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Vegetarian cooking lesson 11, Kadhi soup, Okra and chapatis

A cooking demonstration on preparing Marwa-style gāṭṭā kadhi, chapati, and regional vegetables.

"When I was thinking about how to explain or show the gāṭṭā... it came to my mind that it is like the attachment of this world. When we touch the besan dough, it sticks very quickly. Then we use the oil of wisdom, which gets rid of the attachment."

"The Marwa kitchen has very, very delicious food—spicy, tasty, healthy, and very natural. The people living there eat only regional food. They know the leaves and fruits growing in their area."

The speaker guides viewers through making kadhi with chickpea flour dumplings (gāṭṭā), using the sticky dough as a metaphor for worldly attachment. The process includes preparing the dough with yogurt and spices, boiling and testing the gāṭṭā, and making chapati. The talk highlights regional Marwa cuisine, mentioning local ingredients like guṇḍā and the health benefits of bitter gourd, which is promised for a future lesson.

Filming location: Vép, Hungary

Hari Om, dear friends, dear brothers and sisters. Today we are preparing kadhi with gāṭṭā, a dish from North India, specifically from the Marwa region. The gāṭṭā is a kind of dough, like noodles, made from besan aṭṭā (chickpea flour). To make the dough, we use yoghurt, salt (to taste), turmeric, and chilli. We can also add cumin powder and a little addrak (ginger), peeled and smashed, which gives a very good taste. We mix it only with yoghurt; we do not use water, as the dough would become too soft too quickly. I have prepared the amount I thought everyone would like: four large tablespoons, or about forty tablespoons, of besan aṭṭā. We start with a small amount of yoghurt to avoid the dough becoming overly soft. The dough should be like this so we can roll it, cook it, and put it inside the kadhi. Besan is very common in India for making doughs to bind things together. We can also make a very nice gaṭṭā sabjī with it. In other countries, it is cooked differently. For example, in the Czech Republic, they use something called raska, made from pea flour or soybean flour, so different kinds of flours are used. But in India, we use besan aṭṭā for its very good taste. It is served with kadhi and chapati, along with one sabjī. I would serve it with this gāṭṭā kadhi and eat it with karelā sabjī (cooked bitter gourd), which we will prepare next time. The dough is getting ready. We will see how soft or hard it is. Now, we do not use plain fingers; we use oil on the hands, otherwise the dough sticks immediately. When I was thinking about how to explain or show the gāṭṭā to be cooked, it came to my mind that it is like the attachment of this world. When we touch the besan dough, it sticks very quickly. Then we use the oil of wisdom, which gets rid of the attachment, and then we have the dough nicely prepared. We can use more oil. Now we start to roll it out. Meanwhile, the water is boiling. We will put the rolled-out dough on the working board, which should also have oil on it. This vermicelli is made into very thin pieces. You can make them according to your taste, bigger or smaller. We do not put soda inside, otherwise it will dissolve while cooking. Roll it out into thin pieces, like your small finger. It can be that thin, and then you put it inside the boiling water. You can add salt to the water if you want, but it is not needed. You can keep the rolled dough in the fridge for two or three days. You can make a very nice rām kicharī out of it: when we cook a rice ball with vegetables and spices, then cut the gāṭṭā and cook it inside, frying it together all the way. For a broth soup, we cover it. It has to cook for about 10 to 15 minutes because it goes into the kadhi and cooks with it. Let it cook. The gāṭṭā is then done. If you want to know if it is ready, insert a knife and try to take a piece out. When it is ready, it will break. If you try to take it out and it does not break, it is not done. So, we have prepared cooked gāṭṭā. It looks like this now. Then we cut it into small pieces and put it inside the kadhi. It still has to cook. The Marwa kitchen has very, very delicious food—spicy, tasty, healthy, and very natural. I am going to do all this now in the dry season. The people living there eat only regional food. They know the leaves and fruits growing in their area, like guṇḍā, saṅgrī, tumba, or guāpalī. Our ashram in Jadan offers all this: vegetables, fruits, and also the guṇḍā we have here prepared already, cooked. The seeds are out from the guṇḍā, and we will prepare this next time. The guṇḍā is a fruit that grows on a tree. This is also already cooked, and the seeds are out. They are dried and brought here. They are very, very healthy for the intestine and stomach. We have to soak them before cooking, prepare masala inside, and then eat them with chapati. So, this is our guṇḍā, and we serve it with the gāṭṭā, which is cooking now. We serve chapati. Today, only one dish. Next time, we will prepare the karelā, or bitter gourd. It is very, very healthy and bitter. It lowers blood sugar and is very good for the liver. So, for people who have liver problems, it is beneficial. When we prepare the chapati, try to make the dough not too hard and not too soft, like the earlobe. We roll it into a small ball. We must also ensure there are no wrinkles or holes inside, that it is round. For rolling out, we use white flour, but not too much. Use three fingers, then between the thumb and index finger—not completely on the side, not in the middle. We make it round so that in the middle there is a little bump. Then we do this in the flour a little bit. Like this. We take off the rest of the flour. Then roll it, but do not press too much. The chapati roll is between two fingers, not like this. Two fingers. If you press too much, it will not puff up. A little. Push toward yourself and weigh and push. Pull toward yourself, turn toward yourself, and at the same time roll it. Toward yourself, and roll again. This will let it cool down. When it is cooled down, we can cut it. I do not want to put it here because it is not complete—only so we can see it. The body has to be moved; otherwise, if the chapati is not puffing up, check if there is too little heat. You have to check what could be happening. Sometimes the dough is too soft; you have to find out what it could be. The temperature has to be proper. Okay, it is puffing up. Good. The colour comes from the ajwain (carom seeds) in the dough. We try to put ajwain in nearly every dish because it itself has no strong taste and is very healthy. The gāṭṭā has to cook. I would say 15–20 minutes more. Then you will have the good taste. We serve it in a bowl like this, sprinkle it with some coriander and some chilli, round and round, and serve it with chapati, always with the thin side up. Thank you. Wish you a good appetite. Hari Om. God bless you.

This text is transcribed and grammar corrected by AI. If in doubt what was actually said in the recording, use the transcript to double click the desired cue. This will position the recording in most cases just before the sentence is uttered.

The text contains hyperlinks in bold to three authoritative books on yoga, written by humans, to clarify the context of the lecture:

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