Seafood has amazing recipes. I usually don’t enjoy baked fish, as I feel baking tends to make the fish dry but this recipe for baked fish is just outstanding. This recipe doesn’t require any mayonnaise, or cheese, or any kind of flour or bread crumbs. All you need is butter, lemon, garlic, a few spices, and salt. This Fish by itself is also Keto friendly. I paired the fish with baby potatoes, asparagus, and mushrooms. I also cooked the Fish and shrimp with bell pepper and jalapenos. But the choice of vegetables is always a personal choice. You can always substitute the vegetables you like. This dish is super simple, low carb, gluten-free, and amazingly delicious.
What kind of Tilapia is good?
If you have a store that sells fresh and clan fish, there can be nothing better. That kind of seafood is the best in quality. But mostly, the fish that I buy, especially Tilapia is frozen which is good too. There is always a possibility that any fish you buy has been frozen at some point in order to keep it fresh for transport.
Frozen fish sometimes are better than the Fish that appear fresh but you don’t see them live. Frozen fish is said to be freezer right after the catch, therefore feel absolutely sure to use the fish that is frozen since it is just as good to use as a live fish, and in most cases better than fish from the counter.
Tilapia is generally best and healthy if it’s wild-caught which is the case with most seafood. Farm-raised fish is also considered very healthy. Tilapia is a great source of protein. Though if you are buying farm-raised fish, make sure you check the reputation of the farm and the kind of feed they use for their fish.
I used Shrimp for some extra flavor which I feel goes fabulously with Tilapia. Baked or grilled veggies are a great source of fiber and fill you up too. This dish is great for kids too. The dish is filling, healthy, and low in carbs. Enjoy!!!
Chicken Wings are an all-time favorite for everyone I know. I had never tried Chicken wings before I came to the USA. Our cuisine in India does not offer kebabs or appetizers using Chicken wings. Initially, Chicken wings were always something we ate outside. It’s not that I didn’t think of trying them but it’s just that Mr. Parveez and I as a couple liked Chicken wings but weren’t that huge of a fan. There was a halal restaurant that made Chicken wings with green masala and every once in a while we would go and enjoy the awesome wings. And, after a couple of years, the restaurant shut down.
Well, that didn’t really inspire me to start making my own Chicken wings. A few months later we discovered another wonderful Halal Gyro place that all make Hot saucy Chicken wings which were great, but with time the restaurant lost its taste of making good food. I believe the management changed and hired a new chef that couldn’t maintain the flavors. This is when I felt I should start making my own.
The first-ever Chicken wings I started making were the Buffalo Chicken wings. The kids loved it and it served as a great appetizer or a side dish for brunches and playdates. Once I spent few years making them and seeing fans increasing, I decided on experimenting with different flavors using wings. That’s when I made the green Chicken wings followed by the Special Haala’s hot saucy Chicken wings and finally these. The main reason behind trying these was that I wanted to come up with a recipe that has a little sweet and spicy taste. This recipe is great for people who find it hard to handle spices.
Why Wings?
Wings are cooked with skin and when pan-fried or deep-fried become crunchy. Any flavors, especially those that are saucy taste great with anything that is crisp.
Why use honey and not sugar?
Honey blends in better with spices than sugar. Sugar tends to crystallize or make the sauce more watery so, honey is the best option.
These wings are lightly sweet and lightly spicy which tantalize the taste buds in a way of playing hide and seek. Spicy and sweet together are a wonderful combination and if you combine that with Chicken wings, the crispy texture of the skin and the flavors mingled along with it are just beyond the word “delicious”. If you like Chicken wings, you should try this recipe.
With all the different kinds of foods that we consume, at times you just feel that your tummy needs a break. You feel you need more veggies, less oil, fewer carbs, in all just a healthy meal. But, the problem that people like me face is that we also need something that tastes scrumptious and good along with all the health benefits.
Specially, if you have children as demanding as mine, you basically fight a battle. When the demand is to make veggies look more appealing and to make their protein go leaner without them noticing. That’s when dishes like this are invented.
This Chicken is marinated with spices making it flavorful. The spices can always be switched or played around with. I added Tandoori powder and Red chili powder to make the flavors a little more spicy, but you can always reduce the quantity or omit the spices altogether. I find this a great recipe for easy lunch and dinner.
This is a great recipe and cooks pretty quickly as well. I am not a fan of Alfredo sauce with my Pasta and honestly the boys were never big fans of cheese sauce either but when I came across dish that has Mushrooms and Chicken cooked with Garlic, it kind of sounded interesting.
