Oats and Cranberry bread

While we Indians have always loved our food, the current fixation with international ingredients that don't cost an arm and leg is quite difficult to find. Those lovely cheeses, hazelnuts are not really for regular cooking. However, one ingredient that is still lots affordable is Cranberry. While it is much more expensive than raisin, I normally keep the dried ones handy as a snack as it does not cloyingly sweet taste that the 'kismis' we get here. I was looking for a recipe that would use a fair amount of this and found this lovely recipe by Dan Lepard Find the Original Recipe here: I made a few minor substitutions and there was a lovely flavourful bread that landed on our breakfast plates today. I liked the bread plain with a cup of tea. But my kids preferred a sweeter version so they topped the slices with chocolate sauce and enjoyed it

Ingredients

75g instant oats, plus extra for the crust (the original recipe calls for rolled oats, I used the quick cooking ones instead)
175g dried cranberries
450g strong white flour (I added 3 tbsp of Vital wheat gluten and topped the rest with maida as I don't get bread flour here)
1½ tsp salt
½ tsp all spice powder
1 tsp sugar
50g unsalted butter
1 tsp instant dry yeast
Oil, for kneading
Method

Put the cranberries in a bowl and add 375ml boiling water. Leave for 10 minutes, then add the instant oats to the mixture and leave it until the mixture is warm.
Mix flour, salt, spice and sugar in another bowl, rub in the butter, toss the yeast through, then add the oats and berries, and mix well. Leave to stand for 10 minutes.
I tipped this mixture into my KitchenAid stand mixer and kneaded the dough for about 5 minutes till the dough started pulling together. Then I covered it with a towel and let it rest. There are two more of this knead and rest cycles. I kneaded for 5 minutes after a 10 minutes interval. I did the final knead by hand. The dough is sticky so its good to oil your hands before kneading the dough. Roll up the dough in an oiled bowl and rest the dough for 30 minutes. I covered with a tea towel.
You will see the dough rising. At the end of 30 minutes rise, shape the dough into a rectangle, roll up tightly and squeeze, seam-side down, into a large, loaf tin. My load tin is non stick so I just coated it with a thin film of oil. Use parchment paper for metal loaf tins. Leave for an hour until risen by half. Heat the oven to 220C (200C fan-assisted). Brush the top of the loaf with water, press on a handful of oats, cut a gash down the middle and bake for 50 minutes.
Tap the bottom of the loaf and when you hear the deep hollow sound, you know that the bread has been baked enough. Cover with a towel and let it cool completely before slicing.

Note: The bread browns very quickly on the top; the original recipe says that its typical for a fruit bread.

Cajun-Basil Eggless Cheese Muffins

A good Savoury Muffin recipe that is vegetarian, easy to make and tasty has been eluding me for long now. One recipe gave me really tasty ones but they got really stuck to the liners :( The second time around, the flavours were mild and they popped out of the muffin pan in a breeze but then the baking soda left a vague bitter aftertaste which was more pronounced as the muffins cooled... Farrukh has a lovely blog on http://www.cubesnjuliennes.com/. I have tried some of her bakes before, not only are they amazing, but you have to see the pictures to believe it. She had published a wonderful recipe of cheesy-chive muffins that were eggless and I wanted to try it out. What I did was I stuck to the basic flour-fat-liquid proportions from her recipe and changed the flavours to the ones I had available in my pantry.

