While I was on vacation, I had taken a vow not to cook any new dishes unless and until really necessary. I have so much of drafts to cover and somehow I want to finish them off by this year end, however looking at the way things are, I don’t think I will meet the deadline. At the moment, I am going back to my old posts and seeing which needs updates, but I am taking it slow so that I don’t over do myself. 😀 But I had to adjust the vow a bit when I saw the mail for this month’s Fantastical Food Fighting challenge! Sarah mentions that since September is the “National Honey Month” in the USA, the theme would be – no prizes for guessing – honey! We had done a honey post for MFBC a few months ago. I love honey as an…
YumButterscotch Ice-Cream
We are approaching the end of Q3. Where is this year flying to? It just feels like it was January 1 yesterday and all of a sudden, the end of September is staring into our face. I am not a person who likes to look into a variance analysis of resolutions vs actuals, but this time I did look into it and it is not encouraging. There were a few things I really wanted to start off this year, but I haven’t and I have no excuse for the same, other than my lethargy or taking things for granted. 😕 I am at least thankful that I decided to put a check on my increasing weight and move myself a little more that I usually would. If the first quarter of the year showed an upward trend in my weight, the movement after that has been slowly yet steadily…
YumMeen Aviyal ~ Fish in Spicy Coconut Paste
Remember about my school bestie I had mentioned on the blog a few times (here, here and here)? She used to be in Muscat, till they decided to relocate back home for her children. The time she informed me about it, I could literally feel her going through a lot of sadness on the decision. I think I don’t need to mention what I was feeling. But both of us know that we need to respect certain happenings in life. Allah knows best and it will definitely be for our good. We still keep in touch, however the intensity has reduced since life back home is much tough with growing up kids. Life in the Gulf for housewives is so much relaxed. A couple of days back as I chatted to her, she said she wanted to hear my voice. Incidentally, I had placed this post on the schedule…
YumVegan Banana Almond Smoothie
I discovered a page called “Raz’s Page” on FB last week. I would love you to go through and read some of his posts about his children, and they are hilarious, yet really cute. In between all those light notes, I found this one which was really profound and awoke a lot of thoughts in me. Once you face a tough situation, you will feel vulnerable all the time. But that tough situation also gives you the strength to face that vulnerability, Alhamdulillah. Each word in that post echoed so much with me, and I knew it was all true. There is a great mental satisfaction that comes with placing your problems and sorrows to Allah, and that can’t be replaced by any feeling in this world. The only matter is as human beings we have to be patient enough to get through our tough times, and InShaAllah, good…
YumTiffin Sambar
If you are a reader of my blog, you will know about my fixation with making sambar from scratch. I absolutely loathe store bought sambar powders. Each powder tastes different and somehow most of it don’t appeal to my taste. I hope I can discover a good enough home made sambar powder recipe that will help me fix up sambar as easily as can be done with store bought. Hehe… You can find two absolutely flavorful sambar recipes on the blog, Malabar style Varutharacha Sambar and Arachuvitta Vengaaya Sambar. Here is one more adding to the list… I saw this recipe on one of my blogger bestie Meena’s blog. I kept wondering why it is called “tiffin sambar”. I then discovered that it is called so since this sambar is specifically served with tiffin items, like idlis, dosas, ven pongal, etc. The sambar is slightly more watered down…
YumBlueberry Mug Muffin
I would be lying if I say I don’t miss home. I am not a person who calls my parents every single day, mainly because we run out of topics to talk. 😀 My sister calls umma almost every day and asks detail by detail, however B and I are just the opposite. We always talk to the point. There are times when I call umma after a week, and she starts off with a lot of complaints, but I patiently hear them and smile at myself. What do you do when you lose track of time? After coming back from vacation, I have been calling them alternatively every three days, and somehow after the call, my heart sulks. There was a time when I used to stay with my parents. Sometimes I wished for my own privacy. But once they left and we moved on our own, I…
YumChettinad Milagu Saadam ~ Black Pepper Rice
