Rama Navami is a traditional Hindu Festival to celebrate the birth of Lord Shri Rama. Lord Rama is the sixth reincarnation of Lord Vishnu himself and in Tamil Nadu temples we celebrate “Shri Rama Navami Utsavam” for nine days. It is firmly believed that mere chanting of His name ‘Rama’ burns ignorance, passion and sin. With or without knowledge, correctly or incorrectly, when the word “Rama” is pronounced it showers a rain of good upon the devotees. My mom usually reads Samkshepa Ramayan and she performs a simple pooja by reciting Shri Rama Ashtothram and then finish the pooja with Arti,Nevedhyams.
As I always say, for each and every celebration we have specific foods to offer to God as Prashad. There might be some scientific or logical reasons behind it.Say for example, RamaNavami falls in tamil month ‘Chithirai'[Mid April] which is supposed to be the hottest month in a year.
The nevedhyams that we offer to Lord Rama are Pankam(jaggery water with Lemon Juice), Neer Mor (spiced butter milk) and Kosumalli (Raw Moongdal salad with cucumber).In this hot month of April, these RamaNavami nevedhyams will help to cool our body and protect us from unnecessary health issues.
Dear readers, Happy Shri Rama Navami!
Add few tulasi/tulsi leaves in each of the nevedhyam before offering to God. It is considered auspicious.
Ingredients
Steps
- Dissolve jaggery in water
- Filter the jaggery water to ensure that the impurities are removed
- Add in dry ginger powder and fresh lemon juice
- Mix everything well and atlast add the cardamoms
- It tastes better when it is chilled. You can refrigerate for sometime and then serve or can directly serve it
Ingredients
Steps
- Spiced Buttermilk/Neer Moru is prepared by first beating the thick yogurt and adding enough water to it. Neer in tamil means water. So the consistency of this buttermilk should be watery and not thick.All you need is just 5 minutes to prepare the drink. You can even add chaat masala if you are serving it during parties or gettogether. Since I prepared as a Nevedhyam for Rama Navami, I didn’t add any chaat masala.
- Beat yogurt using a whisk or “mathu” in tamil (traditional wooden spoon used for beating yogurt)
- Add 1 cup of water and pinch of salt
- Now add curry leaves, chopped ginger,green chillies and mix everything together
Ingredients
For Tadka :
Steps
- Soak Moongdal for atleast 2 hours
- Drain water completely
- Take a wide bowl and mix all the other ingredients together
- Heat oil in a tadka pan.Add mustard seeds,hing,urad dal and curry leaves
- Let them splutter
- Give it a mix and garnish with coriander leaves
