Kurma

I'm back at the Hare Krishna Temple in Albert Park, otherwise known as Melbourne Mahaprabhu Mandir, my favourite place to celebrate Sri Krishna Janmastami (the Birthday of Lord Krishna) which falls tomorrow. I flew in this afternoon, and it's already a hive of devotional activity.

You can't see them all, but there's a number of tents on the roadside out the front. They are just for guests shoe storage. Inside there are many other tents for meal distribution, a dosa-making tent, and many more.

These ladies are preparing a South Indian selection for offering to Krishna tomorrow on one his innumerable feast plates. There's toor dal pakora, dosa mix and a number of chutneys in the photo above.

A devotee cook assists his mother in grinding toor dal.

We're expecting 10,000 guests tomorrow, so there's a lot of cooking, vegetable chopping and flower garland making in the huge tents erected on the property. These gentlemen are commencing the cut up for 750kg potatoes.

A fresh dania patta cutting marathon! (none other than fresh coriander leaves). There's many boxes of fresh coriander to go.

Sweets cook extraordinaire Brajabasi has made a huge batch of fresh panir cheese to be brayed and rolled into balls, before simmering in sugar syrup to make the famous rasagulla.

This gentleman is preparing some dal for tonight's evening meal. 500 guests are expected. I'll keep you posted with more photos when they come to hand. This roving reporter is signing out for now...

Strawberries are cheap and plentiful here in Sydney at the moment. Here's a nice strawberry dessert.

Strawberry Cream Shortcake

This cake is actually somewhere between a shortcake and a sponge. It’s enriched with ground walnuts or hazelnuts topped with strawberry jam, piled with rich vanilla-flavoured cream and studded with vine-ripened strawberries. Irresistible!

PREPARATION AND BAKING TIME: about 45 minutes
CAKE COOKING TIME: at least 30 minutes
YIELD: enough for 6–8 persons

The cake:
1 1/4 cups self-raising plain flour
pinch salt
4 tablespoons butter, about 60g
3 tablespoons sugar
1⁄3 cup ground walnuts, or ground toasted hazelnuts
about 1⁄3 cup buttermilk

The cream topping:
300ml double cream
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk powder
a little cold milk if required to thin the cream

The remaining topping ingredients:
3–4 tablespoons strawberry jam
250g ripe, sweet strawberries, whole or cut in half lengthwise

Pre-heat the oven to 200˚C/390˚F.

Mix together the flour and salt in a large bowl. Rub in the butter until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs, then stir in the sugar and ground nuts.

Pour in three-quarters of the buttermilk and gather the mixture into a soft manageable dough. If too dry, add some more buttermilk.

Press the cake mixture into a buttered 20cm (8-inch) fluted cake tin with removable base, taking care to evenly work the mixture up the sides of the tin. Place the cake in the oven and bake for 25 minutes, or until pale golden brown all over. Remove from the oven and allow it to cool. Carefully remove the cake from its tin.

Combine the cream, sugar, vanilla and powdered milk in a mixing bowl and beat it until the cream stands in soft peaks. If you plan to pipe the cream through a pastry bag, beat it until it stands in stiff peaks. If the cream is too thick to start with, add a little cold milk and then whip it.

Spread the strawberry jam over the surface of the cake, pipe or spread the cream, then top with the strawberries. Cut into wedges and serve.

Did you know that there is a search facility on this blog?

Scroll to the top of the page. Cast your eyes to the right. See that little box, and the word search? Just type in a subject, like 'cake' for instance, and hit the search button, and see what pops up. Happy searching!

"We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light." - Plato

"The Vedic literatures describe this material world as darkness. Actually it is dark, and therefore we require sunlight, moonlight and electricity. If it were not by nature dark, why would we require so many arrangements for artificial light? The Vedas enjoin that we should not remain in darkness: tamasi ma jyotir gama. We are instructed to go to the light, and that light is the spiritual world".

"Temporal blessings pass like a dream, beauty fades like a flower, the longest life disappears like a flash. Our existence may be likened to the bubble that forms on the surface of water."
- Niti Shastras (Moral Stanzas)

"This life is tottering like a drop of water on a lotus petal.
- Govinda Dasa Kaviraja", from 'Bhajahu Re Mana'

"For this reason the enlightened person should endeavor only for the minimum necessities of life while in the world of names. He should be intelligently fixed and never endeavor for unwanted things, being competent to perceive practically that all such endeavors are merely hard labour for nothing."
- Srimad Bhagavatam, 2.2.3., A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada