There is something called “warmth”. It is not necessarily only in our own relationships, but it reflects from even pure strangers. Have you felt that? I started experiencing it when I got into blogging and got to meeting a lot of blogger friends. I experience the same while posting stories on my Instagram handle. I never expected total strangers to actually echo with whatever I share. I try to keep it as raw as possible, because life can be very undermining now especially when everybody else’s looks very rosy. I don’t share much of myself but sometimes I do, and it feels good to be instantly recognized in between the crowd. I sincerely appreciate those who come and ask about me, and give me a heads up. It happened at a masjid over the weekend and umma was caught off guard. I couldn’t explain to her how she…
No-Bake Strawberry Cheesecake with Shortbread Crust
The expectation on a food blogger is immense. Each time I have guests at home, somehow they come to know that I run a food blog, and then they expect me to give them some awesome food. 😀 I don’t blame them. Nobody seems to understand that what I post on the blog is not even something that I cooked recently. My family will vouch that they haven’t eaten anything that is appearing now on the blog. I hardly make anything special these days. Life has become such a roller coaster ride. Weekends are as busy and time pressed as weekdays are. At the moment, I am focusing on a few more projects, which hopefully will materialize well, InShaAllah. My baking and cooking has literally taken a backseat. I haven’t lifted up my camera ever since my parents have landed. I actually feel sad when my props and…
Eggless Chocolate Cookie Butter Cake | Chocolate Biscoff Cake
Today’s post for the Bake-a-thon 2018 comes up with a story, but it is a sad one. By the way, can you believe that we are on the second last post for the Bake-a-thon? This time has been super fast. I have totally enjoyed baking, clicking, typing and scheduling the posts for this series with the chocolate theme. I hope all of you loved all the posts that I have done for this series! It has left me drained, literally speaking, but drained in a good way, Alhamdulillah… 🙂 So coming to the story for this cake… I usually bake and take something when I go visit my friends or relatives after a long time. It is like breaking the ice too, right? I always prefer home made goodies instead of buying a box of chocolates. It makes it feel a lot more personalized. I have mentioned before…
Basboosa | Middle Eastern Semolina Cake
This month marks two years of the Muslim Food Blogger’s Challenge. It is an amazing feeling. I have been coordinating this event since the beginning and Alhamdulillah, am satisfied with the way the sisters have taken this challenge in their stride, trying to participate in every challenge possible. This year, we did only 9 challenges, taking a break during the summer months. As was done last year, this year also as part of the anniversary challenge, members are free to choose one of the themes of the previous months and repeat them. Below are the themes we had done over the past year and my posts for each: December 2017 – Arabic sweets January 2018 – Cooking with ingredient: Olives February 2018 – Cooking from cuisine: Bangladesh March 2018 – Breakfast April 2018 – Trying from a blog: This Muslim Girl Bakes May 2018 – Ramadan food from the…
Ghorayeba ~ Arab Shortbread Cookies
I can’t mention how relieved I am. My blogging mojo has just not picked up as much as I would have loved. Last year Ramadan, if I filled my drafts with as much as clicks I could take before the sunshine vanishes, this year, I have done nothing. My blog is moving with drafts that I had clicked last Ramadan – I am being very honest here! This Ramadan, I have been time tight and locked. Over and above that, I have no mood to click anything new or cook anything new. I am sure, this too shall pass… So when I put up the Muslim Food Blogger challenge post for this month, which is based on the theme “Eid Specials from Around the World”, I searched up a bit and pinned up on my kitchen notice board the easiest cookie recipe in the world! But I procrastinated…
Sticky Date Flapjacks
The dates for the MFB challenge seems to be coming one after the other at the blink of an eye! Before I even realize, I am mostly skittling through to cook and finish the post for the challenge. You can see the previous challenge posts here. This month, our challenge was to cook from a food blog run by a Muslimah and this month, we chose “This Muslim Girl Bakes“. This is one of my favorite blogs to gawk at. She has a very impressive Instagram presence as well. Apart from Pakistani delicacies, she posts a lot of lovely bakes that you can resist. Most of her posts are accompanied by step by step pictures, followed by a lot of pictures of the final product itself. I had a hard time trying to select one recipe from her blog. I have already tried her Pakistani Chicken Pulao and…
Vegan Chocolate Beetroot Muffins
Since I had the BM posts scheduled, I haven’t posted any happenings in my life in the past week. 🙂 I wouldn’t talk about the climate, as it makes me sad but let me talk about something else that made me really happy over this week. The last weekend, on Saturday, we all went for a trip to Global Village. A trip of bloggers was in pipeline from last year, but it took time to materialize and finally the last Saturday, we made it happen. Huma was our main guide and Priya, Zerin, Anamika, Jaleelakka, Fajee and our new UAE-ian Prema joined us for a little fun. We roamed for close to five hours, prop hunted, picked up interesting stuff, watched a few shows, chatted and ate through some of the delicacies. I have always gone to GV before but this time, the experience was quite different. Huma is…
Vegan Raspberry Muffins
