Vegetarian
Cooking
Guests visiting a temple of Krishna for
the first time are often puzzled by the ceremonial offering of vegetarian
dishes to the form of Lord Krishna on the altar -- and understandably so. After
all, what does the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Lord want with our
little plate of rice and vegetables? Has He suddenly become hungry? Hasn't He
created countless tons of food? Isn't God self-sufficient? Does Krishna really
need those offerings of food?
In
fact, Krishna does ask for these offerings, not because he needs our
rice and vegetable, but because He wants our devotion. In the Bhagavad-Gita (9.26)
He says, "If one offers me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit
or water, I will accept it."
When
Krishna asks us to offer Him food, we should understand that He is actually
inviting us to reawaken our eternal loving relationship with Him. At first we
comply in a mood of faith mixed with duty; later, as our realization matures,
we do it with affection and love. Just as anybody naturally offers the best he
has to his beloved, the devotee offer Krishna his wealth, his intelligence, his
life, and his vegetarian food.
Krishna
is the ultimate beloved of everyone, but how can we offer gifts to a beloved we
don't yet know? The Vedic tradition can guide us. If you would like to try, but
can't follow all the procedures, you can remember that when the great devotee
hanuman and his companions were building a bridge of large, heavy stones for
King Rama, an incarnation of Lord Krishna, a little spider also pleased the
Lord by carrying the largest pebbles he could.
First, reserve a special place for the
offering. It can be a tabletop or an entire room converted into a temple. The
altar basically consists of a raised platform with a picture of Lord Krishna
and His eternal consort Srimati Radharani on it, a picture of Lord Caitanya and
His eternal consorts (the panca-tattva), and a picture of the spiritual
master.
The
spiritual master accepts the offering of the disciple and offers it to his own
spiritual master, who in turn offers it to his spiritual master. In this way
the offering ascends through a succession of spiritual masters, until it
reaches Lord Krishna. ISKCON devotees who have not been initiated yet, or who
have received initiation from Srila Prabhupada, use a picture of Srila
Prabhupada. Devotees who are disciples of Srila Prabhupada's disciples use a
picture of their own spiritual master.
From
the shopping to the cooking, meditate on pleasing Krishna. Look for the
freshest and best fruits and vegetables. Shopping in supermarkets requires care
and attention. There is more to it than simply avoiding obvious meat, fish and
eggs. Take the time to read every label. Keep in mind that nowadays virtually
everything contains some product of animal origin, although this may not be so
easy to ascertain. And don't assume that products stay the same; they change.
Watch
out for rennet (made of the lining of a calf's stomach and used to make
cheese), gelatine (boiled bones, hooves and horns, used to set foods), lecithin
(if it is not marked "soy lecithin," it may come from eggs), and
animal fats. Many products have it. And if a product has a blank label or its
origin is difficult to determine, don't buy it; the manufacturer doesn't want
you to know what's inside. The same goes for products that are overly or
exclusively coded with the infamous E-numbers.
There
are also a number of products with specific characteristics that make them
unsuitable for offering. Mushrooms are unofferable and you will not find them
in the Vedic kitchen. According to the Ayurveda they increase the mode
of ignorance. On top of that their nutritional value is practically zero.
Digesting mushrooms takes more energy than they could ever give you.
Onions
and garlic are also on the list. Although their medicinal values are highly
praised in the Ayurveda, transcendentalists are recommended not to take
them because they strongly increase the mode of passion, which leads to loss of
concentration, patience and tolerance. Besides the commonly known types of
drugs -- heroine, alcohol, tobacco, etc. -- also coffee, black tea and cacao
are considered intoxication due to their effect on the mind. According to the Ayurveda
these substances shorten the life span.
A
number of these products can be easily replaced. In the Vedic kitchen we use asafoetida
instead of onions and garlic. Chocolate and other cocoa-products are easily
matched and sometimes even surpassed by carob, a powder coming from the
fruits of the Carob tree (Ciratonia siliqua). Similarly, according to many the
different surrogate coffees, such as chicory, taste better than real
coffee. And after tasting the high variety of herb and fruit teas, you will not
find it difficult to renounce the tannic-acid rich black tea that affects the
stomach wall.
Offer
foods in the mode of goodness, such as grains, beans, milk products,
vegetables, fruits, and nuts. Countless recipes are available in the many
cookbooks published by ISKCON and available to you by mail order. By cooking
according to these established methods, you can achieve delicious results with
only a small amount of practice
How
to offer your food
One
must cook in clean surroundings, with as little external distraction as possible.
Make sure the family pet is not in the kitchen while you are cooking or
offering. Please do not taste the food while preparing it, for you are cooking
for the Lord and want Him to be the first to enjoy the preparations.
After
you have finished the preparations, place a portion of each on new plates and
bowls you have purchased just for this purpose. Bring the dishes to your home
altar and place them before a picture of the Lord. One should bow down before
the altar and, after rising, chant the Hare Krishna mantra for five or
ten minutes. Those more advanced in the process chant three specific meant for
offering food. But to start with, chanting Hare Krishna will do fine.
When you finish chanting, take the dishes back to the kitchen,
transfer the food (now prasadam) into normal eating bowls, and wash the
offering plates. After carefully putting the offering plates away ready for the
next offering, distribute the prasadam from the offering plate, as well
as the remaining preparations that were still in their original cooking pots in
the kitchen (all that food is also offered simultaneously with the offering on
the altar and is also called prasadam), and enjoy the transcendental
taste of the spiritual realm. If you like, before the meal you can also recite
the same prayers for honouring prasadam as the devotees do.