I have been thinking of giving up coffee for a while – it’s after all a narcotic beverage. But I haven’t come up with a non-stimulating, non-sedating sattvic alternative I can have in the morning (Hot water/milk/tea/chocolate/decaf ruled out).
Coffee’s a new fad right? I mean, what did people in the Vedic ages drink? Perhaps Panchagavya, made from five products of a cow: dung, urine, milk, yogurt and ghee, was the in-thing at those times. There were perhaps local Cowbucks stores where various flavoured Panchagavya drinks were sold. Teenagers would hang out there drinking this stuff saying “this totally rocks dude” in Sanskrit…
When I posted this on my organization's bulletin board, I received several suggestions on how I could wean myself from coffee. Here are the suggested alternatives:
- Hot / Cold Badam milk
- A combination of the following: Milk, Squashed banana, Honey, Dried mango pulp, Jaggery
- Warm water + Honey + Lime Juice + 1 or 2 Tulsi leaves
- Hot lemon tea
- Vedic Coffee at the ISKCON Café
- Alternatives to coffee available at Swadeshi Aandolana (Aazaadi Bachao) stores
I did try a Horlicks+Protinules combo for a week or so, but soon switched back to coffee... now I've got to try out the suggestions above.
Btw, sometime back, when I was at a local temple, they were handing out prasadam that looked like Panchamruta (which is a mixture of milk, honey, ghee, yogurt and sugar), which I happily gulped down. Only after that we were told that the stuff we'd just had was Panchagavya - yikes! Now I know what BS (or CS in this case) tastes like ;)
I wonder how they prepared this concoction. I mean, 4 of the 5 ingredients are generally easy to obtain. But how do you make a cow pee on demand? I guess there's a designated pee-gatherer who's job is to wait and watch the cow's tail. At the first signs of it lifting, he would rush in with his pitcher...
