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Any One Can Cook: Series30

Hello Foodies,

Hope you all had a fabulous weekend, welcome back to another successful series of Any One Can Cook. I sincerely thank everyone who link your wonderful recipes and made the event a successful one.  Here are the three selected recipes from last week series.
Fruit and Cream by Simple, Sweet N Savoury

Spiceless Poha by Sabdha's Kitchen

Berry Crumbles by Shirley's Luxury Haven


Congratulations! to the selected recipes. 
If you have any recipes easy to cook, link to the event and get the chance of winning the award and gift.
If you are a new reader to this event please check the rules here

Archived recipes can be sent just by giving a link to the event in your post. Also don't forget to give a link about the event in your post.
If you find any trouble in linking your recipe please mail me your recipe link to ayeesha.riaz@googlemail.com.

The linky will be opened from Monday- Friday( till midnight 12) according to Europe- Greenwich Mean Time


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Karee Vadai (Meat and Lentil Fritter) My Guest Post on Cooking Varieties


This recipe is my guest post on Cooking Varieties.  Actually I was supposed to do this long back ago with any recipe using Winter Squash, since it was really just the time we moved to India, I couldn't make it.  Ms.Wan was really kind and patience with me, I really appreciate that.
Finally when I was ready to do the post, it was just a couple of days before Ramadhan, so I decided to make some Iftar related recipes, so this kari vadai (meat and lentil fritters).  Thank you Ms.Wan for giving me this wonderful opportunity.

Kari Vadai is nothing but fritters made with fritters and lentils.  I have used here Chana dhal which is nothing but yellow split pea.  You can find this in any Indian grocery stores.  This is something which we have for our Iftar with Kanji (Soup).  This vadai can be prepared with uncooked meat also, but I cooked the meat and then used for fritters, since it reduces the cooking time for vadai, aslo you don't have to worry whether the inside is cooked or not and your oil doesn't get spoiled with all the meat fat. Hope you all enjoy this recipe

Preparation Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
Make 15 to 20 vadai's

Ingredients:
Chana dhal (Yellow Split Pea) - 150 g
Boneless lamb- 150 g
Onion- 1 small sized finely chopped
Ginger garlic paste- 2 tsp
Cumin seeds- 1 tsp
Fennel seeds- 1 tsp
Chilli powder- 1 tsp
Garam masala- 1 tsp
Turmeric powder- 1/2 tsp
Coriander leaves- 1 tbsp finely chopped
Lemon juice- 1/2 tbsp
Salt as required
Oil for frying

Method:
Soak the chana dhal in water for 2 hours.  Finely chop the lamb pieces and marinate with turmeric, lemon juice, salt and 1/2 tsp of garam masala.  Add oil in a pan, add the meat pieces  and cook  until the meat is completed cooked.   Now grind the chana dhal by adding very little water into a thick coarse paste.  Once the dhal looks coarsely ground, add the meat and grind it again.  Meat should also look like coarse pieces in the dhal.  Now add the spices, salt, onion, chopped coriander leaves and ginger garlic paste.  Mix it well.  Heat oil in a pan to shallow fry, once the oil is hot enough to fry, make patties out of the mixture and drop it in hot oil, keep the flame in medium and cook it on both sides until it looks golden brown in colour.  Serve the hot vadai's with green chutney.


Note:
 To check the oil is hot enough, drop a small amount of mixture in the oil, if it comes bubbling up immediately then the oil is ready to fry.
Also if your mixture doen't hold well and it's too crumbly, add some gramflour or all purpose flour to hold the mixture.

Sending this to Joy From Fasting to Feasting, Iftar Nights, Serve it Only Fried, CC-Appetizers 









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Rose Apple Muffin - Sweet Punch for August 2011

Hello Foodies,

 Okey I'm already a bit late for Sweet Punch this month, so I tried to post it today as early as possible.  This month our Sweet Punch team has chosen Strawberry Banana Muffin from Joy of Baking.  Yes it's Strawberry Banana Muffin, after looking out for strawberries a month, I gave up and thought will use cherries.
Finally I found that cherries season also finished.  I couldn't think of anything and decided to seek help with Sweet Punch.  Divya suggested me to use apple or mango, so finally it's Apple and Banana Muffin.  About these apple petals (hope it looks so ;-) ) on top, couple of days back, I remember one of  our fellow bloggers made these with a different muffin recipe.  Aw!  I have such a poor memory that I couldn't remember the person, sorry dear...

Those elegant shape immediately caught my attention, so I made those apple petals with these muffin.  Coming to the texture of the muffin, this is so great,  I loved it.  Do try it at home and enjoy with a cup of tea or even as dessert with some custard.

