Whole Wheat Dinner Rolls

It was a bit chilly and breezy early this morning and the weather outside was just so beautiful with a brilliant blue, cloudless sky.  It was a perfect day so I was immediately in the mood for some homemade bread.  

Some people are intimidated by the thought of making bread.  It is not hard whatsoever!  I find it so very peaceful and relaxing and the end results are homemade goodness created lovingly by you…just imagine your home filled with the aroma of freshly baked bread and the compliments you will received for all your “hard” work!

When I first saw the delicious-looking pictures for these dinner rolls I knew I just had to make them.  I have been wanting to make these for quite a while now and have just got around to baking them today.  The original recipe for this is from the “For the Love of Cooking” blog.  But Pam’s recipe for whole wheat dinner rolls was meant for a bread machine and since I don’t have one I had to experiment.

The results?  A perfectly (good for you) luscious, soft, melt-in-your mouth bread that you will want to make every day.  It’s so easy!

For starters you will need:

1/2 cup of warm water

1 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon yeast

In a medium sized bowl, add these three ingredients and mix.  Store in a nice warm place while it grows to double (or triple) its size.  This will take about 15-20 minutes.

While you are waiting for the yeast to activate, gather these ingredients:

1/2 cup warm milk

2 tablespoons melted butter

1 egg warmed to room temperature

Mix these three ingredients in a large bowl.

In another bowl you will need the following ingredients:

2 cups of all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cup whole meal flour (or whole wheat)

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon salt

Mix these three ingredients together.

By now, the yeast will have doubled in size.  Add the yeast mixture to the bowl with the milk, egg, and butter.  Stir well.

Now add the flour mix to the bowl with the wet ingredients.  Mix well to form a dough ball.  If the dough ball is a little dry , you might need to add some more milk at this point.  Add the milk 1 tablespoon at a time until you get a nice workable dough ball.

On your counter top or table top, spread a little flour so that you can knead the dough.  This is the fun part.  Hopefully you have a window where you will be kneading the dough so you can sing and watch what’s going on outside. 

Knead the dough for at least 15 minutes.  If you don’t know it, you are incorporating air into the dough helping it to expand and rise…and yeast just loves to be massaged 

Now you will have to add your dough ball (which will be nice and smooth from all that massaging kneading) to a big bowl.  Add a tablespoon of vegetable oil to the bowl and smooth it all over.  Add the dough ball and just turn it once to oil the other side.  Cover with cling fling and a clean dish towel and set it out in a nice warm place.  I set mine outside.  Leave it to rise until it has doubled in bulk (about 1 1/2 hours).

Punch the dough down.  Butter a 9×13 inch glass baking dish (don’t use oil…the dough will just suck it up).  Divide the dough into 15 smaller pieces and place into the baking dish.  Brush each roll with melted butter.

Cover and let rise about an hour until it has doubled in size.

Bake in a 375F oven for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.  You can brush each finished roll again with melted butter  and serve hot.  Enjoy!

If you should find you have any leftovers, these keep well in the fridge and can be heated up in the microwave for a few seconds.  They will still be as delicious!

 

Vegetable Rice Pilaf

This is a delicious and fairly simple rice dish that is seasoned with a medley of Indian spices…mixed and cooked in a broth flavored with coconut milk.

I have made this with the Chicken Makhtoum recipe from yesterday and the flavors from both dishes blend together beautifully.  Of course, it will also go well with a nice, thick gravy-like  lamb stew or with baked chicken.

For this recipe you will need:

4 tablespoons corn oil

1 large onion, finely chopped

1 carrot, diced into small pieces

2 fresh green chilies, chopped (I choose to de-seed the chilies to lessen the heat)

2 cloves of garlic, minced

3 cups of hot water

1/4 cup of coconut powder

2 Maggi chicken stock cubes

1 teaspoon of ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon ground cardamon

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

3 cloves, whole

1 teaspoon black mustard seeds

2 cups of basmati rice

In a large bowl, add coconut powder and slowly add a bit of the hot water and mix into a smooth paste.  Add the remaining hot water and mix well.  Add the Maggi stock cubes and the spices except for the cloves and mustard seeds.

Stir together and let sit for about 2 minutes until the stock cubes melt.  Stir again.

