Winter Squash Soup

Four months ago, when dahlias and asters were crowning the summer season, I inserted a mesh on the windows to bar insects from entering, and to hear the swish of an oak tree that quivers on the backyard like a parasol. Under the canopy you’ll find clusters of acorn – little nuts that look like heads wearing a cap or, as I like to imagine, bells that jingle in the evenings when the man-made world – far away – quiets down. Although woodland creatures – deer, squirrels and birds – gobble them like a starving tribe, I’m sure it is the humming of these wind-chimes that lulls us to sleep every night.

Like adulthood, summer induces the best of many. It stands for potential, and ushers us to wander and explore. Time expands to ripen everything that started earlier as a seed: red currants, wheat, families, and our hopes and needs. With more ease and comfort than in youth, our self-acceptance matures like a corncob in the field.

But, usually sooner than we’d like, shadows grow taller and the breeze hints at the change of mood. Blooms retreat and greens fade. Then, one morning, chirping becomes but a heavy sigh. That’s when you have to pull down the screens and install the windows back. Hey mosquitoes, bees and flies! Where are you now? Have you escaped to a warmer sphere because the autumn is here?

Leaves fall from a tree when they lose their grasp. They hover down and transform. Such falling has indicated autumn (in English) since the early 1600s. Before that, the season was called a harvest.

‘Harvest’ sounds so much more abundant than ‘fall’, doesn’t it?

Although labor-intensive, it reminds of togetherness, woolen socks, hot chocolate, and thanks-giving. It’s the time to reap our quota, gather crops, preserve energy, extract from the culture, wind down, retire to an inner space, and stack for the winter (or the old age). Falling, which is an urban term, signals that something or someone is becoming less, diminishing and sinking inward, failing to keep up or meet expectations, and descending or collapsing by a force, such as gravity. Many have fallen from grace. Which of us hasn’t fallen apart at times?

Autumn is one the scenes nature lays out to teach. As a constant, it walks us through a series of changes, year after year, to show decomposition and the end of all, and then, a renewal. Past the prime, at fifty, I can relate to this better than ever. The seasonal cycle offers a program for a slow-learner like me to reflect on the wheel of samsara, repeated birth and death, and the duties that come along with participating in such a pastime.

To undergo a change is rarely easy – especially when it defies my identity, relationships, abilities or means. When a challenge becomes too overbearing, I take shelter of routines or my personal invariables that anchor me to the favorable side of the situation. Sanguinity works as an inherent antidepressant and enables discernment that clears doubts. Such keenness of insight is an essential element of meditative outlook. It activates the brain’s reward center in a sustainable manner. A conscious effort to recognize positive and negative emotions by describing them in words boosts serotonin and dopamine, the feel good hormones that reduce stress. A constructive disposition of the mind – acquiring knowledge, and feeling grateful and humble – produces good impressions which, in turn, develop into a good habit that will gradually expand awareness. To solve problems by employing guilt, shame, anger and anxiety, on the other hand, gives a quick release, but will propel to destructive impulses again in the future.

Pumpkin soup is one on my autumnal balance points. This must be the third pumpkin soup recipe on the blog; not because I’m addicted to the gourd family fruits or consider them more noteworthy than other vegetables, but I jump at them on the market because they represent the bright face of autumn. Under their skin beats a soft, generous heart – the kind I’d like to cultivate, too.

In what ways is the autumn tutoring and empowering you?