Preparation Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 20-25 minutes
Makes 6 Muffins

Ingredients:
All purpose flour- 150 g
Sugar- 50 g
Egg- 1
Banana- 1(mashed)
Apple- 1 1/2
Vanilla essence- 1 tsp
Butter- 50 g (melted)
Baking Powder- 1 tsp
Bicarbonate of soda- 1/4 tsp
Lemon juice- a squeeze

Method:
Take half of the apple, peel and chop it.  Add a knob of butter in a pan, add the chop apples and cook it until softened. Let it cool down for a while.  Take the whole apple and slice it finely with skin.  Add a knob of butter to the pan, add the sliced apples and cook until it looks soft, add a squeeze of lemon juice and take it off from heat.
Sift the flour, baking powder and soda in a large bowl, add the sugar to this mixture and mix well. Add the chopped and cooked apples to the flour mixture and mix it well to coat the apples with flour mixture. Beat the eggs, vanilla essence and banana.  Add the melted butter to it and mix it again.  Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir just to combine, do not overmix it, you might result in hard texture muffin.
Preheat the oven to 180 degree Celsius.  Grease the muffin tray with butter.  Spoon the mixture into the tray.  Now comes the fun part, start making the floral shapes on top.  You can either make the floralshapes separately in a plate and then keep it on top of the muffin mixture or start arranging them in the mixture itself.  If you arrange them in the mixture itself, it bind well with the texture , but your hands get messy and bit tough.  When you arrange it on the plate and then if you fix it, it's quite easy job, but it stands out separately.
Right to make it, just take the sliced and cooked apples and start forming it like rose petals by gently folding them.  Place it on top of the mixture.  Bake the muffins in the preheated oven for 20- 25 minutes.  Carefully insert a skewer on the side to check if it's cooked.  Remove it from the oven, let it cool down for 5 minutes in the cooling rack.  Serve it while they are still warm.

Note:
If you find the floral shapes on top are bit tough, you can skip that process and make just the muffin, which is delicious on it's own.

Sending this to Joy from Fasting to Feasting and Iftar Nights

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Any One Can Cook : Series 29

Hello Foodies,

Hope everyone had a nice weekend, I sincerely thank everyone who support this event by linking their recipe, thank you so much.  The three selected recipes from last week series.
Mixed Nut Burfi from Tamalapaku

Cheese Flowers by Ramya's Recipe

Peanut Chutney Powder by  UK Rasoi


If you have any recipes easy to cook, link to the event and get the chance of winning the award and gift.
If you are a new reader to this event please check the rules here

Archived recipes can be sent just by giving a link to the event in your post. Also don't forget to give a link about the event in your post.
If you find any trouble in linking your recipe please mail me your recipe link to ayeesha.riaz@googlemail.com.

The linky will be opened from Monday- Friday( till midnight 12) according to Europe- Greenwich Mean Time
reade more... Résuméabuiyad

Neythili Meen Aviyal (Anchovies in Coconut based Gravy)

Neythili or Anchovies are one of the food which I enjoyed the most in my childhood.  Whenever I visit my grandma's place or aunt's place, these anchovies are must in their regular diet.  Even though when I was not a big fan of fish in my childhood, I used to love these gravies even still now.
After a very long time, I had these anchovies, that too prepared by me.  Last week when I got these, the immediate thing which I done was called my mom and asked for the recipe. Except the cleaning part of the fish, the recipe by itself is quite easy. If you can get cleaned fish directly, then that makes your life much more easier . I have used raw mango for this recipe, if you couldn't find raw mango, you can also replace it with tomatoes.  Try this recipe, I'm sure you'll love it.


Preparation Time: 10 minutes (excluding cleaning the fish)
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
Serves 4

Ingredients:
Neythili or Anchovies- 500 g
Shallots- 6 finely chopped
Raw mango- 2 small sized (sliced)
Garlic- 4 pods
Grated coconut-  5 tbsp
Green chilly- 2
Turmeric powder- 1 tsp
Chilly powder- 1 tsp
Cumin powder- 1/2 tsp
Mustard  seeds- 1 tsp
Fenugreek seeds- 1/2 tsp
Curry leaves- 10 leaves
Oil- 1 tbsp
Salt as required

Method:
Remove the head and tail part of the anchovies and clean it well in water.  Grind together coconut, turmeric and chilly powder by adding little water.  Heat oil in a pan or kadai,  add mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, curry leaves, garlic pods and green chillies.  Then add the chopped shallots and saute it for 2 to 3 minutes until it looks translucent. Now add the ground coconut mixture, sliced raw mango and the fish.  Add very little water to this and salt as per taste.  Give it a gentle stir, without breaking the fish.  Cover the pan with a lid and cook for about 20 minutes.  Then open the lid and cook for further few minutes, until the water gets dried out completely.  In the middle of cooking give it a gentle stir.  Once the water gets dried out completely, take it off from heat and serve it with plain rice.

