It’s time for the next Muslim Food Blogger Challenge. The days from the tenth to the tenth just flies as if it’s nobody’s business! This month, choosing the theme wasn’t tough since within the next one week, we are going to be blessed with the beautiful month of Ramadan. “Allahumma Ballighna Ramadan” is the prayer on every Muslim’s tongue, eagerly waiting to reap the immense benefits and rewards that these 30 days hold. May Allah give us the blessing of living to see the dawn of the month as well grant our souls to go through the month with maximum ibaadah and taqwah… Aameen Ya Rubb…. So coming to this month’s challenge, we were supposed to dig into some Ramadan special across the world. There are certain dishes that are specifically cooked for Ramadan, or cooked more during this month than the others. If I talk about my…
Usbu Al Zainab ~ Crunchy Cheese Fingers
It is the tenth of the month, so time for the Muslim Food Blogger Challenge! Last month we completed a successful one year of this challenge, and here we are now entering into our second year, Alhamdulillah… We decided we must start this year sweet, and I had no other better option to choose than “Arabic Sweets”. The Arab world is filled with decadent, drool-worthy, tough-on-the-waistline options for sweets. Most of the desserts are very rich in every sense – either you have a lot of use of cream, loads of nuts, drizzles of sugar syrup, so on and so forth. But it is definitely an indulgence that you wouldn’t mind having and have trouble with stopping too! They are so tempting that saying a “no” after one bite is really tough. Even though I enjoy them on and off, I haven’t been really successful in making them…
Gothambu Ada ~ Wheat Ada
At times, I am late with my weekend updates, but that’s OK. The purpose of this blog is to keep my memories and feelings alive. Sometimes, I randomly pick up an old post and read through, and really think what actually made me write all those. 🙂 On Wednesday night, I had a call from an Oman number. I picked up and it was my bestie online! She was already on the way and was calling to ask my location. I pinched myself to believe it’s true! A couple of days before that, we had chatted and she was skeptical about them coming. I had already given up myself to destiny, but then that call woke me up again. She arrived, we chatted, we went for a late night drive and slept late. She did go to where they had intended to go on Thursday morning, but Alhamdulillah,…
Kettle Popcorn
I am trying to remember when did I get the idea of “kettle popcorn”. I just don’t remember… seriously! Kettle popcorn is nothing but popcorn with a slight sweetness. It isn’t caramel popcorn, yet not just the normal popcorn. This popcorn seems to have originated from the US, you can read a little bit on Wikipedia but more than that, I don’t know. 😀 I am still wondering about its name. It isn’t made in a kettle, yet, why is it called so? Hehe… The process is just like normal popcorn, just that you add some sugar, which melts and covers over the popcorn giving it a slight sweetness. The sugar actually becomes one reason why you have to be extra careful while popping it, since there are high chances of the sugar getting burned. So do trust your ears and nose while making this popcorn! 😉 Just…
Dates Granola Bars
I was thinking of giving the 3 back-to-back series a break this month as well, like I did in August, but while simply browsing through my drafts, the idea for what I need to do this month hit me and here I am with it! 🙂 Since I have been a vegan for five months, I have always looked at various ideas to satisfy my sweet tooth. I am feeling so amazed that there are actually ways of making sweets without having oodles of butter, eggs and milk in it. I have already shared some bakes on the blog before and will continue sharing more in the future, InShaAllah. Though I have now got back to having milk into my diet, my curiosity to try and make more vegan desserts is definitely not going to lay to rest for any time sooner. So this time it is three back…
Carrot Pola – Malabar Carrot Egg Cake
For the past couple of days, it has been a disturbing time for a lot of bloggers. It was noticed that a very popular food blogger, who got her popularity in just around a year, was copying content from many successful bloggers, who have worked hard for the popularity they have now. None of us are walking encyclopedias – we all learn from each other and from many people around who influence us in many ways. Always give credit and never copy what belongs to somebody else… It hurts when your effort is taken and used by somebody else for their own benefits. Definitely, these incidents are not going to go down much, but hopefully bloggers will be more careful on what they do… Hopefully… 🙁 Coming to today’s post… A pola is, I feel, the easiest Malabari treat. All you need is loads of eggs and any…
Ethapazham Madhuracurry ~ Ripe Plantain Lentil Sweet Curry
As we roll into the last days of this precious month, it is a two fold feeling – the sadness that Ramadan is leaving us this time and the excitement that Eid is coming. Eid-ul-Fitr is Allah’s way of giving us relief from the tough days of Ramadan that we have had, at the same time, for some serious stock taking of how much we have learned from the month and how much of it can we move forward with during the rest of our life. It is a festival where we thank Him for giving us the strength, perseverence and willpower to submit to His Will. However, just like I stated, it is also a time for us to consider continuing the work that we carried out during Ramadan till the next Ramadan, InShaAllah… How easy it is to do, is totally upto us but with His help,…
Croccante ~ Almond Brittle
I am so excited to be a part of the Secret Recipe Club. I have been wanting to join in since I have been seeing posts on some of my favorite blogs, especially Chef in Disguise. Also, this club has been going on for so long, very strongly! Moreover, it gives an opportunity to browse through a lot of new blogs that we are unaware of, opening up our horizons for more escapades in the kitchen. The blogs are divided into three groups, and I am assigned to group C, which is moderated by Debbi, who blogs at Debbi Does Dinner Healthy. The blog I was assigned for this month’s assignment is The Savvy Kitchen, the blog baby of Amy. The blog specializes in low calorie and gluten free recipes. While pouring through the recipe list, I was impressed with the wide variety of recipes on her blog….
