The Ease of Chia

For a working professional who lives in a metro city, the hustle of everyday existence and the race to match up with your own schedule sometimes takes away the sweet nuances of patient things. In a bustle of this hum-dum, the ease of a simple and nutritious meal, which is per-say 'exquisite' brought me to do this simple experiment.

I am 'figuratively' new to cooking and due to my exploration skills, have developed some sort of exquisite food palette in the recent times. That said, I am still very much ready to dive any day into a bowl of rasam or a crisp dosa, but when you are trying, why not ease the palette craving for something 'different'! So, I tried this overnight Chia Pudding recipe by Shivesh Bhatia and it turned out really amazing. For a person interested in exploring different foods and trying to maintain health, balancing the two is a challenge these days. and that is why I am naturally tilted to trying healthy recipes or recipes with healthy ingredients.

Going to the science of Chia seeds, it is actually a medicinal plant with the botanical name 'Salvia hispanica L' and has been used since ancient times by the Aztecs and the Mayans, to show its presence in records for the first time around 3500BC. For someone who has some brief idea about food history, these two communities were associated with the origination of foods like chocolate and coffee, so definitely high points from a person like me there. Coming back to Chia here, it is a rich source of nutrients such as polyunsaturated omega-3 fatty acids, polyphenols and carbohydrate based fibers. A scientific summation summarizes the benefits of these nutrients with points such as protection from inflammation, enhancing cognitive performance, reducing cholesterol levels, protection of body from free radicals, aging and cancer, reducing inflammation, regulating bowel functions to write a few. Phew, talk about 'superfoods'! Interestingly, in Mayan language 'Chia' means 'strength'. Since a long time, these seeds are used as such or as flour (grounded), mixed in drinks, as a thickener and can be used to extract oils by pressing.

Here are the ingredients for the recipe I tried, followed by the instructions that can be followed by any kitchen novice like me, or a five year old kid for that matter. I have not included the ratios or the precise amounts here per say, because I made it with a classic 'what feels like the right amount' instinct of mine. So here it goes. Later, we can look at the simple science on why and how it works.

Ingredients

1. Chia Seeds

2. Milk

3. Cocoa Powder

4. Honey

5. Almonds

6. Bananas

Instructions

1. Take milk in a mixing bowl and leave a spoon or two separately in two separate spaces. Add in the chia seeds, mix and let it sit for five minutes or so.

2. Meanwhile, take that milk kept separately and dissolve cocoa powder in it with rigor. Into the other milk bit kept, add honey and mix it again with a rigor until all of the honey is dissolved.

3. After five minutes, combine the seeds with the milk again and let it rest again for five minutes or so. This is important because otherwise the seeds tend to sit at the base of the bowl.

4. When all of this exercise is done, combine the chia seeds-milk combination with the cocoa powder-milk combination and the honey-milk duo and again mix them well.

5. After all of these ingredients are combined, keep them in the bowl covered and let it rest in the refrigerator overnight. The whole process should not take more than 15-20 minutes for preparation.

6. Next morning, take out the pudding from the refrigerator. It should be set, the seeds would have up-taken the whole milk and along with that, the other mixed ingredients. Put some cut almonds and bananas into the bowl and drizzle some honey on the top if you want to, like I did. Enjoy!

I used almonds and bananas in this recipe because they work really well with the cocoa powder in my opinion. And now talking about the science part, if you combine chia seeds with a liquid, preferably water or milk, the soluble fiber and mucilage inside the seeds uptake the water to form a gluey texture around the seeds, being leached out from the seeds itself. This is actually what helps in the formation of the pudding like consistency. Further, I asked for mixing honey and cocoa powder in milk with rigor because cocoa powder essentially doesn't dissolve in water and rigor will help the fats in the milk to combine with the powder and dissolve it easily. Honey, due to higher density settles at the bottom of the milk-honey mixture and thus needs external force to break down between the honey molecules for uniform mixing. This can happen on its own also, but then this recipe will take much more time.

I am thinking of using coffee brew the next time I will make this. In that case I'd like to use maybe hazelnut or caramel flavor with it. Though in place of some fruit, I'd like to team it up with some vanilla cream. But the question of synthetic and not natural (and not so good fats) come to picture, so I guess I'll have to find a roundabout that. I will update on the same, if done. Until then, enjoy and savour!