April 19th Chilli Tomatoes birthday

We actually left the house to buy my lining which was for the sleeves of a pink suit and the full kameez of 4 suits.
Then we headed over to where the girls went the day before. I had imagined a big shop, instead it was tons of little shops like most of the shopping areas I had seen around here. The guy we could get a discount from owned many different shops, we eventually found one and sat there for so long looking at different fabrics and patterns. In the end I got 5 suits (kameez and trousers) 1 skirt, 2 kameez's and 3 shaylas :D happy buny I was!! I felt sorry for husband, poor little lamb spent part of his birthday sat around looking at ladies fabrics but we got him some nice white fabric for a shirt too. I also realised when we were there that it wasnt just the women in my family who pull their duputta's over there heads when they hear the adhan.. it seems to be a general thing for those who dont normally wear a scarf.
When we eventually left it was already dark and we were all hungry, so we decided to try Papa Johns. Me and Chilli took a rickshaw there while everyone else went to pick up Abu. We got there to find it closed but there was a Pizza Hut next door so we settled there and waited for everyone else. We waited so long, even ordered some snacks because we were so hungry. Eventually they turned up, we ordered but then bhai and A disappeared. They came back with a cake and party hat for hubby, the cake even had candles and 'happy birthday Chilli' written on the cake. It was a nice surprise for him and he truly was taken back as they dont normally celebrate birthdays, I think because hes been away for so long it was just something they wanted to do.
After food we went out for ice-cream, all of us in one car!! 7 and a half people ;) was funny. Was good to spend time all of us together without talk of bhai and his relationship issues. Although L wasnt happy for the whole time because she wanted a McFlurry ;)

The rickshaw ride

The birthday boy :)

Dessert time :)

Eid post

Sorry, I just realised I posted an Eid update on my private blog with photos and didnt write anything here.. so here goes
"yay.. Eid al-adha started, and its the first Eid me and hubby have actually spent the whole day together. Eid al-adha 2009 my mum was over and I was in Oxford helping her sort through my recently departed uncles possessions (this was when she first met hubby) Eid al-fitr 2010 I had just started my new job and couldnt take the day off :( 
so this was our first official Eid together and we had a brilliant day masha'Allah. We woke up early, got ready and headed off to the masjid together, prayed Eid salah and then walked back.. I really have to learn more about sunnahs to do at Eid, well both of us do really.. it took me awhile to convince hubby that we should walk a difference way home, even though it meant a direction where we would see noone. Anyways, we did ;) got home, took more photos and had tea and sheermal then decided to go out for breakfast and pick up a few groceries while we were out. We drove to the area we wanted to go to in search of Halwa Poori for the husband... alas we came away with none and decided to come back later on for dosa and dessert :D so we left the area and headed home for a little bit. Hubby spoke to family in Pakistan who arent celebrating until today :( which kind of sucks really, but then we decided to go out to eat sooner rather than later as we were walking there and back. So off we went.. and here are some photos for you

Dosa menu, well the menu but we went for dosa

tin 'glasses' I didnt dare ;)

he managed to get some meat bless him

My spicy potato masala dosa, was yummy!!

strange garlic bread

yup, thats how yummy!!!

 

just a few ice cream choices

dont even ask about cake choices, I zoomed in to take the picture but couldnt face the choices if I went any closer

Finished Eid dishes

Ending of my dosa

alhamdulillah we had a great day, I pray you all did as well... here is a photo of my finished dish at the end of our Eid meal out alhamdulillah

Bread

I've been meaning to make this for so long now since trying them awhile ago. I bought pastry recently to make the cinnamon rolls, on the packaging was a recipe for salmon en croute that I wanted to try. It needed spinach, so I thought why not try making the rolls too. Hubby has been asking since the last try. So today I used my time fairly wisely and made the rolls. Here's a beginning shot, I'll post an after shot when I can get on the computer insha'Allah

This is the after shot :) we still havent tried them yet, so I will let you know and if you would like the recipe you can find it here on my dear sister in Islam's blog. Enjoy and if you do try them yourself please let me know :) I made a few adjustments to her recipe as she isnt the best when it comes to writing down ;) I added half a 450g of ricotta cheese (albeit at the wrong time) add the spinach and cheese into the flour with the sun dried tomatoes.
Ammena
Via BlogPress on her pretty cute iPhone

Cinnamon rolls

This morning I made cinnamon rolls for hubby :) Check out the photos and recipe... no special equipment needed, very quick and easy masha'Allah.

