Thanks Kamla! It's really sad that you couldn't get south indian dishes on the way. In Madurai the best places to get authentic hygenic south Indian dishes are the five star hotels. Hotel Sangam (Alagarkoil Road, Madurai 2) Hotel Pandyan (in the same Road) Taj (Pasumalai, Madurai 4). Hotel Sangam's kuzhi appam served with Thengappal and Sodhi is simply out of the world. Their ghee roast is also different. Some star hotels also serve authentic Chettinad fare like kara paniyaram, vellai paniyaram etc. which are very tasty along with their specially made side dishes. You can also try in Modern Restaurant.(Dindigul Road, Madurai 1 - near the Railway Station) But to get a parking place there is very difficult. And the old standards have gone now. Meenakshi Bhavan is okay. Especially the one in Madurai Railway Station serves good South Indian dishes. But you should go in the evenings. Then there is Sriram Mess in Kakkathopu street near the Railway Station. There they serve authentic South Indian lunch between 11 AM and 3 PM. But it is very filling. Hotel Aarthi near Bus Stand also serves good south indian food. Murugan Idli Kadai serves somes some good Idlies and Dosas. They serve oothappams made of small onion. (sambar vengayam) which along with their own brand of milakai podi and oil tastes very good. When you are planning your next trip this side let me know, I'll give the latest info on hotels serving south Indian dishes. Kamla, I have another anxiety. We Indians, whether north or south, east or west, have a very rich cultural heritage. An the heritage is not merely in scriptures and music but also in things like recipes. We all should be very grateful to people like Chitvish and Mano who are guardians of our heritage. My anxiety is that we might not pass on the recipes to our children. And if our children know nothing but fast food then our culture would be threatened. It is our duty to transfer the recipes to posterity. I was talking to a person the other day who said that we have lost many recipes which our grandmothers and great grand mothers knew. For instance we do prepare Avakkai Uruhai. But I have tasted the Avakkai Uruhai of yester years. That taste would be totally different. In fact there is even a belief amongst orthodox South Indians that when Avakkai Uruhai is prepared the ladies who prepare it should not wear any dress! Strange isn't it! But I have heard some of my family elders confirm this statement. So let's try to guard our culture through sites like IL. regards, sridhar
Food, Recipe and The Ingredients I was overwhelmed by the response I had for my thread Recipe and The Ingredients. Particularly gratifying to a person who has never visited the kitchen but for eating. Though I don’t cook at all, I love to glance through the mouth-watering recipes of the great panel-specialists – Chitvish and Mano. More as a measure of expressing my thankfulness I am sharing the following thoughts about food. This parable was narrated by Swami Chinmayanandaji. Lakshmi married Ram and started a happy life. There was of course one problem. Ram’s parent’s had died long back. Ram’s younger brother was under Ram’s care and Lakshmi was burdened with caring for him too. Either the chemistry was wrong or Lakshmi wanted to be totally free, or Ram’s brother was not desirable – whatever may be the reason, Lakshmi started despising Ram’s brother Shiva from the day she set eyes on him. Shiva had finished his degree and was looking for a job. Ram would have breakfast and go to work. Lakhsmi had to serve lunch for Shiva in the afternoon. She grudged this chore so much that more often than not her facial expression would betray her. She did not want Shiva under the same roof; she did not want to serve food for him. But serve food she did, fearing that otherwise her husband might get angry. A few months later Shiva was admitted to the hospital with severe stomach pain. The doctors diagnosed as the case of acute food poisoning. Now Shiva had never taken food outside the house. Being unemployed he simply could not afford to. Then Ram suspected that Lakshmi was deliberately poisoning Shiva’s food. Which was also not true because Lakshmi ate the same food herself every day. Then how did it happen? Swamiji says that since the food was served with hatred it had poisoned Shiva. The food poisoning was a kind of psychosomatic disorder. You may think that this is just a parable. But let me tell you that our minds are far more powerful than we think of. If you don’t believe this you may do this thought-experiment. (Please never do it in your real life as it may hurt others). You attend a wedding. There has been a wonderful feast. It’s just over and about a dozen people are relaxing in the hall taking betel leaves and supari with the taste of food still lingering in their mouths. Suppose you were to tell them (for heavansake please don’t do this) that a dead lizard had been found in the sambar which they had eaten with relish. This of course is not true. What would happen? All these people will start vomitting and display such symptoms as would appear if there had really been a dead lizard in the sambar. Such is the importance of the power of thought, especially in matters of food. The main point is that food, however delicious it may be, if it is not served with love, it will only poison the stomachs of the eaters. Every recipe should end with the following words: “And now the tasty (here tell the name of the dish) is ready. Serve it with love.”
Re: Food, Recipe and The Ingredients I just chanced upon this thread and out of curosity read it, and surely this was a tasty one...hehe. It reminded me of many things, esp the bhajans my mother used to sing in the kitchen, she once said," The niyat(can be translated as character, but here denotes the feelings of the lady, as in your parable of lakshmi ) with which the lady cooks ,goes into the food and to the whole family, so positive vibes should be around when cooking the food, so that they are transcended to the whole family. The very reason, the lady is called the annapurna, even if it is the man who buys the ingredients for the meal, but the lady is the recipe, which should not be faulted. Once when I was telling my husband's younger brother about this thought, he says , 'today I understand why so much of thought is given to deciding about the family of the bride, while marraiges are to be fixed' What more could I add.
Re: Food, Recipe and The Ingredients Thanks muzna for giving life to a thread more than 4 years old. Your mother hit the nail on its head. The lady's niyath goes into the food. And your husband's younger brother is also right. In India marriage is not just an affair between the boy and the girl. But a relationship between the two families. In those days they used to trace the ancestry of the girl for three generations before the alliance is fixed. The lady of the house is in physical contact with the food. Not only that she is constantly seeing it and smelling it. Whatever she has in her mind, especially her strong feelings would get transmitted to the food. Thanks muzna once again. sridhar
