Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Mantena's Special - Tomato Nuvvula Chutney
Today’s
special in Dr. Mantena’s Kitchen is ‘Tomato Nuvvula Chutney’. Often preparing
Dr. Mantena’s recipes consume lot of time but preparing Tomato Nuvvula Chutney
is very easy and time saving. It can be easily made within 5 minutes and served
with phulkas, vadas etc. If you are an ardent follower of Dr. Raju, then you
might have noticed him using sesame seeds quite often. Sesame seeds are the
richest source of Calcium required for the bones. It is also rich in insoluble
fiber which helps in cleansing the intestines better. So, let us now go into
the details of preparing it.
Ingredients:
1.
Sesame Seeds - 50 gms
2.
Tomatoes - 2 Nos.
3.
Green Chilies - 4 Nos.
4.
Lemon - 1 No.
5.
Coriander Leaves - 1 bunch
6.
Curry Leaves - 5 – 6 Nos.
7.
Turmeric - a pinch
Method:
1.
Take 50 grams of sesame seeds and roast
them in a pan till it turns brown. Care is to be taken not to over roast them
as it turns bitter and under roasting will not give proper taste and aroma.
2.
Grind the roasted sesame seeds in a mixer
grinder into fine powder.
3.
Chop 2 tomatoes, green chilies, coriander
leaves, curry leaves, a pinch of turmeric etc. and add it in the jar of sesame
seeds and grind it into a fine paste.
4.
Extract juice from 1 big size lemon and add
to the paste.
5.
The spicy tinge chutney is now ready to be
served with hot phulkas or vadas.
If
you are new to Dr. Mantena’s recipes, the tongue obviously look out for the
taste of the salt. However the lemony and spicy flavor of the chutney can help
you eat the phulkas and vadas without any trouble.
When
Dr. Raju first gave a call to abandon the use of salt in food, everyone thought
he was crazy as it was a new thing for many people. No one believed that one
can cook food without salt; more importantly eating food without salt was out
of imagination. Look at his followers now? His followers are in large numbers
not only in India but across the World. And this number is growing larger every
day.
Earlier,
the doctors used to ask the heart and BP patients to reduce salt in their food
for safety. But they were afraid to say how less the salt should be because
they don’t want to lose their patients. But these days even the big corporate
hospitals are advertising on mega hoardings asking people to consume salt not
more than 1 gm a day. Thanks to Dr. Mantena Satyanarayana Raju for that. Is it
not the impact of Dr. Raju’s teachings that these people have come up to say
consumption of salt above 1 gm a day is harmful? Even if you believe these
doctors, you are not supposed to consume 1 gm salt per day. Are you consuming
salt anywhere near to this quantity? Just think! I don’t think even the doctors
who are advertising these hoardings will do either. It is because we are badly conditioned
to eat food cooked in salt. We have become slave to the salt which is taking
control all over our nervous system and internal organs and spoiling them
gradually over a period of time. By the time we realize it is too late.
The
only way to overcome this problem is to understand the harm that is doing to our
body and uncondition ourself from it. Being the Supreme of all beings, You must
be ruling the salt and not the salt rule you. You must grow to such an extent
that you add salt in food only when you want but not always in terms of the
salt. It is obviously difficult to sacrifice the salt immediately and
completely because we have been conditioned to have food with salt and huge amounts
of salt ever since we began eating our food. Therefore we need to gradually
train ourselves to overcome this unhealthy habit of eating salt by slowly
reducing the quantity of salt we use in our food.
Try
to cook and eat food without salt at least once a week to begin with and
gradually grow to such an extent that you avoid salt at least one meal a day
whether breakfast, lunch or dinner without salt. I think this itself is an
achievement. The things then change on its own after this.
I
hope you are going to declare a salt holiday at least one time a week and begin
your journey towards healthy living. Wish you all a very good luck and all the
best!
Keep
watching the space for more updates.
Monday, November 11, 2013
Mantena's Special - Sanaga Pappu Vada
.jpg){kind=link}
Today’s Mantena’s Special is ‘Sanaga Pappu Vada’. Vada
is a favorite evening snack of every Andhrite. In fact, it is the favorite
snack of all the south Indians. Usually vada’s are deep fried in oil which is
very harmful for health. Oil fried vadas are not only harmful for the liver and
heart but also for the stomach. On eating couple of vadas you feel a bloating
sensation in the stomach and sometimes it also leads to stomach ache. But Mantena’s
special vada is nutritious, healthy and completely harmless. You can eat as
many vadas as you can without any disturbance to your stomach as well. Let us
go into the details of preparation now.
