Friday, December 25, 2009

Sam Gye Tang: the korean food I prepared myself for the first time


I am always keen to taste any new food that looks tempting and excuisite. But rarely have I tried to prepare a dish that is VERY new to me. So I decided to start by preparing a new food which was not "so new" for me and I opted for Sam Gye Tang: a Korean Chicken Soup. I enjoyed it a few times before and had a feeling that I could prepare this dish. The only thing needed was a recipe which I got here:http://korean-cuisine.blogspot.com/2008/09/sam-gye-tang-ginseng-chicken-soup.html. The blogger put the recipe and cooking method so effectively with pictures that even a non-cook can prepare the dish. I made slight modification to the recipe: after stuffing the chicken with all the ingredients, I placed the chicken in my favorite slow cooker with plenty of water as shown in the picture. I set the cooking time HIGH for 2 hours and then LOW for 10 hours flipping the chicken once halfway through the slow cooking time. Started in the morning, the cooking was done in the evening by the time my family had waited impatiently to devour the chicken soup. I was little worry if my family like the taste of chicken soup because we mostly fry the chicken first for whatever chicken dish we want to prepare and sam gye tang was the only chicken dish that was prepared just by boiling. But to my delight, both my wife and my kid liked the taste and enjoyed the soup very much. Hurrah.....quite an achievment for me. If you want to give it a try go to the site I listed above and hone your culinary skills.

Friday, September 25, 2009

Mirror lake, Utah




Mirror lake--situated in the Uinta National Forest in Central Utah- is a tiny but very beautiful lake. Its clean blue water perfectly adds to its natural beauty.
Wow....it has been nearly three months since I last wrote in my blog. Well, this summer passed very well. I became the dad of a second child-Smriti. This time my wife and I were better prepared as parents than when our first child was born. The hardest part now is to manage time between the lab and the family. We have been through few experimentations to churn out an schedule that works best for all of us and we are still working on it. Talking about last summer, we had several get togethers, few potlucks, few short trips around Utah and other fun stuffs. Due to our very young children, we did not make any long trip and we are not hoping any for one more year. Hopefully, that won't let our "enthusiasm for travelling" let up. There are many interesting stuffs piling up in my mind which I will surely pour into my blog so stay in touch and I hope you also enjoyed your summer.

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Marshy, balloony land raised above the ground....

It was downpouring this late afternoon here at Salt Lake City. Fortunately, I happened to see an amazing natural phenomenon right infront of my apartment at the West Village: a swampy land filled with water, as if it were a balloon, and raised above the ground. The neighbors were having fun. This video shows how the marshy land looked like.

Sunday, April 19, 2009

Female Winner of the Salt Lake City Marathon 2009

Blurry Image.....huh! Nevertheless, I happened to catch in my camera the top female finisher of the salt lake city marathon 2009.

Male winners of the Salt Lake City Marathon 2009

So we now know the winner of the Salt Lake City Marathon 2009. Fortunately, I happened to capture the first and second male finishers of the competition in my camera early during the race and here I put their image again with baloons showing who finished first and second with respective finish time. I am looking back at the images I took y'day to see if I can find the first female finisher. For now, this is it.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Could our belief have a healing effect?

Of late, I am reading articles relating religion or faith to health. Growing up in an oriental country where people believe so much in religion and have so much faith in God, I always wonder whether such beliefs have any curative effect on health, let alone there effect on many other countless wishes the devotees pray God for. It was a revelation to find that people in the western world also believe in religion and God. They may not seem to be as extravagant to show off their devotion as the Orientals, but they equally believe that their faith in religion and God saves them from various illness and misfortunes and helps them live a healthy life. A recent article pubnlished in TIME mentions that different forms of prayer like meditation, yoga etc. do help develop the frontal and parietal lobes of the brain; such development not only increases the ability of the brain to think and analyze it also helps living better life by rationally removing all the faulty predispositions coming to one’s mind. Equally important is another religious practice of fasting. It is now well known that the followers or at least devotees of all major religions practice fasting in some way or the other. Short term fasting is beneficial biologically as well. People eating little less than that required by the body were found to live longer than those eating plenty or in excess. A less stress to the digestive system means better functioning of the system itself and of the whole body. Fasting is believed to have purgative effect on the digestive system helping body get rid of any undigested, faulty materials and tune itself for better performance. Yes, pushing oneself to the limit in the name of religion and faith may have dangerous consequences; yet, little faith and little spirituality could actually do good to our health. So what do you think, go for the little ???

