Lemonade Concentrate

Penne in Tomato Basil Sauce

I love pasta but I don't like pasta in red sauce (tomato sauce). Invariably, I always, always, had pasta in white sauce with extra cheese. Then one day boom, I turned Vegan, cheese loving me turned vegan and thus I stopped eating Pizzas and Pastas all together. I couldn't imagine having pasta without cheese until recently. 

Kochi Bloggers on a Wine Trail

Wine is the most natural alcoholic beverage made from the fermentation of freshly picked wine grapes. Yes, you heard me right, made only from grapes, the rest of the fermented fruit beverages (Gooseberry, Orange etc) that are made at home are not technically wine. This and much more information was provided to us about wines, during the Wine Trail lead by Amit Chavan, Sommelier at United Breweries exclusively for the bloggers in Kochi.

It was the first ever blogger meet that happened in Kochi and all of us were equally excited to meet each other. We all sat around tables, as Amit went ahead and explained about wines. There are different types and styles of wines, Still/Sparkling/Fortified, Red/ Rose/ White, Dry/Medium and Sweet. Classifications of wines based on the kind of grapes used are called varietal wines. Chenin Blanc and Shiraz are varietal wines made of the single grape variety Chenin Blanc and Shiraz. The reason the wines are region specific is due to the Terroir (geography, geology and climate) of the place. The wines growing in a particular climate will have specific taste and thus will produce the wine that tastes different from the same variety of grape grown in a different region. Most old world (France, Italy, Germany and Spain) wines are labelled with terroir and hence the region is fixed. The New world (Australia, India, New Zealand) wines are mostly based on the grape variety. 

Mathanga Payar Erisseri/ Pumpkin and Beans in Coconut Based Gravy

This break in blogging was not at all expected, it just went on due to technical difficulties which I faced been away from home without a laptop. Finally when I got back, I lost all my pictures which I had taken along with me in a flash drive but nothing to worry, there is a back up on my friends laptop. I can't expect her to send it online to me, as there is a lot of sorting out to do. Those posts will have to wait till I meet her again.

Cardamom Flavoured Almond Cookies