In a medium pot, heat the 4 tablespoons of corn oil.  When hot add the onions and carrots and sautee until the onion has softened.

Add the cloves, mustard seeds, green chilies, and garlic.

Stir well and then add the coconut milk mixture.

Bring to a boil.  Once it starts boiling, add the basmati rice.  Stir gently a couple of times.  Bring back to a boil.  Cover and reduce the flame to very low.  Cook for 17 minutes.

When done, gently fluff the rice with a fork and serve hot.  Enjoy!

 

 

Chicken Makhtoum

My friend Noor over at Ya Salaam Cooking has a wonderful collection of tasty recipes available, MashaAllah.

A few weeks ago I tried her recipe for Chicken Makhtoum and let me tell you it is delicious!  I have cooked it at least twice already and my DH just loves the taste of it and this is what I am making for lunch today.

I double this recipe (it doubles very easily) whenever I make it because of my big family, MashaAllah.  I have made a few tweaks here in my version…I sauteed the tomatoes and added frozen garden peas for a little bit of color and also decreased the amount of tomato paste because my DH is not too keen about tomato paste.

I served this delicious chicken dish with Indian Vegetable Rice (recipe to follow in the next post).

Chicken Makhtoum (adapted from Ya Salaam Cooking)

2 medium-sized tomatoes, chopped

1 tablespoon corn oil

1/2 cup onion, diced

1 cup of yogurt

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1 tablespoon Arabic spice mix

2 tablespoons corn oil

700 gram  whole chicken, cut up into 4 pieces

1 cup of frozen garden peas

In a medium frying pan, saute the chopped tomatoes in 1 tablespoon of corn oil until mushy.

In a blender, add the sauteed tomatoes, onions, yogurt, salt, Arabian spice mix, and tomato paste and blend until smooth.

In a large pot, add the remaining 2 tablespoons of corn oil and once it is hot add the chicken pieces and fry until golden brown.

Add the yogurt mix.  Cook on medium heat for 10 minutes and reduce the heat to low.

Add the frozen garden peas, gently stir in and then cover and let cook for about 20 minutes or until the chicken is no longer pink.

Serve with basmati rice or nice and hot parathas.  Enjoy!

And Noor is right, this recipe would be really delicious if you substituted lamb or shrimp for the chicken.

Grilled Hamra with Hashwa

Today’s “Fish of the Day” is Hamra.  In English this fish is also known as Red Snapper.

I will show you in today’s recipe how to prepare Hamra with an easy to make hashwa (stuffing).  Hashwa literally means “stuffing”.  This stuffing recipe is very easy to make and brings a wonderful aroma and flavour to fish.

Grilled Hamra with Hashwa or Grilled Red Snapper with Cilentro and Onion Stuffing

Ingredients:

Hamra (Red Snapper) 1 kg or larger (the fish only needs to be gutted.  Do not scale or trim the fins!)

1 large onion, chopped

2-3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 medium-sized green bell pepper, chopped (optional)

1 bunch of cilentro (kuzbara) chopped

1/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil

1 heaped teaspoon tumeric

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 teaspoon ginger

1 teaspoon cumin powder (or Arabian Spice mix)

Since you will be grilling the Hamra the only thing you will need to do to the fish is have it gutted.  Gut the fish from the belly so that you will have a pocket to stuff the hashwa in.

Do not scale it or trim the fins. The reason for this is that you will be placing the whole fish directly onto the grill and having the scales still on the fish will prevent it from sticking to the grill.

In a medium-sized bowl, mix all of the ingredients (from chopped onion to cumin powder).  Note:  that this hashwa can easily be doubled or tripled according to how many fish you will be grilling.

cilentro, onion, garlic, green bell pepper

salt, black pepper, tumeric, ground ginger, cumin powder

Prepared hashwa

Now all you have to do is stuff each hamra with the hashwa as seen in the picture below.

stuffed Hamra waiting to be sewn up

Now you will need a large-eye needle and some cooking twine (I didn’t have any twine so I just used cotton yarn) for sewing up the belly of the fish.

All the Hamra sewn up

A close-up of my needlework!

Sewn up Hamra up close.

Now all you have to do is prepare your grill.  Grilling time will be approximately 1 hour.  Every 30 minutes turn the fish over so it will not char.  Do not turn the fish over before 30 minutes because it will break up over the grill and you don’t want that!

