15 Marbles

Moments.Musings.Memories. ❤️Gathering little marbles from ordinary days and keeping them for our memory jar. ❤️

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  • Sarees, Selfies and Pajamas

    I haven’t written much lately. Work has been hectic, my energy levels low and time limited.

    And I am doing my favourite Navratri colour challenge with my favourite bunch of blogger girls!

    It’s our annual tradition, one we’ve kept going for so many years.

    9 days, 9 colours , 12 girls, 3 continents and a world of beautiful outfits!

    For these 9 days, our thoughts and group chat are consumed by the colours, the details of each outfit and all the thought that goes into putting it together.

    It really is our thing! 💛

    Navratri is my favourite festival and this little colour challenge brings me so much joy!

    So every evening after work, I come home, get dressed in the colour of the day, look pretty, get the family to take photos and share them with the girls (and Instagram).

    It satisfies my creative appetite, boosts my self-esteem and gives me a bunch of pretty pics to choose my next profile pic from.

    Win-win, yeah? 😂

    And of course, once the photos are taken, I revert to my pyjama-clad version!

    Why am I sharing this?

    No reason, really.

    Perhaps just to remind myself that it’s okay to not show up everywhere. That sometimes, conflicting priorities take over and it’s okay to not do everything.

    But also, to tell you, dear readers (yes, all 5 of you 😬), that I am all about keeping things real.

    So after I share my pretty saree pics and enjoy my moments of glory, I change right back into my soft, well-worn T-shirt and PJs.

  • My Signature Saffron Granola

    [In a hurry?] Jump straight to the Recipe

    💕You can always come back for the story 💕

    Last Diwali, I was looking for a homemade treat to add to my gift hampers.

    Life was particularly chaotic at the time and, apparently, my response to being overwhelmed is to become wildly overambitious and give myself another project. 🙄

    Because obviously what a person with too much to do needs… is more to do. 🙄🙄

    I didn’t have the physical or mental capacity to make traditional Diwali sweets, and most store-bought sweets tend to get passed around and regifted anyway.

    Besides, almost everyone I knew seemed to be trying to eat a little healthier.

    So I thought — granola!

    Homemade, easy to package, something people could actually use for breakfast, and considerably less ambitious than making boxes of mithai.

    But it was Diwali.

    Plain granola wasn’t going to do.

    And to me, nothing says celebration quite like saffron.

    So into the granola it went.

    And there you have it — my Saffron Granola. ❤️

    Recipe

    The Base

    • 2 cups rolled oats
    • 1 cup mixed nuts — almonds, walnuts, cashews and pistachios
    • ½ cup mixed seeds, including sesame seeds
    • ¼ cup chia seeds
    • ¼ cup coconut flakes
    The flavours
    • 15–20 saffron strands
    • A sprinkle of nutmeg
    • A sprinkle of rock salt
    The Wet Ingredients
    • ½ cup coconut oil
    • ¼ cup maple syrup
    After Baking
    • Raisins
    • Cranberries
    • Chocolate chips — however much your heart tells you ❤️
    Method

    Preheat the oven to 160°C fan-forced.

    Combine the oats, nuts, seeds, chia seeds, saffron, nutmeg and rock salt.

    Add the coconut oil and maple syrup and mix well until everything is evenly coated.

    Spread the mixture over a lined baking tray and bake for 30-40 minutes, stirring around halfway through( depending on how toasty you like your granola) – I bake for around 40 minutes.

    If you’re using untoasted coconut flakes, add them for the final 5 minutes so they don’t burn.

    Allow the granola to cool completely before adding the raisins and cranberries.

    And only once it is completely cool, add the chocolate chips — however much your heart told you to use.❤️

    This one is perfect for gifting — or just for everyday breakfast. ❤️

    I love it over yoghurt and fruit, but the slight sweetness of maple syrup and the crunch of baked nuts and oats also make it the perfect 3pm pick-me-up with a cup of coffee.

    Bonus: That delicious saffron-and-toasted-nuts aroma floating through your kitchen and home 🤌🏻😍🤤

  • What we are eating this week

    Here’s this week’s meal plan: pretty simple, pretty basic — and more importantly, what they requested! 😃

    The husband loves his desi food, so there’s always the staple daal-rice or a sneaky curry ordered from one of our local tiffin places (NOT Uber Eats!!!).

    Also all the cooking happens in the evening after work, so quick and healthy is the end-goal.

    Just aiming for happy faces, one meal at a time.

    P.S. Meal plan by me. Pretty graphic courtesy of ChatGPT because mine definitely did not look like this. 

    P.P.S. What’s on your menu this week? Do you meal plan for the week, or take it day by day?

  • Food Blogger I Am Not… Food Hacker, Maybe!

    I love cooking. And M.O.S.T. things I cook turn out delicious.

    There. I said it. 🙃

    When I first started blogging, I shared recipes too. Part of the reason was that I wanted to record my mum’s recipes and make them last forever.

    There was just one problem.

    I am an intuitive cook.

    Measuring ingredients is tedious. Watching the clock is tedious. Stopping midway through cooking to remember exactly how much of something I just threw into the pot? Very tedious.

    A dash of this. A splash of that. Taste. Add something else. Taste again.

    That’s how I cook.

    And that is why I share so few recipes. When I have to measure and document everything, it takes me twice as long to cook and somehow makes the whole thing less fun.

    For me, at least!

    I’m looking for a solution. Maybe talk-to-text while I cook?

    “Adding a dash of this… splash of that… no idea how much that was…” 😂

    Watch this space.

    Ms A helped me make modaks over the weekend and I showed her one of the little hacks I generally use.

    She told me that one day some millennial mum will probably share the same hack for making perfect modak petals one day and she’ll stumble across it.

    I told her, “Remember, you saw it here first!”

    Here being our kitchen. 😃

    But I digress. As always.

    Food blogger I am not.

    Food hacker? I am. Or at least I try to be.

    In my quest to become an awesome cook like my mum, in my motivation to cook my family’s favourite things, and in my desire to feed them healthy, home-cooked meals, I’ve found my own way of cooking.

    It needs to be quick. Nutritious. Low effort enough to account for my time and energy levels.

    And preferably delicious.

    And when they go back for seconds, or I hear the spoon scraping the bottom of the pot, or someone tells me, “It’s perfect” – even when, in my head, it isn’t quite perfect…

    That makes it all worthwhile.