My adapted recipe goes like this... INGREDIENTS:- 110 gms. maida 50 gms. butter, softened ½ cup, curd (I used the set dahi curd) 80 ml. milk ½ tsp. baking soda 2 tablespoons of chopped fresh Basil 1 tbsp chilli Flakes 1/2 tbsp. garlic powder 1/2 of pickled Jalapeno (seeds removed and chopped fine) 1/2 tbsp. sugar 6-8 black olives chopped fine 1/2 tablespoon tomato Ketchup 1 tsp. Cajun seasoning 2 tablespoons cheddar cheese (grated) ½ tsp, salt Cheddar cheese, grated, as required for topping Method: This recipe yields 6 medium muffins... Pre-heat the oven at 170 degrees, grease the muffin pan. In bowl, sift together all-purpose flour, baking soda, salt, cajun seasoning, garlic powder and chilli flakes. In another bowl, mix together butter, jalapenos, olives, cheddar cheese, basil, curd, tomato ketchup. Add half of the flour mixture and half of the milk, mix until combined well Add remaining half of the flour mixture and remaining milk, mix until combined well (do not over mix, work with a light hand else you get rubbery muffins) Fill the muffin pan with the batter upto 2/3. Top with some grated cheddar cheese. Note: These muffins do not rise much Bake them in pre-heated oven for 15 minutes. Take out and cool. Serve them warm with more ketchup :) if your palette is anything like my kids' Enjoy....

Focaccia Caprese

New year brings new beginnings they say and mine will be to blog regularly about the recipes I try out in the kitchen regularly. I am kinda de cluttering my life and putting blogging high up on my priority list :) so those of my friends who have been asking me when the next post is coming up. Here it is. I have joined a fabulous bread baking group started by Aparna that's called We Knead to Bake. She gives out a tested and a fabulous recipe every month and we need to bake along. There is nothing like a gang of virtual bakers egging you on to try bread recipes and they are so helpful in sharing tips and tricks and the finer nuances of bread baking. I love baking breads and think that breads for snacks are definitely a healthier option. I haven't tried out very complicated ones like croissants yet but have come a long way since my first foray some 2 years back. More about the recipe now....There are loads of variations in focaccia like plain, herbed, topped etc and this is the first time I am trying a recipe that has a lot of toppings along with a flavoured oil drizzle. I think that's the secret of keeping this bread moist and bursting with flavour. The original recipe can be found here: http://www.mydiversekitchen.com/2014/01/we-knead-to-bake-13-focaccia-caprese.html I did not make any changes to the recipe. Just added some black olives to the other topping ingredients. Fresh Mozzarella definitely makes this bread special. Do try to bake with this cheese but ensure that the cheese is well drained else the top becomes soggy. So without rambling on any further, here is my version of the Focaccia Caperese.

The bread is light and moist. Its best consumed immediately after baking. The bread was being baked in the oven when my daughter came back home from school. One sniff and she guessed that a 'yummy bread' was being baked :) Note: I use my KitchenAid stand mixer to knead the dough but you should be able to achive good results by hand too. If you are using KA then it takes just about 7-8 minutes for mixing and kneading the dough. Substitute with mozzarella if you cannot find the fresh one. You need about 1/2 cup of oil for the entire recipe (1/4 cup of flavoured oil and 1/4 cup plain) but what I did was used herbs and seasoning to the half cup of oil to OD the flavour. Try it and let me know if it worked for you too...

Multigrain Rosemary Focaccia Bread

Blogging after a long gap and this post has the exp. of baking my first 100% whole-wheat (multigrain) flat bread. Rosemary has this amazing flavour and fragrance and I find that the whole house smells divine when you are baking any bread with rosemary in it. I used Archana's recipe (of Archana's Kitchen fame) of Whole Wheat Rosemary Focaccia Bread on her website for this recipe that can be found here. http://www.archanaskitchen.com/world-recipes/breads/408-whole-wheat-rosemary-focaccia-bread

I find that a lot of folks are scared to attempt whole wheat bread, but if my first time exp. is anything to go by, folks its a breeze. Yeah keep some extra water handy and a little more stickier dough than an APF version probably.

The recipe Archana used yields quite a bit (Pls note that the cup measurements are US cup measurements) - she suggests that you split it and bake in batches. She is really sweet and responds to all email enquiries in detail and PROMPTLY... Also it makes more sense to halve it if you are kneading by hand. I found is really hard to knead the whole dough in one go - No kitchenaid u see.. Maybe i should put it on my list for Santa this Christmas:)

The yeast I used here is the Instant variety called 'Gloripan' - very pleased with the results and summer does help bread baking by making the rising process so much faster. Just a warning, the rosemary we get here is quite hard - maybe not so fresh - so ensure that its chopped really fine or use the dried one (halve the quantity mentioned if using dry rosemary). I followed the recipe exactly. Just added my own toppings. The first one had onion, olives and parmesan cheese and the other one had not-quite-sundried tomatoes, onion and thyme

Loved the recipe and this is a keeper - just replicating here again with my notes...

Whole Wheat Rosemary Focaccia Bread
Ingredients
6 cups multigrain flour or whole wheat flour (Aashirwad brand)
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 cup honey
2 1/2 tablespoons active dry yeast (gloripan)
1/2 cup chopped fresh rosemary
1/4 cup olive oil and more for coating and brushing
3 cups water

Method

In a large bowl, stir together the flour, salt, honey, yeast, and rosemary. Gradually add in the oil and water and knead well until all the ingredients are well combined. I use a KitchenAid mixer and it takes less than two minutes for me to get the ingredients together and mix it all up into a complete mass. Having said that your hands work well as well and you would build some good muscles. (Archana is totally right abt that, i had to divide into two portions and knead!!)

When the dough has pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface, and knead until smooth and elastic. Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl, and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a bowl with a light fitting lid and let it rise in a warm place for two hours. Sometimes I make the dough rise for two hours and then place the same bowl in the refrigerator to be baked for the next day. This kneaded dough will stay in the refrigerator for at least 5 days, so you could bake a small portion of bread for every single day of the week for dinner or a snack.(very sensible advice)

Preheat oven to 250 C. Punch dough down and place on floured baking sheet. Pat and spread into a 1/2 inch thick rectangle and make finger imprints over the bread. Brush the top with olive oil and you could optionally sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and mozzarella cheese or even ringed onions.

Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Serve warm.

(My oven's max peaks at 220 and i used that setting and it look lesser than 12 minutes for baking)

Apple-Walnut-Raisin Cake

So birthdays normally are associated with a nice rich cake with a creamy or chocolaty frosting. But what kind of a cake can you bake for a person who likes all sweet things as long as they are not too sweet? I had to make one such cake recently and came across a recipe from my long time favourite - Joy of baking website. Click on the headline of this post to go to the original recipe or search for apple cake in www.joyofbaking.com, you'll find the video and the tested recipe of this cake..


I did not make ANY changes to the recipe mentioned..

Couple of pointers for those trying to attempt this recipe..
1 Omit the Apricot glaze if you dont like your desserts very sweet - the cake just has a hint of sweetness
2. toast the walnuts very lightly
3. dont use golden raisins like i did for the recipe, dont quite like the taste..
4. this is a fruit muffin kinda cake, dont overbeat the batter
5. I didnt add lemon juice to cut apples (the cutting takes the longest part of the recipe preperation!)I just kept cutting it and storing it in a tight plastic box and after that stored in the fridge for a bit when i was making the batter for the cake...
6. This is quite moist cake and the peices cant be cut evenly because of the apple chunks..
7. The cake was LOVED by all.......

Garlic Pull Apart Rolls

Making your breakfast before and having it on a lazy Saturday morning is something you can do easily if you bake... I used this strategy yesterday and made some Garlic Pull Apart Rolls. They are again from Monika's blog.