I am mad about collecting cookbooks and recipe cut-outs, irrespective of whether I make them or not. I have a few files full of print outs, which then stopped and gave way to saved word documents neatly saved into my pen drive. Then there are pictures that I have taken of recipes from all over the place, and marked as “favorites”. I also have a book in which I have jotted down interesting recipes while watching them on channels. I am not an over enthusiastic cook, but once I start cooking, I go really overboard. How many of you are like me? Please raise your hands… 🙂 Following on with easy recipes, is this Chettinad Milagu Saadam that I pulled up from my notebook. Not sure which show I saw the recipe on, but all I know is that this is perfect fodder for your lunch box. Chettinad…
YumGajrela ~ Pakistani Carrot Rice Pudding
I am trying to get back to regular blogging and I am feeling quite rusty. Having said that, when it is the tenth of the month, I have to make sure that I don’t miss out on a challenge that I nurture and manage – the Muslim Food Blogger Challenge! It has been an amazing journey so far and each challenge has been accepted by my fellow bloggers with a lot of enthusiasm. It is this support that makes me want to keep the challenge going on. I am pretty excited by the fact that the challenge is approaching one year in November. Definitely another pointer to keep continuing, InShaAllah… This month, we are exploring Pakistani cuisine. We had done Indonesian cuisine a few months ago, and as per statistics, Pakistan is the second largest Muslim country in the world. Pakistani food is very similar to the Muslim…
YumChinese Saucy Chicken
Coming back from vacation and getting back to live blogging is something that many bloggers have an inertia towards. It is normal – as a human being, you have a tendency to lazy around to get back to things that you had left unattended. But if you ask me, I have missed blogging. I had gone home with my laptop and camera in tow, determined to learn a bit of manual clicking and working on a few new facets of blogging. But it all happened otherwise. In fact, this is one of the busiest vacations I have ever had, though if you ask me what did I do, I did nothing much! 😀 It started off with B getting hitched. We had a low key yet a relative-filled function. My sister and I instantly hit it off with our new sister-in-law, hehe… Since HD was around for very…
YumSemiya Payasam ~ Vermicelli Milk Dessert
Assalamu alalikum to all my readers in this beautiful month of September! Hope you all had a wonderful Eid-ul-Adha celebrations. If you would like to read more about this festival, then do check out this post! I already have a pressure cooker version of semiya payasam on the blog, but this one is old school – needs some time and patience, but the end result is sweet! 🙂 I am not sure if anybody hates semiya payasam. I have a couple of cousins who don’t like this payasam, and I find them to be really weird. When anybody says “payasam”, the first thing that will always come into mind is semiya payasam, as it is easy to make, with easily available ingredients and basically, no-mess. Just like how you need to be while making the sago payasam, you have to cook enough that the vermicelli looks transparent, the…
YumBaked Custard (and a Giveaway!)
One fine morning, I received a message from Papatia, who runs Djaribi Books, which specializes in Islamic books for kids and adults in the USA. They have launched a new book called “Halal Comfort Foods” and she asked if I would be interested in reviewing it. I was more than happy to do it and hence responded back with a “yes”. Couple of weeks later, I received a pretty parcel which actually had more than the book itself! It came with some nibbles, which were thoroughly enjoyed by ourselves over tea. 🙂 Why the book? USA is said to have the most number of reverts into Islam. More than the inclination to the Shahadah (the Oneness of Allah and accepting that Prophet Muhammad SAW is His messenger), it entails a total change in lifestyle for reverts. That change includes in food as well. Food as a total is…
YumWhite Bean Hummus
I love hummus a lot, even if there are no sides to go with it. Hummus is just perfect to dip and eat your chips, your cucumber and carrot sticks, or even better, just like that! There are times when I run out of dried chickpeas since I forget I had used up all what I had to make a box of hummus. 😀 If you are thinking, “Why can’t she use canned chickpeas?”, then my answer is, I simply don’t like it. It tastes no way close to cooked dried chickpeas. It may be just my thought… During these times, the “innovated” hummus comes into play, like this one with green peas. Here is another one for you using white beans or cannelloni beans. These beans look just like rajma, but white in color. I picked up a small pack since it interested me. The first thing…
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