WINTER SQUASH SOUP

Ingredients for the soup:

2 Tbsp ghee (or butter, or oil)

¼ tsp pure hing powder

1 Tbsp grated fresh ginger

1 tsp grated fresh turmeric

2 medium size potatoes, diced

4 cups (1 liter) diced winter squash

¼ - ½ tsp cayenne powder

4 cups (1 liter) water

2 tsp dry roasted panch phoron powder

2 cups (500 ml) whey

2-3 tsp Himalayan salt

½ - 1 tsp garam masala powder

Ingredients for the garnish:

1 Tbsp ghee (or butter, or oil)

2 cups (500 ml) diced Hokkaido squash (red kuri)

2 pinches of Himalayan salt

1 pinch of cayenne powder

Roasted pumpkin seeds

1 -2 cups (250-500 ml) shalloew-fried paneer cubes

Cooking method:

Heat up the ghee (or butter, or oil) in a large pot. When it’s hot but not smoking; sprinkle in the hing powder, and grated ginger and turmeric. After about a minute, add the potato dices. Fry the potatoes over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes. Then toss in the winter squash dices and continue frying for another 5 minutes before pouring in the water. Cook (covered) until the vegetables are soft. Use a food processor, a stand blender or a hand blender to break the vegetables into a velvety soup. Whisk in the panch phoron powder, whey and salt. Bring the soup to a boil again, reduce the heat and simmer for about 5 minutes. Finally add the garam masala powder before serving.

While the soup is cooking, heat up a tablespoon of ghee (or butter, or oil) in a wok or a pan. Add the Hokkaido squash dices and sprinkle them with salt and cayenne. Fry them until they are cooked, stirring occasionally. Add the roasted seeds and fried paneer cubes. Combine the garnish with the soup.

A tip:

For panch phoron powder, take equal amount of each: mustard, fennel, jeera, kalonji and fenugreek seeds. Dry roast them on a pan over a moderately low heat until the seeds are a few shades darker and aromatic, for about 5 minutes. Let the spices cool down and grind them into powder.

The simplest garam masala powder consists of toasted cinnamon stick, cardamom seeds and cloves. You may add black peppercorns, jeera, fennel, coriander, tejpatta, nutmeg and other spices to make it more complex.

Thank you.

Lentil cakes in Potato & Tomato curry

Sponge-like patties, dhokla, have been steaming on Gujarati stoves for centuries. Made of fermented chickpea lentils and rice, they look like yellow diamonds on a plate.

Also for hundreds of years, but some 2000 kilometers (1300 miles) east – across the core lands of India – mothers and aunties by the muddy slopes of Ganges, in Bengal, have been frying another kind of savory cakes, dhoka. They are smaller and crispier than their northwestern resemblance. Bengalis dip them in curries instead of serving them as a side-dish, snack or breakfast. In addition to their likeness in etymology, dhokla and dhoka are also bound together by a common ingredient, chana-dal.

Consider chana-dal as lentil because it’s processed from hulled and split gram, or chola boot – the most popular chickpea variety growing in Indian subcontinent. Plump and meaty, chana-dal has higher fibre content than many lentils and it provides a valuable source of plant protein.

Now, take the shortest route from Kolkata to Helsinki via Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Russia. Our cottage is an hour drive from the airport. Because there are similar country houses around, look for the one that carries off the fragrance of ghee, hing and kalonji along with the wood smoke. We have set the midday meal on the table, and it includes dhokar dalna. Hopefully you don’t mind sitting on the floor!

When your eyes meet a gravy-like main dish in which the sauce is fairly thin – that’s dalna. It usually has potatoes, either alone or with other absorbent vegetables like cauliflower or pumpkin. Tomatoes, yogurt, coconut milk, and different seed pastes may enrich the sauce. Whereas chenna dalna contains cheese patties, dhokar dalna comes with lentil cakes. Sometimes other legumes, like split peas, replace chana-dal; sometimes chickpea flour, or besan, plays the leading role.

Making dhoka is easy but there are few things to pay attention to. When grinding dal, use very little but enough water to reach a smooth consistency. If the mixture is too dry, the patties will crack when you fry them. Trust me; I’ve experienced that, too.

You could substitute kalonji seeds for dry-roasted jeera powder when making dhokar. In that case, throw them in at the same time with hing powder. I would probably omit kalonji seeds in the gravy then and, instead, sauté jeera seeds with ginger, tejpatta and hing.

For spicier dhokar dalna, supplement the recipe with green chilies. You can also mix finely grated ginger in the dal paste.