Its a fairly simple recipe and since I wanted to use wholewheat - I used 2 cups of wholewheat in this recipe...This is Monika's recipe with my notes and pics inbetween :)

Here is the recipe:
Ingredients
•All Purpose Flour - 3 cups (I used 1 cup Maida and 2 cups Aashirwad Whole Wheat Atta - the strategy i use to measure is scoop the flour into the measuring cup, tap it once and even it out with a spatula)
• Warm Water- 1 cup (tipd keep 20-30 ml more water as atta needs more water - warm the entire quantity and keep 1 cup aside. Use this first and the rest if required
• Dry Active Yeast- 1tbsp (easily available Eagle Brand)
• Salt – 1tsp
• Sugar- 2 tbps
• Olive Oil- 3 tbps
• 1 tbsp milk for basting the buns before baking
For the garlic filling
• Salted Butter- 50grams
• Garlic- 6-7 finely chopped
• Parsley and Thyme – 3 tbps (chopped)
• 3/4 tsp chilli flakes


Method:

• Mix abt 2 tbsp of warm water (from the one cup mentioned), sugar and yeast together and leave aside for 5 minutes till it looks a little frothy. Thats when the yeast has been activated and is ready to use
• Mix the above starter with dough and knead lightly till everything comes together as a dough. No need to over knead it.
• Add oil to it and knead for another 5 minutes till it starts springing back
• Keep the dough for resting covered by cling film for about 30-45 mins till it almost doubles depending on the weather. (My dough doubled in just 20 mintues.)

• While the dough is proofing u can make the garlic spread ready by mixing all the ingredients together at room temperature.
• After its doubled in size, knock down to remove the air and roll in to a half an inch thickness sheet. Use dry flour to prevent it from sticking
• Apply the garlic filling/spread evenly on the dough and roll the dough from one end to another.
• Using a knife or a thread cut it into 8-10 rolls of equal size (I used a combination of thread and pizza cutter for the cutting) and got 14 rolls or so
• Line them in a greased loaf pan, spread the left over garlic spread on top and sprinkle the sesame seeds on top.

• leave it for proofing again for 30 mins or so
• Apply egg wash (optional) (I used a milk wash)and bake it in a preheated oven at 180C for about 20-25 mins
(If you are using a milk wash, top the baked rolls with some butter for a soft crust, empty over a wire rack after 5 minutes of cooling in the pan else the rolls get stuck)
• Pull them apart and eat fresh and warm.

Update on 25/Nov/2014 I made these rolls again with stone ground coarse organic wheat flour in the same proportion mentioned instead of store brought one. The difference to the texture of the bread is to be seen to be believed. Its definitely worth the effort to buy grains and mill your flour. The filling this time had the coriander-mint chutney, grated carrot, dried basil. I was a little sceptical of how the combination of mint-bail-coriander-garlic and carrot would work - but they really pair well. Try out this variation too, but make sure that the chutney is on the drier side...

Healthy Multigrain Rolls

I have been following a blog of Monika Manchanda regularly and found the recipes very interesting. Found a recipe for baked
Baked Spinach Balls – High Protein Delight and decided to adapt and use it for lunch the next day.


I used oats flakes and peanuts and mashed potato instead... and used chat masala for flavouring... and got inspired to make it into a roll - lettuce acts as a barrier and doesnt let the roti get soggy. cheese is for the kids - used ketchup for them and a tabasco-tomato chutney filling for S and me..i doubled the recipe and that yielded 7 such cylindrical cutlets..

Here's my version

Multigrain Rolls - Baked Oats-Potato-Peanut Rolls
For the Roti
• 2 cups of Multigrain flour
• ½ tsp salt
• Water as required
• Oil for coating the dough

For the Baked Rolls
• 2 cups of finely chopped Spinach
• 1/2 cup of oats flakes
• 1/2 cup of peanuts (roasted and crushed)
• 1 tbsp grated cheese
• 1/2 cup of boiled and grated potato
• 2 tsps Chat Masala
• Salt as desired
• 2 tsps of oil

To Assemble
Melted butter, lettuce leaves, ketchup or tomato chutney-Tabasco in a 50:50 ratio

Method
Make a soft and elastic dough – remember softer your dough is, the phulkas will be that much softer. Coat with a thin film of oil. Let it rest for 30 minutes. Roll it out into pulkas, lightly roast on the tava till small brown spots appear. Take off the tava and wrap it up in a soft cotton cloth. Keep it loosely covered in a box.