Ingredients:
1. Chickpea Gram - 3 Cups
2. Raw Coconut - 1 No.
3. Cauliflower Stem - 15 to 20 Nos.
4. Tomato - 2 Nos.
5. Green Chilies - 10 Nos.
6. Lemon - 2 Nos.
7. Ginger - Small Piece
8. Cumin Seeds - 1 tbsp
9. Coriander leaves - 1 bunch
10. Cream - 3 tbsp
Procedure:
1.
Soak 3 cups of split chickpea grams over
8-12 hours in water. Rinse them well in water and grind it in a mixer grinder
making a thick batter. Don’t grind very thin but make sure that some pieces of
grams still exist. This makes the vadas crunchy in taste.
2.
Take a big sized raw coconut, chop into
pieces and grind it into paste. Don’t add any water to grind it.
3.
Take 20 to 25 Nos. of Cauliflower stem,
chop them into pieces, extract juice from a lemon and sauté it in a bowl and
keep it aside for 15 minutes and then grind it into paste in a mixer grinder. People
usually throw the stems of Cauliflower. It is the favorite food of goats. People
eat goats for strength where as goats eat these things. How strange! Isn’t it?
It is full of enzymes required for digestion and assimilation of nutrients in
the body. More importantly it is rich in Sodium which is why we are using it as
a substitute for salt. You can also use spinach in case the cauliflower stem is
not available.
4.
Take 2 tomatoes, grind and make a puree.
Tomatoes give a pleasant taste to the vadas.
5.
Finely chop 8-10 green chilies and sauté it
with lemon juice in a cup or bowl. We are using more chilies because we are
making the vadas without salt and the spice from green chilies and the sourness
from lemon gives some taste to the buds.
6.
Take a small piece of ginger for taste and
crush into paste. Spices are occasionally used in Dr. Mantena’s recipes.
Therefore ginger and cumin seeds are exceptions today.
7.
Roast the cumin seeds and grind it into
powder. Cumin seeds give a great aroma to the dish.
8.
Finely chop the coriander leaves and keep
it aside in a cup or bowl.
9.
Now add all ingredients into the chickpea
gram batter one by one and mix it well. Don’t add any water to the batter as it
already has plenty of water from soaked grams, coconut, cauliflower stems and
tomato puree. If the batter becomes thin then it becomes difficult to make the
vadas. Therefore keep the batter as thick as possible.
10. Now
put on the stove, keep a nonstick pan over it. Let it heat for some time and
then put some cream over it and spread all over the pan. Again cream is also occasionally
used. Make vadas with your hand and put it over the heated pan and let them
cook for some time. Once you find the vadas are cooked on one side, turn them
upside down and cook on the other side. Once
the vadas are cooked from both sides, serve them hot. You can serve these vadas
as breakfast, lunch or dinner with Nuvvula chutney or Gongura chutney again
made naturally in Dr. Mantena style. You can eat any number of these vadas
without any harm as they are free from salt, sugar, oil, ghee, red chili
powder, tamarind and spices. Every care is taken to replace these harmful
tastes with natural substitutes.
Earlier
people used to eat these kinds of food once in a while in a year. If you
observe the festivals in India, at every festival a different kind of sweet,
snack or food is prepared. Moreover, utmost care is taken to make it delicious
by adding ghee, sugar, oil and different varieties of masalas and spices.
People used to enjoy them and remain healthy as well. There are two reasons for
their health. First, people used to exert their bodies to earn bread and
secondly there used to be very few festivals like Sankranti, Dassera, Diwali
etc. Day by day people stopped exerting their bodies for earning bread as
machines replaced human labor from kitchen to the factories and the number of
festivals have increased to such an extent that you need a calendar to remember
them. Earlier they used to work hard throughout the year and enjoy the delicacies
not more than 10 times a year as the festivals were limited. Today every day is
a festival. Step out of the house and you find a sweet shop, Tiffin center,
fast food center, bakery and a snack point ready with different varieties of
snacks and tiffins at every corner of the street and roadsides. And if you
reach a market place or a center around the cross roads you find them competing
with one another in serving you the delicacies. Remember one thing; no hotel, Tiffin
center or snack corner thinks about your health while making food. Enjoy the delicacies
but don’t make it a habit or weakness.
Thanks
to Dr. Mantena Satyanarayana Raju in researching and designing these recipes
for the aspirants of good health. He realized that if such delicacies are
provided at home without harmful salt, oil, ghee, sugar, red chili powder,
tamarind and masalas by substituting these tastes with natural ingredients then
you don’t feel a craving for junk foods available in the market. You can enjoy
the taste as well as remain healthy.
I
hope you enjoyed this update and keep watching the space for more.
Labels: Dr. Mantena's Kitchen, Dr. Manthena, Dr. MSR, Sanaga Pappu Vada, Vada
Subscribe to Posts [Atom]