Kolam by Sudha Balaji

Pavakkai inippu pachadi This is my mother-in-law's dish. Many of us do not like bitter gourd obviously because of its bitter taste though we are aware of the health benefits offered by it. So, this not a very sweet gravy, my mother-in-law used to prepare. I understand that she was doing it for 4 or 5 decades.   The ingredients are bitter gourd - medium size - 4 nos Onion - medium size - 1 no Tomato - medium size - 1 no White sesame - two tablespoons. All these helps to reduce the kasappu or bitter taste of bitter gourd.   Bitter gourd recipes | Pavakkai recipes South Indian   First dry roast the white sesame seeds in a shallow vessel  till  they turn golden brown in colour. Then dry grind to get a fine powder after cooling the seeds ( in a mixer ) Add a little oil in a shallow vessel called vanali in Tamil and add mustard seeds. Then add the finely chopped onions to the oil Next it is the turn of the chopp...

How to make white rangoli powder at home  Take a flat plate and a sieve  Take three measures of white rangoli powder  Sieve it well  Coarse particles are left behind  Remove the coarse particles and mix the fine particles with a spoon or ladle  Now add one measure of rice flour Add the rice flour to the filtered white rangoli  Mix both well thoroughly so that they blend well The rangoli powder is ready for Diwali rangoli . This combination gives the advantages of white rangoli powder and rice flour i.e rangoli powder gives us continuous lines and thin lines , rice flour will give brightness What is the alternate when white rangoli powder is not available  online.  In countries like USA and UK , I think they get colours but not white rangoli powder.  My solution to this problem is very simple.  Mix rice flour and powdered salt  ( table salt as we also say ) in the ratio 1: 1 an...

   Update: Vararalakshmi Vratham 2018 date is 24th August (Friday ) It is preferable to celebrate the festival on that day when it meant to be celebrated as per Panchangam However if for any reason we are not able to celebrate on that day we can celebrate on any Friday of Aavani month If we miss the Aavani ( Sravan ) month we can celebrate on a Friday during Navratri On Thursday before the Pooja day , the Pooja room is cleaned well and all the photos of Gods in the Pooja room are cleaned with a wet cloth  Apply sandalwood paste in the form of a tilak to the photos.  Then apply turmeric powder and kumkum on the sandalwood paste .  This is done usually for the forehead and Feet of the photos of God The items required for Pooja or betel nut leaves, areca nut ( pakku ) , coconut , five types of flowers and five types of fruits Of the flowers lotus and Thazampoo ( screw pine ) are important for this festival Mandapam decoration The images below should ...

Diwali rangoli designs through unique ideas Some of the most novel ideas for creating rangoli designs were and are being thought of by me to help those who want to make rangolis for Laxmi Puja and Diwali but are still learning the rangoli art making. Necessity is the mother of invention - though I am comfortable with various types of traditional kolam making, I was and am being flooded with requests for some easy rangoli making ideas either for beginners or for kids.   Consequently, the number of innovative rangoli ideas I " invented "  has increased manifold.  Here are some of them in this blog post too. This is somewhat like a traditional carpet rangoli or poster rangoli created with these simple tools instead of making it the traditional way. Somehow, I like the violet, yellow combination and you would have observed that I use it in many posts.  What are your favourite colour combination, please write back through the comment section The fir...

Since this post is about rangoli video for Diwali decoration, first a rangoli from my  video from my YouTube Channel Rangolisansdots ( which is primarily about rangoli or kolam ) .  Of course there is an occasional recipe, festival related information and crafts. दिवाली रंगोली वीडियो       Place the old CDs around the central CD such that the edges of any one CD touches the compact discs on either side and also the compact disk at the centre.  It is possible because all the disks are of the same diameter.  The arrangement of the cds is shown the image below.   These disks have been painted by me with acrylic paint and patterns are drawn with 3D glitter for use in making rangoli using this technique.  I found that the disks reflect a lot of light interfering with video making and taking photos , so I thought of preparing some disks for the purpose of creating rangoli.   After arranging the CDs it should be possible to mar...