For the Baked rolls
• Dry roast the oats flakes, grind to a coarse powder after it cools.
• Combine all the ingredients together and roll into rolls. Add corn flour if binding is required. The above mixture gives about 6-7 rolls.
• Bush with olive oil
• Grease the baking tray and place them on it.
• Bake in a pre heated oven at 185 C for about 10 mins or so. The rolls will have a nicely browned crust.
To assemble
• Spread some melted butter/ghee on the phulka and place half a lettuce leaf on it. Place it such that it covers the length of the phulka but only quarter of the width. lettuce acts as a barrier and doesn’t let the roti get soggy
• Smear the ketchup or chutney on the lettuce leaf.
• Place one roll on the phulka and wrap it up tightly.
• If these rolls are being sent in a lunch box, wrap in a foil too.

Latest in the baking marathon - Veggie calzone

Vegetarian Calzone

For the covering
250 gms APF
7.5 gms Fresh Yeast (or 3.75 gms Active yeast)
10 gms sugar
5 gms salt
10 gms butter
150-180 ml water
Italian seasoning and chilli flakes depending on your taste

For the filling
1 tbsp oil
Bell pepper, mushroom, onion (sliced/ cut finely) – abt 1 – 1.5 each
Sundried tomatoes – abt ¼ cup
Grated Mozzarella cheese – 75-100 gms
Chilli flakes – according to taste (I didn’t use any)

Method:
For the filling
Sauté onion, peppers and mushroom in abt 1 tbsp of oil till crisp and cooked. Add sun dried tomatoes and salt to taste. Remember there will be cheese too, so adjust salt accordingly. I did not add any extra flavouring as the herbs in the sundried tomatoes were very strong. You can use normal tomatoes (discard the seeds and the water parts) and add fresh herbs (basil/thyme/rosemary or a mix of all) and garlic. The filling should be well cooked and dry. Let it cool.

Keep the grated cheese handy along with the filling – do not mix them. You can use grated paneer instead of cheese – and mix it in the last state of preparation of the filling too.

For the covering
Measure out 150 ml of water. Then in a bowl add sugar and yeast and add enough water from the measured water to submerge the yeast. I used fresh yeast. Sieve the flour once and then add the seasoning and salt. Mix. Make a well and pour the yeast mixture into it. Mix well and add water and knead till you get a dough that is like that of Poori dough in consistency. Add abt 20 ml more water and knead. Add the butter (u can melt it after measuring it) and ensure that it is incorporated well. Keep kneading for 15-20 minutes, keep adding water as required. When the dough passes the Window Pane test, you can keep it for the first proofing. Let it rise for abt 15 minutes (it becomes puffy but doesn’t double). The puffy state is important – timing can vary depending on the climatic conditions.

Preheat your oven to 185 Celsius degrees. The test being that the temp for calzone is abt 15 degrees Celsius lesser than that what you bake a pizza in. So reduce accordingly.

Knock down the air and you can divide the dough into 8 portions. Roll out each portion into a small roti, brush with some melted butter, place filling in the centre, and add some cheese and some chilli flakes. Wet the edges with water and close the puri to form a crescent. Use a fork to seal the edges by pressing on the edge. Keep aside in a greased tray (that you will use for baking) for proofing for 15-20 minutes. Brush the tops with oil and put into the oven for baking. It takes about 10 minutes or so. If you want the crust more browned then increase the temperature to 200 degrees Celsius and bake for abt 2-3 minutes more.


Cool on a wire rack and brush the tops with more oil/butter. Serve with Ketchup.

Weekends? What are those???

I had just run to the local supermarket late evening on a Sunday. Normally, I never shop on a weekend evening close to the beginning of the month. After all, who wants to bump into your neighbours discussing the merits of buying daliya over Oats for breakfast or meet a your kid’s friend’s mother well ahead of you on the checkout counter… But this time I had to get my daughter’s preferred Horlicks flavour or risk a mutiny in the morning before they leave for school on a Manic Monday.

