Lemon Rasam

A simple, refreshing and tangy rasam. No specific ingredients required and no need to grind anything, you don't even need Dal extract to make this rasam, can make this with whatever is lying around in kitchen :-)! Simply put, you are gonna spend hardly 5 minutes in making this rasam and it definitely tastes good with hot plain rice. Fryums or Pappad goes very well with this humble rasam.

Ingredients:

1)Lemon - 1 

2)Tomato - 1(chopped)

3)Green Chilli - 2

4)Garlic - 5 to 6 cloves

5)Water - 3 cups

6)Chilli Powder - 1 tsp

7)Coriander Powder - 1/2 tsp

8)Cumin Powder - 1/2 tsp

9)Turmeric Powder - 1/2 tsp

10)Salt - to taste

11)Sugar - 1 tsp

12)Mustard Seeds - 1 tsp

13)Cumin Seeds -  1 tsp

14)Asafoetida  - a little

15)Whole Red Chilli - 2(small, crushed)

16)Ghee - 1.5 tsp

17)Coriander leaves - good amount

Preparation:

1)Crush Green Chilli and Garlic cloves. Keep aside.

2)Heat ghee in a pan and add Asafoetida, Mustard Seeds, Cumin Seeds, Red Chilli and let it splutter.

3)Add the crushed green chilli and garlic, chopped tomato, chilli powder, coriander powder, cumin powder, turmeric powder, salt, sugar and water.

4)When the content nears the boiling state, add lemon juice and let it cook for a minute and switch off the flame.

5)Add chopped coriander leaves and the remaining ghee. Close the lid to arrest the flavor.

Poori Masala

Who doesn't like Poori Masala? Although, good amount of oil goes into making pooris, once in a while this is a great breakfast for sure! Here, I got my version.

Ingredients:
For making Poori:
1)Wheat Flour - 2 cups
2)Rava (with fine texture) - 1 tsp
3)Oil - 1 tsp
4)Salt - a little
5)Water - as required
To deep fry pooris:
1)Oil - 1 cup
For making Masala:
1)Potato - 2
2)Onion - 1(chopped)
3)Tomato - 1(chopped)
4)Oil - 1 tsp
5)Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
6)Split Urad dhal - 1/2 tsp
7)Channa dhal - 1/2 tsp
8)Green Chili - 2
9)Besan or Gram Flour - 1 tsp
10)Curry Leaves - 2 to 3 sprigs
11)Asefoetida - a pinch
12)Ginger - 1/2 inch(grated)
13)Turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp
14)Salt - to taste
15)Coriander Leaves - 2 to 3 sprigs

Preparation:
Poori:
1) Mix Wheat flour, Rava, Oil and Salt together in a bowl. Add enough water and make the dough. Make small ball sized rolls.
2)Flatten the dough balls with a rolling pin. Use oil instead of flour.
3)Heat oil in a frying pan. Deep fry the flattened dough until it puffs up on both the sides.

Masala:
1)Cook the potatoes in pressure cooker with water and salt for 2 whistles. Once done, peel off the skin, mash the potatoes and retain the water.
2)Heat oil in a pan and add Mustard, Split Urad dhal, Channa dhal, Green Chili, Curry Leaves, Ginger and Asefoetida. Let it splutter.
3)Add the chopped Onion, Salt and fry till they turn translucent. Add the tomatoes and cook till they are done.
4)Add Turmeric powder and cook for a min.
5)Mix Besan with little water and make a smooth paste. Keep aside.
6)Add the cooked/mashed potatoes along with the water, besan paste and cook for couple of minutes. Add coriander leaves and mix well.
Poori Masala is ready!

Vatha Kulambu (Kuzhambu)

"Vatha Kulambu" is one of those tangy gravies, which tastes perfect with plain rice! Although, this is not a staple at home, I end up cooking pretty often. Mind you, this gravy can stay for a week when refrigerated. You just need a spoon full of gravy for a good amount of rice, but do not forget to sprinkle a little ghee on to your rice - Oh! just divine!

Ingredients:
1)Sunda Vathal - 2 tsp (Okie, what on earth is this? :-) It is called as "Dried Turkey Berry", you can get this in small sachet from super markets. If not available, you can make this gravy using just shallots or loads of garlic or okra!)
2)Shallots or small onions - 3(chopped)
3)Garlic - 7(chopped)
4)Tamarind pulp - a lemon sized ball, soaked in luke warm water(2.5 cups) for 15 minutes.
5)Gingelly oil - 3 tsp
6)Sambar Powder - 2 tsp(I used Shakti Sambar Powder)
7)Curry Leaves - 3 sprigs
8)Salt - to taste
9)Jaggery - a pinch
10)Asafetida - a pinch
11)Mustard seeds - 1 tsp
12)Split Urad dal - 1 tsp
13)Fenugreek seeds - 1/4 tsp
14)Whole Red Chilli - 2 to 3(small, crushed)

Preparation:
1)Heat oil in a pan and add asafetida, mustard seeds, urad dal, fenugreek seeds and whole red chilli. Let it splutter. Make sure the chilli is not burnt.
2)Add curry leaves, sunda vathal, chopped garlic and onion. Saute until they are done.
3)Add salt, sambar powder and mix well. Cook for couple of minutes.
4)Add tamarind extract and let it boil for 30 to 40 minutes(Yes, you heard it right - the liquidy gravy should turn to semi solid consistency, hence the time). Do not forget to close the lid of the pan, so that the flavor stays put.
Note: When the gravy boils(say after 15 minutes), add a pinch of jaggery to it and mix well.
5)Add a spoonful of Gingelly oil on to the gravy and mix well. (PS: Gingelly oil is good for health!)

Here you go,Vatha Kulambu is ready to be served with plain rice and ghee! I'm drooling already.

Are all advertisements mundane?

After an IT Industry bashing session with a dear friend, we changed the topic to ads. She asked me, if I had seen the latest "Idea cellular" ad - but, I had no clue. When I was heading back to my apartment, I youtubed to see, what the ad is all about. And trust me, it is an interesting commercial. Take a look.

Every time we encounter ads in between a match or a movie or a TV show, all we do is frown, but why?
Because advertisements are mundane, boring and not cool. Not to forget, ads are the primary source of revenue for any program that is being aired in TV. So the broadcasters are never gonna spare us from telecasting ads in between our favorite shows. Hence, the obvious question which comes to anybody's mind is - Why are they not making ads that are cooler or at least watchable?
Well, there are quite a few good ones available. But yes - not many, just a handful.

So here, I'm trying to dissect the perception, what works and what doesn't in advertisement.
No instant results:
The challenge in creating a killer ad is that, one has to make it appealing to the audience, in 1 to 2 minutes of time. Ads should have creativity, credibility, entertainment and a story. Out of the 4 listed items, story is the most important one.
Advertisements are not going to bring in immediate customers. Nobody is going to get outta their couch, to buy a "Scooty Pep" just because "Priyanka Chopra" rides one in their brand advertisement. Ads can never give immediate results. Ads may create expectations and interests but the results can only be measured eventually.

Brand should speak for itself:
One should never make advertisement based on the brand, instead the story that is being pitched in should sell the brand without asking the audience to go buy the brand. Successful advertisement seldom succeeds through argument or calls to action. Instead, it should create positive vibes and feelings that influences our behavior over time to encourage us to buy something in near future. No one likes to think that they are easily influenced. Hence, the best advertisements are ingenious enough to leave a lasting impression, at the same time they are ethical. Overselling a product is never fruitful.

Creating Brand Equity:
The most powerful tool to sell or market any product is advertisement.
Coke has spent millions in advertising over so many years to fortify the brand equity. Say, if they stop advertising in near future and I'm sure, at least for another decade - people would still continue to purchase their product.  Imagine, how profitable would that make the company to sell a "carbonated sugar water" that costs nothing to produce, for next decade with no marketing/advertising expenses.

