Sattva: Issue 02
Wooden chopping boards, reusing egg cartons, chocolate & book recco, ingredient spotlight
Sattva (सत्त्व) is a beautiful Sanskrit word that has many meanings—spirit, true essence, good sense, wisdom, quality of purity, energy, consciousness and mind, among other things.
Through this fortnightly newsletter, I want to bring to you all things good, which will make your life better. My focus will be on topics such as mindfulness, productivity, slow living and sustainability, accompanied by genuinely useful recommendations of products, books, music, links to read, and of course food and recipes. Through these, I hope to instil some Sattva in your life.]
Thank you for the overwhelming support and positive feedback for the first issue of Sattva.
I promise to keep things interesting and inspiring here. 🙂
Care tips for wooden chopping boards
I used to have a couple of plastic chopping boards until a year ago but now I have replaced them all with wooden ones. The scratches and cuts you see on plastic boards from using sharp knives are signs of microplastics going into our food. Using wooden boards is definitely a safer option.
I once put a wooden chopping board into the dishwasher assuming it will come out sterilized and squeaky clean. It did come out squeaky clean but in three pieces (!) as the hot water and steam had made the board come apart along the joints. Two lessons here. 1. Don’t put your wooden chopping boards in the dishwasher. The long washing cycles expose them to too much water and steam, and reduce their life. 2. Look for chopping boards made with a single piece of wood.
Wooden chopping boards do need some maintenance. Do not leave them in a wet sink. Wash immediately and dry thoroughly before stacking on the counter. Keeping damp boards in closed cabinets could lead to mould, especially in high humidity areas. Once a week, deep clean wooden boards by sprinkling baking soda and vinegar all over the board. Let this sit for 5 minutes, then wash it off with your regular dishwashing powder or soap. Wipe it thoroughly. Take a few drops of cooking oil on a piece of kitchen paper or cotton cloth and rub the oil over the board. This will make them last longer.
Egg cartons as seed starters
Empty egg cartons (also, beverage tetra paks like you can see in the pic above) are very useful as seed starters. Fill each cavity with cocopeat or a mix of cocopeat and compost. Sow in 1-2 seeds in each compartment and cover with a thin layer of cocopeat. Water it well and sprinkle water every day to keep it from drying. Depending on the seeds and their germination rate, it will take 1-2 weeks for seeds to germinate. After 3-4 weeks, these can be planted in slightly bigger recycled containers or similar sized small pots and after a few more weeks into their final destination, be it a pot or the soil. Plastic egg cartons can be reused 2-3 times.
Buy yourself a good bar of chocolate
If you haven’t had an overdose of chocolate during Valentine’s day, I thought it would be nice to share with you a chocolate brand I’ve discovered recently.
Dark chocolate isn’t just a wonderful indulgence but this antioxidant-rich food is good for your health in small doses. The active ingredient phenylethylamine present in cacao is a known mood booster. It is one of the ingredients I have written about in the Superfoods Compendium chapter of my book, Everyday Superfoods. A small piece of dark chocolate is the best post-dinner sweet something. But of course, as with all things food, the quality of the ingredients have a huge impact. Most commercially available bars are highly processed with a lot of additives and sugar. Darkins is one of the brands that use a bean-to-bar method. Each bar contains only cacao beans, cacao butter and organic cane sugar, which incidentally also makes it dairy and gluten-free. I totally love their packaging too.
Website: darkins.in
Heston Blumenthal’s 2-ingredient Chocolate Mousse
While we’re on the subject of chocolate, here’s a simple and magical recipe that just takes minutes. In all probability, you already know of Heston’s 2-ingredient chocolate mousse. It never fails to amaze me how you can make something decadent with just one main ingredient.
Bring some susegad into your life
I’ve had the chance to have a sneak peek into this book called Susegad. Susegad is an untranslatable Konkani word used by Goans to indicate the sense of peace and calm that is so trademark to the state and its culture. In this new book on the Goan Art of Contentment, Clyde D’Souza examines the unique elements that result in the relaxed bonhomie. You’ll find everything from how to add a Goan touch to your casa to how to make rachaedo masala so that you can imbibe the spirit of Susegad into your life too.
Ingredient spotlight on kohlrabi / knol kohl
My casual question on what can one do with kohlrabi on Twitter last month got over 300 responses. I did not expect this kind of love and support for this rather underdog vegetable. I learnt that it is one of the most favourite vegetables for Kashmiris, who prepare it as a simple stew with the greens flavoured with just hing, chillies and salt (monjje haakh). It is also made into a pickle when in season, and cooked along with a variety of ingredients like mutton, paneer, tripe, fish, moong dal and more. In Tamil cooking, it is a common vegetable added to sambar (one of my least favourite sambars!), made into kootu (even more blah!), and rather popular in Kannada cuisine too, featuring in saagu, the vegetable gravy served with pooris and in bisi bele baath.
Here are a couple of tips:
Choose small-sized tender kohlrabi with leaves attached. These are not fibrous like the more mature ones, making them easy to cook, and nice to eat raw too, in salads (see recipe in my Mint Lounge column here) .
Peel the skin of kohlrabi using a sharp paring knife and then use in recipes of your choice.
I would love your feedback on the newsletter. If you like what you read, please share it with your family and friends. I am grateful for your help in reaching my newsletter to a wider audience. See you in two weeks time!
Books: Everyday Superfoods | The Everyday Healthy Vegetarian
Blog: https://saffrontrail.com
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Wow! Mam wonderful tips for the products which we use almost daily. You have shown us a way to reduce our waste and instead use it. Great tips for the wooden boards too. And I have never tried kohlrabi but now have a recipe and why not give it a try and I know it would be delicious. “ Susegad” will definitely read. And have ordered my dark chocolate from darkins too. Thank you mam because you take such great effort and time to instil such great values as sustainability into our lives and great tips too.
Will be awaiting the next issue. ❤️