I’ll show you some other time how to prepare dhokla. You will then be able to decide whether you are Gujarati or Bengali at heart! I already know which one I am.

DHOKAR DALNA / BENGALI LENTIL CAKES IN POTATO & TOMATO GRAVY

Ingredients for the lentil cakes:

½ cup (125 ml) split gram (chana dal)

Water for soaking overnight

About 2 Tbsp water for grinding

1 Tbsp ghee or oil

A pinch of pure hing powder

A pinch of Himalayan salt

1 tsp jeera seeds, dry roasted and ground

Ingredients for the gravy:

2 – 3 Tbsp ghee or oil

1 Tbsp grated ginger (juice removed)

2 small tejpatta

Less than ¼ tsp pure hing powder

1 tsp kalonji seeds

2 medium size potatoes, peeled and cubed

2 medium size tomatoes, peeled and chopped

2 cups (500 ml) water

½ tsp cayenne powder

¼ tsp turmeric powder

1 tsp jeera seeds, dry roasted and ground

2 green cardamom seeds, lightly crushed (or ½ - 1 tsp powdered garam masala)

1 tsp Himalayan salt

Ingredients for frying the cakes:

Ghee or oil

Cooking method:

Sort, wash and soak the dal in plenty of water for about 8 hours. Drain.

Add enough water to the dal to grind it in a spice mill or food processor (1 to 3 Tbsp).

Heat up the ghee or oil over moderate heat and sauté the hing powder for about 30 seconds and then scoop in the dal paste. Keep stirring it until it thickens for about 5 minutes. As it will stick to the bottom of the pan, keep stirring. It’s ready when it pulls away from the sides and forms a solid mass. Now add the roasted jeera powder and salt. Mix well and spread the paste in a buttered/oiled platter.Tap it into an even rectangle. When it cools down, cut it into mouth size diamond shapes or squares.

While the paste is cooling down, make the gravy. Heat up the ghee or oil in a pot. When it’s hot but not smoking, drop in the ginger paste and tejpatta. When the ginger turns a few shades darker, add the hing powder and kalonji seeds. Fry for 30 to 40 seconds and add the potato cubes. Keep frying them until they become golden and crispy. Mix the potatoes occasionally. Add the tomatoes and fry until they start to stick to the bottom of the pan, and the ghee or oil begins to separate from them. Now pour in the water and powdered spices, salt and cardamom seeds. Cook until the gravy thickens.Some of the potatoes may dissolve and some of them may retain the shape.

While the gravy is cooking, shallow-fry the lentil cakes in hot ghee or oil. Drain and add them to the gravy when it is somewhat thick. Remember that the cakes will absorb liquid; you may have to add some more water if the gravy dries up.

Remove the whole spices before serving.

Thank you.

Leafy Greens and Potatoes with Coconut

Earlier this year our brother in bhakti-yoga, Sadhumarga Prabhu, translated into Finnish “Cooking for Gaura Nitai”, a cookbook compiled by the students of Bhaktivedanta Academy Gurukula in Mayapur, West Bengal. The book contains nearly 100 lunch recipes, showcasing the diversity of Gaudiya Vaishnava* culinary tradition.

The book presents several kinds of rice; raita (salad); shukta (bitter preparations); saag (green vegetables); dal (legumes); cacchari (simple vegetable dishes); fritters like pakora, bora, kofta and bhaji; ghanto (stew-like vegetables); dalna (rich vegetables dishes in gravy); chutneys (sweet and fiery “jams”); and finally sweets, including all famous Bengali milk delicacies. There is also a chapter on Ekadasi, the eleventh day after full and new moon, during which we fast from grains and legumes.

Sadhumarga has also added a chapter in which he contemplates the relationship between health and culture – and the wholesome role of physical, mental and spiritual purity; the cleanliness of ingredients and environment; cooking techniques; and our attitude. Despite the small size, the book is packed with information and since I read it a few evenings ago, I’ve been inspired to improve my cooking, as well as my character. I’m not sure how I’m doing with the latter – it seems to take a longer practice – but I prepared leafy greens and potatoes with coconut according to the book’s instructions, and served the dish with rice, raita and roti (bread) yesterday – and, it was a success! Gradually I will be going through the recipes, and post some of them here on the blog, too.

