Strawberry Rose Lassi

At the recommendation of my vegetarian sister, I have recently started to consult an Indian Ayurvedic doctor for recommendations and remedies to achieve overall general well being. I have always been interested in approaches to attain better health albeit I am not ready to give up meat yet. Since my younger days, I had been exposed to anti oxidants like pine bark extract and evening primrose oil. I confess I used to be somewhat of a supplement junkie but have toned down tremendously over the years. My first introduction to Ayurvedic treatments took place when these weren't even in fashion.  I remember my first experience in doing the Shirodhara treatment almost 20 years ago. They were dripping warm sesame oil on my temple - it was as can be imagined, a greasy, gooey experience - you end up with a whole head of oily hair - but interestingly, the process must have stimulated the right glands somewhere, for my face took on a healthy glow for days after that.

This time, I went into consultation primarily to see if there is anything that can be done to improve my health in a natural manner- I know this is madness - it makes me look like a hypochondriac or a modern day Emperor Qin trying to seek some elixir to longevity or something. Anyway, I do have digestive problem. After taking my pulse, the doctor explained that I have wind problem (which is very true) , categorising my body type as a Vata-Pita combination. (VATA - wind, Pita- fire) I was asked to take some Ayurvedic herbal powder every evening after meals (tastes awful) and was asked to boil water with coriander seed, cumin and caraway seed to drink everyday.... I haven't boiled the seeds in water yet but have been taking the yukky powder every evening. So far, it has been helping in my digestion and I am envisioning myself moving to the realm of higher well being... Oohmmm...

Anyway, instead of boiling water with the spices, I thought I would try to incoporate them into a more palatable drink. Lassi, as most would know is actually a yogurt based drink made with fruits and a variety of spices. I still have some Strawberries left over from my Lollies experiment so I decided to use that for my lassi preparation.  For a little elegance, I added a few drops of Rose Water.

I drank most of it but still managed to pour some of the left over lassi into my lollie molds to make lollies for my neighbour's little girl. For the lollies, I had added additional sugar and honey to sweeten it. The feedback for my previous batch of lollies was that they were not sweet enough for the children. (it was sugar free and 100% fruits) In fact, for this batch, I had to add quite a bit of sugar to sweeten the lollies - I was quite disturbed - it goes to show how much processed sugar the kids are putting into their system nowadays.

Recipe :

400g              Strawberries
300g              Natural unflavoured yogurt
25g                Soft brown sugar
300g              Ice water
A few drops   Rose Water
Dash              Mixed spices (I ground a mixture of coriander, cumin and caraway seeds, you can just add
                      freshly ground pepper if you want this to be easy)

Method:

1. Hull strawberries and cut them up coarsely. Blend this with 150g ice water until smooth.
2. Add yogurt, sugar, Rose water and rest of water to blend until smooth.
3. Pour into chilled glasses and add ground spices.