2 tikkas – shredded or cut into strips
• Oregano
• Pepper (preferably from a pepper mill and not a shaker)
• Salt

What you need to do:

1. Whip 1 big spoon of chutney and curd together. Add as much chutney as you would like. Feel free to throw in some red chilli powder.
2. Mix the lettuce, egg, tomato, chicken, oregano, salt, and pepper.
3. Add the chutney curd mixture.
4. Voila

Preparation time: 13 mins, if you don’t make the kababs of course

Serves: 1

Serve with toasted multi-grain or whole wheat bread. You can even make a sandwich out of this mixture.

How much I likes: *****

Ideal for dinner coz of low carb value.

Check it out:

Banjare Murgh ka Salad

As some people would say, I yennjaayed like yennything.

Project Health Status Update

When I found my weight limiting a lot of things I really wanted to do, “that” switch went on. The Project Health switch. So far my interest in health has been purely hedonistic. I mean the state of mind and euphoric bliss you experience after yoga is hedonistic or what. So I got a reasonable amount of fitness in place but never really lost much weight, and instead kept gaining every time I returned to burgerland.

This December found me in Hampi. I couldn’t climb half the rocks. Not to mention dwindling levels of stamina, energy, and enthusiasm. Hampi played on my mind long enough. Then along came a breeze. A friend’s transition from 74 to 47, achieved over a period of 1 year. Spurred me on to join the red and white and silver and big french window gym, hereafter referred to as the Big Gym.

So it’s been 26 days of workouts so far and what have I gained. About 3 kilos off. Some inches that result in falling belt lines. And energy and enthusiasm. Focus. A following perhaps. 2 other women at work have started the same routine as I have, I don’t take credit, but they started right after I did. And suddenly, we have Project Health happening at work as well.

The role model for the project of course was the 74-47 friend. Apparently, she did it all by making little little changes to her lifestyle. I immediately soaked up everything she had to say.

Of these, the changes I did make:

1. Threw out all the junk food and replaced it with fruits.

2. Started packing my own lunch and cooking it. I try not to eat out as well, but this ends up happening at least twice every week.

3. Ate 4 meals a day instead of 3.

4. Breakfast became mandatory, although I am still struggling with this one.

5. At least 1 fruit a day if not 2.

6. No fried snacks or dessert – at least not more than once a week.

7. No rice for dinner. All rice was destarched.

8. At least 4 days at the gym, if not 5.

9. No GM diet. No cutting down on carbs through and through.

10. Enjoying the workout instead of criticizing it in the head came automatically from the “that” switch.

Apart from these, I started inventing recipes that used only 1.5 tsps of oil for 2 portions. Some of these were catastrophic disasters. I intend to log some of the recipes that weren’t all out failures for my reference. Chance doesn’t favor you twice on the same dish.

Music continues to drive the momentum. We also get together once a week at work to do yoga as a group of health enthusiasts. Next in line is an experiment with a swimming pool that PB has finally wished into existence. The pace is amazing. I never imagined I will rave about fitness ever in my life, but try stopping me now.

But most importantly what has changed is everything has become doable and less abominable. Not to mention the fact that I get random ideas more often than I used to earlier. Other Projects keep rearing their heads once in a while. Working toward all is difficult at the same time, Project Health stays top priority.

Resonance

Music is the rope you can grab to propel yourself to new extremes. Of late, my visits to the gym have become private raves characterized by phenomenal bursts of energy, a state of trance when I close my eyes, and pure magic. Euphoria is inevitable if you enjoy the workout.

There is rhythm in all of us. To find the resonant frequency, sometimes, it isn’t enough to sit and absorb. Movement, dynamism, action, throbbing muscles all contribute to your dance.

I can be pretty repetitive when it comes to music, and listen to the same music for months, especially when it comes to routines I associate with them. For example, I have used the Alien Project v/s Rajaram Live at Heineken Sundance albumwrap for all my workout sessions, starting February. Last evening, I took it a notch higher and used Azax Syndrome – Shinjitzu for a change and that made all the difference. I spent 45 mins doing cardio instead of the regular 30 odd mins. For me it was no longer about brisk walking, which is my routine on the treadmill because I can’t jog. But I couldn’t take that pace anymore and started jogging. Walking was no longer enough. No one walks at parties.