There aren't exact measurements in the book but the recipes only list what ingredients and in which order they are used. I found it very nice. It forced me to look at each item attentively to see how it contributes to the process and result, and focus on cooking more deeply than I would’ve done otherwise. I tried to understand the idea of the recipe, and once I got it, I took the liberty to change some details within it. For example, I used kalonji instead of radhuni seeds, and a mixture of greens from our garden instead of just spinach.

By the way, “Sadhumarga” means “the path of saints”. I am happy to follow his direction, course of action and conduct in the kitchen to reach the goal of life.

*Gaudiya is another way of saying Bengal; Vaishnava is a devotional order dedicated to Sri Vishnu.

LEAFY GREENS AND POTATOES WITH COCONUT

(Serves 6 to 8 persons)

Ingredients:

6 to 7 liters (24 - 28 cups) lightly packed green leaves and stalks (spinach, Swiss chard, radish greens, and baby beets and beet leaves)

6 medium size summer potatoes

1 coconut

2-3 Tbsp ghee

4 cm (1 ½”) piece of ginger (finely grated, juice squeezed out)

1 tsp jeera seeds

1 tsp kalonji seeds

2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

½ tsp pure hing powder (or ¼ - 1/2 tsp Vandevi hing)

2-3 tsp Himalayan salt

Method:

Wash and chop coarsely the greens.

Wash and cut the potatoes into sticks.

Wash, crack open and finely grate the coconut.

Blanch or steam the stalks and greens (and baby beets) until they are soft.

Heat up the ghee in a wok or pot. Add the grated ginger and fry it until it turns light golden. Add the jeera and kalonji seeds along with ground pepper and hing. Fry for 20-30 seconds then add the potatoes.

Fry the potatoes until they get some color and become almost cooked. Finally add the greens, coconut and salt. Cover and cook until the potatoes are tender but not mushy.

Thank you.

Buckwheat Roti

One cup buckwheat flour, a good pinch of Himalayan salt, one tablespoon of ghee (or oil), and about a third of a cup water (or as much as needed for an elastic dough) – that’s the basic recipe for making buckwheat flatbread, or roti. For softer dough, use dairy – milk, yogurt or buttermilk – rather than water. Being gluten free, buckwheat doesn’t have viscosity and tends to dry up and tear apart easily. Dairy functions as glue.

Rub the ghee into the flour and salt mixture with your fingertips until it resembles coarse crumbs. Fold in the liquid gradually. If you slip in too much water, add flour. There is no need to excessively knead the dough. As soon as you have formed a smooth ball, cover it and let it rest at least for thirty minutes.

Should you become an adventurous baker, incorporate mashed avocado to the flour mixture. Reduce the amount of water accordingly.

Potatoes and buckwheat go well together. Make spicy roti by adding ground jeera and black pepper, chilli, and fresh fenugreek seedlings or chopped cilantro along with the potatoes.

The stovetop baking method is straightforward. If you want fully blown, feather light breads you need two sources of heat.

First, place the flatbread on a medium hot skillet (preferably cast iron) and let it bake until tiny bubbles appear on the top and the edges curl. If you roll the bread thinly, it takes only about thirty to sixty seconds, but if you make a thicker bread, it may take one and half to two minutes to reach this point. Using metal tongs, lift the bread and place it on the top of a direct flame. It should instantly fill with hot air. If you don’t have access to fire, place a mesh a few centimeters (1 inch) above a hot burner and flip the bread over it. As soon as it puffs, remove and cover it with a cloth.

I usually skip the second part and bake the bread on a skillet by flipping it over continuously while tenderly pressing and encouraging it to cook properly. At some point I brush a little bit ghee on the top. With this method, the bread formulates many smaller air pockets instead of becoming like a balloon.

