organic urak

[clea cc]

Organic urak available, no endosulphan sprayed on fruit and all containers stainless steel or glass, no plastic or rusty tin drums used!!!

Price to be determined, will be only a bit higher than market rate

Any takers?

--
my best wishes
Clea

[Miguel Braganza]

Dear Clea,

Grrrrreeeeaaaat!

Can you write to me privately the total quantity of ORGANIC URRAC [no insecticides, no fungicides, no chemical fertilizers for the plants or the fermentation, no Navsagar and no battery power for the kick], you are likely to have by 25 April, 2011?

Information on whether it is traditional lavni or "copper coil in water bath" condensation, whether uniquely bottled and labelled and the actual price F.O.R. at Mapusa would be helpful. I am a part of a group that hopes to revive and present the KONKAN FRUIT FEST started by the Botanical Society of Goa in 2003. The decision will be reached tomorrow by lunchtime. The BSG is having its AGM at Dhempe College, Miramar at 10.30 A.M.

If all goes well, you could set up a stall and sell the urrac and promote permaculture, composting ,etc on your own terms. Otherwise, we could find other ways to promote the health Goan spirit of summer, Urrac, naturally!! 

The National Steering Committee of the Organic Farming Association of India [OFAI www.ofai.org] is meeting in Goa on 28 April, 2011. The Participatory Guarantee Systems Organic Council [PGSOC www.pgsorganic.in]. 

We are looking for greater convergence.

Together Everyone Achieves More. That's the T.E.A.M. spirit that has been winning.

Warm regards,

Miguel

--
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.
Miguel Braganza, S-1 Gracinda Apts,
Rajvaddo, Mapusa 403507 Goa
Ph +91-9822982676;91-832-2255913
www.ofai.org www.pgsorganic.in
Horticulture.Facilitation.Networking
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

[farida dias]

Dear Cleo:

Amazing and Congratulations! I am definitely interested.
Count me in
Farida D Dias
9822686297

On Sat, Mar 26, 2011 at 2:36 PM, clea cc <cleach...@gmail.com> wrote:

--

[Sunita Rao]

Hi Clea,

I am visiting Goa possibly in May or June and would be most grateful if you kept a bottle or two  for me. I would like to use it to make sannas (rice idlies fermented traditionally using toddy....so I am assuming urak can also be used the same way). I have never seen or drunk the stuff before.

I would also like to add that its such a pleasure to have something like urak spoken about with so much love, gusto and pride on the gardeners' group. Where I am, we are having such a battle with misuse of liquor by husbands of gardeners and where the only traditional liquor is what you get bootlegging, and theres such a social discomfort and stigma associated with alcohol  that one does not dare to speak of anything closely related to it!

Cheers,
Sunita

On Sat, Mar 26, 2011 at 2:36 PM, clea cc <cleach...@gmail.com> wrote:

--
Sunita Rao
Adjunct  Fellow, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bangalore, India (www.atree.org)

Member, Kalpavriksh, Pune, India (www.kalpavriksh.org)

Founder Trustee, VANASTREE, Sirsi, India (www.vanastree.org)

[clea cc]

Sunita,
Great! will keep 2 bottles for you!

[Tallulah D'Silva]

Clea,

One bottle for the D’Silvas please.

Regards,

Tallulah

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tallulah D'Silva

architecture R/T

4T4, Dukle Residency, Tambdi Mati, St. Inez, Panaji - Goa 403001

ph: 0832-2420198, 9823362217

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Arati Fernandes]

 clea

am sure victor will be most interested....................!! and my fil too.

will forward to him.

let us know when it is ready.

ara

---

From: clea cc <cleach...@gmail.com>
To: goagar...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sat, March 26, 2011 2:36:50 PM
Subject: organic urak

[Miguel Braganza]

Dear Sunita,

Urrack is a DISTILLATE of fermented cashew juice. It contains alcohol without the yeasts that produce it ...so it is no use to make sannas but great to drink with a dash of lime and sugar syrup ...and  sanna-sorpatel. The closest equivalent is Arrak, NOT toddy.

Cashew apples have medicinal properties when consumed fresh, as juice or neero [clear as the Kannada word 'neeru'], fermented as wine or distilled as urrak or feni that now has a registered Geographical Indication that says "FENI is ONLY from GOA". The Botanical Society of Goa will be promoting all these products of the Cashew Apple ...which is not the 'Forbidden Fruit' in God's Own Abode that has a simple acronym .... GOA! Come to Goa on the last weekend of April and enjoy the feast day of the foster father of Jesus, St. Joseph the patron saint of all workers. We call it the KONKAN FRUIT FEST because the borders of the former Portuguese colony of Goa, should not separate us from our roots in the whole of the Konkan region.

The other abbreviation/acronym to remember is ATM ...for Ati Tithe Maathi, the Marathi expression that means Excess is disastrous! Alcohol consumption in excess is almost  as bad for health as religious fanaticism or communalism that are the major afflictions also of the poor and the frustrated elements of society that seek some escape from the drudgery of life. MODERATION is the key ...though not of the 'Goanet' kind. Alcohol should also not be served to children and those below 18 years of age, as is often done illegally at feasts, Kermess/Queramesse and zatras in the name of socially acceptable entertainment.

Warm regards,

Miguel

On Mon, Mar 28, 2011 at 5:58 PM, Sunita Rao <sunit...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Clea,

I would like to use it to make sannas (rice idlies fermented traditionally using toddy....so I am assuming urak can also be used the same way). I have never seen or drunk the stuff before.

