Happy Earth Day!!!

Happy Birthday Dear Earth!!


For how long I have been meant to tell you this but never did… better late than never…

Thank you for giving us those beautiful flowers every spring.
Thank you for giving us those yummilicious and healthy fruits and vegetables.
Thank you for making our galaxy look beautiful with your presence.
Thank you for making the rain as you are indirectly involved in the process.
Thank you for giving us lots of minerals that we can use to make our lives easier.
Thank you for giving us a place to live in this universe.

There are times when we don’t appreciate you.

Most time than not, we don’t realize how important you are to our daily lives.
You have shown your anger at us through earthquakes, volcano eruptions, and tsunamis.
Your anger is just and the Humans owe you big time.
I am sure as generations pass by, they will be more aware of it than we are at this time.

I just wanted to tell you how amazing you are and am very thankful to you for who you are. And to teach us Humans a great lesson in life – to give without expecting anything in return.

Above all, I Thank you Allah (swt), for making the earth for us and making it so beautiful and accessible and helpful for the mankind. More often than not, I forget to Thank you as well. I take this opportunity to Thank You for what have given me in this life, and I hope and pray that rewards for me in the life hereafter are as great, so long as I believe in You and the messenger Mohammad (S.A.W) and I pray for you and none other.

Picture Credit: Google Images for Earth Day.

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Break due to Heavy Workload!!!

I will not be able to post any of my recipes and bore you guys till April 2011 due to extensively heavy workload... I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause... :(

-Az

Picture Credits: Google Image Search on "Heavy workload".

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Our Veggie Garden

Few months ago, I had shared with you all that my younger brother JK has a green thumb. He started gardening in our back yard and I will have to admit that this was THE smartest thing that he ever did.

Not only that we had lots of veggies growing right in our backyard, but I also realized that gardening brings inner peace and works wonder in controlling the stress. I realized that any kind of activity that you do, which includes nature, will help you grow the inner peace in you and will moralize you in a great way. Some examples are gardening, bird watching, picnic, going to beach, watching a stream of water flow by (not man-made ones, but the natural ones).. so forth and so on... The list is too long to fit it in one post :)... Thanks Allah (swt) for all these beautiful gifts!!

Unfortunately, due to the extreme cold weather, our precious little garden is no more, but I have the pictures and tons of tomatoes left from the season. We had lots and lots of tomatoes and eggplants. We ended up sharing this with a lot of our family-friends and whatever we had left, ended up in the deep freezer. I have about 6 big Ziploc bags filled with tomatoes. I think we will be good till mid to late April!!

Here are some snaps for you to enjoy as well :)

Der se aaye, durust aaye (Better late than never) - We had to wait forever, for these delicious devils to grow...

 Another one, and I sure put it to good use in summer by making this delicious Watermelon Juice...

Cute Little Eggplant...

These eggplants grew much bigger than this one... I actually had never seen these kinds (by size and design) of eggplants before.

The regular eggplants.

Carrots - These didn't really came out that great though... next time we will be careful!

 Green Bell Pepper

Green Chilies - I made these delicious Bhajiyas out of these...

The ugly tomato - so since, everything was organic, these tomatoes that we grew were called "Ugly Tomatoes" since they all had some kind of scratch on them...

The non-ugly tomatoes - I made this delicious chutney out of these...

 Some more Ugly Tomatoes

Green Onions...

A really good friend of mine had gifted this rose plant to me in 2009 Fall. I planted in hopes that it will survive for at-least one month. It didn't but then in 2010 Summer - It grew again, not only grew but also blossomed with many rose flowers which I used to decorate my house for Eid... Thank you so much A...

Fresh mint leaves - Doesn't it feel like heaven when you can just go out and pick up fresh veggies and mint leave whenever you want?!?! It sure does dear... These were grown by the previous owner. They die every Fall and come back to life every Spring...

Some more snaps of fresh mint leaves...

This is Watermelon Vine - This one kept getting bigger and bigger. It climbed and spread all over the places. JK did a really good job in managing this. We believe it grew at-least 9 to 10 inches if not more. It mothered four watermelons for us...



ENJOY!!!

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Award; What's in your refrigerator Event; & Gardening

Hello Friends,

I got my third award from Jay of Tasty Appetite for participating in her "I Love My Dad" event... Thank you Jay!! It was so nice of her and the roundup for the event is great!! You can check it out here...

The award comes with a rule, you can share it with three of your blogger friends, highlighting why you like them best. The intention is to spread the message of love from our heart..!

Blogging is so much fun... It makes you think, explore, talk to people you have never met or seen, be creative, be honest and ethical (by not copy-catting (is that even a word) others recipe and if you do give them full credit).. and a lot more...

I don't see myself as creative as some of my fellow blogger friends are... Here are three of my fellow bloggers whom I like the best (not in any order) and the reason why:

Cool Lassi(e) of Pan Gravy Kadai Curry - CL always comes up with these delicious, colorful, and yummy fingerfoods... When I think of finger food the only thing that comes to my mind is pani-puri... I am never able to think outside the pani-puri :), but CL is very talented when it comes to that... check out her blog to find out more...

Umm Mymoonah of Taste of Pearl City - Mymoonah's entries will really make you feel that you are in the Pearl City!!! The other thing that really fascinates me about her is that she blogs religiously!! You will see her yummilicious entries pretty much everyday or every other day and sometimes she blogs up to three entries in a day... Don't know how she does it but this tells me one thing about her is that she is really good in time management and fulfills her commitment... She recently posted her 200th post and is also hosting a giveaway - do check it out..