Take 50g caster sugar and 2 tsp ground cinnamon, mix together in a small bowl

Roll out 250g ready made puff pastry to an 8 inch square, sprinkle half of the sugar mixture over the square

Roll out the pastry to press in the sugar, making a 10 inch square. Brush with a beaten egg and sprinkle the rest of the sugar mixture over the area.

Loosely roll the pastry into a log, use the egg to secure the edge in place. Using a sharp knife cut the log into small sections

Place onto a greased baking sheet and place in a preheated oven at 220 degrees Celsius for about ten minutes, until golden and crisp

ENJOY :) Iftar isn't for another five hours, so I'll let you know how they are then ;)

Iftar cooking

Final product: Pakoras

Hubbies vegetable pakoras.... batter, then veggies, then final product

Ammenas falafels... yummy

Final iftar food, vegetarian sausage rolls, falafel and vegetable pakoras :) yummy yummy

Cupcake Storage

I figure I will get more chance of a reply from blogger than from the friends who I know dont do cupcake stuff on Facebook.

So the thing is, my friend is making the cupcakes for my wedding insha'Allah, at the moment Im thinking I will be picking them up the Sunday evening for the wedding on the Monday. So will they keep? Whats the best way to store them? Anyone??

Please and Thank you in advance

Coconut biscuit recipe

I have previously given this out to a sister but it was on facebook and not as public so here goes.
Recipe makes about 16 biscuits
Oven 180 degrees celcius
100g shredded/ dessicated coconut
100g plain flour
100g oats
75g unsalted butter
100g caster sugar
2tsp bicarbonate of soda
1tbsp golden syrup
2tbsp hot water

Mix flour, sugar, oats and coconut in bowl. Melt cubed butter and syrup in a pan, when melted in separate vessel mix bicarbonate and hot water together. Then add to butter, mixture should fizz in pan. Add melted mixture to bowl of other ingredients and mix well. Making small balls of the mixture with your hands, place on lined baking trays and cook on top shelf for about ten minutes. Not usually that long so keep an eye on them until golden brown

Enjoy and I look forward to pictures and your opinions of the recipe. Hubby doesn't want me to change anything, but would u add any other ingredients? Fill me in
Fi amenallah
Peace and salams,
Ammena
Via BlogPress on her pretty cute iPhone

Ring

So I did promise you all.. I added some to Facebook but for all you lovely ladies, here are some pics of my ring that I picked up yesterday masha'allah, oh and a food picture for those of you who love them :D

Amazing

I had an amazing day today.. but Im tired and I havent prayed Maghrib, so Ill leave you with a few photos insha'allah... me in THE outfit (cant see the shoes sorry) especially for Ms EyeS.. look we are getting your news over here, just wanted to let you know I saw it and immediately thought of you, then theres my starter at pizza hut. Enjoy.

Me and my vegetarianism

Ive just been looking through the veggie forum that Im part of and came across a thread on the stupid things omnivores say so I thought I would write a little blog about me and my decision to not eat meat.
This really is spurned by a conversation last weekend with the woman who came over here with my mum, my mum obviously told her I was a vegetarian so she told me her mum was a vegan and that she thinks she only does it to make life harder for the rest of the family lol. She proceeded to tell me that she was a big cheese fan and loved fish. I didnt know what to say, it tops my mums 'well my friend is a vegetarian and she eats chicken, why cant you?' Some people just really dont get it, not just my reasoning but the definition of a vegetarian.
How hard is it to understand no meat or meat bi products, granted you sometimes dont realise there are meat bi products in things. My mum goes on to tell people that Im a vegetarian and I dont eat gelatine or anything like that... that its a special kind of vegetarian.
My cousin tells me constantly that she is sort of a vegetarian because if she didnt eat meat then she would only eat other things, but then 'I dont like vegetables' I shake my head.
Im constantly dumbfounded by the number of muslims who tell me its unislamic.. what?? its unislamic to want to care for the health of animals in our society? hmm... 'oh, but its halal? well why didnt you say so, pass me the steak!!' People have even told me its haram, because Im making something haram for myself that Allah has said is halal... Now those who know me in real life will know I dont push my food opinions on anyone else, I try to make things as easy as possible for those who are eating around me, I dont not allow people to eat meat around me and I definately dont tell people that eating meat is haram. So whats your opinion??

