August 22, 2010 12:23 by
anisha
Maigalganj is a small town which is located on the highway between Lucknow and Sitapur. There are rows of shops on either side of this mandatory stoppage, but it is the Gulab Jamuns that claim fame for this small town. It is almost sacrilegioius to pass by Maigalganj without tasting these hot, soft and yet crispy on the outside, Gulab Jamuns. I ate 3 in one go!
The Gulab Jamun is an Indian dessert made of thickened milk (Khoya) and fine all purpose flour (Maida). The two are kneaded well with a bit of water, made into balls and deep fried (preferably in clarified butter or pure ghee) and allowed to soak in a sugar syrup. Gulab Jamuns taste best when fresh and piping hot, and are a favourite street food in North India.
Getting enough calcium in your diet is only half the battle--the other half is absorbing it. Mahirishi Ayurveda shares with us tips for improving Calcium intake and absorption:
- Eat foods that are easy for the body to digest.
- Eat the biggest meal at mid-day, when the digestive fire is strongest.
- Avoid caffeine and refined carbohydrates such as sugar.
- Avoid cold or iced drinks, which decrease the digestive fire.
- Do a daily warm oil massage (abhyanga). It helps enhance digestion and flush away impurities, and is traditionally known to stimulate bone growth.
- Go to bed by 10 p.m. so your body is at rest during its natural purification cycle from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.
- Eat plenty of foods that are high in calcium, such as sesame seeds, green leafy vegetables, walnuts, coconut and coconut milk. Warm whole milk is also an excellent calcium-booster, but choose unhomogenized milk for greater absorption. To enhance digestion, drink your milk separate from meals.
- Avoid vegetables from the nightshade family, including eggplant, tomatoes, potatoes, and yellow, red and green sweet peppers.
Foods to favour:
More: Mapi.com
The act of eating is life-giving. The process of eating, according to ayurveda, is something reverent and important for the development of consciousness as well as our physical health.
Our bodies need an uplifting and settled environment in order to process and absorb the nutrients from our meals. If that is not available then we should at least be sitting down to eat -- not standing, walking, or driving our way through a meal.
Click to read a Sanskrit prayer before meals
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Eat your main meal at midday, when your digestion is strongest. It is the high pitta time of the day. The fire is high and food gets digested with minimal waste.
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October 26, 2009 10:59 by
anisha
When the dinner was almost over, Siva sang a beautiful hymn. Others, too, followed. All had finished their meals. Some had left some vegetables, etc. on their leaf. Siva’s eyes fell on these.
‘Visweswaranandaji, please see that nothing is wasted. All that remains on the leaves should be collected and given to the cattle. Also, please send for the health officers (this is the only name by which Siva can refer to the scavenger) and feed them nicely.’
There is a wonderful philosophy and a lesson in psychology in this. Siva does not chastise those who have not consumed what they took nor those who served, nor does he instruct the management to reduce the quantity prepared—but goes straight to the core of the problem.
‘There is no waste: everything has its own use, in the cosmic sense. The animals and the fish in the Ganga get their share.’
What a great heart.
~ Inspiring talks of Gurudev Swami Sivananda
September 1, 2009 03:10 by
anisha
Avoid refrigerated, processed, artificially colored, canned and chemically preserved foods as far as you can. They increases ama or toxic undigested matter in the physiology, tax the body's agni or digestive fire, lack vitality and do not stimulate your Sattva. More...
March 28, 2009 07:22 by
anisha “Poison on the Platter”, is an eye-opening film, made by Mahesh Bhatt and Ajay Kanchan, illustrating how all of our lives are going to be (adversely) affected by genetically modified foods. It is no more a farmer’s issue alone, it’s a matter of the consumers’ right to food safety. You and I wouldn’t even be able to recognise a normal Brinjal from/over a GM one, if Bt Brinjal - a GM crop produced by the mighty agri-MNC Monsanto - is let through by our corrupt regulatory body. Let’s put up strong resistance, demanding a ban on GM food/crops for 5 years, until they are proven safe for human consumption by independent, long-term studies.
GM Food is a big issue today in the whole world… The world is shifting towards natural food…but here (in India) nobody cares about it as an issue.
~ Milind Soman
Say no to GM Food
India should only farm the organic way. They should not go to genetically modified food…
…Until and unless it is proved fool-proof that it has no harm for the public, don’t propagate it. Propagation of something which you are not sure of…which could create enormous damage to life on the planet is not acceptable by any means. It is not science, it is terrorism!
~ Sri Sri Ravishankar