Itty-Bitty Cupcake Bites For Halloween-- And A Ghost Story

I am not a big believer in the supernatural but there was this one time, on a cold, dark February evening, when my rooted-in-reality self turned a wee bit agnostic.

I was walking out of the Maryland statehouse in Annapolis. The legislative session was on and getting longer by the day with delegates and senators racing against the clock to pass crucial bills. I had just finished filing my story for the next day's newspaper from my desk in the bullpen -- a busy room in the statehouse basement where political reporters from almost every media outlet in the state congregated during the session.

It was nearly eight and I hurried to make it to the bus stop around the corner, in time for the last shuttle to the parking lot. An unusually gusty, strong wind whistled and stirred up the rust-gold leaves on the cobbled brick pathway as I walked past the grand, wide marble steps leading up to the first floor of the state capitol.

The Annapolis statehouse is surely one of the most breathtaking state capitols in the country, with a tall, distinctive, white dome capped by black shingles. On the left, behind a black, wrought-iron fence, is the governor's mansion with its red-brick exterior and wide, white wood trim. Behind the statehouse, separated by charming, centuries-old homes, is the Chesapeake Bay Harbor edged with hundreds of boats bobbing in their slips. And up front, across a brick mall with a statue of the United States' first black Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall, are the House and Senate buildings.

The walk from the statehouse to the shuttle stop was not a long one and usually there would always be a guard or two and a couple of government aides or reporters walking around. But that night I was quite, quite alone.

Low-Fat Rajasthani Five-Lentil Curry (Panchmel Dal)

My weekends are usually brimming over with chores big and small, but this weekend-- or at least this Saturday-- I have swept my calendar clean for the event of a lifetime: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert's Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear.

DC is a pretty exciting city year-round, overrun with events you can't wait to go to and some you wish you never heard of. This is, after all, the nation's capital and every voice, big or small, wants to be heard here. As a reporter I often covered these events and became blase enough to the point where now, if I hear of something interesting, my excitement never manages to break past my phobia of traveling in the suffocating crush of a Metro train at the end of the event.

But this time I'm psyched enough to brave it all. Desi and I have been counting the days and it's not just us. Rarely has an event generated the sort of buzz in this very political city as this one has. Stewart has been broadcasting his show live from DC each night this week and there have been serpentine lines each day to get tickets. Everyone I know is going to the rally and almost everyone has relatives or friends coming in from out of town to attend.

I can't wait!!!

I'll be telling you all about it after. Meanwhile, our camera's back in circulation and I finally have a wonderful recipe I can't wait to share.

Narayanan Krishnan: A Real-Life Hero

Photo: Akshaya Trust

I first heard of Narayanan Krishnan when Desi mentioned him in passing as one of the 2010 nominees for CNN Heroes--a rising star at an Indian five-star hotel's restaurant headed for a job in glamorous Switzerland, who one day just gave it all up to feed the old and the destitute and the hungry. The news that he cooked and served vegetarian meals was cherry on the icing.

I love stories like these and I ran to my computer to read more. The real heroes, to me, are not the rich, the successful and the famous but those who, in however small or big a way, work to make this world a better place. For the last few years India has been in the throes of massive change, and as the rich get richer, and the middle class grabs its share of the spoils, there is little attention or consideration for the poor who make up the largest share of the country's population but just do not have the tools to barely survive.

Think of this: more than 40 percent of India's population lives on less than $1.25 a day. There are no social safety nets for the poor-- no food stamps, no shelters, and no soup kitchens. You could be a two-year-old born in a family of eight other siblings and parents without work, or an 80-year-old man tossed out on the street by the children you thought would care for you, and you'd be on your own with nowhere to turn.

Narayanan had his revelation when he was visiting the temple town of Madurai in south India and saw an old man eating human waste. He started feeding the man and decided that was what he wanted to do. At 29, Krishnan has served more than 1.2 million meals through his nonprofit Akshaya Trust , which he set up in 2003. According to the CNN website, he feeds the homeless and destitute, mostly elderly people abandoned by their families and often abused.

Photo: Akshaya Trust

Here's more from CNN:

Krishnan's day begins at 4 a.m. He and his team cover nearly 125 miles in a donated van, routinely working in temperatures topping 100 degrees Fahrenheit.

He seeks out the homeless under bridges and in the nooks and crannies between the city's temples. The hot meals he delivers are simple, tasty vegetarian fare he personally prepares, packs and often hand-feeds to nearly 400 clients each day.

Krishnan carries a comb, scissors and razor and is trained in eight haircut styles that, along with a fresh shave, provide extra dignity to those he serves.