Start from the beginning.. I became a vegetarian before I became muslim.. yes it isnt something that was forced upon me by my choice of religion. I had known a girl from school who had died from vCJD when she was 18, since the mad cow scare I rarely ate beef, I was never a bird or pig fan but I did love my lamb. When I started uni lamb was the expensive meat so I never really ate it and in my second year I was living with a vegetarian friend from my first year. In my third year I moved down south for my placement year and for some reason I decided, 'ok its now or never' my mum was moving after at some point that year, I was away from everyone.. from questions and confrontation so I went for it. Its funny I always thought that I had done it with islam in the back of my mind but I cut it out within a few weeks of living down there before I even started looking into islam :D
Ive never liked how animals were treated, coped in little pens with nowhere to go, birds breaking their legs because they had grown so big from hormone injections. Vegetarian animals being fed meat products which spread BSE to the great lengths that we remember back in the 90's. What bugs me is all the stupid things people say to me, my mum acts like its a disease that she has to tell people just so they are aware, my family constantly ask 'you still vegetarian?' people its been 7 years!!! and no i wont eat marshmallows or the jelly sweets youre offering me!! no I didnt do it for somebody and yes I believe it what Im doing.
Will I eat meat again? Allahu alim! but I will tell you this for sure, there will be stipulations for the meat if I ever eat it again. It will have been hand reared by me, in my little field at the back of my house... obviously I cant really see that happening here so I guess I will have to wait to leave this country, or never eat meat :D simple.
So any questions? comments? feel free and thanks for reading :D

Vegetarian foods

So the other day I was in Asda and I thought about blogging about something I ran into... if you know me enough you will know Im a vegetarian :) yes and a muslim and no it isnt haram before anyone goes into a big lecture. Anyways about a week before I picked up some chocolate mousse from the refridgerated section only to realise after eating a few that it wasnt vegetarian :( I hate it when that happens... so I had bought this mousse for just over a pound and it was on offer, when I returned to Asda I decided to check if there where any others I could have (I love choc mousse) so guess what I found... the only mousse that was suitable for vegetarians was the cheapest one at about 50p Can u imagine?? I always thought that non vegetarian things were cheaper because the gelatin used (if used) was cheaper than the vegetarian version.. this is just unbelievable!! I have to check the labels with everything, not just for the meat things now but with the alcohol.. I picked up a box of Linda McCartney pies the other day, they had 4% red wine in... erm, why??? I dont understand!! Oh well :) I have non red winey pies and meat free choc mousse now heehee

Thursday

Assalamalikum girls... ok so thursday, I know Im a little late but i havent really had time to sit here and post about it. So I woke up on thursday awaiting a txt from Laylah to say we were still going to get together, alas there was no text this was at 8am, so I put my alarm on for 9 and decided to sleep a little longer. Then about 5mins later my phone vibrates, its from laylah apologising for sleeping in and telling me shes on her way. So we txt back and forth with name of train station and questions about times and stuff, I will cut this shorter. Eventually Im on my way to pick her up from the train station and she calls to tell me shes about 15mins away from the station still on the motorway... so I tell her thats cool, Im stuck in a little traffic.. so I get to the train station at around 1010am i think it was and I drive to the doors (the trains are out at the mo, but it wasnt good weather) but she wasnt there.. so I park the car opposite the bus area and start to send her a text, then a taxi pulls into the carpark with someone sat in the back, I knew it was her.. so I followed the taxi to the main waiting area and pulled up. I think she knew it was me too alhamdulillah, so she got in and away we went. She told me the taxi had broke down just as she put the phone down.. but alhamdulillah we were there are going to have a few good hours insha'allah.

