Sri Rama Navami recipes special kolam

 We celebrate the festival with panagam, buttermilk and kosimbhir.  All these have a cooling effect since the festival comes during April when it is quite hot in Tamil Nadu. Panagam is prepared by adding jaggery powder in water.

Add cardamom, dry ginger. Add lemon juice to get this recipe.

 Neer mor - To buttermilk we add unripe mango pieces and cucumber. Seasoning is done with mustard and cumin seeds. Kosimbhir is a type of salad made from moong dhall soaked in water for half an hour.

 Small pieces of cucumber and carrots (raw, grated and of course washed). If mango pieces are added lemon juice extracted from a piece of lemon is not required.

Another important offering for Sri Rama Navami is rava laddu.

                                   

Rama Navami recipes - Paanakam , Neer mor ( butter milk ) and Kosimbhir

Sri Rama Navami (celebration of the birth of Sri Rama).  Puja is performed to a portrait of Lord Rama. Usually, one showing the coronation of Lord Rama is used for performing the puja.  Since it is celebrated for nine days in some parts of India it is also called Vasantha Navratri. The nine-day festival concludes with the celebration of Rama and Sita called Sita kalyan.

Since Rama Navami is celebrated during summer the traditional recipes include ingredients that are available during summer and also some ingredients that have a cooling effect like moong dhal and cucumber. There is a tradition of inviting guests for this festival and offering them panakam and neer mor that have been offered to Lord Rama. A wonderful tradition that is followed in our country.

Neer mor (or butter milk - spicy)

Curd is churned into butter milk.  
To butter milk, add few slices of mango, chopped cucumber. 
Add seasoning with mustard seeds, jeera and asafoetida powder.  
Curry leaves can be added later or during seasoning.

Traditional recipes prepared for Ram Navami 

Dissolve good quality jaggery in water or else after dissolving filter the jaggery. 
The quantity of jaggery depends upon the degree of sweetness desired. 
 Add cardamom powder, dry ginger powder( sukku powder). 
Mix all the ingredients well.  
I have added crushed dry ginger as shown in the photo.
Squeeze a lemon and stir well.

Rava laddu is another important naivedyam for the festival.  It is one of the sweets or recipes that come under the category of "recipes without cooking " This video 👉 Rava laddu recipe  is from my YouTube Channel.

We can make this festival for Diwali also.  I uploaded during the Diwali festival season.

      

Take required quantity of rava or semolina
Dry grind in a mixer. We need not roast it
For one measure rava take quarter measure of maida
Take three fourth measure of powdered sugar
The other ingredients needed are desiccated coconut, elachi powder, ghee and cashew nuts
In a vessel add ghee, heat it and roast the rava
If we use chiroti rava we can add directly, any other rava is to be ground in a mixer
Remove the rava and allow it to cool
Then add ghee and roast maida - maida is the binding agent to make laddu
Allow it to cool.
Now in another vessel to ghee add powdered sugar mix well to get a cream like substance
To this add cooled rava and maida
Then add elachi powder and cashew nuts fried in ghee
Mix all the ingredients well and make laddus the traditional way

While we can have different types of kolam including padi kolam for festivals I invariably use one or more of the three kolams shown in the video below in the Puja room.  They are Hrudaya kamalam , Aishwarya patra rangoli and Kubera kolam ( not the usual one drawn with numbers).  These rangoli are popular in our family for all festivals .  Many of us are aware of these rangoli designs.  For those who are new these, the video 👉 Puja rangoli video  should be helpful