Navratri - Sep 29 to Oct 7
Dasara - Oct 8
Recipes
While each Madhwa household cooks differently and cooking differs from person to person, there are some common food items that are cooked during festivals.
These include
1. Simple rice dishes like lemon rice
2. Chutney/Kosambri
3. Simple curries like bittergourd curry
4. Sambhar and Rasam
5. Sweet dishes with a filling like Holgis and Kadubus
6. Fried items like puri's and bajjis
Most of these recipes are simple to make and take least amount of time. Food items that are complicated or time consuming are sweets and fried items. Preparing countless dishes is one of the main reasons that makes people overwhelmed and probably shy away from celebrating any of these festivals.
On this website, our goal is to simplify complicated dishes, signifcantly cut down planning and preparation time, and provide tools that help cut preparation time even more, making the whole process to take less than two hours.
Absolute No-No's during festivals:
Garlic and Onion's are a big no-no for any festival.
Follow these simple steps to cut down on time significantly.
Tip #1: Vegetables Choose vegetables that take considerable less time to cut. For example, cucumber takes much less time to cut than beans.
Tip #2: Recipe choices: Choose recipe items to cook based on time constraints. For example, each festival has basic required food item to be prepared. All other items become optional.
Tip #3:# of items and quantity: Cut down on quantity of each item based on # of items that you cook. For example, cut down 1/2 on rice dish, if you add puris and vice versa.
Tip #4: Management of time: You don't have to cook the sweets/desserts and fried items all at one go. Cook what is required for naivaidya in the morning. Remaining part can be cooked in the evening. Some actually prepare holgi's previous day. Naivaidya part is cooked on the day of the festival. This cuts down on the time considerably.
Tip #5:Clean Kitchen Most significant part of saving time goes to having a clean kitchen and all cooking dishes available. This can easily be achieved by cleaning the kitchen and dishes the night before.
Tip#6: Time Management If comfortable, cut the vegetables previous night to cut down on time and stress.
Tip #7:Tools in the market Use availabe tools like rice cooker, steamer, grinder, food processor to significantly reduce cooking time.
Tip #8: Common Ingredients Prepare common ingredients across the recipes first. Planning is the key to a stress free celebration.