Sabudana Vada : Fried Tapioca Dumplings

I have to admit, being in India, I have rarely had this dish. Sabudana Vada, which are these fried dumplings made from tapioca pearls and potatoes. They are very typical of Maharashtra, India where I come from, but my mom never made these. As for my wife, she loved this and it was one of her favorite things that her mom used to make. To celebrate Mother's day, we had friends get together and everyone made a dish that their mom made. My wife naturally chose this and I was amazed. Absolutely delicious and sinful. Tastes even better when double fried. hehehe. Here is where my wife got the recipe from. What is your favorite dish that your mom made?

Creative Gaga: The Enthusiastic Creative Journal

I am absolutely thrilled to be published in the Creative Gaga Magazine and more importantly making an appreance on the Front Cover! This is a quality magazine circulated mostly in India.

It is very well put together with great images of my work in a four page layout. Here is the writeup.

Handmade Solutions:

There is a love and attachment that passes on from the creator to the consumer when something is handmade. Moreover, when these pieces come as design solutions to everyday affairs, design gets a new meaning. Charan Sachar comes out to be an artist with an endeavour to add this design-dimension to his creations.

Clay transcends the distance between art and design. From all the mediums I have worked with, clay gives me an opportunity to make three dimensional art which can serve the purpose of function as well. The whole transformation going from a lump of soft clay to a form that is created from one's imagination, resulting in a solid piece of solution, is an experience in iteself.

Culture is an accidental mentor. India's amazing treasure of art and culture has been me since childhood. Without a conscious effort, the colors, patterns, motifs etc. seeped in me as I grew up to be a visual artist. It is magical how all the small things that I was exposed to now find a way into everything I create.

Every problem either has a solution or a beautiful solution. At the core, pottery is all about creating functionality. But if you want the user to go beyond usage to experience, aesthetics will have to fit effortlessly into the larger design scheme. The shape of the form or its beautification can, for instance, make a huge difference to the way even a mug can transcend the shelf space to acquire an emotional space. It is the ultimate aim of any creator to create an attachment. Experimentation with ways to solve a problem is the only way out.

Bollywood Influence

As many of you know, my work is influenced a lot by Bollywood and Indian fabrics and costumes seen in the movies. It is amazing to me when these influences penetrate your brain.

I came across this video of a Bollywood song shot in 1970 (Shot before I was born). There is a striking resemblance to how I even take pictures of my work compared to this video.

You can see the main actress (who appears a little later in the video) in red dancing in the center and the other dancers in colorful costumes dancing in the background. Now look at the picture below of my Dancing Bottles. I took this picture several months back without intentionally matching it to this song. Can you see what I see?

Travel Entry: Rock Garden

This is one of the most unique gardens I have seen. Rock Garden is located in Chandigarh, Punjab and is made of mostly recycled/upcycled material and also uses a lot of concrete that is used in the most creative way.

Here you will see stunning landscapes of mountains and waterfalls. If seen closely they are jute bags that filled with concrete to make the structure and of course a lot of rebar.

Almost every surface is covered with broken tiles, broken sinks, cups, plates, glass. There was this array of abstract concrete forms and I spotted my early teapot forms here. Can you see the resemblance?

Then there was this huge area set up like an outdoor auditorium. the mosaic work done on the walls was one of the best I have seen. This place would be a mosaic artist's paradise. The picture below is of a small section of the 300ft+ wall. Just square measures about 6 feet. So imagin 50 of these in amazing colors.

Other than covering the walls with tile, there are surfaces covered with electric sockets. Like in the wall behind my wife in the picture below. You can see the detail.

The walls below are made with pebbles stacked in different ways making lovely patterns.

And the wall below was one of my favorites. From far it just looked like an orange wall. But in close up you can see it is small terra cotta pots that are stacked to make this wall.

The highlight of the garden are the doll scultures below that are made of broken glass bangles. I had visited this place when I was 8 and I have a feeling my current dancing diva sculptures made their first entrance in my brain at that time looking at these beauties.

Travel Entry: Langar (Meal at the Gurudwara)

If you are familiar with Sikhism, you must have heard of the langar, the meal that is served at a Sikh Temple. Below is a very nice clipping of an upcoming documentary talking about the langar.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eRAEilK_n4

It is amazing that so many people regardless of caste creed or religion have this free meal as a blessing. In the Golden temple, around 1000 people are seated, fed and then the room is cleared up in 10-15 minutes... and then the next 1000 people come in. Here is a picture of a small section of the crowd and the quick cleaning that follows before the next crowd walks in.

Now you must be thinking... how is it possible to feed so many people, so quickly and prepare food in such quantities. All the work of cooking is done by volunteers and it is a great honor to serve in the langar. Check out the huge cooking vessels and the vegetables being prepped for cooking.

Garlic being peeledOnions chopped.Carrots chopped and potatoes peeled.Potatoes and peas.
And then of course is the cleaning of the utencils. No dishwasher here.