Also from the awareness perspective, you may find people who do not know our Prime Minister's name, but I don't think there is anybody who doesn't know Coke! And that is brand equity!

Target Audience & knowing when to do what:
Advertisers should understand the relevancy of telecasting a particular ad at a particular time. Why is timing so important?
When Indian Idol show is going on, it makes sense to advertise Sony or JBL headphones, but at the same time - it may not be a good idea to advertise "Servo Engine Oil". You know they say, "Doing the right thing at the right time".

So the final question: Does advertising influence user's choice?
You may not think advertisement influences you. But marketeers do. Well, years & years of accumulated quantitative data proves that, advertising does influence user's choice not immediately but gradually.

Image & video Courtesy: Google and youtube

Sports - Why is it so important for kids?

The other day, I was talking to my cousin sister, she asked me - what other sport(other than Cricket) can her 8 year old son be a part of, either by playing or watching. I suggested, Formula One Racing. She asked me to teach her kiddo the basic nuances of the race, so that he can pick it up and start watching the race. I gladly agreed. The main reason she wants her son to learn some form of sport is that, she can stop him from spending umpteen number of hours watching cartoon(Chota Bheem - Seriously, why kids are crazy about this, right?) or playing video games or meddling with laptop or phone.

Why sports is not ONE OF THE best, but THE best way to a kid's well being? Read further:
1) Discipline and Physical Fitness:
Current generation of kids are fighting the pandemic called obesity. Blame their sedentary life style(Blame Chota Bheem, :-)). To be honest with you, this is reason enough to consider enrolling them in sports. Anything that is being taught, will start with the basics and the first word any kid learns from any sport is "discipline". Do you guys think, it is easy to make them sit at home & teach discipline? Nah! It is not possible.
Sports promote an active lifestyle and help children achieve and maintain a healthy body weight & image. They will very well be aware of what to eat and what not to, in couple of years of practice. Physically fit children are less likely to fall sick. Regular exercise reduces the feeling of stress, anxiety, mood swings in kids.

2) Social Skills:
Kids learn to interact not only with their peer group, but also with senior players, coaches, physical trainers and sports officials. They learn coordination and cooperation, leadership skills and communication skills that will help them in school, career and also in personal life.
A dedicated and skilled coach can have an amazing impact on children. In fact, kids respond better to an inspiring coach, than to their own parent.

3) Goal Orientation:
Sports teaches the importance of setting goals and working towards achieving them by individual contribution or by a team effort. The art of taking one step at a time towards achieving the ultimate goal, will be taught and experienced perfectly in sports. Even though, one may fail several times, the same is re-taught and re-experienced until they reach the highest goal.

4) Positive Image & Attitude:
Kids involved in sports exhibit higher self esteem and self confidence than the kids who are glued to cartoon network 24/7. As they grow further, you can very well sense that they have a better body image, being fit and energetic. Research from the many Institutes across America, points that children who participates in sports are less likely to smoke, do drugs or overuse alcohol.

5) The 5 “Ps” - (practice, patience, perseverance, pragmatism and positivity):
I'm sure everybody would have heard of 3 Ps of life, but here I got 5 Ps for sports.
Every kid who participates in some form of sports would definitely learn and follow the 5 Ps without fail.

• Practice: Practice teaches them the quality of "you don't get glory without earning it" and pushes them to perfection.
• Patience: Patience is what is required to sail through several successes and umpteen number of failures in sports. It will make them tough.
• Perseverance: Perseverance is what is required to get back and do it all over again, when you fail. Who better can teach this concept than sports?
• Pragmatism: Being practical is very important in sports - your goals should be practical, logical and achievable - You cannot run a Marathon with a day's practice, it requires you body, mind and soul to work in sync to achieve the common goal.
• Positivity: Even when we are 9 wickets down and with 1 ball remaining and a 6 runs to score - the batsman should have the positive attitude & guts to pull a 6 run off the field and that quality is patented to Sports.

6) Ego under control:
One of the most destructive words in English, that is known to have ruined relationships and friendships, is "EGO". I have seen families breaking down to shambles because of ego problem. Trust me, sportsperson cannot afford to build ego and the first thing a good coach does, when he senses a smoke of ego in a sportsperson is to stamp down that one fatal quality from its root. One can utilize this quality of keeping ego under check, in both professional and personal life.

Is this not reason enough to push your kids to get involved in Sports? Think about it!

The are excellent movies in Hollywood, that would motivate not just kids but anybody to take up sports. When you get a chance - do watch these movies!

• The Karate Kid 
• Remember the Titans (Adult supervision required)
• Goal! The Dream Begins (Adult supervision required) 
• Million Dollar Baby (Adult supervision required)
• Bend it Like Beckham (Adult supervision required)

Image Courtesy: Google

How to use SWOT in Personal Life?

I always draw parallels between my professional and personal life. Anything, one learns in their professional life can be customized and applied to their personal life but vice versa may not be true. So here is one such topic called SWOT Analysis. The interesting thing is, you can use SWOT analysis personally for self awareness & personal development without having to spend considerable amount of time, breaking your head.

Basic Definition:
SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

Who uses SWOT analysis professionally?
SWOT analysis is a tool for auditing and analyzing an organization, environment and individuals. SWOT analysis is the first stage of planning which helps professionals, managers and marketers to focus on key issues. Also from the IT industry perspective, we use this analysis for performance appraisal & feedback of any individual.

What is the aim of SWOT analysis?
The aim is to turn our weaknesses into strengths, and our threats into opportunities. The outcome of the analysis should be an increase in ‘value’ for customers/individuals.

How to use SWOT in personal life?
Doing a SWOT analysis of your life can give you a clear picture of who you are and the opportunities you have for your life. It will help you identify where you need to improve, and more importantly allows you to identify your internal strengths, that you can capitalize on to grab your opportunities and prevent any external threats.

It is also an essential key in your day-to-day decision making in your personal life. Before you decide to buy that expensive product, evaluate the impact of what can happen when you make that decision. You may find out that you will prevent yourself from making the wrong choice.

There are 4 steps to SWOT:

1)Write down:
Take a paper and divide it into four quarters. Label each area as S, W, O, T. Identify the area of your life that you are gonna address via SWOT.
[I have taken an example of "A typical Food Blogger's anxiety" to illustrate this analysis, instead of getting too personal - Write down the answers to following questions(you can come up with any number & type of questions) in the allotted quarter.]

Strength

Qn: Which areas do I excel in?

Ans: Cooking

Qn: What skills and capabilities do I possess?

Ans: Presentation, Photography

Weakness

Qn: What skills do I need to develop?

Ans: Networking, SEO, Social Media

Qn: Which personal difficulties do I need to work through to reach my goals?

Ans: Being regular, taking care of family & kids, time constraint, coming up with innovative ideas for cooking.

Opportunities

Qn: Which circumstances can help me achieve my goals?

Ans: Managing time efficiently by plotting couple of hours everyday to blogging(having a schedule),

following number of blogs to get inspired to further innovate the cooking style.

Qn: What could be the outcome, if I fulfil the above answer?

Ans: A balance between blogging and personal life, bringing steady flow of audiences, making bucks via advertisements.

Threats

Qn: What obstacles am I currently facing?

Ans: Dearth of creative ideas.

Qn: Which fears are holding me back?

Ans: Fear of not being regular, Fear of loosing audience, Fear of uncertainty.

The problem is half solved already, when you know what you have and what you don't. Yes, writing or jotting down is the first step towards achieving any goals. It is not without any reason that people take notes while in a meeting or a conference. Richard Branson, still runs around carrying a small notebook(in the era of phablets and tablets), to take note of anything and everything important that he comes across.

