‘Our house is clean enough to be healthy, and dirty enough to be happy’. Yes, we decided to repaint the house after putting the long due project to back burner for years. The house is in total mess, but this exercise is a good lesson not to collect things which we may never use in life. There are sackful of such useless articles peeping errr..sleeping in the cupboards and overhead lofts, and I am on a disposing spree…finally.

On a positive note, painting your house is a good chance to do some spring cleaning as well. My old oven, box TV, stone age printer, bangle boxes, speakers, toasters, fluffy teddy bears, bagful of plastic kitchenware…looks like I have a real Pandora box…and believe me some of these have never seen the light of the day. Getting attached with these not so useful objects which were a part of my life some years back is inevitable, and I really feel sad to part with.

Home is where the heart is….my heart belongs to Chennai, the place where I got married and have been living since 1996. I have wholeheartedly accepted the city and have accustomed to the traditions, climatic conditions and the food here.

But even after spending a good 17 years in Chennai I feel that a part of my heart still lives in Udaipur. The place where I grew up, studied and spent the most beautiful years of my life with family and friends.

And why not, if one is the place of my birth than the other made me a complete woman! I take it as a special privilege of belonging to the two different cities at once.

Creativity has no boundaries and is best expressed when the mind is free and the world is your canvas to work upon. For the last couple of days South Indian cinema and politics is abuzz with a certain ban on the release of a Tamil movie. Though I don’t follow the happenings from the field of cinema or politics much, but this one caught my eyes. People in the shops, morning walkers, school children, my maid and not to forget the screaming TV channel anchors, everyone seems to be worried about the freedom of expression overnight.

Anyways, hope both the sides resolve the issue amicably soon and the freedom of an artist to express art without any boundaries or political pressure is restored and also the powers of politicians to bring in peace and justice are appreciated.

Anyways, hope both the sides resolve the issue amicably soon and the freedom of an artist to express art without any boundaries or political pressure is restored and also the powers of politicians to bring in peace and justice are appreciated….

‘Sports do not build characters. They reveal it.’  I would never have known this side of my son but for the sports day celebrations in their school. He along with other friends helped their teachers organize the props, dresses and other essential accessories for the shows on Sports day. Some of the students (including him) who stay near school premises took extra food, water and goodies daily to share with others during long hours of practice sessions in school. Proud moments for any parent.

And I promised him to make a dessert on their sports day which resembled the color of their dress code, Yellow.

Think of yellow and Pumpkin pops up in mind. This extremely light, delicate and scrumptious Pumpkin Pie was what I baked and shared with my son’s friends.

Festivals to me are to celebrate the happiness that family & friends share together. A perfect time to celebrate just living! In India we have celebrations all round the year. Festival of lights (and sound) – Diwali being one of the major festivals of India everyone look forward to.

Though the festival is same, people all over India follow different rituals to celebrate it. In South India Diwali is celebrated with a sacred bath before dawn followed by prayers, getting blessings from elders and bursting crackers. While in other parts of India it is more of a pompous fun fare with grand Lakshmi Puja during evening hours and buying gold & other metals on Diwali.

I am neither a sweet eater nor a cracker lover and left to myself will not indulge in both on Diwali day. But my hubby makes sure that I make sweets and he buys crackers for children on Diwali, so that they appreciate the importance of festivals & traditions in our culture.

It was just another day in paradise…spent an evening on beach, had fun and listened to each drop of water tell a story of life! The pleasing sight of vendors selling colorful snacks, lovey-dovey pair lost in their world, elderly couple walking hand in hand and children from the most affluent to common families playing together on the beach…the more I see, the less I know about life.

A trip to beach is always welcoming both to the parents and the children. My kids and hubby love to play in water, make sand castles while I travel to and fro with the waves in my dreamland. Hubby keeps a watch on both children & me, interrupting frequently with “Take care of our shoes, camera, bag …don’t get lost in your own world”.

I have lost count of the number of times I tried soaking sago for making this popular breakfast recipe and using the same for starching my sarees. Those were the days when I stayed away from mom for higher studies in Delhi and later for job prospects. Bored of my usual sandwich breakfasts I wanted to try my hands on some of the Indian breakfast recipes I used to love eating but would dare not make it.

I simply couldn’t get the correct sago consistency to make the Sabudana Khichdi which is non sticky and fluffy. And most of the times the soaked sticky sago was used to starch my office sarees.

A signature dish of Maharashtra in India, Sabudana Khichdi or Sago breakfast recipe is mainly cooked during fasting period when certain food items such as grain, pulses, onion & garlic are avoided. But then neither do I fast nor do I wait for any occasion to cook what I love

There are things I love to do for my children even though it least interests me, going to movie is one such. I could never connect myself with the world of cinema except for listening to good songs. When hubby’s choice ruled there were more of detective English movies which later changed to animation and comic movies once the children started to influence us. But all I remember & cherish about my movie watching stint is the time we all spend together and of course the huge bucket of pop corns!

Recently my son persuaded me to watch this Hindi movie ‘Burfi’ by downloading & playing the songs over and again. Not bad, songs are melodious and for a change I forgot to eat pop corns and kept myself awake till the end of the movie

‘So much chocolate. So little time‘! Yes, that’s what my children say whenever there is a chocolate dessert on their menu. Wish they said the same for studies also. I often take advantage of their chocolate love by sneaking in healthy foods which in its normal form are non acceptable. Oats, peanuts, almonds, dates, prunes and the list is endless. Most of the recipes on Lite Bite revolve around my endeavor to find out ways to make the food kids friendly, more healthy and also taste scrumptious at the same time.

The rustic iron Wok which was abandoned long back sits pretty in the backyard of my mom’s place after the entry of  that swanky oven in her kitchen. This black heavy-bottom wrought iron wok has been a part of our childhood memories for long. The melt-in-mouth cookies, Naan Khatais, Baatis and sort of spongy cakes she baked in it makes this ‘wok’ an important  part of our growing years.

These Chickpea flour (besan) cookies were the most baked goodies in our indigenous oven. Half of the wok was permanently filled with sand and a thin aluminum plate served as the baking tray to bake.