My interest towards vegan baking started only when I was forced to go vegan due to medications last year around April for a period of six months. I sometimes wonder whether I would have discovered vegan baking otherwise. Those six months made me realise how tough it is for vegans to even have something from outside. I used to get frustrated at the lack of options and how I would helplessly look at the girls while they enjoy their slice of cake or their bowl of pudding. There would be eggless options, but not vegan options. Thankfully, slowly things are changing, but still vegan options are still mighty expensive in this part of the world. It is easier to make them and eat them at home rather than buy them! Hehe… So for today’s Bake-a-thon post, these vegan muffins studded with raspberries is what I am going to…
Eggless Chocolate Cake | Condensed Milk Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Icing
I was wondering if I should go on with the Bake-a-thon 2017 without a chocolate cake recipe and my mind said, NO! 😀 I had initially chosen to feature the Orange Almond Brownies while I was deciding which posts I should put in. Then my eyes fell on this one. One of the cakes that I made to gift my fellow bloggers while I went to see them and I totally enjoyed clicking them too. The time I clicked, I had left behind only one slice at home which disappeared from the counter top upon return! You can imagine the disappointment on the girls’ face once we returned back home. We finally traced the culprit, it was none other than B! 😀 So to cover up the disappointment, I had to make this cake one more time. So why was the cake delayed? I was…
Eggless Banana Coconut Bread
While doing a post for the Bake-a-thon 2017, I shouldn’t be leaving a banana bake! Bananas are my favorite fruit to bake with. There are so many different types of banana breads and cakes already on the blog and I feel it is never enough. I just want to keep exploring more and more. 😀 Nowadays, I tend to buy just enough bananas to eat so that I am not tempted to bake! Hehe… Once I happened to chance upon this recipe and since it had coconut in it, I had to try it. This is not the first time I have baked with the banana coconut combination – this crumb cake with the same combination was a killer that I am considering baking this one really soon, hopefully with wholemeal! So I was sure this one would be an amazing back too… I guess you can see it…
Vegan Chocolate Banana Bread
Can you believe October is ending? Then we will have just have two months left to complete this year. Each year seems to be passing on faster than the previous. Actually, it feels scary too. That we are getting older by the minute, we are moving faster towards the ultimate end… Everyday when I lie down, I wonder what I have done that day to make it special. Maybe it was just a mad rush of traffic, work, gym and home… with not even little time to read the Quran, to listen to it, talk to my kids properly, call my parents, even chat openly with HD… “Man is created hasty…” (Surah Al-Anbiya: start of verse 37) How many times have we forgotten that there is much more than the life in this world? 🙁 I am guilty of the same, day in and day out. Trying to balance…
Eggless Chocolate Tiramisu
After my 1000th post on the blog, I had stopped counting my posts. WP does tell me how many posts I am on now, but unlike before it doesn’t excite me anymore. I have enough to cover and I would like to go on till I am able to, without really bothering the numbers. But today, there is one reason why I am really excited. I was randomly going through the number of “my recipes” a couple of weeks ago and I noticed that it was almost reaching 1000! Seriously? I really can’t believe the number myself… And today, with this post, the blog hits 1K recipes! I was never a cook enthusiast… Sure, I love to eat and a good meal satisfies me like anything else. I love sweets that are not high on sugar and enjoyable. I love good company with food. That is basically me….
Ultimate Vegan Brownies
After the Avocado Brownies and the Cream Cheese Brownies, here comes the third brownie under the theme “Let Them Eat Brownies” in the Blogging Marathon #78. I had to choose to share a vegan brownie, since this is one area that I am loving to bake. Baking a cake or a brownie without any diary or eggs is a challenge in itself. Making it successful is very tricky too. You can browse through the vegan bakes on the blog here. While craving for brownies, I landed up on this link which called it the “ultimate” vegan brownie. The title itself was so tempting for me to get moving on with it. The vegan avocado brownie on the blog had a really fudge like texture, which was missing in this brownie, but would tick all the right buttons for sweet tooths who like more cake like brownies, just like…
Vegan Banana Chia Biscoff Muffins
I don’t know if I really love Biscoff. If you ask me, I would say a “no”. But I don’t hate it, I just like it. 😀 Even though I love sweets, I find Biscoff and its Lotus biscuits overwhelmingly sweet. I can’t go beyond one little spoon of Biscoff or two little biscuits at the same time. But I can vouch for one thing – that both these ingredients make amazing desserts! If you love Biscoff, then here are a few recipes on the blog that you could try: Cookie Batter Granola Biscoff Almond Milk Pops Biscoff White Hot Chocolate Vegan Biscoff Cheesecake I am now going to add one more to the list… 😉 These vegan banana muffins are spiked with Biscoff with an added crunch and goodness of chia seeds. Just like all the banana bakes I have made and cherished, I ended up eating…
Eggless Apricot White Chocolate Scones
Eid just came and went. I am tired to the bones, I must say but in a good way. The lack of sleep is getting onto me, but Alhamdulillah, no complaints. On Saturday night, as soon as Eid was declared, I got to making chicken cutlets for our Eid breakfast at my aunt’s place, where my cousins did the Ela Ada. It was a bit of a pandemonium, since the mix I made for the cutlets were too little. Fortunately, I was able to whip up an extra small batch to make a decent amount of cutlets that everybody could enjoy. I also got to making some awesome cinnamon rolls for my cousins, which were totally wiped out. I will be making them again for the blog, since surprisingly HD seemed to enjoy them! After our prayers at the Eidgah and breakfast at aunt’s place, I quickly got to…