2)Think laterally and get a third person's opinion:
Sometimes the strengths that you have, may not look like a unique quality to you - but a third person(say a friend) can help you realize the strength or weakness. You may also want to get people who are close to you to share their perspective, especially on your strengths and weaknesses.

3)Understanding the concept of "One quality leading to another":
Remember one thing, strengths tend to lead to opportunities and weaknesses tend to lead to threats.
For example, if a weakness that you have is that, your cooking skills are limited to one particular cuisine(say South Indian), the threat might be that there is only so much that you can do with one type of cooking, which means in some time you are gonna run out of ideas(so that is a threat). The opportunity is that you can learn a different cuisine and turn that into your strength.

4)Apply the findings:
Once the list is ready, you need to look for ways to apply your findings. You can start applying your findings by asking questions about each quadrant.  For example you can ask: How can you use your strengths to maximize your potential? How can you get rid off your weakness? How can you find opportunity? How can avert threats?  The answers to these questions will help you with the strategies for achieving your goals.

You should have a much clearer perspective about who you are, where you are headed, and what opportunities you need to pursue, once you are done with applying the findings. Try out when you have sometime, perhaps it will help.

Image courtesy: Google

Coconut Milk Rice (With Raw Mango)

Inspired by the subtle infusion of whole spices in variety of rice recipes(by Nava), here I got one. No powdered spices required, just the whole ones should suffice. This is a simple recipe, but tastes pretty good. I added raw mango to give that kick, since we are not adding any powdered spices. The coconut milk, gives the mild sweetness to the rice which gets enhanced by the sharp sour taste of raw mango. If you are one of those, who appreciates the innate taste of whole spices or veggies, probably you will like this rice. Give it a try.

Ingredients:
1)Long Grain Rice - 1 cup
2)Raw Mango - 1/2(chopped)
3)Carrot - 1(chopped)
4)Green Chilli - 1 to 2(slit)
5)Onion - 1 (small, chopped)
6)Coconut Milk - 3/4 cup(thick, add 1/4 cup water to dilute it) - (I got Dabur brand Coconut Milk)
7)Ginger - 1/2 inch (grated)
8)Salt - to taste
9)Oil - 1.5 tsp
10)Cumin seeds - 1 tsp
11)Cinnamon stick, Cardamon and Cloves - a few

Preparation:
1)Soak the rice in water for 30 minutes. Heat oil in a pan and add cinnamon, cardamon, cloves, cumin seeds, let it splutter.
2)Add slit green chilli and grated ginger, saute for couple of seconds.
3)Add chopped onion, salt and saute until onion turns translucent.
4)Add chopped mango and carrot, saute for 2 to 3 minutes.
5)Now add the coconut milk and mix well.
6)Add the soaked rice and mix well. Adjust the amount of water.
7)Transfer the content to a pressure cooker and cook for 2 whistles.

Coconut milk rice is ready.

Iron Man 3 and a very obvious question!

After watching the movie "The Avengers"(where more or less all the interesting super heroes joined hands to save the world), I had little hope on Iron Man 3 - after all there is only one super hero in this movie. Man, can I be any further from the truth?
But I must admit - I have always liked this uber cool, cocky, playboy, industrialist and an amazing engineer, Mr Tony Stark(dubbed Iron Man). I dunno, there is something so good about this guy, he is not the typical macho man, nor he has this chocolate boy kinda face - but I guess the charm of this character comes from the innate intelligence he possesses and flaunts them with elan. I'm only pitching in my take on why you should watch this incredible movie.(Spoiler alert!)

Pros:
1)For starters, the movie is made with a budget of whopping 200 million dollars.

2)Director: If you had watched Iron Man 1 & 2, you can predict the directional style of Jon Favreau, but this time around, the new director Shane Black took the coveted position as director and hence the overwhelming expectation on the movie as to will-he-or-will-he-not make the cut!

3)I love this movie series for its IQ - which is 99% of the movie and usually they throw in an EQ of 1%, you know they say - just in case :-) But in this movie, the ratio is changed, but not stuffed.
The IQ quotient is still 99%, but the EQ quotient adds an extra 15%. And hence this is a perfect movie. Had they reduced the IQ quotient, this movie cannot satisfy the technicality hungry fans, but they made sure they add that extra 15% emotional quotient to get more audience, what can I say "Master Stroke".

4)The twist: Ben Kingsley(as Mandarin) is supposed to be the bad & deadly guy in the movie, it turns out otherwise, convincingly so! Love that part. Who could have guessed that?

5)The bespectacled, limping Guy Pearce's(as Aldrich) transformation into a 6 pack and uber intelligent guy is a revelation. Ultimately it proves the point, "Bad guys are made outta situation, they are not born bad".

6)Air Force One rescue operation: Seriously, go buy a ticket only to watch this incredible scene, where our Iron Man saves the lives of 14 people in a stunning free-fall rescue from the aircraft - The incredible effort made to get this scene right, is a technical marvel - kudos to the actors, helpers, graphics and visual effects team!! All 14 of them were tied to invisible ropes to make this scene come alive. Is it possible in real life? Nope - But that is why we need technology to make believe and oh boy, did they nail it? Indeed. Look at how they shot the scene in this snap, thrilling!

7)The kid Ty Simpkins(Harley): Well, the kinship between Iron Man and the kid Harley is portrayed in a very subtle, yet funny way. Especially in the scene, where Harley tells Iron man that his Father left him. Look at the dialogue from our Iron Man to the kid,
Iron man: “Dads leave. Don’t be a pussy about it”!!
HaHa, Love this guy!

Had it been our Indian directors, they would have done the following 2 things for sure - One, an emotional song in the back ground sung by Sonu Nigam and in the next scene, Iron man would go down on his knees and carries the kid on his shoulder and comforts him with a lollipop in his hand, that things will be alright, beta!
Thank god, this movie was not made by EQ packed Indian directors! Peace prevail!

8)The Captain America color on the body armor of Don Cheadle(Rhodey), because it was sponsored by US government, what can I say? Classic. He is so funny all throughout the movie - watch out for him!

9)Javris: The technical marvel always lies in the brain power of the overworking, sleep-deprived Tony Stark(Iron Man), his creation of umpteen number of mini Iron Mans(or body suits) as a military unit controlled by the omnipotent robotic machine himself, "Javris" is an incredible one and that makes it for a spectacular action sequence at the climax of the movie.

10)As always, a movie should have one damsel-in-distress and Gwyneth Paltrow(Pepper) is reprising her role once again, no big deal of a role, but she gets to save Iron Man at the end of the movie with couple of straight punches thrown at the bad guy! Phew!

Cons:
1)I praised the visual effects of several other scenes, but whenever the invention called "Extremis" is subjected to any human, the body kinda burns from inside out - Those scenes are not at all believable, I dunno - how could one miss that, the burning scene kinda looks very cheesy, like it was brought straight outta the shelf of "Lajjpat Market in Delhi" or "Commercial Street in Bangalore" - Not quite satisfied with the visuals(mind you! only those Extremis scenes) of a 200 million dollar budgeted movie.
Anyways, this one point can be ignored!!

The obvious question:
Mandarin, as portrayed in the movie is just the face of a terror unit, but he is not the brain or muscle behind the terrorist activities. Although, he is shown as the one who is doing this terror strikes all over the world, he is actually a dumb actor, he is paid to be the face of the terror unit, basically a puppet - while the real bad guy i.e. Aldrich makes plan to attack further from behind the scenes. The whole world searches for the puppet Mandarin, while the actual terror guy sits somewhere else and plans his next move. We can draw a parallel to "Osama Bin Laden" - don't you guys think so?
May be, Osama could just be the face of the terror unit, but the actual brain and muscle might have been somebody else? I shudder the very thought of this!! Holy cow.

Verdict: Go watch it, only in theaters! - This is the kinda movie you should spend you money on and come outta theater with a feel that, this movie is worth more than what you payed for.