Happy baking!

Thank you.

Alu Gauranga

Born as a prince in the seclusion of Himalayan foothills, Siddhartha Gautama’s father shielded him from seeing disease, old age and death since birth. It wasn’t until at the age of twenty-nine, he met an aged man with a wrinkled face and bent back, outside the palace. The prince was shocked to hear from his charioteer that everyone’s life will eventually come to an end. Upon encountering a citizen who had fallen sick, a decaying corpse and an ascetic, he became resolute to understand and overcome suffering. Six years later, he was known as Buddha, the awakened one.

We live in the same world. 2000 years have not swept away duhkha, loss and pain. When the media brings the downside of human experience onto our breakfast table, as printed or electric news, we choose to distance from it: 239 passengers and crew members of the Malaysia Airlines’ flight MH370 who perished in the Southern Indian Ocean are mere statistics to us. We may be shaken while reading that 176 persons are still missing and 16 found demised after the landslide in Washington but, at the same time, we are safe. At least, now. Do we think that the 529 people sentenced to death in Egypt  are someone’s spouses, children, parents, uncles, friends and colleagues? For us they are nameless numbers. We are somewhat immune to the atrocity of death as long as it doesn’t collide with our field of action.

When Maharaja Yudhisthira was asked what the most striking phenomenon in the world is, he replied (Mahabharata, Vana-parva 313.116):

ahany ahani bhutani
gacchantiha yamalayam
sesah sthavaram icchanti
kim ascaryam atah param

“Day after day, innumerable living beings are taken against their will to the abode of death, but those who are temporarily spared never think they will die; instead they continually desire a permanent situation. What could be more astonishing than this?”

There never seems to be an appropriate moment to speak about loss. Yet, all faith traditions, science and even the materialistic enterprise, built on economic development, strive to alleviate distress.

We tend to think the Eastern thought is pessimistic because it discusses such a difficult subject; we would rather remain blindfolded than face it. But, have you ever considered that it is too late to analyse tribulation in its acute phase? Most of us are crushed in a situation we have failed to preserve what is important to us, whether it is a beloved relationship, quality, condition, position, asset, activity, revenue, quota or goal. When an emotional storm hits slamming us from disbelief to bewilderment, denial to sadness, anger to quilt, blame to shame and fear to helplessness, our feelings prevent us from accepting and processing rational information. Sometimes we even reject consolation and affection because our hurt is too raw.

For a living entity, it is natural to response emotionally. We are sensitive creatures. Therefore, knowledge is not meant to oppress but harness our feelings before they bolt and disable us. Only in a sober state of mind we can study the true nature of things and beings. Then, at the arrival of trouble and reverse, we have a solid perspective, even though we are never fully prepared for adversities.

As long as we view material energy as the only dimension of awareness, we remain confused about dualities like pleasure and sorrow that are constantly changing. In fact, Bhagavad-gita speaks of them like the seasons following one another in the cycle of time. We can’t stop them but change our attitude towards them. Trying to achieve a permanent situation in a transitory environment – as if we were building a house on ice that will melt in due course – is hardly a sign of developed intelligence. In Sanskrit, it is called maha-maya, a grand illusion.

We experience and deal with afflictions according to our perception. In ignorance, we are both disinterested and neglectful of the eternal constituents of reality. When faced with personal disaster, we become destructive and hopeless; we take refuge in reminiscence, sleep and intoxication. When passionate, we are mainly concerned of our interest, and focus on what we can enjoy and control. With such character, we are likely furious when forced to renounce anything “mine”. Because we judge in terms of friends and enemies, anyone who disagrees with our plan – be that nature, other beings or God – deserves our revenge and wrath. But, when we cultivate purity and goodness, sattva, we gradually recognize consciousness as the substance that distinguishes matter from spirit. More we discover our indestructible form beyond ephemeral values, more we appreciate others as equal sparks of Divinity and claim no ownership over anything or anyone. Only then, we are able to specify who is losing and what is being lost, if anything, at the time of despair.