Sending this to Kerala Kitchen Event

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Ramadhan Mubarak



   Ramadhan Mubarak to muslims all over the world.
"Ramadhan is the (month)  in which the Quran was sent down , as a guide to the mankind and a clear guidance and judgement( so that mankind will distinguish from the right and wrong)."TMQ( 2:185)


Allah' s Messenger ( peace be upon him) said: Whenever you sight the new moon( of the month of Ramadhan) observe fast, and when you sight it( the new moon of Shawwal) break it, and if the sky is cloudy for you, then observe fast for thirty days.( muslim)
Allah's Apostle said, " When the month of Ramadhan starts, the gates of heaven are opened and gates of hell are close and the devils are chained."( Bukhari)
Narrated by Abu Huraira(r.a): The Prophet said:" ..... whoever fasts during the month of  Ramadhan out of sincere faith and hoping to attain Allah's rewards, then all his past sins will be forgiven."( Bukhari)
The Messenger of Allah ( peace be upon him) addressed his companions on the last day of Shaban, saying," Oh people! A great month has come over you; a blessed month; a month in which a night better than thousand months; month in which Allah has made it compulsory upon you to fast by day, and voluntary to pray by night.  Whoever draws nearer( to Allah) by performing any of the (optional) good deeds  in this month shall receive the same reward as performing an obligatory deed at any other time, and whoever discharges an obligatory deed in this month shall receive the reward of performing seventy obligations at any other time. It is the month of patience and the reward of patience is heaven. It is the month of charity , and a month in which  a believer's sustenance is increased. Whoever gives food to a fasting person to break his fast, shall have his sins forgiven, and he will be saved from the Fire of Hell, and he shall have the same reward  as the fasting person, without believer's reward being diminished at all." ( Narrated by Ibn Khuzaymah).

Ramadhan is the month in which Allah(swt) covers you with his blessings, sends down  Mercy, decreases sins and answers prayers. So show Allah( swt) the goodness from yourselves, for the unfortunate one is he who is deprived in (this month) of the mercy of Allah.
"Fasting is the shield  with which a servant protects himself from the Fire" ( Ahmad)
On the Day Of Judgement" Fasting will say: O My Lord I prevented him from food and desires so accept my intercession for him." ( Ahmad, al- Haakim, Hasan).

In this holy month of Ramadhan let's get closer to Allah(swt) by doing good deeds and praising Allah the Almighty.  One more thing when it comes to Ramadhan, most of the women spend a lot of time in kitchen like planning for get together, inviting guests and making special things for Iftar.  Although we get lots of reward in cooking for our friends and family, we should not forget to spend our time for Allah (swt).   The time between Asr and Magrib is the best time to be in Dhikr and seek more, also that's the peak time for us to cook for Iftar.  So sisters plan your Iftar earlier with some simple menu or something which you can make it ahead and warm it  later.  I have given a sample menu for 7 days, along with that links from last year Iftar Moments with 30 day menu plan .  This is just a sample menu, along with this include plenty of fruits and salads in your diet.
Here goes the menu

Day 1
Starter -Oats and 
Sago Kanji

Starter - Uzunda
Vadai

Main - Polenta Idli

Main - Vada
 Curry

Dessert -Blackberry
Pudding


Day 2
Starter - Vegetable 
Cutlet
Main-Haleem Main - Manakish

Main -Tandoori
Chicken

Dessert - Walnut and
Almond Kheer


Day 3
Starter - Turkish
Lentil Soup

Starter - Turkish
Pide

Main - Mediterranean
Kebabs

Dessert - Semolina
Syrup Cake


Day 4
Starter - Wholewheat
Kanji 

Main- Garlic
and Coriander
Naan
Main - Butter Chicken

Beverages - Nongu
Paal



Day 5
Starter - Vegetable
Soup 

Main - Broccoli
Rice

Main - Chicken
Kurma

Dessert-Carrot
and Almond
Milk




Day 6
Starter - Morrocan
Harira

Main- Garlic
Rolls

Main -Baba Ganoush

Dessert - Baklava


Day 7
Starter - Falafels

Starter - Carrot
and Paneer Paratha

Main - Kethal
Chicken

Dessert -Fruit salad



Also for more ideas refer these links
Iftar Moments Hijri 1431- Roundup 1
                                         Roundup 2
                                         Roundup 3







Ramadhan Kareem!!!






















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