India celebrates Ram Navami, the auspicious festival signifying Lord Rama’s birth, with a variety of sattvic dishes offered to the deity as bhog. The dishes prepared without onion and garlic, hold spiritual significance. Many are simple recipes that coincide with the summer season. A Ram Navami speciality in South India is panakam, a summer cooler, believed to be Lord Rama’s favourite. Here’s how to make it.
Make Lord Rama’s Favourite Drink, Panakam, For Ram Navami
Traditionally, offerings to Lord Rama on Rama Navami are of sattvic nature. They are pure and nourishing food, devoid of ingredients like onion and garlic. The emphasis on the purity of offerings to Lord Rama coincides with Ayurvedic principles that help keep the mind and body balanced and disease-free. Ayurvedic cooking believes in the power of food to influence one’s mind apart from the body. Ram Navami bhog typical consists of sweets, fruits, savouring dishes and a cooling beverage. In many South Indian households, that cooling beverage is Panakam.
Prepared during the summer season, Panakam is a South Indian summer cooler made of jaggery and a few kitchen spices. It’s a simple, sweet and sour drink that’s made by dissolving jaggery in water and then combining it with a few spices, lemon juice, tulsi leaves and even a dash of edible camphor for that unique aroma that’s familiar to prasad. A perfect summer drink for those warm spring days when Ram Navami is celebrated.
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A Simple Recipe For This South Indian Summer Cooler
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Chef Sanjyot Kheer shared a recipe for Lord Rama’s favourite drink, Panakam as part of his news series— Incredible Drinks of India. Here’s his recipe.
Ingredients
- Jaggery
- Black peppercorn
- Cardamom pods
- Water
- Edible camphor
- Dried ginger powder
- Lemon juice
Method
- First, chop the jaggery into small pieces.
- Using a mortar and pestle, crush the black peppercorn, cardamom pods
- In a large bowl, mix the crushed spices, jaggery pieces with water, and mix well.
- Let the jaggery get infused in the water.
- Strain this water
- Then, add a small amount of crushed edible camphor into this water.
- Add dried ginger powder, lemon juice and tulsi leaves. Mix it and enjoy your Panakam chilled.
Also Read: Have You Been To Karnataka’s Chandramouleshwara Temple, Known For Its Uncommon Architecture?
Will you celebrate Ram Navami South Indian style with a glass of Panakam? We surely are!
Cover Image Courtesy: Canva Pro and Wikimedia Commons
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