GiOrangeade -- A recipe

A sinus inflammation always makes me crave oranges and ginger and something to drink. Sadly caffeine is out of my life so no more tea and therefore no more ginger tea. But, I decided to try something new. I am going to call it GiOrangeade = Ginger Orangeade. I tried two versions. First one I did not like that much. The second one I loved.

Version One of GiOrangeade:

Juice of 2 large navel oranges
1 cubic inch piece of ginger, peeled.

Cut the ginger into very thin slices
Boil it in 1/4 cup of water to make a sort of ginger tea.
Let it cool.
Pour it into freshly squeezed orange juice (dump some pulp in, if you like)
Mix and drink up!

Version Two of GiOrangeade (much simpler and much better):


Juice of 2 large navel oranges
1 cubic inch piece of ginger, peeled.

Smash the living daylights out of the ginger in a pestle and mortar.
Empty the contents of the pestle and mortar into the freshly squeezed orange juice.
Mix and drink up.
Munch on the mortal remains of the ginger at the end!

Enjoy. Your sinuses will thank you. And sorry, no pics. I drank up well before I even thought of making a post out of this!

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Kitchen Garden Update

I harvested my first batch of methi (fenugreek, vendhayam) leaves for my methi omelette today. I did not get much out of it, just two hands full. Normally I like to have a whole bunch for to omelettes. But nipping off the tips will probably make these guys grow bushier.

Methi -- two weeks ago.

The basil is also looking good, although it will probably be a while before I have enough for batch of pesto. Here is a "file photo" of the basil from a couple of weeks ago.

Basil -- two weeks ago.

And here it is now:

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Random rant.

On somedays all I want to do is take a really good book, preferably hard bound and huge -- like say the Mahabharata or something and then lob it real hard at life. The trouble, I find, is that while metaphors like this are so satisfying to visualize, they are of no use. I am unable to pin life down to any one physical form.

Today is one such day, where I wish I could concretize life to one object and then lob things at it. I just wish I did not have to be so many things to so many people and have so much to do. But then again, if wishes were horses.

Minor irritant number one: I am sick again and can't seem to drum up enthusiasm for anything.
Minor irritant number two: I almost made up my mind to hire some one to do something on the house. A large scale thing. Turns out that although they claimed to be Better Business Bureau certified, I can't seem to find them on the BBB listings. A seed of doubt has been sown and I can't seem to sleep! Now that means, the screening, interviewing and everything has to start all over again! But more importantly, it means I am still gullible.
Minor irritant number two point oh one: I discovered today that they guy we hired to do some electrical work and who had apparently praised my halloween sculptures a lot to my husband has, in deed, broken my ground breaker!
Minor irritant number three: I bought too much stuff for the yard that needs to be done. I am nervous that I may let things slip by one more year.
Not so minor irritant number four: Dad is not doing all that well and I am nervous about how my Mom is going to manage alone.
Slightly major irritant number five: I have two major deadlines and a conference coming up.
Slightly major irritant number six: I am losing steam on workouts -- actually have no interest it seems which is more important than just not making it to workouts. Apparently I prefer to procrastinate like I am doing now!

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Bambi goes Bananas!

My yard is under constant attack by several critters: hares/rabbits,

White tailed bunny

deer, groundhogs, woodchucks (which is another name for groundhogs) and whistle pigs (which is also another name for groundhogs). When I started my garden here, deer were the biggest Eaters of Everything. I learnt very soon that roses and hostas were deer candy. So I fenced the backyard in to keep the dogs in and the deer out and moved the hostas and roses inside.

The day after I returned from my recent trip to India I transplanted some bushes from my raised garden by the front door to the main front garden, wondering why it was that I had not done this earlier. The next day, this is what I found:

uprooted plants

Something had uprooted these plants in its feeding frenzy. The culprit had left enough unmistakable foot prints for me to see:

guess who came to dinner?

I also noticed that the lilies that had grown to a nice height had also been lopped off at the top. Deer love tender vegetation and apparently these asiatic lilies are also deer candy! I had saved most of them last year by bringing them into my backyard, but some bulbs seem to have escaped me.

Deer pruned lilies

That evening I transplanted these guys to a pot to recover from the injury and left them in the back yard until such time as a bed is readied for them!!!

This morning when I went on a regular trip around the front yard and noticed this:

daylilies: chomped down to a nub!

Grrrr..!

They did it last year, and I thought it was because they were too hungry from the crazy winter. This year, they had let the things go until now. Apparently, day-lilies are not safe either. So, I will have to relocate all of these guys -- that would be 6 more plants for which I have no soil!

But there is some good news in the yarden.  The lilies I saved from Bambi last year are flowering pretty

asiatic lilies

And the red hot pokers that I thought were gone for good are actually poking out. Take a look at the chocolate sunrise, which is, well, rising.

Chocolate Sunrise Unfurling

And there is always the bowl of peonies to keep me happy

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