As my luck always, I was in the last in the long line of the checkout counter and there was no express counter that was working. And much like Murphy’s law, the other two checkout counters were definetly moving faster than mine.

That gave me time to reflect over what I had done on a supposedly Lazy Sunday. Well for a start I woke up a whole two hours after my normal weekday wake up time and then rushed to get a heavy brunch ready, got lots of stuff done in the kitchen as pre-preparation for the week, gave my daughters a quick oil bath and ran to get my vehicle serviced. Came back home, helped my daughter prepare for her Maths exams, ran out with her to her library and then stopped by to return the DVD of this neat Tamil movie (more about that later) and then stopped by in the supermarket before heading home. Whew…..

Well, my turn was still long time away so I was thinking back on how things were when I was probably 9 years old. Well those days all of us (Dad and us) had work and school 6 days a week. There was no concept of a weekday. Sundays meant lazing around, eating elaborate lunches and then seeing some lovely programs on the TV. I think we had Star Trek in the mornings and then we had time to go visiting in the evenings. We had no car back in early eighties so we used to walk to the nearest bus depot a good 15-20 minutes walk from our place, take a 30-40 minute bus ride, visit and come back home well in time and be fresh for the next day. The way life was those days was definitely more relaxed and easier on everyone. I don’t remember my mom fretting over her shopping not done on a Sunday, and to think they used to go to different wholesale markets to buy things right from veggies to masalas!

Not so these days, we rarely go beyond a 10-12 km radius over a school weekend. Anything else is postponed for three day weekend or vacation time. Weekends are no more for relaxing. Weekends are for supermarket errands, bank work and all miscellaneous items that we never get time to get done on weekdays. Saturdays is probably when we have a little more fun; kids go for their weekend activity classes or we get some shopping done or probably catch a movie. But these 48 hours just fly past our eyes.

So here comes another week and starts the mad run again….Have a great week folks…

Sunita's Nook

Sunita's Nook

Summer vacation fun
Another week to go and then starts my overtime. Yes my daughters start their summer vacation. All these years, I never sent them to any summer camps – I used to think that I could do a better job of keeping them entertained at home – when I have done it for 9 and half years I can do for 60 days no big deal. But this year I am having second thoughts…

Well there is no major paradigm shift in my thinking so to say, but then the options available are so interesting that it makes more sense to send them and get them to have a whole new experience.

For my older one, there are options ranging from a Theatre/Drama course to a Science-experiment based one. Of course we have ‘I do everything’ kind of camps where u can pick a couple of indoor, couple of outdoor activities and have peace for 4-5 hours every weekday.  My younger one who is almost 6 can take a pick from craft classes, art classes, cooking  dance and music and the like. No heavy duty learning stuff for her. Some places even offer a once a week field trip to a farm, planetarium and the like. Then there is the usual swimming and tennis reserved for noons and evenings. They love to read, I am sure there will be couple of visits to the library over the week. So I think that if they doesn’t get tired by the end of it, they can look at me for inspiration and flop down on the sofa to look at her eyelids….Notice how my husband is missing from the action in all this. Vacations may come or go but his office ensures that they schedule some important project release close to the holidays and make a mess out of any longish vacation plans.

I have never attended a summer camp all my life and don’t think I have done badly for myself. I remember two months long holidays in my granddad’s place where we cousins used to get together and laze around in the mornings, followed by a relaxed breakfast and lunch and follow it up with long Monopoly/carom sessions and end the day with long walks to the beach and get a Aavin cone /Ambika puff as a treat at the end of it all. I remember the many stories my granddad used to conjure up for us. I learnt to play a game of ‘Chozi’, make a cup with the jackfruit tree leaf and maybe a little bit of gardening too from him. But those days are all gone. When we were in high school, during the summer vacations, my dad took us for 10-15 days to show us places around India. We never went just to Shimla, we took time to explore Chandigarh, the Kumaon range, check out Bhimtal and other such way off places along the way. It helped that he worked for a PSU so he had sufficient leave for a long holiday. Those memories stay a lot longer than a 3 day 2 night package in a lush resort that we tend to favour these days.

