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Today we are preparing very simple food: kadhi, or Mahāprabhujī soup; some bhindi (okra or ladyfingers); and some roti or chapati. I will start with the kadhi because it takes some time to cook. We take some besan atta, or chickpea flour. Of course, at home I use a different bowl. We mix it first with a little water so that there are no crumbs inside the chickpea flour, or tisāna mochā. It makes everything binding and a little bit thicker. We know it as kadhi or Mahāprabhujī soup. Then we put some yogurt inside, homemade yogurt if you have it. That would be the best. Smetana we don’t use; it is too fat, so we use normal yogurt. What is very important: when we use the yogurt and open these yogurt containers, please don’t lick the aluminum foil. I don’t clean it. It is because there are heavy metals inside, and it’s not good. I heard from my dentist that this is not so good, and she tries to get the heavy metals out. So, we don’t, of course. Some say it’s a pity because there is a lot stuck in there, but better not to do it. Then we put water inside, too. The quantity depends on whether you are cooking for two persons, one person, three persons, as you would at home. The important thing is to mix and mix and mix it well. Also, while cooking, we have to mix it. Then comes haldi, haldi—turmeric, or yellow powder. It’s very good to use it in each meal. It has a lot of calcium, and it is a natural antibiotic, a natural disinfection for everything. It colors everything very nicely, making the eating yellow. Add a little chili if you want; you can put more or less as you like—chili or hot paprika—and salt. We use sea salt, kosher salt. So, according to your taste, put the salt inside. Better little than too much. We mix it well. Then prepare the cooking pot. We have here, thanks to God, a gas stove—real fire. Many of us have only ceramic or electric, but lucky are those people who can cook on real fire. The eating has a different taste. I put a little olive oil inside. We prefer to cook with olive oil. Into the cold olive oil, we put some mustard seeds and some cumin seeds. Then I close it and wait until they splutter. The oil is very good for the heart. In the whole Mediterranean kitchen, they cook with olive oil because the experience is that olive oil is very good; it has an effect on the heart, and it is very good that people have fewer heart attacks and heart problems. They use the olive oil, so the heart’s heat comes first in the oil, and then we put the curry inside. We have to take care with the mixture we prepared because when it cooks, it likes very much to boil over. It gets more and more, so we mix it. Also, it doesn’t dissolve together, so the yogurt and water don’t separate. You have to mix it until it is cooking, and when it starts to cook, then you can reduce the heat and just let it cook. Later we will put some more ingredients inside; we will see. Just observe the kadhi, how she is doing. Then we start to prepare the bhindi and okra. Of course, when we have our own kitchen at home, then you have more routine. We have prepared for the okras, of course, different ways to cook the bhindi. The bhindi look like this. This is a big bhindi, this is a small bhindi. When we cut the bhindi, we cut only the upper stem part, not the complete pod; we cut only this part. Otherwise, it’s a waste of vegetables. We cut in that way, yeah, like this—small, small. Some people cut also in this way. Everything is good. Some people stuff the bhindi, so they cut them lengthwise and put the filling inside. So it depends how you prefer. I like this very much. The bhindi are very good for those people who have problems with the intestine, stomach. They have some special mucus inside, and this is for the intestine very, very good. One thing is, when we cook and cut the okra, please wash them and dry them before cooking. When we cut them wet, then they become slimy, this mucus comes out, and it’s very hard to cook. The bhindi don’t like water when you cook them. Just cook them slowly on low heat and don’t put water inside. There are two or three vegetables: the bhindi, the baingan (eggplant), the melanzani (eggplant), and the karelas (bitter gourds). They don’t like water while cooking. They have enough liquid themselves, so we do not need to put water. So here again, the olive oil. Thanks to God, we got cold-pressed, very virgin olive oil, very good, homemade. This is something very rare, so if we have this, use it. Then we put some mustard seeds in, a little bit. We have to take care when we cook that we don’t mix too many spices together, because every vegetable doesn’t accept all spices. Of course, it’s also according to the taste, according to the type, according to the season, according to the country where we live. We have to use the spices and the ingredients and also the vegetables. We try to cook seasonal. So also here in Europe, Hungary and Croatia, and very southern countries, the okra is growing. The bean is growing. It is a very nice plant, a high hibiscus plant. It belongs to the hibiscus family and is very, very healthy, and many people grow them in their garden. We cut the onion. We have the red onion and the white onion. I prefer the red onion. It’s a little bit sweeter in taste, but it has more iron than the white onion. We cut it just before, so not hours before, but just before, so that it doesn’t get a bitter taste. And at the same time, I’m observing this, what is cooking here? We put it in the cold olive oil, also inside. Cooking would, this. And, at the same time, the okras, the bhindi are coming. I use my fingers, wash, dip now in the banana kichṛī. So it will be. So we say good luck. Reduce the flame a little bit. Slowly, slowly getting up, starting to get hotter. Meanwhile, we can warm up the chapati tawā, the chapati pan. So make this small, small, that it doesn’t get too hot. Chapati tawa or the chapati pan—if you have your sarān cooking place at home, you of course need a flat one, like you use for crepes. If you have a gas stove, you can use a chapati tawa originally, like this, or one made from iron. What you use is up to you, but it should not stick. This we have to take care of. The okra also gets the cut green chilies inside, in the same size like this also, anything. We prepared some chapati dough before, but in the meantime, I will show how to make it. Chapati dough, the right chapati dough is like your ear, the soft part of your ear, so soft. In