tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926Fri, 11 Sep 2026 18:27:45 +0000RecipesMy TravelsFestivalsLifeMiscellaneousMy CraftsRestaurantsSoulful SongsCelebrate we will, for life is short, but sweet for certain.http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Unknown)Blogger82125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-7344752806966256110Fri, 27 Mar 2015 21:15:00 +00002015-03-27T14:22:22.760-07:00My Travels The most incredible thing I experienced in Puerto Rico was the Bioluminescent Bay. Before I start explaining what it is, let me clarify that I didn't click any pictures while I was there. We went kayaking in the bay, at night. I had never kayaked before so I didn't want to risk taking my camera with me in case I fell off the kayak. Unfortunately, I didn't have those plastic cases to carry my http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2015/03/bioluminescent-bay-fajardo-puerto-rico.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-6827883905226674338Tue, 03 Mar 2015 22:34:00 +00002015-03-27T13:17:51.086-07:00My Travels San Juan (pronounced sahn hwahn) is the capital of Puerto Rico. San Juan is known as La Ciudad Amurallada (the walled city) and is one of the biggest and best natural harbors in the Caribbean and is the second oldest European-founded city in the Americas. The metropolitan area known as San Juan has 3 distinct areas: Old San Juan, the Beach & Resort area, and other outlying communities. Old http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2015/03/old-san-juan-puerto-rico.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-8050264898660010735Mon, 02 Mar 2015 01:35:00 +00002015-03-01T17:45:15.762-08:00My Travels Last year, in April, we went to Puerto Rico to celebrate our second anniversary. After the trip, I got pregnant and we had our son, Arjun, on January 9th, 2015. Maybe I should name him Rico instead, since I'm pretty sure he was conceived there. I got lazy to write during my pregnancy so I skimped out on blogging for the past year. But I'm back now and will share my experiences in Puerto Rico. http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2015/03/luquillos-playa-azul-condo-complex.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-4985402689621103022Sun, 09 Mar 2014 01:41:00 +00002014-03-08T17:51:47.118-08:00Recipes After almost a year and a half, I finally feel confident of my paneer-making skills. Paneer is fresh cheese common in South Asian cuisine. It is an unaged, acid-set, non-melting farmer cheese or curd cheese made by curdling heated milk with lemon juice, vinegar, or any other food acids. Sometimes it is also called 'cottage cheese.' In India, people just buy paneer from the grocery stores. http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/03/how-to-make-paneer-at-home.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-3976273302572390910Sat, 01 Mar 2014 20:49:00 +00002014-03-01T12:50:00.814-08:00Recipes This is the easiest naan I've ever made and it turned out so good. As usual, I made this as a last minute thing and didn't have yeast or baking soda. But I still managed to make it taste good somehow. Here's the recipe: Ingredients: 2 cups all purpose flour (maida) 4 tsp baking powder 1 tsp salt 1/4 cup plain yogurt 1 tsp lemon juice For garnish 4 tbsp butter, softened 1 tbsp http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/03/naan-recipe.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-3567175202799735086Thu, 27 Feb 2014 03:14:00 +00002014-02-26T19:18:17.759-08:00Recipes Continuing on with the meal, the next on the list is dal makhani, which I have now nailed after several attempts in the last year and a half. I have learned that you cannot make dal makhani from recipes online. I have read so many recipes that I've lost count. I even tried to make it from this one post that claimed it was the same recipe of dal makhani from the Oberoi Hotel. Whatever. It wasn'thttp://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/dal-makhani.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-3398976570439649625Wed, 26 Feb 2014 02:36:00 +00002014-02-25T18:41:31.012-08:00Recipes Last night, I made shahi paneer, dal makhani and naan. I've made shahi paneer once before. It was good but not amazing. Last night, it was amazing. I'm so proud.  I have read all sorts of complicated recipes to make this, involving a gazillion spices, yogurt, cream, etc. Here is MY version of the recipe (which is brilliant, by the way) and requires nothing complicated. No butter, no http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/shahi-paneer.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-7915081827905756801Tue, 25 Feb 2014 04:23:00 +00002014-02-24T20:25:22.112-08:00Recipes I love mushrooms and I've been trying to find a good mushroom pasta recipe for a while. Today, I experimented a little and it turned out pretty good. It is super simple to cook, very little ingredients and it is packed with flavor.  Ingredients: 1 package of spaghetti 1 large package of mushrooms (whichever kind you like), chopped 6 large cloves of garlic, minced 1 http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/mushroom-and-garlic-pasta.