A long walk and a chance to humiliate a wrongdoer!

Yesterday was my long-walk-day of the week! I walk for couple of miles every alternate week, usually the pace would be faster but I don't run. I usually take the really long-stretched-road, which connects Whitefield area with Varthur area. I wouldn't dare say, the traffic is lesser in this route, but it is bearable during off periods and holidays, hence the choice.

It was 6:30 PM - trainers on, music on and there I go. I walked for 10 minutes and there was hardly any traffic, thanks to May Day. I saw Mainland China Restaurant to my right and there was nobody inside, I was wondering - did they even do a research before building this restaurant here, especially in this stretch of road with no big stops per se - anyways doesn't matter, as long I'm not a share holder, so I changed my concentration to my side of the road. I saw a bike parked near the shoulder of the long-stretched road, from a distance of 100 feet.

And the owner of the bike, walked across the shoulder and he was looking at a mini tree with hardly any leaves and some bush nearby. Yes, you guessed it right, he started urinating over the bush. By that time, I was 50 feet near him and there were couple of people walking nearby me.

I looked back - I saw a cute couple, walking hand in hand and a (50 to 55) year old lady(wearing a salwar suit and a comfy sneakers) and a really tall guy walking nearby.
Because there were people around(just in case, if I get into trouble), I shouted at the urinating guy - "Yo, what the heck?" - he turned around with a huge shock in his face, as expected the sneaker lady backed me up and started scolding him in Kannada in a baritone of a voice and the rest joined the Humiliation Mela - The bike guy got embarrassed so much and he hastily ran towards his bike and scooted away.

And all of us(Yes, strangers) started talking about how these guys are spoiling the beauty of Bangalore and parted ways in couple of minutes.

Well, back to Public Urination - Mind You! This is a unique problem of India. The worst thing is, not just the uneducated, but also the educated mass does this disgusting ceremony on roads.
After returning home around 8:30 PM, completely tired - I wanted to freshen up, eat something and hit the sack. But instead, I told myself, I would browse for some time and then crash around 10.
When I was browsing on this topic, I happened to stumble upon a BBC post that states the following- "In the state of Rajasthan volunteer organizations and public authorities began shaming offenders by drumming and blowing whistles" - Is humiliation the only way to stop these guys? Having acknowledged the fact that humiliation does work, I should say - YES.

One other point to be noted is, only Men do this nonsense, not Women. India's rural development minister Jairam Ramesh said that the country needed toilets more than temples. People started pouncing on him. But isn't it true? If one is not hygienic, even God can't save him/her from the disease that he/she contracts by being filthy.

From BBC article:
This is an observation by an onlooker, walking in the streets, co-relating the view of Jairam:  "I saw pictures of the gods on the wall in front of me. They had been placed outside a house so that people would not urinate on it. India may need more toilets than temples - but in this deeply religious country, it seems that divine intervention is the only thing that can stop men from urinating in public."
HaHa, how ironic and true!!
Oh, My India!!!!

Image Courtesy: Google

Simple Tindora Fry

Tindora or Ivy Gourd is one of the most interesting veggies ever, because they have a unique taste and they are easy to cook. Upon accentuating this veggie, with couple of spices - they taste perfect. When buying Tindora, you have to make sure they are not too ripe - in that case, the inner chunk will be red or orange in color and it doesn't taste good, when used for frying. So make sure they are just right, i.e. green.

Ingredients:

1)Tindora or Ivy Gourd - 1 cup(chopped to thin slices)

2)Onion - 1(chopped)

3)Turmeric Powder - 1/2 tsp

4)Red Chilli Powder - 3/4 tsp

5)Coriander Powder - 1/4 tsp

6)Ginger Garlic Paste - 1/2 tsp

7)Salt - to taste

8)Oil - 1.5 tsp

9)Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp

10)Split Urad Dal - 1/2 tsp

Preparation:
1)Cut the Tindoras into thin chip like slices.
2)Heat oil in a pan and add mustard and split urad dal, let it splutter.
3)Add chopped onion, salt and cook until they turn translucent.
4)Add ginger garlic paste and saute until the raw smell goes off.
5)Now add the cut tindoras and mix well. Cook for 3 minutes
6)Add salt and saute until they are completely cooked. It may take around 3 to 4 minutes.
7)Add turmeric, red chilli and coriander powder and mix well. Cook for 3 minutes.

Tindora fry is ready to be served with rice or roti.

Swamynomics

Indian Politics is a whirlwind, picking one person out of the lot is a huge exercise. There are some people in the world, whom we hate and there are several others, whom we like and there is a third category, of whom one cannot IGNORE. And that is because they are constantly in news for one reason or the other and one of those would be Subramanian Swamy. Yes, the Political Leader of Janata Party(India).

When a person speaks in a public medium, that too - when he/she holds a public service or government position, the chances of getting maximum audience and coverage in the form of people and media - would be good, when their speech beholds one of these:
1)One - Tongue firmly in cheek.
2)Two - Biting your own tongue.
And, should I even mention that - our Swamy falls under point number two?

I sometimes wonder, should his middle name be "Troublemaker"? - Yes, he gets into too much trouble and mind you! nobody pulls him out of his troubles, he saves his own butt and gets his fare share of media attention, especially twitter and goes back into hiatus for sometime and once again - gets into trouble and as they say, the cycle repeats itself.
Watching these politicians, is like watching a juggler in Circus.

Listing out some of his controversy filled speeches/actions:

1)It all started couple of years ago, when Swamy wrote a xenophobic article against non-hindus in an English daily. Mr Swamy’s solution to stop terrorism in India, is by providing Non-Hindus only have the right to vote if they “proudly acknowledge that their ancestors were Hindus” and if they “feel for the Hindus” - Is this even a solution? What was he thinking, right? No wonder this controversial write up, ultimately cost him his Harvard teaching assignment. Yes, he used to be a visiting professor of Harvard and he is a Harvard Alumni himself. Trouble doesn't stop here, a case was registered against him by the crime branch, on his hate speech.Well deserved.

2)What other job does he do, other than being the leader of Janata party and writing his mind out? He files PIL(Public Interest Litigation) in court, day-in-day-out. The problem is not with his PILs(in fact, it is a welcome move), but he shamelessly owns and shows off the outcome of any verdict(when it is according to his expectation) to his stride. He praises himself, he tells people/media that - because of his PIL, a particular issue is being debated in court, and all other non sense. While this may be partially correct(5%), it is not always true and hence people & media find him as an object of ridicule.

When one says, he/she is fighting for the good of common man(Aam Aadmi) - Self Pride, Boasting, Bragging should be locked up somewhere and they should fight for the actual cause, leading from the front and walks away unaffected by sharing the victory with everybody involved. An ideal example and a master of this concept would be Mahatma Gandhi. Although nobody expects, politicians like Swamy to be Gandhi - at least they should not brag when the victory is not completely theirs.

3)After UP assembly election, Swami tweeted "What is the diff between Akhilesh Yadav and Rahul Gandhi(Buddhu)? Former is 38 years old and has three kids. The latter is 42 and still a kid" - What can I say - another controversy, another day?
If you noticed the word "Buddhu", in his tweet - Yes, he called Rahul Gandhi a "Buddhu"!! No comments!

4)With the recent news involving the Italian Marine controversy, again Mr Swamy filed a PIL. And sat in the front row of Supreme Court cockily as always. But what he got as a return gift, is something he would never forget in his life.
The Honorable Chief Justice of India Mr Kabir, asked the following to Swamy:
"Who are you?” the judge asked. “I am sorry you are not an advocate. You have no right to appear. You have no right to argue. What will happen if any person on the road comes and says I want to argue. You might have done it earlier, but we will not allow you.”
Swamy's ego was so hurt and this ultimately led to his exit from court.

