Ugadi Pachidi

On the day of Ugadi,after we all pray to god, the first prasad we take is the Ugadi Pachidi. Ugadi Pachidi is made out of things that are of different tastes. I always like the freshness of Neem leaves, flowers while making the Ugadi Pachidi. Here in US, we dont get the fresh flowers, so we finally end up using the dried neem flowers for the pachidi.

Ugadi pachidi has 6 tastes ( Sweet, Salt, Spicy, Bitter, Tangy, Sour) in it which in turn signifies the different emotions in human life.

In our house, we add the following ingredients for our ugadi pachidi. It might differ slightly in other households but the pachidi will definitely have all the different tastes in it.

Ingredients

1 Raw Mango - Finely cut into very very small thin cubes.

1/4 Cup Jaggery - Finely Crushed or grated.

1 pinch - Chilly Powder

1 pinch - Salt

2 Medium Size ripe Bananas - Nicely cut into small small cubes.

1/4 cup - Putnalu Pappu / Pottu kadalai / Roasted gram.

( Soak the Roasted gram in water for few minutes before adding).

1 Cup - Tamarind Juice. ( With mild tamarind flavour).

4 tbsp - Fresh Neem Flowers or Dried Neem Flowers

Procedure

Soak Tamarind in water first. Simultaneously, cut the raw mango and bananas. Soak the Roasted gram into water for sometime. Start adding the ingredients into a medium sized vessel easy to stir and mix. Add the banana cuts, raw mango cuts, jaggery followed by the tamarind juice, salt, chilly powder, roasted gram. Mix everything thoroughly so that the jaggery gets totally dissolved in the juice. Finally add the Neam flowers into the pachidi. Our ugadi pachidi is now ready for Neivedhyam.