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-5070478005165323942Sun, 23 Feb 2014 20:38:00 +00002014-02-23T12:38:10.962-08:00Recipes Here is a simple Himachali Madra recipe. The first time I ate madra was at a dhaam (feast), during a wedding. Wedding madras are fatty with thick gravy, chickpeas and lots of dry fruits. It tastes brilliant, though. I've cooked it at home twice but considering my weight, I can't afford to make it too often. Haha. This is a madra that Himachalis cook at home as part of a meal and it is quick http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/himachali-madra.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-1778040268041770126Sun, 23 Feb 2014 05:11:00 +00002014-02-23T11:45:26.619-08:00Recipes Ah! Momos. The first time I ate momos was ages ago, in Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh. Dharamshala is my husband's home town. Coincidentally, my sister lives in Dharamshala and happens to be my husband's grandmother's neighbor. My cousin, Ritesh (whose home is also in Dharamshala), introduced me to it while I was there on vacation once. I've been in love ever since. During those http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/veggie-momos-dumplings.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-8672693291250846665Fri, 21 Feb 2014 21:01:00 +00002014-02-21T13:01:45.608-08:00Life Hello! I'm back after like... forever. My laptop started to become a pain in the rear last year and I completely stopped using it. And writing a blog from my phone was no fun. Well, for Christmas last year, my husband bought me a beautiful, new laptop. I love it. I had almost forgotten how it felt to have a computer that worked this fast. This laptop has a core i5 and is the fastest laptophttp://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2014/02/back-from-dead.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-5994839281256582654Tue, 16 Jul 2013 18:05:00 +00002013-07-16T11:05:08.930-07:00Recipes So one day, I was sitting around and thinking about food (as usual) and suddenly, I had this bad craving for gobi manchurian. Gobi (cauliflower) Manchurian is an Indian-Chinese dish made with an Indian, spicy sauce with Chinese-inspired flavors.The first time I ate gobi manchurian was when I was in Manchester and my friend, Kanika forced me to go eat at a vegetarian restaurant. Gobi Manchurian http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/07/gobi-manchurian.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-5663211457120436159Tue, 16 Jul 2013 16:56:00 +00002013-07-16T11:17:36.219-07:00Recipes A friend of mine taught me how to make delicious homemade mango ice cream. It is super quick and simple to make. You'll be surprised at how yummy the ice cream turns out to be. It'll last over a month (if you don't eat it all up before that). Ingredients: 30 oz/850 grams of mango pulp (I bought the tin can) 14 oz/396 grams of condensed milk (the little tin) http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/07/mango-ice-cream-recipe.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-2869476432108795930Tue, 18 Jun 2013 19:19:00 +00002013-06-18T12:30:42.815-07:00Recipes Chhole Bhature (pronounced chho-ley bh-uht-oo-rey) is one of the most popular Punjabi dishes. The first time I had chhole bhature was when I was six years old in a shopping place, in Janakpuri, New Delhi. My brother took me out for breakfast and we had chhole bhature. I have been in love with it since. I never thought I could make this dish because I always thought it was too complicated to http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/06/chhole-bhature.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-8987792095927690215Mon, 17 Jun 2013 18:00:00 +00002013-06-18T12:33:54.666-07:00My Travels Hello, beautiful people. Sorry for taking forever to write in here. I keep getting lazy. I have a lot of recipes to write about because I've been trying new things in the past few weeks. Today, I'm going to write about the condo we stayed at while we were in Hawai'i. The place pleasantly surprised us so I think it deserves a post of its own. Makaha Beach - View from the lanai Makaha http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/06/makaha-beach-cabanas.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-8238560731466719463Fri, 10 May 2013 19:42:00 +00002013-05-10T13:12:25.208-07:00My Travels Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park and the Lava Tour were the main highlights of our trip to the Big Island. We did, however, drive around the whole island and stopped to check out some cool locations.  The Island of Hawai'i is also known as Big Island or Hawai'i Island. It is larger than all the islands in the archipelago combined and located in the Southeastern most tip of the United http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/05/big-island-of-hawaii.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-7709623626489173208Thu, 09 May 2013 21:49:00 +00002013-05-09T15:03:42.361-07:00My Travels Hello everyone. Yet another beautiful day in Utah today. There's a Fiesta de Mayo taking place at the club house of The Falls so we'll be going there today. Should be fun.  