Zaiqa

I am so delighted and glad! The good news is that both zaaiqa(dot)net website has been closed down and the my recipe pictures has been removed by the blogger as they both had violated the copyright policy of my blog. I thank all those who helped me out in this cause. Cheers!

A few days back I had brought home some ripe bananas and fresh strawberries, and they were lying in the refrigerator waiting to be turned into something delicious. I thought of preparing a smoothie immediately as I am a huge fan of strawberry lassi/smoothies.

Enjoy this smoothie on a hot summer afternoon. Your kids will also love this drink. Its healthy and nutritious.

Minty Strawberry Banana Smoothie~Lassi

Makes – 5 small glasses

Ingredients:

• Ripe Banana – 1
• Whole Strawberries – 4 cups
• Mint Leaves – 8, large
• Yogurt – 1/2 cup
• Honey – 8 tbsp
• Lemon Juice – 1/2 tbsp
• Ice cubes – 1 cup

Method:

• Halve the banana and strawberries, roughly tear the mint leaves with you hands and add with all the remaining ingredients into a food processor or a blender container. Blend till pureed. Add the few ice cubes and blend again till they are lightly crushed.
• Pour into chilled glasses and serve immediately. Do not store to serve at a later day.

For this smoothie, I used the mint from my Mint plant which I planted indoors in container. This goes as an entry to Grow Your Own Event hosted by Jai and Bee of Jugalbandi.

Some of my bloggers friends were kind enough to pass me some awards during the last few weeks. I am honored and feel delighted to recieve them. Now I have two more awards on my shelf to show off

Silvana of UvAromatica has forwarded me the “Brilliant Weblog Prize”.

Brilliant Weblog is a prize given to sites and blogs that are smart and brilliant both in their content and their design. The purpose of the prize is to promote as many blogs as possible in the blogsphere. Here are the rules to follow:

1. When you recieve the prize you must write a post showing it, together with the name of who has given it to you, and link them back.
2. Choose a minimum of 7 blogs (or even more) that you find brilliant in their content or design. Show their names and links and leave them a comment informing they were prized with ‘Brilliant Weblog’.
3. Show a picture of those who awarded you and those you give the prize (optional).

I furthur pass this award to Indira of Mahanandi, Asha of Aroma, Meeta of Whats For Lunch Honey, Elise’s Simply Recipes, Cinnamon of Cinnamon Trial, Shilpa of Aaayi’s Recipes and Nupur of One Hot Stove.

I also recieved the Inspiration Award from Zainab and Hameeda of Arabic Bites.

This is given to bloggers whose stories and recipes inspire us.Whether it’s to eat healthier, dive back into our past to conjure up something we ate as children, or just make the light bulbs in our brains go on with a new idea for a recipe. The rules of the award are: As recipients of this award, please share with us what inspires you and then pass on the Inspiration Award to 4 other deserving bloggers. Please let them know what the award means and what to do with it

My Mother’s simple and quick cooking, my readers and their comments is what inspires me.

I pass on this award to Kay of One Bite at a time, Priya of 365 Days of Pure Vegetarian, Sunita of Sunita’s World and JZ of Tasty Treats.

And last but not the least, I thank Foodbuzz for sending me the goodies which include Moo cards, an organic Tote bag and a personalised ‘Zaiqa’ site badge. I loved them all a lot.

Luv,
Mona

Jellies are translucent spreads made from strained fruit juice. I had learnt this process while studying Nutrition during my graduation in Hyderabad. We were taught to prepare few jams and jellies using local fruits and this jelly was one of them. Recreating it today in my kitchen brought back all those fun memories during that time of my life.

Banana Jelly

Jelly making a two-step process. First the juice is to be extracted, then strained. Then, the clear juice is cooked along with sugar and acid until the perfect jelly consistency is reached. Ripe bananas which have a naturally sweet taste are perfect for jelly preparation. Do prepare it and try at least once.

Banana Jelly

Ingredients:

Ripe Banana/Pake huwe Mauz – 6
Sugar – 2 cups
Lemon juice – 1 tbsp

Method:

1. Wash and peel the bananas. Cut them into small pieces.

2. Take a pressure cooker and add cut banana pieces into it. Add water just enough to cover the banana pieces and let it pressure cook for just a few minutes till the banana are very soft. Mash the banana mixture and sieve through a strainer so that no pulp fiber should come into the extract. Discard the residue.

3. Pour the obtained clear extract into a measuring glass, and add equal amounts of sugar to it. ( I adapted because the bananas that I used were very sweet. I added 2 cups of sugar for 2 1/2 cups of obtained clear extract)
4. Cook the extract again in a heavy bottom pan by stirring continuously till the consistency of a jelly is obtained. Make sure that you do not to over cook it, else it will crystallize and harden. Pour the jelly into sterilized glass jars and let it cool. Store in the refrigerator.