The body is but a shadow of the self. It is animate only as long as the soul illuminates it. For the soul, there is no beginning or end. Self-realization, being the privilege of human life, is the only way to come in terms with the mechanics of material laws that seem unfair and harsh at times. When it dawns to us who we are, what everything else is, what our relationships are and how to act in a progressive manner even in unfavorable circumstances, the calamities appear like dreams that no longer perplex us.

When my grandmother passed away in 1995, I sobbed in the funeral. Sitting next to me, my brother handed a napkin and whispered to my ear, “Don’t cry, she has transmigrated into another form of life.” He was right, and I knew it; after all, I lived in a monastery and studied the subject of reincarnation daily! Nonetheless, I missed the association and grace of my “mummo”, and couldn’t check the tears. It was necessary to grief.

The topic of departure is complex because it involves attachment and love. Letting go anything we are keen to, is hard. If we become aware of the deathlessness and common pursuit of happiness of every soul, we can make the transition easier. It, of course, requires that we question the validity of the material concept of life and reform our paradigm accordingly.

Alu Gauranga has nothing to do with the topic we have talked about above, except that I learnt the recipe while living in the ashram. In the spiritual life everything is personal. Therefore, we also name our food and sweets after saints and incarnations in order to remember the path and goal we have taken. Gauranga means “golden limbs” and refers to the radiant complexion of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Alu is a word for potatoes. I have also used parsnips in the recipe; whether they qualify as potatoes, I leave for you to decide! In the past I have substituted part of the potatoes with fried eggplants, zucchini and other left over vegetables that seem to blend peacefully in the yellow bliss made of fresh cheese and sour cream.

An update: I was just kindly reminded that the recipe originates from the first cookbook Great Vegetarian Dishes by Kurma Dasa whom I adore.

Potato Swirls

”Indian Halloween” headed an invitation to a Diwali celebration I saw – and smiled at – a couple of days ago on Facebook. It sounded like a hybrid of the Festival of Light and All Saints ’ Day! These two holidays intersect on the Vedic lunar calendar and the Western almanac this year.

A couple of minutes ago, I googled “Halloween” in order to understand what the tradition is about. When I was seventeen, I spent a school-year in America as an exchange student and, still, remember the cat outfit I dressed up for Halloween. My older sister, Kim, in the family I stayed at was a cowboy. She took me to a reception at her workplace and I assumed Halloween was an annual costume party. I wondered about the lanterns, skulls and scarecrows but don’t recall anyone explaining them to me. Due to commercialism, Halloween has since been adapted in Finland, too.

Although there are similarities, Diwali and Halloween are visibly different traditions. The former is about awakening the inner knowledge. It’s about contemplating, growing and revealing the pure and eternal beyond the physical, whereas the latter is about associating with the dead: the good, bad and evil. All Hallows’ Eve is observed in the Christian community as a reminder of our mortality and to honor and, in some cases, fear those who have passed away. The custom of dressing in disguise was there, initially, to hide from the vengeance of the spirits. Of course, both, Diwali and Halloween are mostly taken today as social events rather than occasions of spiritual or religious importance.

In one sense, yogic lifestyle is a year around Diwali because it’s anchored in the cognition, consciousness and activities of devotional nature. The meditation I wake up for every morning is like igniting a ghee-lamp to dispel ignorance and apathy.

We had a snack of aloo patras yesterday. They are potato filled whirls that are usually deep-fried. I made the dough slightly fattier and baked them in the oven instead. I’m not sure about the origin of the recipe. It seems to me, like the combination of Diwali and Halloween, a crossbreed of two different worlds.

Aloo patras must be served with a chutney. They set a canvas on which the flavors of chutney are painted. A recipe for the date and tamarind chutney will be in the book.

Pardon the ugly vinyl glove in my right hand. It looks like a Halloween themed artifact generating doom and horror! However, it's there because of a touch sensitivity to chili, ginger and a million other things.

Oh, and before I forget: happy Indian Halloween!