These days, parents cannot be away from their home base for that long. Kids also get bored and miss their friends back home. And there are only so many stories /games the poor grandparents can think of. And add to that the blessed IPL matches during the summer holidays and you can ensure that come evening and no one wants to step out of their homes – so there is no scope for any socializing in the evenings…. Lalit Modi I hate you for this….


So that is pretty much my summer plan for this year – get the kids off to a camp, get them to do a sport in the afternoon / early evening and then send them out to play later and I can see days zooming past.

So will my daughters like it? Well ask me that on June 1st :) Happy holidays to all the kiddos and their moms…

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Samyukta and Shreya posing for a sanp in Chennai. This was on 21-Oct-06. The day of Diwali

Shreya and Apppa posing for a snap together. Shreya is busy looking at appa's face rather than at the camera.















Shreya is sampling Diwali sweets from Srini. Shreya is where the goodies are!!













Sammy is looking at the sweets and decided to do without it..
 

Saw this on cyberspace and found it quite funny. Thought it might bring a smile to your face too
To those of us who have children in our lives,whether they are our own,
grandchildren, nieces, nephews, or students...Here is something to make you chuckle.

Whenever your children are out of control, you can take comfort from the thought that
even God's omnipotence did not extend to His own children.

After creating heaven and earth, God created Adam and Eve. And the first thing he said was
"DON'T!"

"Don't what?"  Adam replied.

"Don't eat the forbidden fruit." God said.

"Forbidden fruit? We have forbidden fruit? Hey Eve, we have forbidden fruit !"

"No Way !"

"Yes way !"

"Do NOT eat the fruit!" said God.

"Why ?"

"Because I am your Father and I said so!"  God replied, wondering why
He hadn't stopped  creation after making the elephants.

A few minutes later, God saw His children having an apple break and He was ticked !

"Didn't I tell you not to eat the fruit?" God asked.

"Uh huh," Adam replied.

"Then why did you?"  said the Father.

"I don't know," said Eve.

"She started it!" Adam said.

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"DID NOT! "

Having had it with the two of them, God's punishment was that Adam and Eve
should have children of their own.

Thus the pattern was set and it has never changed.

BUT THERE IS REASSURANCE IN THE STORY!

If you have persistently and lovingly tried to give children wisdom and they
haven't taken it, don't be hard on yourself. If God had trouble raising children, what makes you
think it would be a piece of cake for you?

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT!

1. You spend the first two years of their life teaching them to walk and talk. Then you spend
the next sixteen telling them to sit down and shut up.

2. Grandchildren are God's reward for not killing your own children.

3. Mothers of teens now know why some animals eat their young.

4. Children seldom misquote you. In fact, they usually repeat word for word what you shouldn't have said.

5. The main purpose of holding children's parties is to remind yourself that there are children
more awful than your own.

6. We childproofed our homes, but they are still getting in.

ADVICE FOR THE DAY:

Be nice to your kids. They will choose your nursing home one day.

AND FINALLY:

IF YOU HAVE A LOT OF TENSION AND YOU GET A HEADACHE, DO WHAT IT SAYS
ON THE ASPIRIN BOTTLE: "TAKE TWO ASPIRIN" AND "KEEP AWAY FROM CHILDREN"!!!!!

Check out the snaps that we got when Shreya, Rhea, Tanya and Samyukta got together on Monday, 26th June. Here Shreya has just woken up from her nap and was quite surprised to see such a large gathering around her. She is busy observing Tanya. Rhea is lending a helping hand to Samyukta in stacking the egg-face together.