Some respite:
As of yesterday, after being a complete non-sense for quite sometime, he got back his senses and made a acceptable and relevant comment on the frisking of UP minister Azad Khan at the US airport, by stating the following: "Going to US is voluntary choice. So why this hullabaloo if a sovereign government has its own rules of security ?"
Some sense prevailed, finally!!

The real question is:
It is not that, India does not have highly educated, qualified and smart Politicians, we do have quite a lot of them - like Swamy himself, Shashi Tharoor, Akhilesh Yadav, Sachin Pilot, Chidambaram and so many more. But why don't they channel their experience, intellect, smartness on so many things that require attention, why waste time in getting into controversy and involving themselves in umpteen scams? (Swami and Shashi are like the hot favorites of controversy.)
The economy is still not up and the inflation is surging and people are loosing faith in Indian Government and for some time "Arvind Kejriwal", an IITian himself looked promising, until he got into the bandwagon of "Fault Finding Mode" and pounced on all the high profile people, got enough media attention and in turn incited common men to further hate government. If Congress is not good, then BJP is definitely not an alternative, so whom do we even vote for?
Actually none!
Leave a thought!

Image Courtesy: Internet

Simple Bitter Gourd Fry

I don't like to meddle with the actual taste of any vegetable(in particular, bitter gourd), I season them in such a way that, their innate taste is retained. And that is one of the reasons, I don't add sugar or jaggery to bitter gourd. I cannot tolerate the mild sweetness popping out of the already bitter recipe, I could never fathom this - dunno why?. All I do is, add basic seasoning, remove the really bitter seed from the center and saute it in little oil. As always, no deep frying required(strictly).

Instead of trying to make this vegetable taste less bitter, you can have a main dish which is very light and subtle, say curd rice - this will work too. Warning: This is definitely not a kid-friendly recipe, HaHa!

Ingredients:
1)Bitter Gourd - 1(medium)
2)Oil - 1 to 1.5 tsp
3)Turmeric Powder - 1/2 tsp
4)Red Chilli Powder - 1 tsp(1 tsp really? Yes you need a bit more of this.)
5)Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
6)Split Urad Dal - 1/2 tsp
7)Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
8)Salt - to taste

Preparation:
1)De-seed the bitter gourd and cut into "thin semi-circle" shaped pieces.
2)Heat oil in a pan, add cumin, mustard seeds and split urad dal - let it splutter.
3)Add the cut bitter gourd pieces with little salt and saute until they are cooked 90% - It takes around 5 minutes.
4)Add turmeric powder, red chilli powder, remaining salt and keep stirring for another 3 minutes.

Sauteed bitter gourd is ready!!

Simple Palak Dal (Spinach Dal Recipe)

Palak Dal is one of the simplest of recipes, at the same time very rich and healthy too. It works very well with both rice and roti. It is a welcome change to the mundane Dal Fry for sure. Not many add tomatoes to this Dal, but I did - because I like the mild sourness it brings to the Dal.

Ingredients:
1)Toor Dal - 1/2 cup
2)Spinach - 1 bunch(chopped, I used the stem as well)
3)Green Chilli - 1(slit)
4)Small Onions or shallots - 4(chopped or slit or whole)
5)Tomato - 1(small, chopped)
6)Whole Red chilli - 2
7)Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
8)Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp
9)Asafetida - 1 pinch
10)Turmeric Powder - 1/4 tsp
11)Red chilli powder - 1/2 tsp(optional)
12)Coriander powder - 1/2 tsp
13)Oil - 1 tsp
14)Ghee - 1/2 tsp

Preparation:
1)Soak Toor Dal for 30 minutes in water.
2)In a pressure cooker, add soaked toor dal with enough water, turmeric powder, asafetida, salt, slit green chilli, shallots and tomatoes. Cook for 4 whistles.
3)Heat oil in a frying pan, add cumin, mustard seeds and whole red chilli - let it splutter.
4)Add chopped spinach, a little salt and cook until it is done.(About 4 to 5 minutes)
5)Now add the content from cooker into the pan and mix well. Let it cook for 2 minutes
6)Add red chilli powder, coriander powder and mix well. Let it cook for 3 minutes.

Add 1/2 tsp of ghee at the end and mix well.

Suspended Coffee, a sweet gesture!

Fellow blogger Sanjay, once shared a post on "Suspended Coffees", but somehow - I forgot to re-share that post in G+. So here, I'm sharing the mini story dusted with little more history. Before I jump into explaining, what is "Suspended Coffee" and what is so sweet about it, here is a question: How many of you can start a day, without the help from a pick-me-up, say coffee or tea? Not many! May be 10% among the entire population, right?
So the remaining 90% of us, rely on this marvelous drink, which has become a part of our lives. Basically, Coffee is not a luxury but a human right :-)

The Story(rather, the sweet gesture!):
At times, when we come across genuine stories like this, we will be reminded of the term "Being Human", and in turn - it reinstates the faith in human beings - even when we are subjected to acknowledging a lot of natural and man-made calamities around the world!!

"Suspended Coffee" can be called as a custom or a ritual, which is easy to follow. "Suspended" means "Set Aside", so "Suspended Coffee" means "A Coffee which is set aside for later use"

When a person, who had a break of good luck(or simply put, the ones who can afford) enter a cafe and order a cup of coffee, he/she would not just pay for his/her own cup, but for two or more cups, allowing someone less fortunate to have a cup of coffee later, for free.
The Batista would keep a log, and when someone comes by the doorway of the cafe and ask for the availability of suspended coffee, the Batista would serve him/her with a cup of free coffee.

It is a sweet way to show generosity - where the donors and recipients never meet each other, the donor doesn't show off and the recipient doesn't have to show gratitude. "Suspended Coffees" are prevalent only in couple of European & Russian nations. Hope, it spreads it's tentacle all over the world.

At the same time, when I was thinking about India, I could not stop myself from pondering the most obvious question: "Even if I pay for a "Suspended Coffee" in India - there probably is no guarantee that a poor would be served, isn't it? I wish, I could be an optimist here - but the reality is kicking me hard!"

Leave a thought!

Soya Granules Pulao

Meal-Maker(Soya) comes in different varieties and shapes - like chunks, granules, flakes, nuggets, grains, and strips. They are full of Protein and rich in Fiber. Hence, it is an ultimate ingredient to any type of cooking.
Somehow, I do not like to use big chunks of Soya, hence I opted for granules. So here is a simple Pulao made of Soya Granules and Potatoes.

Ingredients:
1)Long Grain Rice - 1 cup
2)Soya Granules - 1/2 cup
3)Potato - 1(medium, chopped)
4)Green Chilli - 1(chopped)
5)Onion - 1(medium, cut lengthwise)
6)Ginger Garlic Paste - 1/2 tsp
7)Red Chilli Powder - 3/4 tsp
8)Garam Masala Powder - 1/4 tsp
9)Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp
10)Cardamon , Cinnamon, Cloves, Javitri(Mace) - a few
11)Salt - as per taste
12)Oil - 1/2 tsp and Ghee - 1/2 tsp

Preparation:
1)Soak rice for 30 minutes and cook the rice along with whole Cardamon, Cinnamon, Cloves, Javitri(Mace), salt and water. (If you have Saffron at home, then add saffron strands to luke warm milk and add the mixture to the rice before cooking). Make sure the cooked rice is grainy.
2)Soak soya granules in 1 cup of water with a little salt for 10 minutes. The 1/2 cup granules should become 1 cup after soaking. Filter out the granules from water and keep aside.
3)Heat oil and ghee in a pan and add cumin seeds, chopped green chilli, onion and salt. Saute until onion turns translucent.
4)Add ginger garlic paste and saute further.
5)Add chopped potatoes and saute well. The potatoes should cook for 3 to 4 minutes. (You can add 1/2 tsp of oil here, if required). It should turn crispy in the corners.
6)Now add the granules and mix well.
7)Add red chilli powder, garam masala powder and mix well. Saute for couple of minutes.
8)Now add the cooked rice with the whole spices and mix well, saute for couple of minutes.
9)Garnish the Pulao with fried onions on the top. Sauteed cashews can also be used.