So I got down to trying and cooking my own. I love Mushrooms, but the kids aren’t a big fan so the dish had to be interesting enough. Roasting garlic in the oven enhances the flavor in a dish. So, I roasted garlic with skin with olive oil, salt and pepper till its soft and mushy. Cook the chicken pieces in a pan with little oil, salt and pepper. Further adding butter and oil to the same pan and added the mushed garlic and a little chicken broth followed by mushrooms. After it comes to a boil added a little heavy cream and further the cooked chicken. I also added Red chili flakes and White pepper for extra flavor.
This dish can be served by itself or with Rice too, since its a little saucy, but I personally felt that it goes on best with pasta. I served it with Spaghetti Pasta and a side of Garlic bread. Trust me, my boys who do not like Mushroom at all loved this dish. This dish easily qualifies as an awesomely flavorful and delicious dish. The taste is that of a dish you’d get at a high end Italian restaurant. It might seem a little complicated but trust me if you follow the recipe and make it once, you will become pro and will manage making this dish in no time. This dish is actually perfect for those surprise dinner dates. This impresses anyone and everyone.
With all the different kinds of foods that we consume, at times you just feel that your tummy needs a break. You feel you need more veggies, less oil, fewer carbs, in all just a healthy meal. But, the problem that people like me face is that we also need something that tastes scrumptious and good along with all the health benefits.
Specially, if you have children as demanding as mine, you basically fight a battle. When the demand is to make veggies look more appealing and to make their protein go leaner without them noticing. That’s when dishes like this are invented.
Now this isn’t your regular Chicken veggie wrap. Its a little different. The wrap that I have used is not a Tortilla, though you can always use a home made/ store bought Tortilla. The Chicken I used is boneless thigh meat, but you can also use Chicken breast. I cooked it with little Olive oil, Garlic powder, Onion powder, Red chili flakes and white pepper powder with Vinegar. Once the Chicken was cooked, add Bell peppers and Onions. Further, just add hot sauce to add a little zing. Wrap everything in lettuce leaves with some onions and chilies/jalapenos and further in a roti or whole wheat tortilla with some garlic Mayo sauce and enjoy the scrumptious bites of goodness and health.
This Japanese dish was made almost without any prep work. My boys watch some Japanese show which had the character in love with Ramen Noodles and the boys had been on about how delicious the dish looks. now, I have never tried Ramen Noodles only for a simple reason that we never find any Halal Japanese restaurants. And, honestly they never appealed me to try out the seafood version.
But is there any way I could have my boys think the same way. Oh! No, never. They are just out and about and want to try everything under the sky that’s religiously permissible. There are barely any restaurants that serve Halal Asian food around us and my boys are at an age where they really like trying different varieties and since, their mom can cook well and enjoys cooking different cuisines, they just trick me into trying everything they want.
So, I started looking into different recipes over the internet and with 3 hours for research. Yes, 3 hours is all I got because they just started behaving worse than me when I was pregnant with them. The more confusing part was that I didn’t even have basic ingredients. Most recipes I saw have Buk choy, Lemon grass, Broccoli but all I had was Spinach, carrots, Mushrooms, cabbage and zucchini. I could have added Onions, but I think onions have a pretty distinctively sharp taste and adding them to something that soupy. Also onions tend to get a bit too soft and the mushiness in the soup, so avoiding onions is better.
Though I am not a pro at cooking Japanese food, but I am becoming a big fan and try to make them as close to the actual food flavors as I can. A few changes here and there to make it more adaptive to our taste. This is one of the amazing ways of serving your kids more vegetables. Hope you like and enjoy it just the way we did.
Who doesn’t like Garlic bread? No one I ever met said they didn’t love a good Garlic bread. Growing up I always thought that Garlic bread and Pizza go hand in hand thanks to a food joint. I could just not take the fact of people not ordering garlic bread as an appetizer before eating Pizza. And, I am sure that famous “Pizza” joint and it equally good famous competitors must have seen so many like me.
As much as my family and I love getting the Garlic bread and Pizza, at times its just not possible to order restaurant food. I mean, there are Big names and Big companies, but at times the thought of you not knowing how fresh is the food that you are consuming or is it a mix of preservatives. With all that confusion and realizing that you are blessed that you can cook, we decided we make our own. Now, it isn’t that I feel people who order take outs are doing something wrong, but I do feel that eating that kind of food every day or every other day isn’t very healthy. And then when making it at home is pretty easy.
