Paradise Wildlife Park

Today we set off early for a day out , the day was grey and looked like a down pour was on its way ultimately it did rain but we missed the worse and the sun shone out mashaAllah. We had a great day very enjoyable and exciting, i myself was in awe to Allah and just looking at his magnificent creations subhanAllah. i took loads of pic's as so much to see and the kids just loved it there , not too far out of London in Hert's, here is the link http://www.pwpark.com/ I pictured Birds, lovely colourful birds, parrots, lions, lemurs, wolves, meerkats, wolves well i only got the den as they were hiding! Zebra, tapir, reindeer, squirrel monkeys, small cats, ottors, cheetah,wallies camel and much more, my fav's have to be the lions and zebra. I really like this Park better than the Zoo as they allow you to get quite close to the animals and they have a large selection, i even got to stroke a big Snake and the alligator was cool to subhanAllah. Worth a visit, see for yourself






























































opps posted the grandfather of owls a few times too many! big aint he?

Muffins gone wrong

This was supposed to be 6 muffins but i didn't have a tin, so the cases collapsed and spread out whilst pouring and then i decided to put the mixture into a cake tin and i made this instead al-hamduilah. Happy to say none was left on the plate, went down a treat al-hamduilah.

Iced Banana Loaf

8oz self raising flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/4 teaspoon of mixed spice
4oz margarine or butter
1lb of ripe bananas
6oz sugar
2oz roughly chopped walnuts
4oz chopped mixed peel
2 large eggs lightly beaten
FOR ICING
4oz icing sugar
About 1 tablespoons of water
Few walnut halves about 9
Quartered orange slices

Well grease a 1 1/2 loaf tin. sieve the flour, salt & spices into a bowl. rub in butter until it resembles fine bread crumbs. Peel and mash the bananas, add to bowl and remaining ingredients, mix well till all blended. Pour into pan and bake at gas mark 4 for 1hour and 10Min's, leave to cool in pan for about 5-10Min's before turning out. Leave to cool well before icing.
4oz

Bram Brack

A very satisfying bread for tea, simple ingredients and simple method, just some pre planning.
"Delicious Irish fruit cake. Serve thickly sliced with butter."
INGREDIENTS
425 ml brewed black tea, cold
220 g packed light brown sugar
180 g golden raisins
60 g chopped candied citron
155 g self-rising flour
1 egg, beaten

DIRECTIONS
Put the tea, sugar, raisins and peel into a bowl, cover and leave to soak overnight.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour an 8 inch round pan.
Sift the flour into the fruit mixture, add the egg and beat well.
Pour into the cake pan and bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 1 hour and 45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center of cake comes out clean. Leave in the pan for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.

Linguine & Veg Sauce

sweat some onions in the pan witha little oil,salt, pepper, paprika, add a tin of tomatoes, salt thyme, grate a corgettue, a carrot add some tomato puree a little water allow to simmer for about 15-20mins on a low heat
Boil up some linguine and serve sprinkled with some parmasan cheese

Cutney & Plain Pratha's

An old fav of mine mums mint & corriander cutney, you will need, a bunch of corriander, about 5 sprigs of mint, onions, fresh garlic to taste,salt, tamrind and fresh chillis to taste,
Blitz it all in the blender and serve with chapati or paratha's, I had it with samosas yesterday, i have ofen used it with fried fish too, or just as a side dip for any dish.

Flapjack

I have been wanting to make this since i saw it on http://katescrafts.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/i-was-overcome/ kate's blog, noone seems to be in apprehaition of my cooking these days, I am cooking but noone is eating, Allah Al Must'aan.




i must say at first i though i had gone wrong somewhere but once they cool , mashaAllah a very chewy delight, I added pecan nuts and cinnamon too mine otherwise followed Kate to the T.

cauliflower & carrots in a corriander & cheese sauce

A bit like cauliflower cheese but with an Asian twist,cumin. I fried some onion in a pan with a little oil as this began to cook added a teaspoon of whole cumin seeds, salt, pepper and powdered garlic. I added a small cauliflower and some sliced carrots, leveled it with boiling water and covered it and let it cook latter removing the lid to allow the juices to evaporate.

In the meantime i made a coriander sauce , just a roux with finely chopped coriander(as opposed to a parsley sauce)poured this over the cauliflower and carrots, then grated some cheese and popped it into the grill.


Serve with a green salad.

When sisterhood hurts

At the charity bazzar a sister approached me , who i met 7 years ago when she first arrived to the UK as a new bride , alone, confused and lonely. For the sake of allah i really went out of my way to befriend this sister and offer her sisterhood for the sake of Allah. Such a kind and special sister mashaAllah. She asked me at the bazzar why we were not intouch , i told her if you looked for me , you would have found me. I made every effort to ensure sisters had my contact details, so thoses that bother would have found me! The sister didn't like to hear this, i told her i was totally disamayed with the sisterhood i shared once i made hijrah. When i was in need of my sisters i found not one and this hurt me. MashaAllah the sister appoligied and asked me to forgive her. The sister wants sisterhood and we exchanged numbers. Sometimes you have to take a stance, ok as muslimahs we are encouraged to do good , forgive, and forget but Allah does not tell me lay onthe floor and let sisters trample over me, even i have standards. So i plan to be more assertie and make my feeling heard. Some may think i am wrong but i am sick of turning the other cheek and letting others mess with my emotions, when all i want is love for the sake of Allah.

A Day AT A Time

Since my return to the UK i decided , I was here to benifit my deen and use the wealth of resources the UK has for Muslims mashaAllah, namely get on top of my Quran recitation and morisation inshaAllah.. This is one of the few blessings i can still apprechaite in the UK. I decided not to fall into my old ways, benifit my family more and spend my time with them more. Not to out do my health by getting involved in a hectic socail life (as in the past). To keep it real, to take it a day at a time. Work through/towards one issue and then tackle the next. To take in hand the here and now and lay the ground for whats to come. HEALTH for all the family is on the ajenda.