The Iftaar Series: Part 1

Iftaar Alone in Birmingham

It's Ramadan. The eighteen hour fasting time here in England has reduced my life to two meals a day - iftaar and sehri. Normally this would be fine as both these meals are special to me. They're both communal affairs where the whole family gets together, something which becomes especially meaningful in Bangladesh at my grandmother's. There the meals give way to impromptu reunions with aunts, uncles and cousins. Iftaar and sehri are also when certain Ramadan-only favourites like chaap (tenderised beef or lamb curry) and haleem make their appearance at the table, which keep me further placated. 

However, here in Birmingham I'm getting none of this! The family is currently scattered all over the world and my culinary prowess definitely doesn't extend to chaap or haleem. I've actually been eating pretty weird things for iftaar and sehri and now, I've decided to share these meals with you instead of my family. You should feel special. And yes, I think I've officially degenerated into look-at-what-I'm eating posts, but I promise they do serve a purpose. See the title saying this is part 1? Well, I'm flying to Bangladesh sometime in August, and hopefully part 2 will be a more interesting post on the traditional Bangladeshi iftaar. 

The Slightest Hint Of Fusion

Mom's Fish Fingers

Fish fingers, but a little more exciting than usual

Fish is an integral part of the Bangladeshi diet - probably something to do with the many rivers, lakes and ponds in the country. It's very common at our table too, but sometimes in surprising forms. I have no idea how actual fish fingers are made, but this is how mom makes them at home. She adds some spices to make the fish a little more exciting than your usual frozen supermarket fare, before . I have no amounts written down for this recipe unfortunately, as everything is to taste depending on how strong you want your marinade. 

Preparing My Own Spices

...Mushroom & Tomato Curry?

Yeah...this was lunch today.

I wandered downstairs to check the fridge today and saw I had nothing stocked except mushrooms, tomatoes, fresh chillies, butter and a bottle of milk. The spice cupboard was almost full though, so this was enough for me to attempt a curry. 

The Lull After Graduation

মুরগী আর টমাটো ভুনা

Chicken and Tomato Curry with Thick Gravy

Chicken curries are usually the easiest to cook

The title is a lie. 

Life is crazy right now, with having to sort out a new job and what not. I'm writing this post to see if it'll help me relax, in the same way cooking curry does. There's something about combining all the spices in a pot, blending and experimenting with ingredients to produce the perfect flavour, that melts all my stress away. Often enough you'd find me in the kitchen at 1 AM after an intense study session, defrosting chicken and pulling spices from the cupboard, wondering what vegetables I could cram into this dish to get out a balanced meal.

Really A Suggestion Rather Than A Recipe

Sweet and Spicy Pineapple

Sweet and spicy pineapple with chilli powder

I love pineapple. I'm actually trying to decide if it's my favourite fruit, but it's competing with mango in my mind right now. Anyway, I love pineapple in many forms, and one of these forms is the dried pineapple sprinkled with sugar and chilli I used to have in Thailand. Unfortunately, this isn't something I've been able to find in Birmingham so I've tried recreating something similar using fresh pineapple. The results have been satisfying enough for me, so I thought I'd do a post on it.

A Change From All The Curry

Crêpes With Vanilla Syrup & Ice Cream

I'd eaten quite a bit of it before remembering I needed to take a picture...

I've actually lived in France, but funnily enough I don't remember ever trying a crêpe while I was there. For me, it was all about the the waffles with Nutella or the mushroom and cheese pizzas sold by the Eiffel Tower. It was only after moving to England for university that crêpes registered on my radar. I like the fact that you can fill it with anything, and it happens to remind me of a similar Bangladeshi dessert that I must hunt down the recipe for soon. 

A Slightly Unusual Curry

চামড়ার তরকারী, বসানো রান্না

Slow Cooked Chicken Skin Curry

Chicken skin curry, served in a bowl

In our house, chicken would always be cooked skinless. Rather than wasting the chicken skin, my mom would occasionally cook this dish for me. It's not something she would do often, however, because skin is very high in fat - especially if it's coming from chicken that wasn't raised free range. I don't intend to cook this often either, but it is one of my favourites, and as such I can't not put it up on the blog!

Introducing: my love for chocolate

Toblerone

I've always been a big fan of chocolate. I like the taste. I like that I can just pop down to the local shop and buy some, instead having to cook it from scratch like so many other things! However, I don't like all chocolate, so I thought I'd do a few posts with my favourites. For today, I'm uploading a picture of Toblerone, one of my earliest and oldest favourites, probably since age four. And no this isn't a cop out, I promise I'll start work on a proper recipe post later today!

However, I don't like getting the nougat stuck between my teeth....

Reviews

I've decided I'm going to do them...

I've already updated my About Me page to say a few words on this. 

Reviews will be labelled "review" (duh!), although some will be complete reviews, and others will be from memory - shorter descriptions of what I recall of an experience. I'm not going to be looking to review each and every restaurant I go to. I'll concentrate on just those places that stand out to me, or the places I go to when I happen to have a bit of free time. A lot places I've been to should also be "student budget" friendly, so I'll tag those as such. And lot of places I remember just for a particular dish that I really liked, so instead of doing a review I'll mention the dish in question and put up a link to a dedicated post on my Personal Favourites page, tagged as "favourite foods".