Typically, Garlic bread is made using a French baguette, or sometimes a sourdough like ciabatta which is partially sliced downwards, allowing the condiments to soak into the loaf while keeping it in one piece. The bread is then stuffed through the cuts with oil and minced garlic before baking. Alternatively, butter and garlic powder are used, or the bread is cut lengthwise into separate slices which are individually garnished.
I made mine a little differently. I made the dough using warm milk, yeast and egg with flour, sugar and salt and added butter. Once the dough had risen, I added minced garlic, butter and scallions. Sprinkle some cheesy and bake….Serve hot and enjoy the oozing flavors.
We love all kinds of Sea Food. Curries, Fried, Grilled, any which way we love them. This dish makes a great option if you are on a diet, or looking for low carb options or following keto recipes. This is a quick recipe for lunch and a super nutritious one too.
I used Frozen cod but if you have fresh Cod available, that would be great. My boys love fish and grilled veggies or just cold salads on the side of a pan fried fish. These kind of dishes are easy, scrumptious, fits the budget, healthy and delicious. This is a perfect recipe when you are running short on time.
I use basic spices like Red chili flakes, Garlic powder, Onion powder, White pepper powder and Tandoori masala. I also added some dry parsley for flavor. You can always mix and match and use the spices you like. I personally don’t like much of cinnamon or Red chili powder on cod fish. I also feel that Black pepper makes it a little bitter so I prefer white pepper powder. Add a little Lemon juice and the marination is just perfect.
I grill or saute the bell peppers and Asparagus in the same pan as the fish once i am done cooking the fish. I feel it adds a lot of flavor from the fish and the spices to the vegetables. This is a great dish if you want to involve your budding teenagers and teach them easy and quick dishes.
These are delicious wraps with spicy pan fried chicken and cheese that come together in under 30-40 minutes. This is something that will make your children ask for more. They are easy to make and can also be made partly ahead of time. These little scrumptious bites are something you will fall in love with.
For Chicken, you can use Rotisserie chicken or any chicken that’s left over, or any grilled chicken or even chicken kebabs. I cooked my chicken in a tex mex style. I cooked the chicken with some onions and green chilies and added Paprika, cumin powder, chili flakes, cumin powder, Garlic powder, Onion powder and Dry parsley. I also added little Apple cider vinegar and hot sauce to spike it up a little. Just cook everything till the chicken dries up and the sauce coats the chicken completely.
The quesadilla can always be made from store bought Tortilla. I made mine at home with All purpose flour and Corn flour. They are pretty easy to make as long as you have a Tortilla maker. Once you make the Tortilla, add some cooked chicken and cheese, fold them up and place them in the oven for 10 minutes.
The quesadillas can be cut into two to make them look nicer while serving. These quesadillas are scrumptious, filling, easy to make and scrumptious.
After trying my hands on the delicious, airy and scrumptious British scones, my kids had always been after making them. I have already made them numerous times, I felt it was time to experiment with something new. One of the main reason behind trying out the Chocolate chip scones was Mr. Parveez. When I made the plain scones, he mentioned that he loved the chocolate chip scones at a Book store cafe which he visited on some weekends before we got married and he loved them.
Therefore, I felt my second trials have to Chocolate chip scones. these scones are pretty rich, chocolaty , slightly sweet and just melt in the mouth. They are pretty easy, simple and fast to make, crunchy exterior and soft interior make them extremely satisfying. I make scones in a traditional scone way where I patted the dough around an inch thick and then cut them with the help of a biscuit cutter. But you can also roll the dough into a circle, around 8 inches and cut them in triangle shape, like a pizza. You can cut them into as many as you like, as long as the width is around an inch.
The butter you use should be cold because if it melts too soon, your dough wouldn’t be crumbly. If the dough gets super soft for any reason, because the butter you used was on room temperature or melted, then place the dough in the refrigerator for 30 minutes to an hour, till the dough is good enough for you to handle. The heavy cream used in the recipe is an approximate measure. It honestly depends on the flour that you are using. If the dough doesn’t come together easily and if you feel its still dry, add a little more cream, little at a time. Similarly, if the dough is too sticky and gets hard to handle, you can always add a little more flour, one tablespoon at a time. Avoid overworking the dough, because scones do not need too much mixing. Less mixing makes softer scones. The dough should be soft, not sticky.
Scones are best when you serve them fresh out of the oven. If you have extra, its always better to freeze the dough and bale it when you are ready to eat. You can freeze them up to 2 months in an airtight container. When you want to use it, just thaw the dough and use it.