If you haven't been to a Sikh Temple and had the Langar, you are really missing something. The food is delicious and prepared with so much love and kindness. Almost all gurudwaras in the US too offer Langar (If not everyday, then at least on weekends)

Travel Entry: Homemade Tandoori Paranthas

This is not exactly a travel entry, but it is something I learnt on my trip to India. After eating the tandoori breads, naans, kulchas, paranthas (also kind of bread) in India, I really wanted to get a tandoor for home. The problem is that they are big and bulky and are not favored to be transported all the way to the US. There are some available in the US but the costs are very high.
In this trip my Mom taught me how I can make the naans and paranthas at home in my pressure cooker. I tried this out at home and you can see they came out very good.
Below are the step my step instructions with lots of pictures.
Basic ingredients are wheat flour dough made from two parts flour and a little less than one part water. It shouldn't be on the very soft side and refrigerating for an hour helps. Also we need some ghee (clarified butter), but I use margarine instead. And some dry flour to assist in rolling.

Apply a little butter on hands and roll the dough in small 2 inch flat balls. I can fit four of these in the pressure cooker, but here Iam showing three.

After dusting with some flour, roll these into approximately 5 inch round with the rolling pin and smear a tablespoon of the clarified butter and sprinkle with a tablespoon of flour. Sprinkle some salt as well. You can put in minced garlic or herbs at this stage too if you want to add more flavor.

Then fold this in pleats till you get a long narrowstrip of folded dough and butter

Then roll this from one end and you will get the following ball of dough.

Again with some flour roll it into a 5 inch round. You can see the layers and these will crisp up similar to puff pastry.

Now for the tandoor, I use my big aluminum pressure cooker. The main thing about tandoors is that they need to get really hot and retain that heat. This has thick walls which help in retaining the heat and the aluminum helps in getting it real hot. So place it on the big burner on high and let it heat real good.

Now place the pressure cooker on the side and slap the bread on the side. To make it stick first apply a little water on the back side of the bread before slapping it on. Turn the pressure cooker and apply all the breads.

Now we invert the pressure cooker over the heat and keep the heat on medium now. If the bread close to flame is browning first then you need to reduce the flame.

This takes approximately 2 minutes for the bread to cook and there you have it. Remove it with tongs. It comes off very easily if the pressure cook was very hot to start with and if it is cooked all the way. Serve hot with butter. :)

I am so grateful to my Mom for teaching me this. Happy Mother's Day! Now I just need to watch my waist line. :)

Do give this a shot and let me know how it works out. If you have more suggestions or ideas for tandoors, feel free to comment.

Travel Entry: Punjabi Food

I had to dedicate one entry regarding my trip to India just for the food we ate in Punjab. Mostly vegetarian and very very delicious. The flavor of the vegetables in the North of India is really not found anywhere else in India.

First, breakfast! Nothing like stuffed Kulchas in the morning. These are made of wheat dough and stuffed with cauliflower or tangy potatoes or panner (cottage cheese) and then cooked in a tandoor oven slapped against the walls of the hot tandoor. Served with spicy cholas (garbanzo beans) and pickle. Oh and how can I forget.. That IS a big chuck of butter! Have two of these in the morning and you are all set!

The best thing that goes after the kulchas is a hot cup of tea. And yes, the young couple next to me are my Mom and Dad. :)

For snaking during the day, nothing like hot pakoras (vegetable fritters) with chutney. To get them extra crisp these are fried twice! Sinful!
After mentioning Pakoras, talking about samosas is the right thing to do. Check out these busy bees stuffing dough with a spicy potato mixture for samosas and see the picture following it. Do you blame me for overeating?

Another favorite snack.. Pani Puri. These are hollow and crisp, filled with a small quantity of potato and then filled with a spicy chilled beverage. They are hard to resist, but due to the unknown source of water used, I would recommened having these only in reputable resturants and not on the streets.

Not an uncommon site to see people cooking on the street in the early mornings. Here puris are being made. Puris are made from wheat flour and then deep fried. Check out the size of the wok!

And it is almost impossible to go to Punjab and not try some tandoori chicken. This is where you can eat "real" tandoori chicken and this is how it looks like. I am so tired of trying every Indian resturant in the US trying to find a decent place that serves tandoori chicken with isn't floroscent pink.

Next week, I hope to share some techniques of how I make tandoori naan at home.

Travel Entry: Golden Temple, Amritsar

The Golden Temple in Amritsar is considered the holiest place by the Sikhs. Being a Sikh, we were very glad to get this oppurtunity to visit. There is undescribable sense of peace one experiences the minute you are in the vicinity of the Golden Temple. It sits in the middle of man made sroovar (lake) and is just mesmorizing to watch. There is a lot about the history of the Golden Temple which you can read here. Here are some pictures I took during the day and night time.

The picture below shows the close up of the Golden Temple. The gold on the Golden Temple is Real Gold.. not paint. The bottom part is decorated with beautiful marble inlay work.

The floor around the lake is all marble with gorgeous floral marble inlay patterns. One can spend hours here admoring the art work surrounding the temple.

The first day we were here (on a Thursday) we got to visit the gurudwara (Sikh Temple) and attended the evening prayers. On the subsequent days being a long weekend, the crowd grew exponentially. There was a 3+ hour wait to get in. My advise to anyone who wishes to visit the Golden temple is to go middle of the week and avoid any major holidays. If you don't believe me check out the pictures of the crowd trying to get in. :) We were glad we got to visit the first day. We spent the rest of the days in Amritsar visiting other gurudwaras each of which had amazing stories. I will share some in my next entry.