Your Pulao is ready!

Simple Fried Rice

The traditional Chinese version of fried rice contains egg, that is the base. Also they use 'one day old cooked white rice'. Yep, you heard it right! But here, I jotted down a simple yet authentic Chinese Veg Fried Rice(of course with egg but not with one-day old rice :-) ). The ones, who cannot consume egg, can very well skip point number 3 and instead can add capsicum, works just fine.

Ingredients:
1)Cooked long grain rice - 1 cup(should be grainy, less water please)
2)Egg - 2 nos
3)Carrot - 1 (medium, chopped)
4)Beans - 7 (chopped)
5)Green Chilli - 1 (chopped)
6)Regular Onion(Spring Onion works well too) - 1 (chopped)
7)Garlic - 3 pods(chopped)
8)Pepper powder - as per your taste
9)Soy Sauce(light) - 1 tsp
10)Salt - to taste
11)Oil - 2 tsp

Preparation:
1)Heat 1 tsp of oil in a frying pan and add chopped green chilli, garlic, onion and salt. Saute until onion turns translucent.
2)Now add the chopped veggies and saute until they are cooked 90%(Yes, for any fried rice - the veggies should not be cooked 100%, otherwise it loses the crunchiness). Keep aside.
3)Heat 1 tsp of oil and add eggs, scramble them.( Even eggs should only be cooked 90%)
4)Add the sauteed veggies into the pan and mix well. Add salt and pepper to the mixture and stir well.
5)Add the cooked rice and mix well.
6)Add 1 tsp of soy sauce and stir well.

Your authentic Chinese fried rice is ready to be devoured!

Indian Men and Rape!

Seriously, what is with the rape culture among certain percentage of Indian men? In specific, we are hearing hell lot of news from the Northern part of India. The worst thing is, toddlers who are between the age of 4 and 5 are getting raped? Isn't this insanity personified? For the past one week, we have been hearing terrible news like: bomb blasts, earth quakes, explosions, 10 rape cases in India(in just one week)? One of the dailies reported that the rapist, who smothered the innocence of a 5 year old, comes out shamelessly and says - he was under the influence of alcohol and he had watched porn, before he pounced on the kid? I was like, my goodness, did he even listen to what he just said? How on earth these people sleep at night?

(Whom or What) should we blame for such atrocities? - Parents? Lifestyle? Friends? Poverty? Male Chauvinism? - These are all just hog-washes to say the least.

The real reason for the prevailing nonsense is THREE_FOLD:
1)Not having access to BASIC EDUCATION: Look at the statistics of Indian rapists, 60% of them are not educated. Isn't this a huge number? Isn't this the responsibility of the government to provide education to every individual, be it rural or urban?
Why rape cases are lesser in developed countries? It is because they are educated enough to understand their country's law, they know very well the implication of even thinking of committing such crimes.

Also there is one more thing - Police Lethargy in India: Our Police Officers should be educated in ethics and moral values periodically - Cops have NO RIGHTS to bribe a rape victim's parent to not to file a complaint against the rapist.
Also cops have no rights to say - "Who will rape a 40 year old lady?" - How dare they say that?

2)Not empowering women at home: One need not get out of the house, to learn good habits and deeds(say by attending school or by attending a mass). Education should start at home. Parents are responsible for the kids, until they outgrow themselves - Make men/boys at home respect women. Make them understand that, women are not the customized machines to do the cooking, cleaning and stuff like that. Treat your kids equally. You need not protect girls, just empower them.

As the Delhi protesters say, "Don't tell your daughter not to go out, but tell your son to behave properly" - Isn't spot on?

3)Not having Legal enlightenment: You may be wondering - why "enlightenment"? Don't you guys think, our Legal system should be updated or reviewed - accommodating the recent changes and not blindly following the 10000 pages rule book, that was written 100 years back?

As we all know, Nirbhaya was gang raped and she passed away after struggling for 13 days in Dec 2012. Politicians called her "Daughter of India". Yeah right! What did they do to the rapists, who were responsible for her death? They are still in Tihar Jail and it is going to be 5 months already. We all know what happened, all the evidences point to the culprits, the girl who was raped - herself stood as a proof, the friend who was with her, is still a proof - But our Indian Judiciary cannot come to a verdict yet? How lethargic!

I was so angry, when I heard the news that the main culprit committed suicide. How the hell can he get away so easily? The pain that he inflicted on Nirbhaya was never paid back. The Judiciary(if it has a face) - should convict the remaining gang, by subjecting them to "Chemical Castration" and then "hanging them publicly". This will be the perfect lesson to those percentage of Indian men who rape.
And forget those 'Human Rights Activist', they are just motormouths - invading prime time in news channels.

Take away:
Until all the above points are implemented, what can women do - to not to get into a situation like that:
1)It may sound like a cliché - but yes, if you are going out late in the night, carry a pepper spray or a handy mini knife or a sharp object or never leave your friend's gang when outside.
2)Do not drink too much, that you cannot handle yourself.
4)Talk to your kids about strangers and the ones you doubt, make them aware of the fact that "Strangers could harm them". This is one of the pitiful times, where we end up realizing, a kid who watches cartoon at home is better safe than the one who is playing out in the streets! Cannot digest the fact, but that is true.
3)You can look cool or hot, in the way you want without having to wear skimpy clothes. Seriously - carry your attitude, watch what you eat, work out and wear the right cloth, Voila - you look damn hot!

Hope, I did not blabber too much - Do pour in your views, positive and negative alike.

Image courtesy: Internet

Facial Recognition Technology: How did FBI narrow down the suspects?

You might have read a lot about Boston Bombings, hence I'm not getting into any of that. Instead, I'm gonna solely concentrate on the technical side of it. I'm always intrigued by the findings that goes into making a successful or a failed capture/attempt. And I dunno, somehow I have always loved Hollywood action movies and have a great respect for The USA's defense system in the name of FBI, SWAT and so on. Unlike our Indian movies, Hollywood seldom shows their defense system in bad light. Why? Because they are really effective, up-to-date, have money to spend on defense and super strong.

The pressure on the entire defense syndicate in The USA on Boston Bombings would have been hell lot, owing to the fact that it took them 3 complete days and even then they could not come up with anything concrete. But, by end of the 3rd day, they narrowed down the suspects to these immigrants from Chechnya(Russia) - Two brothers,  "Tamerlan Tsarnaev", aged 26 and "Dzhokhar Tsarnaev", aged 19.

How did "Facial Recognition Technology" help FBI?

Some of you might be knowing the technology and some of you might have seen the usage of such technologies in Hollywood movies called "Facial Recognition Technology". A simple example would be - "Tagging of faces in Facebook Photos" - Mind you! Tagging is not same as Recognition, but the base concept is the same. The manhunt (fortunately, it is over now) was facilitated by surveillance coverage, amateur videos and photos on Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and other social media sites. But how can someone find a suspect from a million population photographed or video taped? It is a humongous task and it is near to impossible, had it been couple of years ago. The hunt to figure two suspects out of the million faces would have taken hundreds of days, if this was done manually.

But now, it takes couple of hours, because of technologies like "facial recognition", "voice identification" and "object tracking". According to a software firm based out of The USA - "Their software can pick out parts of a face, the nose, eyes and shape of a cheek, create composites match and use the meta data. Then in what they described to be like a Google search, the software scans thousands of faces. The scans are effected according to age, gender and other category related data. They can also scan objects, for example backpacks, vehicles, etc.."