that way, the chapati dough should be. It’s always good if it can rest a little bit. So when we prepare, we do it in the beginning, and we let it rest, put a wet cloth over it so that it can rest. If you make fresh chapati, we use whole grain flour, if possible. Yeah, if you can, we use it fresh ground. Just to clean the pot here. Freshly ground chapati flour is always the best—from wheat, from barley; we can put all kinds of grains inside. Put also a little turmeric; it gives a good color. I don’t put salt because the vegetable is mostly very spicy. When we eat the chapati or the rotis with the vegetable, then we save the salt a little bit. So, and then we look here what the bhindi are doing and make it small, small, better. They get soft by themselves, and the salt and spices we put in later, otherwise it burns. Actually, we can take some more inside. There we have enough, so it will be. Close it, small temperature, and it will be. The kadhi is boiling. There are different things we can also put inside. There are methī seeds. They are washed, that’s why they are in the sieve. Methī seeds are... I don’t know the word in English. Methi, we call it methi, or boxthorn tea salmon. They are very good, they are bitter in taste, and very good for digestion. They give a little bit of heat in the body, but mostly we have cold climates, so this is no problem that they have some heat. I’m using some heat. I also put in one whole garlic, a peach, or two. I don’t cut it, and one chili. I’ll just let it cook, and in the end, a little bit, we put the green onion inside. So the chapati dough is prepared. A little water, in one hand hold the chapati, the other hand is mixing the dough. If the dough sticks, we can put some oil on our hands and our fingers. It depends on the climate also. If there’s no climate outside, if it’s raining, then the dough likes to stick a little bit. Monsoon. It’s very hard to make chapati when it’s raining. You can also put the spices inside, like in the thread—like coriander, ground coriander or ground cumin. Something green, like palak, spinach, cooked spinach, whole spinach. We can use, instead of the water, we can use yogurt. It’s a different kind of roti, chapati. Then some like to do it with the oil. Now it’s quite good. Kadhi is cooking. Just make my hand one more way. We can do it the same way we can make parathas: after cooking and putting on the chapati tawa, to use some ghee, some purified butter. This you can make at home. If you heat the butter, one, two packets of butter, you heat it on slow, slow temperature. Put one, two looms inside, or cloves. And just let it cook and cook, and then afterwards filter it, and then you have very good ghee. And it need not go in a cool place; you can just keep it in a glass and have it ready. So we work a little bit on the chapati dough. Good training. You need not the expander. You need no weights, no handles. Keep fit. So this is ready. Check the heat of the chapati tawa and the okras. They got a little bit too much temperature, so now we put a little salt inside. It will also help that more liquid comes out, and I put some tomatoes inside. If you like tomatoes, put them in. If not, then just leave them out. It’s no problem. Some people eat, some don’t eat. So we leave it like this. Uncover again. Now we can put the green onion inside. So then, I would like to move, but I’ll try once more, maybe the last one is working, so this one here, otherwise this fire is too high and it will burn. So if I don’t make the chapatis, we need some space with the white flour. If you have white flour, little bits. Then, make some balls. If you want small chapatis, make small balls. If you want big chapatis, make big balls. Yeah, then like this, with three fingers, you make in the middle. Take care that you don’t have too much flour on it. Then you make it round, round, and then very gently try to make it round, round. Don’t use too much flour when you make the chapatis. Otherwise, the burnt flour has a bitter taste. This we don’t need. Samādhi always says, "If you eat bitter, then you have a sweet life. If you eat sweet, you have a bitter life." But chapati flour must not be burnt and bitter, so we will see. Good luck. We can prepare one cloth. If the fingers are not used to taking out the chapatis, then we can use a cloth and just leave it a little bit. Meanwhile, we prepare. Just finish it. Big chapati, big. The big, big, big one is called Hanuman chapati. Then you have like a bread, a flatbread. Of course it has to be slowly, slowly on the heat because it takes more time to be ready. And if you want, you can put now some spices inside—coriander, some cumin, some green things, some coriander leaves, put some salt, and if you want, also a little chili. Fold it, and fold it once more. Many things of this cooking technique, many, many recipes we learn from Swamiji directly. He is the best cook that I know, and also from Umetsinghji. He is from, he was from Rajasthan, from the Lunava village. I learned many, many things to cook, and of course, from all my friends, from my mates in the Yoga and Daily Life group. And then the hunger, of course, is the best cook, we say, so we just mix it. Decorate with a little fresh coriander. If you have it, you can also use some from your home. Spices, what you have. We don’t try, we don’t test the eating before offering to our master, to Swamījī, or on our altar. And if you like, you can always put after some salt, of course. Gurūjī said, as our Gurūjī said, you never put salt afterwards inside, because it’s not curry. But of course, if you want, you can always put some salt. But as it becomes as good as it is, it will be good. As I always say, the best cook is the one who sees the eating and knows what is missing. Who looks to the eating and knows what is missing? Who smells the food? Now you can put some ghee or oil if you want, round, round, to make the heat a little bit higher. In that case, I will not touch it, because it’s very hot. I have some paper. Also, you can use the paper for turning and shaking more. So, actually it’s ready. Kāḍhī is ready. Mahāprabhujī soup is ready. For decoration, we also give some leaves. Swamiji used to always give Guruji the kadhi with a little chili powder on top. It looks nice and has a good taste. We can put the kadhi in the katori. In this also, on one plate. This eating we will give to Swamiji on the altar, if you like. Hari Om. Good appetite, and wish you good success with cooking. Hari Om.