Winter Mood

Hello my dears... The past week was rather tiring for me on the job side - more translation work started coming in which resulted in me being completely drained by the end of the day. As soon as I work half day from home, it might seem like an easy task, but it isn't. In fact, my day is endless. Some days I simply feel like curling up on a bed and doing nothing at all. It doesn't happen, almost never. My sleep timings also depend on little A's preference, however one good thing is that he finally started sleeping through the night. Before that I couldn't get a proper night's rest for more than 2 years :O Hence I am very happy for both of us.
Thank you everyone for your wishes for my mom's recovery. She is already at home and doing well, though would need to be more careful from now on and still requires to support her arm. Life seems to be getting on its' usual track.
That winter mood always visits me as Christmas and New year approach. It's time for cozy evenings and hot chai, for warm socks and crocheting. As our house gets colder, I feel the need to keep warm whenever and however possible.
Yesterday I had a crocheting "onset" and accomplished a sweater for little A. I still need to work on to weaving the ends and probably blocking it. The pattern is "from my head". The yarn I used is like 15 years old! I got it from home last year. First, I had doubts about the colour, but then, why boys should wear only all dark and blue and green?  I am planning on adding some applique to it.

Updated - sweater pictures! :) Its a little bulky and tacky, but Ok to wear at home. I have a pattern for another crochet sweater, so hopefully the second attempt will be better. My model though refused me taking his pictures in a new attire :)

 Recently I tried making something new - baked samosas. They are a totally healthy vegan version of a popular Indian snack. I am going to make more... when I feel like :P

Have a happy day my friends whenever you are! Blessed be!

From Russian Soups to Chilly Paneer - Russian Wife in India

♨This will be interesting for me to look back and see how well I, a girl who spent 23 years of her life in her native country, realigned herself for new settings in just 4 years. It quite amazes me but time flew so fast I now perhaps won't be able to recollect those impressions as they were.
Every country has its unique "taste", so does India, one of the most savoury countries in the world. The food of Indian subcontinent is definitely something to pay attention to, to discuss, to love or to ... dislike. Take it or leave it. Nonetheless if you are a permanently living in India foreign wife, you will have hard time adjusting to Indian food if you cannot stand spices. I was lucky (as well as my D) to be one of those foreign wives to teach my taste buds to like spicy and oily table. The first meal I had here was an omelet we bought at the bus station cafe when we arrived from Delhi. It was yumm, but it had some little green rings of some vegetable in it - green chillies! I had to dig them out from the omelet following a timely advice by my D.

On my first day in the city I was settled in a paying guest (called PG here) facility with some Indian girls. That evening I was hungry and the girls helped to fetch some rice, it looked great, all vegetarian, and I digged into it and had two-three spoons at once... When after a while I realized that my tongue as well as ears were on fire! It was so spicy and felt like it burned all the insides.
The days later my D was taking me to the university canteen where I tried Indian paneer with gravy, which I enjoyed a lot however fighting with chillies in it too. But I started liking Indian food almost straight away and after a while couldn't imagine my meal without pickles or green chillies (I got ya!). See my old post.
The food transition for a Russian girl used to tasty but rather plain Russian soups, minimum salt  and pepper in her dishes, went smoothly. The only thing is that after some time I start missing my country's cuisine very much. In those cases I cook something rather Russian like soup or simply take a piece of bread and put butter on it and eat with tea or coffee. My tongue still craves for "simple" taste without any spices added.
A peculiar thing is that Indians like to eat fruits (grapes, watermelon, papaya, apples) with black salt and black pepper. After I tried it that way several times and my throat didn't thank me, I simply made a point that I prefer a pure taste of the fruits.
Another challenge for me at times (though I don't cook much) is to make a dish which meets my Indian husband's taste. He likes Russian food a lot especially the one prepared by my mom, but I know that he expects me to cook Indian style at least a little bit. As I am a rather independent person I asked Indian food cooking tips from my in-laws very rarely, choosing Internet as my teacher. I believe I managed to make something resembling Punjabi kidney beans and channa (chickpea) and even tried to make South Indian dosas and vadas! Otherwise almost whatever I cook turns out to be of a mixed Indo-Russian taste, I can't help it. Here is what Russian I tried to cook in India, not much but it made me happy:
Taste of Dacha - vegetables in a pan, my Mom's recipe.
Cooking the Crescents - Russian dish vareniki with potato.
Apple Pie - called Sharlotka in Russian.