He says many of the homeless seldom know their names or origins, and none has the capacity to beg, ask for help or offer thanks. They may be paranoid and hostile because of their conditions, but Krishnan says this only steadies his resolve to offer help.

You can vote for Krishnan here.

Lucy the Road Tripper

Over the long Columbus Day weekend, Desi, Lucy and I took a short road trip through upstate New York. As much as we love to go on road trips, and despite the many, many pet parents we always encounter at rest stops who travel with unflappable dogs and even cats, Desi and I have always had a strict no-pets policy when it comes to our vacations, not least because there are many dangers to traveling with pets. Cats, for instance, tend to hide away for long periods of time in un-findable places when spooked by strange surroundings, and you run the risk of losing them in whatever place you've traveled to. And for some dogs at least, traveling in a car for long periods of time and then being holed up in a strange hotel room would be a really stressful experience. Opie, for instance, who can never sit still, hates confined spaces and starts getting antsy within minutes of sitting in a car.

Still, this time when we made our plans we wondered if we should include Lucy. For one, Lucy is a fantastic car rider-- the best I've ever known. She will sit in the back seat for hours and you won't even know she's there. Second, she loves being with us at all times-- a trait that seems to have magnified since all her experiences of the last few months, after she was diagnosed with osteosarcoma. She will follow Desi and me up and down the stairs (with three legs) each time we move around, and she fights to go with us every time we step out of the door-- something she never did in the past. Also, her chemo medications have to be given to her daily with unfailing regularity and although we know we can completely trust Hallie, who runs the daycare we usually check them into, Desi-- the loving dogfather that he is-- just felt like he had to do the honors himself.

So we called around and found hotels in Albany and Syracuse that accept doggie guests. We deposited Freddie and Opie at Hallie's, and off we took for our first road trip with our tremendous dog.

All said it was a great experience, although not one I'd likely repeat any time soon. For one, we learned a lesson about the solidarity between Opie and Lucy who came to our home just a month apart and who -- despite their very significant differences in behavior and energy levels-- share a strong bond. All through the trip Lucy seemed a little out of sorts without Opie, and he -- according to Hallie-- was miserable without her.

For another, as much as Lucy loves car rides, I think she found out on this trip that you can have too much of a good thing. On our way back home from Syracuse we ran into bottlenecks at several points along the highway and ended up spending three hours longer on the road than we had expected.


Still overall it was lovely having her around and not having to worry about her. She in turn loved all the extra attention and the treats she was showered with, for the three days that she had us all to herself.

And yes, she did love all those walks in all those strange places with wonderful new smells and calling cards left behind by other road-tripping dogs from all around the country!


***

A piece of not-so-great news from this road trip is that I dropped our camera on the beautiful marble steps of an Albany government building and broke beyond repair the lens Desi uses to click all those yummy pictures. As a result, I've had no pictures to post and I'd rather not post a recipe without showing you the end result. But a replacement lens is on the way and Desi will be clicking, and I writing, again in no time.

Thanks for hanging in there with us!

Brown Rice Dhokla

Gujarat is a beautiful swath of land not unlike an alligator's head that sweeps into the Arabian Sea and kisses Pakistan's southeast border. This is the state where India's most illustrious son, Mahatma Gandhi, was born. A land that was once the playground of Krishna, the charismatic child-god and friend of cows whose antics cram the pages of India's holy and mythological books. The state that is home to the Jain community, a religious group who have -- for centuries and long before the term "ethical vegan" was coined--believed in shunning cruelty to every living creature, including insects.

In recent years, this glorious history of peace and nonviolence has come under a cloud because Gujarat has gained notoriety as India's live fuse for communal violence. The state's chief minister, Narendra Modi, a man sometimes-- very inadequately -- described as a terrorist, was charged with planning, provoking and then allowing unchecked a genocide in his state in 2002 that left nearly 900 people dead, most of them Muslims. And then, despite all that, he went and got reelected. Today, Modi has turned his state into a mecca for large multinational corporations, turning Gandhi's land into a new kind of colony for the powers that be.

My memories of Gujarat, fortunately, pre-date Modi. This is a land of incredible beauty, with beaches that stretch forever, ancient temples that glitter under clear, moonlit skies, and an abundant wildlife that  includes solemnly majestic tigers, lightning-fast leopards, and bone-lazy sloth bears. The Rann of Kutch, the exquisitely mysterious gulf that lies between the two alligator jaws, is a bird-watcher's paradise with raptors, bustards, cranes and hundreds more bird species.