I would also like to add that its such a pleasure to have something like urak spoken about with so much love, gusto and pride on the gardeners' group. Where I am, we are having such a battle with misuse of liquor by husbands of gardeners and where the only traditional liquor is what you get bootlegging, and theres such a social discomfort and stigma associated with alcohol  that one does not dare to speak of anything closely related to it!

Cheers,
Sunita

On Sat, Mar 26, 2011 at 2:36 PM, clea cc <cleach...@gmail.com> wrote:

Organic urak available, no endosulphan sprayed on fruit and all containers stainless steel or glass, no plastic or rusty tin drums used!!!

Price to be determined, will be only a bit higher than market rate

Any takers?

--
my best wishes
Clea

Oh! Cashew Wine!

 

The summer is heating up the State of Goa as much as the growing debate on the proper  “medium” of instruction. Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain wrote, “I never let my schooling interfere with my education.” Neither did I, nor have my three children allowed the Konkani in Devanagri “primary” schooling in ABE schools interfere even with their choice of languages. They do not know what a ‘kaju fok’ is but they are nuts about cashews! Since the advent of the RFRS-Vengurla, Sanjeev Mayekar from Bicholim and Lumina Lobo from Siolim, my children, Martha and I know of, and enjoy, cashew squash and cashew wine in addition to the bibbo, mutto, neero and the cashewnuts specially the organic, salted, drum-roasted types.

Frank Sinatra sang about his “Summer wine” because he knew nothing of urrak-n-lime or cashew wine. Wine is one of the most delicious products we can enjoy in the processing of cashew ‘fruits’ or ‘apples’. You can truly get pleasure of cashew and other non-grape fruit wines only if you know Dr. John Carmo Rodrigues or Lumina Lobo’s phone number or learn how they are made. It is really not as difficult as you think! You can pick up a copy of my ‘Guru’ Edwin Saldanha’s book on “Successful Home made Goan Wines” from any bookstore, wait for Carmo’s book or just read on. Check out the ingredients and the step by step procedure for making wine from the cashew fruits.

The cashew tree Anacardium occidentale L., generally considered to be native to the Northern part of South America, is now found in many tropical areas. Brazil, India, Vietnam and Nigeria are the main producers. The fruit consists of mainly the nuts containing an embryo (kernel) and a false fruit commonly called cashew apple  and it is rated foremost of the native fruits in Nigeria. Goa is known for TPS certified ‘organic’ cashewnuts and now has the ‘Geographical Indications’ for cashew feni.

The apples undergo reverse osmosis [RO] like your water purification process to extract the juice but you do not need any equipment for it. Just a little sugar will do the trick. The juice will have to undergo the process of fermentation to produce the wine. The baker’s yeast will do the job for you. All you need to do is to ‘activate’ the yeast with a little warm water and sugar and occasionally stir up things for the active yeast like a social activist.  The product is yellowish-brown in color and becomes reddish brown upon aging. It contains ten to twelve percent ethyl alcohol or ethanol

For one kilogram fresh cashew apples you need one hundred grams of refined sugar, half a teaspoonful of yeast. The procedure is simple. Select juicy, ripe cashew apples, wash, trim both ends of the apples and slice into four equal parts. Weigh the sliced apples. Add sugar and soak the mixture for 12 to 15 minutes. Decant and transfer the juice to fermenting vessel. Add the activated yeast and stir the mixture in a circular motion. Cover the mouth of the jar or can with cloth and tie it. Stir once a day for a minute for five days. Set aside for two to four weeks. Siphon or decant the wine.

Fully ripe cashew apples (yellow variety) ameliorated to 20° Brix and  inoculated with one gram Baker’s yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) per litre of extracted juice and fermented  at 28°C for 14 days and then aged for six months of storage yields a wine that is  light brown, slightly acidic in taste (total titratable acidity 0.74% w/ v tartaric acid)), low in tannin (0.60 mg/100 ml), low in vitamin C (14.2 mg/100 ml) and low in alcohol (7.2%) concentration. Sensory evaluation results show that there are no significant differences (p<0.05) in aroma and overall acceptability between the wine produced from cashew apple powder (CAP) and commercial fruit wines particularly in taste, colour, aroma and overall acceptability.

If the wine is a bit hazy, clarify it with egg white or albumen. Mix half a cup of egg white and pasteurize the wine to 50-60°C for three minutes. Pack in bottle with tight cork or non-metallic screw cap to ‘age’ the wine for at least six months. Chill the wine before serving. Try it out now while the cashews are available in plenty. If you need some more clarifications, write back or meet us at the Konkan Fruit Fest, come May or earlier.

Miguel Braganza

This article has been first published in the oHERALDo SPLENDOUR on 27 March, 2011  [www.oheraldo.in]

 

 

 

 

--
Sunita Rao
Adjunct  Fellow, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), Bangalore, India (www.atree.org)

Member, Kalpavriksh, Pune, India (www.kalpavriksh.org)

Founder Trustee, VANASTREE, Sirsi, India (www.vanastree.org)

[Arati Fernandes]

 

sunita

as far as i know, only fresh toddy can be used to make sannas.........................purists wd weep at the thot of wasting urak on sannas...................!!!

ara

 

---

From: Sunita Rao <sunit...@gmail.com>
To: goagar...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Mon, March 28, 2011 5:58:09 PM
Subject: Re: organic urak

[Sunita Rao]

Thanks Arati and sorry for the rather plebian query!