Namitha and Sunitha of Collaborative Curry - I have no words to explain expertise of these two talented ladies!! Not only do they post mouthwatering recipes but they also post mouthwatering pictures of their entries... If we were to held a competition on best food photography I have no doubt that they will surely be ranked #1 and me probably the last :)... You have to see it to believe it... check out their blog!!

Divya of Dil Se.. is hosting Show Me Your Refrigerator Event : Again one of the very talented fellow blogger who thinks outside the box!!! Here is what I have on my Refrigerator... 

I basically have five magnets which has some great phrases... a magnetic shopping list, and a magnetic board which my younger brother, JK, got yesterday... and left me a message, "Didi, make good food for me!!!" and my response up in the corner, "When I make good food you are never around!"... :)

Speaking of my younger brother JK, this year we found out that he has a green thumb... we have a pretty big space in our yard and he has put it to good use this year. He planted tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, green bell peppers, green chilies, watermelon, onions, and garlic... Here are some snaps...

Our Yard

Green Chilies

Tiny little bell pepper

Tomatoes

Cucumber

More Cucumbers

Eggplant (no eggplant though, Still waiting...)

Watermelon... (idk, if we will get one this year or not but JK still tried)...

Enjoy your weekend friends!!!!

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My 50th Post!!!!! - Carrot Cake for Celebration!!!

I am super-duper excited today... as this is my 50th post!!! I never thought that I would reach this point given all the work load that I have to deal with on a daily basis. The biggest reason behind this achievement is all the encouragement that I get from reading your comments... I learned a lot in these few months from a lot of my fellow bloggers... thank you so much for stopping by a leaving your encouraging comments. I truly appreciate it!!!

I initially started this blog just to get away from my routine life... but as time passed by this became my passion... every time I cook something I would ask my hubby AG like 100 times as to how it is and if he thinks my viewers/friends would like it or not... He had been very supportive throughout our lives together - be it a CPA exam or a food blog :). I am so grateful to Allah (SWT) for giving such a good hubby!!

I am celebrating this occasion with a Carrot Cake recipe. This is my first cake ever, and as you can see, I am not so good at decorating it. I made this cake for my niece's birthday. You can find out more about her here. While decorating the cake, I never realized that the word “Birthday” is this long. I don’t know how the bakers do it… what I know right now is that decorating a cake is not my cup of tea… :)

Ingredients:
For Cake
1. Eight medium carrots – grated
2. One and a half sticks unsalted butter – softened
3. Half a cup corn oil
4. One cup sugar
5. Four eggs
6. A pinch of salt
7. Half a cup raisins
8. Half a cup chopped walnuts
9. Half a cup shredded coconut
10. Two tsp cinnamon powder
11. One tsp vanilla extract
12. Half tsp baking powder
13. Half tsp baking soda
14. Two cups all purpose flour

For Frosting

1. 16oz. Philadelphia Cream Cheese - softened
2. One cup confectioners’ sugar
3. Half stick unsalted butter – softened
4. Half tsp vanilla extract

Process:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 9x13 inch pans.
2. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, oil, butter, flour and sugar.
3. Mix in baking powder, baking soda, vanilla extract and cinnamon powder.
4. Fold in carrots, walnuts, raisins and shredded coconut.
5. Pour into the two prepped pans (step 1).
6. Bake for 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
7. Let it cool in a pan for 10 minutes. Then turnout on a wired rack and cool completely.
8. In the meanwhile, prepare the frosting by beating all the ingredients in a medium bowl.
9. Once cool, place one of the cake on a stand. Spread the frosting and carefully place the second cake on top of it.
10. Carefully spread the frosting on the entire cake and decorate as you wish or leave it the way it.
11. Refrigerate it for about 15-20 minutes before serving.

NOTE: If you have better idea or way to decorate it please do so, as I said earlier this is not my cup of tea.

ENJOY!!!!

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Masala Papad, Goodies from India and Mehendi Designs

One more great weekend with the family which left me relaxed, comforting, happy, satisfied and much more ..... well let's just say that it made me feel so good and so thankful to Allah for a wonderful family that I have!!!! I hope and pray that this kind of happiness stays with us and everyone else, as well... Amen...

At times, I always wonder what is the purpose of this life... and its weekends like this that makes me realize that we are not in this world just to live, work, have family, and then die... we are here to make others happy, help others out, love each other, make everyone laugh, share our happiness and sorrows with others and much more... as they say, "Laugh as much as you breathe and love as long as you live"....

Ok... enough of philosophy now... let's get back to real life... :)

My Dad came back from India last week and brought a lot of goodies with him... My Dad is big on giving gifts to others and I think this is one of his best qualities... resulting in him buying 12 Kgs of Mithais (Indian Sweet) from India for everyone at work and his close friends... He also bought some mouth watering savory snacks for us... Here are some snaps of what he brought from India...

Mansuri Halwa House - Pineapple Halwa

Pineapple Halwa

BansiLal Pedawala - Burfi

Burfi

Chocolate Burfi

Snacks

More Snacks

Refrigerator filled with Mithai Boxes

Coming to the today's recipe... The very first time I went on a date with my fiance (now husband - AG)... I had this Masala Papad as a starter... I instantly fell in love with it and it always reminds me of our good old days :)

Ingredients:

• A quarter of Onion - finely chopped.
• A quarter of tomato - finely chopped
• 1/2 tsp chaat masala
• Two strings of fresh coriander - finely chopped.
• One Lijjat Papad

Process:

Microwave the papad for about one minute (varies depending on microwave); Sprinkle onions, tomatoes, coriander and chaat masala; serve immediately!

I also put on some mehendi (my other passion besides food) over the weekend... Here are some snaps for you...

ENJOY!!!

Photo Credit: Google Images for Lijjat Papad

Quote Source: Unknow.

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