For more read: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1879016,00.html


Saturday, April 4, 2009

Own stuff....

For the last couple of weeks weather has not been so kind here in the Salt Lake. It was snowing intermittently, pretty cold--windy as usual--compared to the average temp. in March-April. In contrast, the same weeks have been very intense, warm and informative academically. I attended three great talks this week: first from Mitch Lazar, UPenn Medicine, who talked about nuclear receptor mediated transcriptional regulation of genes involved in metabolic programs. Mitch is a big stuff in transcription biology and so was his talk. I, together with one of my lab's post-docs, had the rare opportunity to present our work on transcriptional regulation of some metabolic genes we had been working on and got some invaluable inputs from Mitch. Thanks Mitch for attending our talk and for your own great presentation; second from Daniel J Klionsky, U Michigan Ann Harbor, on "Autophagy". Klionsky is a pioneer in autophagy. His lab identified cytosol to vacuole (CTV) pathway of autophagy. Klionsky's talk was very absorbing and he really kept all the audience entertained yet focused during his entire talk. Since I am also working on autophagy, it was a great opportunity for me to attend the talk; third from Zolt Arany, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center at Harvard. Arany has pushed PGC1 (a family of key transcriptional co-activators of many nuclear-receptor regulated genes) to a new avenue of angiogenesis. His work defies the conventional view of HIF mediated transcriptional regulation of key angiogenic factors (genes). What I learned from Arany's talk is that you really have to think outside the narrow window of conventional and comfortable believes and have to constantly challenge them to emerge as a great scientist as Arany is.

I hope in coming weeks both weather and science will be entertaining alike.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Get set go...get in shape...

It is not for nothing that I finally decided to run. It took me months of contemplation and lot of inspiration from folks around me to make the decision. People who know my physique also know I have no extra adipose to burn. Nonetheless, I can’t overlook the health benefits of running; neither can I underestimate how running is helping many to stay upbeat throughout the day. On top of all these, being in a metabolism lab, I feel obligated to stay healthy and fit and also share common interests with my lab members who are now established runners. BUT…I’m not gonna break myself up running to the hilt….running for me is just to stay healthy and keep my spirit high.
I started last weekend running just 6 k(m)/day. My target is 8 km (5 miles) max for next 3-mos. So wish me the best.

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Salt Lake Temple

Situated at the core of the famous temple square, Salt Lake Temple is the preeminent temple of the follower of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS). For more information please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_Lake_Temple. Here, just enjoy the picture. During the year end holidays, the lighting in and around the temple made the whole temple square an amazing sight to behold.

Saturday, February 28, 2009

Facts of Life

"Life is no straight and easy corridor along which we travel free and unhampered, but amaze of passages, through which we must seek our way, lost and confused, now and again checked in a blind alley. But always, if we have faith, God will open a door for us, not perhaps one that we ourselves would have thought of, but one that will ultimately prove good for us " ---A. J . Cronin

Tuesday, February 3, 2009


Hoover dam,built in the Colarado river on Arizona-Nevada boarder, is a masterpiece of extreme engineering. It houses a hydro-electric power generating station. The picture shows the water draining back into the river after flowing through the mega-tubines generating electricity. A nice place to visit on your Las-Vegas vacation besides the vegas strip....

Monday, February 2, 2009





Intake towers (top)--through which water is pumped into the turbines. Dam crest(bottom)-- provides required elevation for water to run through the turbines at a great speed


It's winter in Utah. Frequent snowfalling covers the trees and the ground with white snow. I enjoy watching snowfall inside from my apartment. Snow in Utah considered the best in the World. Skiing is always a great fun here in winter ...

My ResearcherID