Ingredients for Indian Mango Lassi

Video Transcript

"Aloha, this is Sonia Martinez from the big Island of Hawaii on behalf of Expert Village. Selecting the ingredients for the lassi. The basic lassi, the original lassi, was just yogurt or milk, water and spices. Today we have a little bit more choice and we use either yogurt or buttermilk, water or milk or fruit juices, we select a fruit. In this case we chose mango, as you know, lemon juice is optional, you can put a little bit of lemon juice in it if you wish, honey, sugar; any other kind of sweetener or fruit juices, you can use roasted ground cumin, which was originally used. You can also use cardamom, which is what I chose to use today. One of the uses in certain parts of India is saffron which makes a very rich lassi but saffron is so expensive that unless you have an unlimited supply you might as well skip that one for now. You can also use nutmeg, which you can grate or you can shave, to put on top. These can be added to the lassi itself or you can use them to sprinkle on top after you're ready to use your lassi. In some areas of India they even spice it with a lump of butter, they call that makhaniya, since the hindu word for butter is Mahal. We're going to be using yogurt and milk to make it a little bit richer. You can use cream also if you prefer but the milk and the yogurt and the fruit and a little bit of the honey and then our spices, which cardamom, will be the one we use, is what we're going to be doing today."