Rajasthani Treat

What I like about India the most is its diversity. Travel from one state to another and you’ll see (and hear) different languages, traditions, clothing, life style. Living in the North part of India, in the city, a Union territory of two states Haryana and Punjab, we are lucky enough to have a piece of another state just 27 km away from the city. This place is called Chokhi Dhani, and it represents culture of Rajasthan state.

the restaurant building in palace style

the path leading along the performances

Last Sunday the company my D works for organized a get together for its employees and their wives and kids. It was a fun event, full of interaction and interesting things. We were able to witness some of the traditional Rajasthani performances.

Curiosity lead us to the palmist. Well, I said as soon as he doesn't tell anything bad its good :) Me and my D were happy with his predictions.

These women’s rhythmic and cheerful dance involved few of us later on (I was among them too). We danced  in the circle, repeating the dancers’ movements. That was my first such experience and I loved it!

The guy-rope walker’s show was a little scary at the moments when he was turning, lying, and walking backward. Another guy was sitting below, playing drum (or tabla?) and having some funny conversation with the rope walker, making the overall impression of danger even deeper.

The puppet theatre was hilarious, accompanied with music, singing and some story telling. I had already presented  Indian puppet theatre once in this post. Mostly, the scenes and  the characters from people's daily life are shown during the spectacle. 

The magician took all our fancy. His tricks must have been simple, nevertheless interesting. We were under impression from the last trick, when the magician covered a white dove with a lid and when lifted it up, there were already 3 doves sitting!

I’m sorry, but even the washrooms bore that ethnic touch - a drawing of a man and a woman in traditional clothing.

This boy was also dancing to Rajasthani beats, inviting people from our company to join him on the stage.

The most delicious part of our visit was Rajasthani lunch. Yes, this is the way it is served – on the broad dishes which stand on the low benches. You have to sit on the special mats and enjoy eating with hands! It really tastes better this way.

Such type of serving of the dish with loads of various meals is called “thali”. Ours included loads of things which names I’m not able to recollect now J. I liked chautneys a lot, those in the bottom right corner of the picture are garlic, green and peas with some plant. Yumm!

I liked the lamps which were hung all around the place and gave a stunning look with their lights at night.

Hope you liked being a part of our short visit to Rajasthan. It left many good memories to us and, of course, we would like to go to the "real" state to see all those beautiful maharaja palaces and try more of yummy food. 

Have an interesting and happy day!

Recipe 1.Delight for a "hungry lion"

 This is a delicious story of our yesterday homemade dinner. We don't have a microwave yet, as well as an oven, but we have an electric oven and things come out tasty when prepared in it. So, I experimented as usual. 

 Ingredients needed for this dish are available in indian markets, you just have to find them. 

Main products:
Chicken (chest and leg) - 1 kg
Potato                        - 4 items of a medium size
Onion                         - 3-4 items of a medium size

For marinade:
1-2 tomatoes
1 lemon (indian small lemon, size of a lime)

2 garlic cloves
salt to your taste (better not to make marinade too salty)
spices - such as black pepper and any kind of herbs you can get in the market

 The main flavor of the marinade will be given from garlic and lemon with tomatoes.
When I made this marinade  and smelled it I already knew dinner was going to be yummy!!!
Preparation won't take much time as long as you are passionate about delicious food yourself and want to please your hungry lion - husband :)
 Wash chicken pieces very well  and let water flow off it, you can even squeeze pieces a bit to remove spare liquid. It will prevent chicken being steamed rather than baked.

  Take a bowl, put chicken in it. Cut tomatoes into small pieces. Garlic has to be cut as tiny as possible. Add tomato and garlic to chicken. Cut lemon into two halves and squeeze juice out of it in the bowl with chicken. Add salt, spices to your taste. Mix chicken in the bowl with all added ingredients and let it stay covered for at least 30 min.

  While chicken is being marinated you can prepare potato and onion. Here you can let yourself create: cut potato round or like for french fries, or may be make small squares. Make sure pieces will be thin enough to be cooked in the oven. Same with onion. 

  Oh, time has passed like a shot! Our chicken is very well marinated and we can start cooking itself. I adjusted the temperature on our home electric oven at the maximum 220. But you can cook even at 200 degrees.

  Put marinated chicken in the form (mine was made from aluminum), arrange pieces so that all of them will be cooked well. Spread cut potato and then onion on the top. Put a bit of salt, some spices to give vegetables better taste. There was a small piece of mozzarella left in our fridge - I used it too by rasping on the top.

  Now you have to keep the form with chicken in the oven, cover it and count the time. Approximately 30-40 min. 

 You can also check the readiness of your dish from time to time by piercing chicken with a toothpick. My mum does

like this.

 When dish is ready you will see it. Sprinkle a pinch of oregano before serving.

 My hungry lion was happy and grateful! "Grrrrr" turned to "Mrrrrr" :)

    P.S.  We have this kind of an oven . It was popular during Soviet Union and was called "chudopechka" (чудопечка) literally "miracle oven".