Because of being in nascent stage, this technology has its pit falls too - Facial Recognition Algorithms struggle once a person’s face is hidden by more than 20 degrees, but there are softwares that can correct hidden side up to 45 degrees. It does this by filling in the hidden side of a face by copying from the visible side. Hence, the software can do the job 'approximately' for sure. And mind you, these kind of pricey technologies are used only by the developed nations, as of now. It would be great to see the day, when India gets into such hi-fi mode, isn't it?

Here is the extra hunch - (for the action lovers):

You may argue with me as to, "How did the FBI get the lead on the 2 suspects: Yes! the software fetched their faces from the crowd, but how did they get the initial scoop on the 2 suspects?"

The answer is:

• FBI's strategy was simple, the bombings happened twice with a distance of 100 meters apart. FBI was looking for faces which were present in both the locations and narrowed down to couple of suspects. Now, should I even re-iterate that our 2 suspects were already part of that bunch?
• Secondly, they were scrutinizing for backpack wearing people in the crowd, again they got a good lead which points out to the 2 suspects.
• Last but never the least, FBI asked for public help by asking them to recognize the suspects by spreading their photos and also requested the public to share photographs/clips of these 2 suspects.There you go, public did the last bit. We all have seen the picture of the 2 suspects walking with their backpacks, but one of the audiences in the public shared the picture where both did not have their backpacks, instead were fleeing the area. Should I even explain further?

See for yourself in the picture below,

So this is how FBI/SWOT/Techies/Helpers/Onlookers/Media nailed the suspects using technology. Again, my salutes to the Mighty American Defense System & of course, to our very own technology!

Share your thoughts!

Image Courtesy: From Internet

Is the party over for Gold?

I dunno, who is in the picture below, but seriously - what was she thinking, right? This much amount of gold on that neck, would give her Cervical Spondylitis in one day, Holy Cow!

I'm sure my Mom, Aunt even my Granny would blame "Kalyug" for Gold loosing its sheen, being staunch believers in the investment of gold. HaHa, we South Indians - We never get bored of buying gold, do we?
I'm happy though, because I don't like gold. Anyways, it doesn't matter whether I like gold or not, but what matters is the truth that is prevailing or getting speculated in the recent weeks. So here is the inside story:

The Gold Story:
The belief that gold is the finest investment, whose value can only go up, is absolutely wrong. History shows that gold fluctuates very often and sometimes very bad too, so it can look a fabulous investment for some time and then become a total disaster. There's nothing safe about it. After all, it is just a metal!

After generating incredible positive returns for 12 consecutive calendar years, gold has surprised everyone by declining sharply by around 20 to 25 percent from its high of Rs 33000 per 10 gram in late 2011. It has since fallen steadily to Rs 26,000. The domestic price of gold has been buoyed by a steady depreciation of the rupee against the dollar in the last couple of years. In dollar terms, gold has not generated meaningful returns in the past two years.

Global trends suggest we have entered an era of falling or stagnant gold prices. 
Buyers and Investors beware: Gold will probably be a bad(or not so exciting) investment in the next decade.
It may bounce back temporarily, but will then fall back again for sure.

Gold used to be the safe haven to which people rush during troubled times, so speculators hoped its price would rise in today's troubled conditions. When I say troubled times, I'm talking about the global impact caused by "North Korea, which is threatening nuclear war and then comes Japan, which is trying to double its money supply and Cyprus, has set a dangerous precedent by confiscating uninsured large deposits in its top banks, and this could have prompted a rush into gold". Why then, has gold fallen instead of rising? Read further.

Market Correction:
Every product will go through a "Market Correction" at some point of time. Gold was enjoying this glorious period of high-handedness for quite sometime now, but guess what: The vantage point is reached and hence the correction to the price.

Reason for the Correction:
1)One of the main reasons for the recent correction in gold price is the confidence in the US economy that has led to investors shifting money from safe havens like gold to riskier assets like stocks.
2)The rise of the dollar value due to the economic crisis in Europe also resulted in prices being adjusted as it is denominated in US dollar terms. The dollar has also moved up on hopes that the US economy is emerging from its crisis.

Verdict:
It's (nearly the right time) to sell gold, and not buy. Investors should be patient and should not expect new highs in the near term. If you are an ardent Gold investor, do keep track of the market condition, to get to know the sudden ups and downs to make a good choice.
Okie now, what are the other ways of investment that is upright?
Real Estate, Fixed Deposits and some safe stock investments are upright in this year.

Hope this post triggered a thought process in your mind about gold. Adios Amigos!

Image Courtesy: Somebody mailed me

Simple Carrot and Paneer Pulao

I know, what you guys are thinking - "Carrot and Paneer", seriously? Yes, that is exactly how I was breaking my head, when I was trying to cook something with this combination for the contest hosted by lovely Neela. I initially planned to make Bhurji with this combo, but since I had already added a variety of Bhurji with Paneer, I did not want to go down the same road again. So here, I made a simple and quick Pulao with carrot and paneer. Trust me, it turned out very well. Although, I wanted to add Capsicum, I could not find a fresh one in the super market today, so did not add them. But make sure, you guys add capsicum, it would be crunchy and just right.

Ingredients:
1)Paneer - 1 cup(cubed, big chunks)
2)Carrot - 2 (small, Grated)
3)Green Chilli - 1(chopped)

4)Onion - 1(medium, cut lengthwise)
5)Red Chilli Powder - 1/2 tsp
6)Coriander Powder - 1/2 tsp
7)Turmeric Powder - 1/4 tsp
8)Garam Masala - a pinch
9)Ginger Garlic Paste - 1/4 tsp
10)Cardamon, Bay leaves, Cinnamon, Cloves - a little
11)Oil - 2 tsp
12)Cumin Seeds and Mustard Seeds - 1/2 tsp each
13)Cooked Long Grain Rice - 1 cup

Preparation:

1)Heat 1 tsp of oil in a pan and add the cubed paneer, saute until they turn golden brown, keep aside.

2)Heat 1 tsp of oil in a pan and add Cardamon, Bay leaves, Cinnamon, Cloves, Mustard and Cumin seeds, let it release flavor and also splutter.

3)Add the chopped green chilli, onion and salt. Saute until the onion turns translucent.

4)Add ginger garlic paste and saute until the raw smell goes off.

5)Add the grated carrot, turmeric powder and saute until it cooks. It takes approximately 4 minutes. 

6)Add red chilli, coriander and garam masala powder and mix well, let it cook for 2 more minutes.

7)Add the sauteed paneer and mix well. 

8)Now add the cooked long grain rice and mix well. 

Simple Carrot and Paneer Pulao is ready to be served with Raita! 

Note: The Puloa will be slightly sweeter because of the grated carrot. If you do not want the Pulao to taste sweeter, then reduce the amount of carrot or otherwise chop the carrot instead of grating them. But somehow, when the carrots are chopped it did not look like Pulao, it looked more like a fried rice, hence I grated. :-)

Screams, Smoke, Chaos, Pain, Tears and Fatalities - Where are we heading?

I wanted to pen down something else for today, but just could not get a word out of my mind. I woke up to "Boston Marathon Bomb Blast" news early in the morning and the dreadful images that flooded internet. I just could not digest or get the images out of my mind, I'm sure the feeling is mutual. Two bombs, placed in a garbage can(or a mailbox) blasted through the finish line of the Marathon in the heart of the city of Boston.

Mind you! Boston Marathon is the KING OF ALL THE MARATHONS around the world. This is one of the biggest events of its kind, with more than half a million fans watching live or online. You can see umpteen number of flags, belonging to different countries planted nearby the sidewalk of the long stretched road leading to the finish line, representing the participant's country. Taking part in this Marathon is no easy task, but the purists practice for months to get into shape and also to get used to the unforgiving endurance. An "easy to say" but "hard to follow" word is "discipline", which goes into making these Marathoners. Typical Marathoners run for a cause - usually, to fund a rural school or a library, for cancer victims, for research on medical excellence and some, the cardio-addicted junkies for mere fun and also to witness the adrenaline rush.