Pazhampori ~ Ripe Plaintain Fritters
There is nothing more that I can think of that has to follow the parippu vada, than this pazhampori. Pazhampori is Kerala style ripe plantain fritters. You go to any road side eatery there and you will undoubtedly find this. I think it can easily be crowned the “national four o’clock snack”. Plantains are so frequently available back home that this is the first snack that gets made when a guest suddenly comes in. Prepare the batter, cut, dip and fry. You are promised not to get back even a single leftover in the plate! 😉 Normally, the batter is made with all purpose flour, and some add a little bit of rice flour to give it some crunchiness. I always make pazhampori with a mix of wholewheat, all purpose and rice flours. The idea of adding chickpea flour (besan/ kadalamaavu) was given by my colleague, S. I…
Baked Caramel Popcorn
Today, the climate is amazing. While the kids were gone and I was washing their glasses, I peeped out of the kitchen window to see that it was so dark, that I doubted for a moment whether it was actually time for them to go to school and time for me to leave home! 😉 It was so dark at 6:30 am, so unlike yesterday… Moving out, I see the skies are totally overcast and it had drizzled. As this post goes live, it is totally looking dark outside with really heavy clouds, ready to pour down any moment. I wouldn’t really mind the beautiful weather, but I sincerely hope that I don’t have to go through the same bout of fever for the whole family. InShaAllah, while hoping for the best, thought I must share this one… 🙂 I have already shared the basic popcorn…
Lqeimat | Luqaimat ~ Emirati Yeasted Dumplings
From tomorrow onwards for the next four days, InShaAllah, we will be off from work. Schools and government institutions are already off from today, as they get the Martyr’s Day holiday today, while the private sector gets their holiday shifted to Thursday, thus giving us a relief of a long weekend. A long weekend basically for me means trying new dishes and clicking the maximum I can in the sunlight! 😀 Since the days are shorter now and the sunlight is not as brighter as it is during the summers, it is more of a challenge. Even though I have a lot in my drafts, it has been sometime since I have tried new food, so I am hoping to do some good recipes over this long weekend. We have no outing plans and I actually didn’t want any, as I wanted to just lazy around after having a…
Banana Nutella Puffs
Back to live posting after almost 40 days! I really appreciate all who have been with me and the blog throughout these days, while I enjoyed my fantastic stay back home. I guess I haven’t had such a refreshing break for qutie some time now. The past few weeks were a perfect mix of fun, hectic schedules, relaxation and family time.. Alhamdulillah… As I go by, InShaAllah I will have quite a bit to write and as well share a few recipes that were cooked up from the kitchen there. Though I have so much in my drafts, I may well bypass them for a while to bring the latest one first! 🙂 To kickstart, I thought – why not do a post that is for a linky? A group of relatively young and enthusiastic food bloggers have set up an event called Blogger’s Monthly Fiesta. I got added…
Be My Guest – Raagi/ Muthari Kinnathappam
ThakabalAllah Minna Waminkum – May Allah accept (all good deeds), from you and me! Eid is truly the time for celebration. After giving up on our worldly desires in the morning and being deep into prayers during the nights, the day of Eid is awaited with much fervor. This is not the first time I have had special guests to grace my little space during both the Eids over the past years. Do check out Humi’s yummilicious Butter Chicken, Ambreen’s Marmalade Upside-Down Cake, Lail’s delicious Date Chutney and Aiza’s Apple Struesel Cake. This time, again I have a special person – Shabna, who blogs at Shabbu’s Tasty Kitchen. A Keralite settled in Australia, a mother of three cute kids and the wife of a doctor, she strives to cook homely Keralite meals as well as international cuisine from her kitchen. She has been blogging for the past three…
Eylanchi ~ “Love Letters”
I was wondering why this snack never appeared on the blog! Hmm… this happens to be one of HD’s favourite chai time snack. I don’t know how much he loves it but whenever we have sudden guests and he runs down to the restaurant to get some snacks, he would pick up a few of these. The restaurant ones would be so sweet that the guests wouldn’t eat it much, however once they are gone, he would happily sit and have them. Umma would also make them each time she would run out of ideas for tea snacks. I don’t understand why they have a tag name “Love Letters” – may be it is because of the sweetness hidden inside a normal cover! 🙂 There is another interesting name for this snack in my place – mayyithappam. “Mayyith” actually means dead body… grrr… I would always tell umma not…
Pazham Varattiyathu ~ Roasted Plaintains in Coconut
Having mentioned many times how fussy my kids are when it comes to eating, some dishes really excite me since I know I will not get any negative remarks. Rasha is someone who keeps comparing my cooking to umma’s and keeps telling me that though my food is tasty, it is not upto umma’s cooking. I feel jealous while hearing that comment, but can’t ignore it too! Umma is a person of few dishes which she would make perfectly while I try to incorporate something new into food every now and then. Somehow, I feel the kids are not being able to accept that trend, which is why nowadays I am cooking off my known repertoire and experimenting less on food. Thankfully, I have amassed a lot of drafts in this period, so I can conveniently go on with this particular phase… This is one snack that the kids…