Hamra on the grill with some shrimp.

When the Hamra is finished serve on a platter.  When you get ready to eat it just peel away the skin.  Serve with the hashwa with a squeeze of lemon if you wish.

When I prepare grilled fish with hashwa I serve it with white rice, daqoos is optional, lemon wedges, and fresh greens.

If you so happen to plan a picnic on the beach in the evening all you need is a roaring fire, some lemons and bread from an Iranian bakery (khobuz Irani).

Enjoy!

Red Snapper

Fish of the UAE – Sall

Today’s Fish of the Day is Sall which is part of the Carangidae family of fish.  I think that the English name for this fish is Brownback Trevally (someone let me know if I am wrong.)

MashaAllah my husband brought home this fish and it is huge!  It weighs about 3kg!  I could barely get it to fit in the camera’s frame! 

Sall is part of the Jesh family of fish.  Like the Garfa from yesterday it has small, smooth scales and is easy to clean.  The body of the fish is tall from top to bottom and is silver with a hue of yellow along the head, upper fin, and tail.  If you notice at the tail area, there is a raised ridge of hard scales that run from the tail to the middle of the fish…this is characteristic of fish in the Jesh family.

Since this is a huge fish, it will be scaled and trim of the fins.  Then it will be cut from the top of the fish all the way to the belly and gutted so that it will make a “pocket”.  I will make a hashwa (stuffing) of herbs and spices  and place it into the “pocket”.

The recipe and how I will cook this fish follows in my next post, InshaAllah (Allah willing).

Be sure to come back tomorrow on more Fish of the UAE, InshaAllah.

Spicy Apple Muffins

The weather here in the UAE right now is wonderful.  The air in the mornings are cool and crisp.  I was awake at 4am and wanted to take advantage of this quiet time to make a special treat for my children.

I decided to make some muffins because what better way to wake up to a home filled with the sweet aromas of cinnamon and nutmeg.   (and I love the scent of nutmeg…especially when it is freshly grated!)

Spicy Apple Muffins

2 cups of sifted flour

2.5 teaspoons of baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup of sugar

3/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1 egg

1 cup of milk

1/3 cup melted butter

1 large apple (peeled, cored, and shredded)

Preheat your oven to 425F.  Brush muffin tin with some butter.  Add the sifted flour, baking powder, salt, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg into a mixing bowl.  Mix well.

In a small bowl, mix the egg, milk, and butter.  Add this to the dry ingredients and mix just enough until the dry ingredients are moistened.

Fill the muffin cups about 3/4 full.  Bake for 20-25 minutes.

This makes 12 moist, delicious muffins!  

Fried Fish with a Dry Spice Rub

Since I am posting the pictures of Fish of the UAE I will go ahead and post this recipe to frying fish UAE style.

The recipe that I am sharing with you today is basically fish coated with a dry spice rub.  Almost all of the fish that you will in the UAE can be fried.  Depending on the size of the fish you will need to cut it into big chunks or if frying a whole fish that is fat in size, you will need to make a couple of slits on the sides to ensure even cooking.

In this recipe today I am using Chennad (Kingfish).  It is quite long so I had it cut into big chunks.

Ingredients:

fish

1 heaping teaspoon of Arabian Spice (or you can use garam masala or curry powder)

1 teaspoon of tumeric

1 teaspoon cumin powder

1 teaspoon of salt

(Note:  the spice mixture can easily be doubled or tripled according to how much fish you will be cooking.)

Corn oil for frying (I like to use Coroli corn oil)

Arabian spice mix, tumeric, cumin, and salt

Mix all the spices together in a small bowl.

Since this is a dry rub, sprinkle the fish with the spice mixture and then gently rub into the fish.  Let this sit, covered for at least 30 minutes.  The moistness from the fish will soak in the spices.

On a high flame, heat the oil in a deep skillet.  When you see the oil slightly smoking turn the flame to low.  Add the fish.

Cook for 5 minutes and then gently turn the fish over and fry for another 5 minutes.  Take fish out and drain on paper towels.

Serve with basmati rice, daqoos, and fresh greens.  Enjoy!

Fish of the UAE – Garfa (Indian Mackerel)

Today’s Fish of the Day is Garfa.