The first place I took her to was the islamic bookstore which I think she was wanting to go to the most. When we got there, there was a bike outside and only when trying to open the door did I realise it was closed, oh course!!! We were about 15mins early, then a guy came over.. oldish guy and started chatting to us, asking us about the black stone in Mecca. He told us for many years he has had this pull from Islam alhamdulillah and while passing the row of shops the rain poured down so he took shelter then only realised it was an islamic store when he was looking around. So he wanted to check the store out, but we were still waiting for them to open it, we probably waited till about 1040am when he commented, im giving him 4 more minutes then i have to go. I whispered to Laylah that if he left without getting into the shop I was going to have words with the guy Alhamdulillah it never got to that, because i kept asking him questions and he probably stayed for another 10mins, which was long enough cause then the guy turned up. So he wandered around and left with promise to come back for a few books, insha'allah, insha'allah.

So in the shop Laylah bought loads.. still cant get over it sis!!! i bought a new hijab, and a few books on quran and tawheed which are quite good alhamdulillah. Then a guy came in and was chatting to the dude who opened the shop for ages... he even pulled up a chair, I think they were doing business... then we eventually decided to pay, after around 1hr in the shop.. i love shopping with Laylah so we got talking to the guy... youll never guess who it was.. it was the main musician from the Fletcher valve drummers who have helped to produce Dawud Wharnsby Ali's latest cd masha'allah, he was a really cool down to earth guy. He was telling us that they just came back from touring the UK, yes he picked up on the accent as they all seem to. So we chatted about the UK, and i noticed he was holding the cd but in a different casing, I told him i liked that one better.. the flatter case, with the cardboard cover rather than the plastic cd case... so I asked him if they sold that here, apparently it was the UK version.. well that was it, I had to have it then yeh i know... Anyways, I got it alhamdulillah, this song was the main reason I wanted it, I heard it quite a few months ago and loved the sound.. this clip doesnt really do the whole song much justice but I still like it.



After we finished with the shop we went for something to eat, so I took Laylah to a halal chinese near where I used to live called Bombay chopsticks.. they had an afternoon special on so we filled up.. yummy, and i took the rest home for food while i was at work (i actually used it the next day cause i forgot we had pizza ordered for us that evening) After that which was about 120pm I took Laylah back to the train station.. i wanted to do so much more with her, but Allahu alim..... insha'allah next time we can do it earlier and spend some time at 2nd cup before the shop opens, and im taking your cards next time Ok.. well this is another song that really touched my heart on the album, usually I cant stand hearing songs about hijab because well as Im sure youve all realised you dont hear many girls singing, and really what does a man know about hijab... but masha'allah this song is really good, and he definately hits a few strings with me. Lemme know what you think girls.



And thats me for this evening... alhamdulillah I had such a good time, and now im going to go read somemore. Looking forward to the comments, take care girls and keep in touch.

Fi amenallah, Ammena

My tea last night

who says I dont eat properly??? hmm?? potatoes, lots of veggies (i didnt think it would be so much) cauliflower, broccoli & carrots, and sole fried in a little lemon juice and flour. It was sooo nice, and now I remember why I like making big things like that.. cause I feel so much better after. The past 3 evenings Ive been really bad with my food, I would get hungry around 6ish so would make a little snack, which would end up makin me not really hungry until it was bedtime so I wouldnt eat any more. Allahu alim... insha'allah it wont happen often.. Ive run out of crackers, and thats what Ive been eating, cheese & tomato on crackers. heehee.

Yummy

yummy yummy alhamdulillah

Tea for tonight

Assalamalikum everyone.... so here is my food for the evening.. a stir fry of onions, mushrooms, garlic & red pepper with grilled veggie sausage in a sweet & sour sauce. Served with white herby rice.. yummy alhamdulillah....