Saturday, August 7, 2010

SAFFRON!!

Quite some time has elapsed since we last played True Colour Thursday. Mummy wasn't up to hunting around for colours with her camera and we humoured her.
But we couldn’t let this week pass by because the colour this week is special for us. You will understand in a minute why.
The colour for this week is SAFFRON!

Saffron is one of our NATIONAL colours.
And how nice that this colour was chosen for NOW, because on the 15th of this month we shall celebrate our INDEPENDENCE DAY.


The colour SAFFRON on our National Flag along with Green and White had been chosen after much deliberation to depict and embody the essence of our large and beautiful country-INDIA.

Saffron signifies Patrotism, Sacrifice and Piety. Green is meant to symbolize Prosperity while White Peace, Purity and Simplicity.

The colour Saffron also has a religious connotation to it as it has been embraced by Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism to portray their diverse aspects.

(A Saffron gateway to a temple)


(We found this old man selling Saffron coloured Flowers used for religious rites, in one of our road trips)

Saffron actually is a very illustrious SPICE considered indispensable by an array of cultures since ancient days.
The culinary delight it provides is not only due to its bright, vibrant colour but also due to the accompanying exotic aroma.
Indian Sweets would lose their allure without Saffron colouring and flavour.

(Mummy's favourite: 'Besan ladoo' or Gram flour sweets)


 
(Daddy-made 'Paneer Khatta Meetha': Cottage cheese preparation with saffron colouring)


Arabic Coffee is considered deficient without saffron and cardamom in it.



It is an indispensible ingredient in the famous Risotto in Italy and Switzerland.

(Mummy has the recipe downloaded and promised to make some soon. Paws crossed!)


Saffron is derived from the stigma of the Crocus sativus flower. The plant blooms only for about three to four weeks and the stigma is harvested by hand to derive Saffron.





It is the bright red colour of the stigma which has made it so popular as a source of organic dye apart from its use as a spice.

We enjoyed sniffing around for Saffron. (But not many items were to be found which made us turn to GOOGLE, the surest store of ready images, for some of our illustrations as you might have guessed earlier in our post)
Here are some items we found at home.


(National Colours in Mummy's bookshelf)


(Old and faded but Saffron nontheless!)


(Mummy loves this cup-bowl)



(New cups in the cupboard!)


In case any of you wants to play this colour game just drop in HERE.

We are glad to have made acquaintance of  DOYLE and MOLLIE, our new furry friends who are keeping this meme going in BLUE’s absence. They are adorable and you must go meet them!

Hope our colours will help brighten up your weekend, Friends.
Wags,
,

18 comments:

houndstooth said...

You always have the most interesting pictures on your color posts! For some reason, I feel like I need to eat something now, though!

Bunny

Molly the Airedale said...

You guys did an awesome job with saffron! Coffee with saffron and cardamom? Mom says she needs to try that out!

Love ya lots
Maggie and Mitch

Bella Roxy & Macdui said...

We love saffron rice. We watched a tv show once showing saffron being collected (harvested) and now know why it is so expensive. Very labour intensive.

Great examples of colour, as usual.

XXXOOO Daisy, Kendra & Bella

Lola and also Franklin, too said...

Oh, nice choices for sure. I'm getting hungry and I just had dinner. It's an excellent color for your flag, because even though saffron can be found in lots of different cuisines, and maybe came from other places first,I think we mostly think about India first when we hear the world. At least Blog Mom says she does. We really enjoyed the photos, too.

lotsa licks, Lola

♥♥ The OP Pack ♥♥ said...

Saffron is a most beautiful color. Mom says that risotto looks really tasty. We think we might like that cottage cheese - anything cheese-y is yummy. We used to do TC, maybe we need to get back into it.

Woos ~ Phantom, Thunder, and Ciara

Kate said...

Mum was too busy drooling over the food to read the words!

However, I did and have a Happy Indiaversary!

Chewy said...

My momma uses saffron on her foods too! Too cool!

Chewy

Teddy Bear said...

Great job, Ginger and Buddy! That cottage cheese sure does look yummy.:)

Love,
Teddy Bear

jabblog said...

Saffron is precious indeed - very expensive! Love the cup bowl and I like risotto too, but the last time I made it it turned out rather badly :-(
I hope your Mummy is feeling better now.
Happy Independence Day for August 15th, next Sunday :-)Are you having a party?

Nelly said...

We love those pictures of saffron things. It's always so interesting to see things from different cultures - Lovely. Thank you!
Nibbles
Nelly x

Anonymous said...

Saffron! Yum! My Mom and I watch the Food Network sometimes and a chef called the Barefoot Contessa uses saffron in her cooking sometimes. Mom says it's the most expensive spice in the world. Definitely a treat to savor. Can't wait til I get to try some!

Thinkin yellow orange is my new favorite color,
Roo

Roan said...

The food looks delicious. When I lived in Dallas, one of my favorite places to eat was an Indian restaurant just down the street from my house. Yummy food! Thanks for the educational aspect of your post, as well. ;)

JD and Max said...

Hi Buddy and Ginger,

We love your saffron post - our humans go to Egypt a lot and always bring saffron back so our kitchen often smells of saffron!

We're glad you found out about being able to sponsor a dog through Dogs Trust, we're sorry we didn't get in touch with you soone about it. We were very touched when you offered to give up some of your biscuit rations to sponsor a doggie - that was wonderful! We hope you do sponsor a doggie - you can also do it through Shelby's auction OR you could also sponsor one of Khyra's rescue runs and help save lots of doggies.

We appreciate what you're saying about the p&p to India but we'd like to suggest a special package to you as we'd love to send you some of our local confectionary! We'd usually just send it through to you so that your humans can enjoy some tasty noms too but as we're all wanting to raise money for Shelby we thought that if you donate $10 we'd make up a special package for you to include some rock! We'll include some really nice but light items to keep p&p down and the rest of the package would be a surprise for you. What do you think?
If you like the sound of this please drop us an e-mail with your snail mail - thanks!

Schnauzer snuggles - JD and Max

♥Mona + Prissy + Angel Weenie♥ said...

Mommy has been so bad. She hasn't been helping me visit my friends blogs in so long and I hope we can be friends. Mommy went to an Indian resturant for lunch today. Her favorite is lamb currie but it is a all you can eat placew so she ate everything. Seh tought of you when she went there.

Thanks so much for being on Shelby's Team. Mommy is hoping to get more pictures this weekend and I haven't had a chance to meet her yet but Mommy brings me kisses from herr everytime she goes to see here.

{{{huggies}}}...Mona

Lorenza said...

Perfect work with the saffron color!
I loved your post!
Happy sunday!
Kisses and hugs
Lorenza

Cassie said...

Loved this post! Now we know so much more about saffron thanks to you!!
Smooches from pooches,
BabyRocketDog and Hootie

http://hootieandbabyrocketdog.blogspot.com

doyle and mollie said...

woof hoo that was so the bestest saffron post the country you live in is so full of colour we will really look forward to your posts loves and licks xx

the booker man said...

hooray for TCT! i really liked your saffron post! it was neat to learn what the colors of your national flag mean! oh, and mama totally digs the soup cup-bowl, too. she'd like to put some saffron rice into it and have a little snackie. heehee.
*woof*
the booker man

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