These silver with hues of green and gray towards the head area and along the top of the fish.  They are a close relative of a local fish called Dardemon (I don’t have  a photo of that one right now).  This fish is also a little plump around the body and very tiny smooth scales.

It is very easy to clean.  Just scale, trim off the fins. and gut the fish.  In our house we leave on the head when cooking.

These Garfa are small sized and have lots of bones so the best way to cook this fish is to deep-fry it.  The day my husband brought these home I seasoned them and then deep-fried it until it was crunchy.  The reason I deep-fry them like this is because of the small bones.  It is easier to just eat it all without worrying about choking on fish bones…but still you have to be careful.

More fish tomorrow, InshaAllah (if Allah wills).

Fish of the UAE – Sultan Ibrahim

Today and the next few days I will share with you a few kinds of fish found here in the UAE.  My husband is a fisherman and MashaAllah (how Allah wills) he brings home fish on a regular basis, Alhamdulilah (thanks to Allah).

Because each emirate here in the UAE is located on the Arabian Gulf you will find a fish souk.  Every day of the year you can find a variety of fresh fish and each fish has its own season.  Now that is colder weather fish like Shari and from the Jesh family are huge…about 2.5 to 4 kgs!

When shopping at the fish souk (Souq As-Samak) you will find two groups of fish.  One group is the fish that are caught by the fishing dhows in which the dhows go out on fishing trips that last about 10 days to 2 weeks.  Whenever fish is caught by a dhow they are kept in the boat’s freezer compartment for that amount of time and then brought to the fish souk to be sold.  The fish is still technically fresh (fresh frozen) and still good to buy of course.  The main stalls of the fish market sell fish from the dhows.

The other group of fish are the ones caught by fisherman who go out for 1 or 2 days and will bring back very fresh fish (some of which are still alive).  When buying fish from these fisherman you will find them on the outer perimeter of the souk.

Sultan Ibrahim (Threadfin Bream)

Sultan Ibrahim is best bought small (about 6 to 8 inches) if you should buy this fish bigger than that it has no taste at all.  This is one of my favorite fish to eat because it tastes so much like shrimp…but cheaper.

I season this with some local Arabian spice called bizar, salt, and tumeric and then deep-fry it until it is crunchy.

Fried fish at my home is always served with basmati rice and daqoos along with a variety of fresh greens like arugula and green onions.

This is picture of what I cooked the other day:  Sultan Ibrahim and Garfa.

More about fish tomorrow, InshaAllah (if Allah wills).

Cheese Samboosas

My sister-in-law taught me this delicious and very simple recipe and I only make it during Ramadan.  Whenever I make this for friends they always ask for the recipe and comment that they have never eaten cheese samboosas before.

This recipe will make 100 samboosas!  A few days before Ramadan starts, I will make a batch of these and freeze them and cook them as I need them.

Cheese Samboosa

Ingredients:

200 gram block of mozzarella cheese

250 gram block of Kraft Processed Cheddar cheese

250 gram block of Haloomi cheese

1/2 cup of finely chopped fresh mint (I have only ever used fresh mint.  I don’t think dried mint would work in this recipe because it will not soften from any liquid.)

1 can (425 grams) of corn, drained

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

2 packages (50 sheets) of samboosa wrappers (Here in the UAE, I use the Switz brand samboosa wrappers.  The samboosa wrapper should be long and rectangular about 2 inches by 12 inches).

Corn oil for frying

 Shred all 3 cheese.  In a large bowl, combine the shredded cheese, mint, drained corn, and black pepper.  Mix very well.

Take one samboosa sheet and fill with 1 teaspoon of cheese filling.  Bring up a corner of the wrapper and fold into triangles.  Moisten the finished edge with water and seal.

Layer the stuffed samboosas on a tray lined with wax paper because you don’t want the uncooked samboosas to stick to the tray.  Add wax paper between the stacked layers of samboosas.

For freezing:  Once you are done stuffing all the samboosa wrappers, place the tray in the freezer.  Once the uncooked samboosas are frozen then you can pack them into ziploc baggies.

For cooking:  On medium-high heat, heat enough oil in a deep frying pan or wok.  Add a few samboosas at a time (I add seven pieces at a time).  Fry until golden brown.  It only takes a couple of minutes so watch them carefully.  Drain on paper towels and then serve.

Enjoy!