Well, today's post is about LAVA! :D  While we were staying at "At the End of the Road B&B," Ray hooked us up with this lava viewing tour company. We were leaving for Hilo that morning, but the sitehttp://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/05/lava-tour.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-392420393670471118Wed, 08 May 2013 17:23:00 +00002013-05-08T10:33:48.333-07:00My Travels While we were visiting the Volcanoes National Park, we stayed at "At the End of the Road Bed and Breakfast." I decided to write about this place because we had a beautiful time there. Even though our visit was short, the place and the hosts are definitely worth writing about. Their hospitality and kindness were unmatched and if we ever go back to the Big Island, we would definitely stay here http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/05/at-end-of-road-bed-and-breakfast.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-2756919129208231658Tue, 07 May 2013 19:51:00 +00002013-05-07T16:51:49.176-07:00My Travels Aloha! As soon as we landed in Kona, at the Big Island of Hawai'i, we picked up the rental car and drove straight to Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park. This park was established in 1916 and encompasses two active volcanoes: Kīlauea and Mauna Loa. Kīlauea is one of the world's most active volcanoes and Mauna Loa is the world's most massive and active volcano. The park was http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/05/hawaii-volcanoes-national-park.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-6001291303149647262Mon, 06 May 2013 21:53:00 +00002013-05-07T12:55:41.975-07:00LifeMy Travels Aloha everyone! I just got back from an awesome ten day long vacation in Hawai'i. Hawai'i is just so beautiful.  I spent some of the best days there with Ankit, Ankur Bhaiyya and Astha. The four of us celebrated our anniversaries together. Sometimes I can't believe it has been a year since I got married and moved to the States. The year just flew by.  We spent the http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/05/back-from-hawaii.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-4575095075144933299Fri, 05 Apr 2013 02:28:00 +00002013-04-04T19:44:24.506-07:00Recipes It's been a while since I made ragda patties. Last time, my friend, Maryum, asked me for the recipe and I completely forgot to send it to her. My aplogies, Maryum. Today's post is for you.  Hope you like it. :) Ragda Patties (pronounced pattice) is a popular snack from Mumbai. The first time I had it was on my birthday, four years ago when I was visiting Mumbai for my cousin's http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/04/ragda-patties.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-1327352472524034430Wed, 03 Apr 2013 20:20:00 +00002013-04-03T13:42:19.005-07:00My Travels So after we got done checking out Arches National Park, we still had some time left before heading back home. We decided to visit Canyonlands National Park. It's like 30-40 minutes away from Arches. What we didn't realize was that this park is divided into four districts: the Island in the Sky, the Needles, the Maze, and the rivers themselves. Unfortunately, the three districts have three http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/04/canyonlands-national-park-island-in-sky.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-5520581878477410869Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:03:00 +00002013-04-03T13:25:18.976-07:00My Travels Over the weekend, Ankit and I traveled to Moab to visit Arches National Park. It was about a 4 hours drive from South Ogden (where we live). We left at 6 in the morning.  Arches National Park is situated in Eastern Utah and preserves about 2000 natural sandstone arches. The park lies on an underground salt bed. It is said that some 300 million  years ago, the sea flowed through http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/04/arches-national-park-moab.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-1034153368379123317Tue, 02 Apr 2013 16:19:00 +00002013-04-02T09:28:55.495-07:00FestivalsRecipes For Holi, I made Gujiyas. As mentioned in my earlier post about Holi, making and distributing gujiyas is a Holi tradition and true to the culture, I made gujiyas at home and distributed them. Since this was my first time, I made just eight gujiyas but they turned out to taste quite nice. So here is my recipe -- a mix of recipes from my Mother-in-Law, my Mum and stuff I made up along the way :p http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/04/gujiya-sweet-coconut-pierogies.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8722153420271890926.post-3778709532591782366Tue, 26 Mar 2013 18:15:00 +00002013-03-26T11:19:56.775-07:00Festivals Hello :) Tomorrow is Holi; a Hindu festival of colors. It is celebrated every year on the day after the full moon, in March. It is a day when people sing, dance, play with lots of bright colors, laugh, dunk friends in mud pools, squirt colored water/powder and water balloons on anyone who passes by and get intoxicated on bhaang (An ancient native Indian drink, consisting of various spices, http://akritiankit.blogspot.com/2013/03/holi-festival-of-colors.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Unknown)3