Three of them, lost their lives and 140 of them, injured. The worst thing is, many people got injured fatally because of the shrapnel used in making the bomb and there are quite a lot, who lost their limbs to this blast. The images of bystanders, with severed limbs would bring even the stone-hearted to tears. You know, during the time of crisis is when, one could see the innate nature of human beings. How true is that! Most of the Boston residents, opened their doors to the injured, survivors and bystanders to take shelter. They helped them with whatever little they can. Kudos to those who helped in such a trying situation. And salutes to those who helped the bystanders and marathoners, get to safety during the blasts.
My heart goes out to those victims, their families and the injured!

The matter-of-fact question, which comes to my mind is - How can somebody, guard garbage cans in the city 24/7 (or) for that matter, any random "Joe" can place a bomb in the mailbox of some other random "Joe's" house? How would one know, there is something fishy in the mid of a thrash can or a mailbox?
Can we say, the cops were lethargic! Nope, we may not - because US has one of the best defense systems in the world. Will any one, look for a small-teeny-tiny-not-so-flattering item in a thrash can, that too - probably, was checked or scrutinized an hour back? No, practically not. Then, how on earth will we curb such violent and disturbing act against civilians?

Only when the wrongdoer realizes his or her act, these blasts would stop. Until that day, we all should stick around like nothing happened at all, and move on, I guess. Basically, we are the easy target for all those crooked minds sitting somewhere and delegating the order to bombard a city with the help of a retarded doer. How would they do this unfathomable act and sleep peacefully at night? No answers, all we have is 'questions and doubts'. Well, tomorrow is a new day - Hope to witness a normal, peaceful and a mundane day! No surprises and shocks, please!

Note: These images from Yahoo, genuinely portrays the agony of the people who were present at that time of the blast - Boston Images.(Warning: There are some disturbing images)

Image Courtesy: Internet

Simple Paneer Bhurji

This is the quickest of all the Paneer recipes in the world! Will we ever get bored of Paneer?? Nah!!!

This is a simple yet damn-good-looking recipe. I have not added any vegetables other than tomato and onion, but you can very well add capsicum to this recipe, that will make the Bhurji even more crunchier. It goes very well with roti and rice.

Ingredients:

1)Paneer - 1 cup(scrambled)

2)Tomato - 1(medium, chopped)

3)Onion - 1(medium, cut length-wise)

4)Green Chilli - 1(chopped)

5)Ginger Garlic Paste - 1/4 tsp

6)Red Chilli Powder - 1/2 tsp

7)Turmeric Powder - 1/4 tsp

8)Coriander Powder - 1/2 tsp

9)Garam Masala - 1/4 tsp

10)Salt - to taste

11)Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp

12)Cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp

13)Oil - 1 tsp

14)Water - a little(optional)

15)Lemon - 1/4th

Preparation:

1)Heat oil in a pan, add mustard and cumin seeds, let it splutter.

2)Add chopped green chilli, onion and salt, saute until the onion turns translucent.

3)Add ginger garlic paste, saute until the raw smell goes off.

4)Add chopped tomato and saute until it cooks.

5)Add turmeric, red chilli, coriander, garam masala powder and mix well. Let it cook until the raw smell of the masala goes off(2 minutes).

6)Add the scrambled paneer and mix well(1 minute). 

7)Turn off the heat and squeeze the juice of 1/4th of a lemon and mix well.

Whoopee, your recipe is ready!

Healthy Bottle-Gourd Recipe

Bottle Gourd is one of those rare vegetables which is packed with fiber, iron and protein. It has very less carbs. When bottle gourd is cooked with Moong Dal, there is nothing in the world which is so yummy at the same time damn healthy too. It is super good for those who are trying to lose weight. 

Ingredients:
1)Bottle Gourd(small) - 1 cup (skinned & cut into mini cubes)
2)Moong Dal - 1/2 cup(soaked in water for 20 to 30 minutes)
3)Onion - 1 (small, chopped)
4)Whole Red Chilli - 2
5)Cumin & Mustard seeds - 1/2 tsp each
6)Asafetida - a pinch
7)Garlic - 2 pods(chopped)
8)Red Chilli powder - 1/2 tsp(optional)
9)Turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
10)Ghee - 1 tsp
11)Salt - to taste

Preparation:
1)Pressure cook the moong dal & bottle gourd pieces along with water, turmeric powder & salt for 2 to 3 whistles. (If you want the cubed gourd to be mashed like mine in the pic, then leave it for 4 to 5 whistles).
2)Take ghee in a pan, add asafetida, cumin, mustard seeds, let it splutter.
3)Add whole red chilli, chopped garlic and onion along with little salt & saute until onion turns translucent.
4)Now add the pressure cooked content into the pan & stir well.
5)Add red chilli powder for the extra punch & mix well. Let it cook for couple of minutes.

Simple & healthy recipe is ready.

Book Review: "Attitude is Everything" by Jeff Keller

Yes, you guessed it right, this book falls under the category of Non-Fiction. The author says, the book will change your life forever.
Okie, I read the book. Did it change my life? Well, I will let you guys guess the answer by telling you, what I'm doing right now - I'm having a cup of coffee(yes, home made cappuccino) as always, read three online dailies as always, listening to country music by band 'Lady Antebellum' as always, looking for a good movie to download as always. Well, I'm sure, you know the answer! HeHe.
For the once, who has no time to read the review, jump straight to the verdict section at the bottom.

So the question here is, why this not-so-interesting book got too many rave reviews in the first place.
My guesses would be:
1)Damn cheap - 150 bucks
2)Very less page count - 130 pages
3)If this is your FIRST ever motivational, inspirational or self-help book then guess what? You are gonna jump from head to toe and say what a lovely write up.
But my friends, I'm a sucker for such books, read quite a lot and take my word on this, there are 100s of better books than this.

Review:
The problem with the book is, there is nothing new to offer or there is nothing extraordinary that will stick with you even after you are done with the book. Basically, it is powerless. Motivational and Self-help books, have the problem of getting the attention of the readers and trapping them by giving anecdotes, examples, punch lines, quotes and so on for the readers to glue to the content unlike fiction, where you have a story which goes on and on for 300 to 500 pages.

The book is set out in three parts: Thinking, Saying and Acting. Each chapter is an essay on a topic relating  to one of these subjects. Here comes the other problem, self help books should never follow an unending essay pattern. The chapters should be split into chunks or snippets, not more than a page or two to keep the audience attention.

I liked couple of celebrity examples from the book(These two would stand out from the rest for sure)

1)Celine Dion was asked if she ever dreamed at the start of her career that someday she’d sell millions of records and sing in front of tens of thousands of people. Her response was that none of this surprised her as she had pictured the whole thing since she was five years old. 
That was one heck of a confidence, I must say.

2)In 1990, while Jim Carrey was still a relatively unknown comedian, he wrote a cheque to himself for $10 Million for “acting services rendered” and post-dated it thanksgiving 1995. Jim Carrey knew he was going to be a success and every day he looked at this cheque. In 1994 he was paid $7 million for his role in “Dumb and Dumber” and in 1995 he earned many more millions. 
This clearly proves, how much gumption one has to have, to think positive and have confidence in their ability.

Well, these 2 killer examples are not enough to say, a book is great. The author vouches for his idea of attitude that changed his life and he wanted to share his experiences with his readers, so that they can change theirs. Reading this book changed only one thing in my mind - "Why did I spend 150 bucks on a feeble book, instead I should have gone for a ''Cafe Mocha" from CCD, where I was sitting and reading this book"!! Hmm..

Verdict: Do not buy, if you are an avid reader!
But you can buy, if this is the first time you are trying out such genre.