Every year, muslims ummah around the world celebrate two eids or religious festivals: eidul Fitr and eidul Adha. Eidul Adha is the day that muslims sacrifice animals. Eidul Adha is also called eidul Qurban in some places or Eidul-Kabeer. Qurban in Arabic means closer or much closer. It is known by this name because it is expected that, hopefully, by doing our sacrifice we’re getting closer to Allah, as our Prophet Ibrahim ‘alayhissalam did it for the first time.
Allah says in the holy quran “Their meat will not reach Allah, nor will their blood, but what reaches Him is piety from you. Thus have We subjected them to you that you may glorify Allah for that [to] which He has guided you; and give good tidings to the doers of good.” Verse (22:37)
From this, we can understand that the purpose of the sacrifice is for us to be conscious of Allah and to do make efforts for His sake with very pure intentions. We all learn from Prophet Ibrahim A. S and his family that we need to sacrifice not only our animals but also our egoistic selfish feelings. Prophet Ibrahim A.S followed Allah’s command to slaughter his beloved son, Ismail as a test of his faith. We will appreciate his steadfastness even better when we realise that it was the son that he wanted for so long with first wife, Sarah. Sarah sacrificed her feelings by accepting that prophet Ibraheem married Hajar. After Ismaïl was born, Hajar also sacrificed to live far away from her beloved husband, she and Ismail lived alone.
What can we sacrifice then?
Sometimes, we realise that it’s harder to buy qurban animals than our accessories things. For those who have not been able to afford animals, Allah is also aware of your good intention to do it. From the sunnah of the prophet, we are encouraged to do the following activities regardless of whether we have been able to afford an animal sacrifice or not.
Anise cookies is one of the most popular and warming winter biscuits in most Arabian countries. It is sold in all Egyptian bakeries year round. When you bake these ‘babes’ they fill your home with the comfy aroma of anise. Anise has this distinctive licorice taste and flavor.
The best recipe is what the fellahin make for Eid (Egyptian agriculture laborer).
Ingredients:
½ cup of ghee
¼ cup of vegetable oil
1 tablespoon of keshta or cream fresh
1 tablespoon of dry yeast
1 tablespoon of sugar
500 grams of all purpose flour
1 cup of warm milk
1 tablespoon of fennel and 1 tablespoon of anise
Toasted sesame seed for garnish
Elaboration :
Heat the ghee and oil together
Mix the dry yeast with the warm milk and the sugar
In a big bowl or in a electric mixer, add the flour and pour all the liquid
When everything is mixed, slightly sticky dough will form. The dough is high in oil content, so your hands will get a bit oily when you work with the dough.
Using your hands roll out a log, then shape it into a ring. Place on a greased or lined with parchment paper sheet pan, then sprinkle with sesame and nigella seeds if desired.
Place the cookie sheet in the preheated oven, and bake at 180C for 12-16 minutes. Start checking at 12 minutes, and see if you need to cook them for longer.
Molokhiya is also known as jute in English. It’s served as a thick soup with rice (called “roz” in Arabic) and it’s usually served with chicken or rabbit. Molokhiya with roz is a very common dish prepared at home across several different Arab countries. The Lebanese make molokhiya slightly different from the Egyptians, as well as Palestinians.
Egyptian Chicken molokhiya
Author: Marisa Lopez
Molokhiya is also known as jute in English. It’s served as a thick soup with rice (called “roz” in Arabic) and it’s usually served with chicken or rabbit. Molokhiya with roz is a very common dish prepared at home across several different Arab countries. The Lebanese make molokhiya slightly different from the Egyptians, as well as Palestinians.
The origins of the dish are said to be in ancient Egypt, where it’s still popular to this day. In the Egyptian preparation, the Molokhiya leaves are stripped from the stems, then minced using a mezzaluna. It’s cooked with ground coriander, garlic and stock and is often served with chicken (or more traditionally rabbit). In Levantine countries such as Syria and Lebanon, Molokhiya is made with the whole leaves and is served with a vinegar and onion sauce along with toasted pita squares.
I share my recipe which is the traditional Egyptian one :
Ingredients
For the broth :
1 whole chicken
Water
1 whole onion and 1 whole carrot
Cumin, salt and pepper and cardamom
For the molokhiya and tasha :
You can use fresh or frozen minced molokhiya. Fresh molokhiya gets better results in taste and consistency but frozen one can work well also.
1 whole head of garlic or about 14-16 garlic cloves
Ground coriander, salt and pepper
Ghee
For the Egyptian rice with vermicelli:
2 cups of Egyptian rice
Half cup of vermicelli
Olive oil or ghee
Salt and peppet
Water or broth
Grilled chicken
Our previous cooked chicken
Cumin, Tomato paste, yoghurt, olive oil salt and pepper
Elaboration
The first step is boiling the chicken, onion, cumin, and cardamom. I boil the chicken on high for 45 minutes. Reduce to medium-low and cover with a lid for another 45 minutes. The total cooking time for the chicken broth is around 1 hour and 30 minutes. The reason for cooking the chicken in water is to be able to use the broth for the molokhiya and rice. A secondary benefit is that the chicken is very tender!
Cook the molokhiya (fresh or frozen) in the chicken broth
Prepare the tasha : Peel and cut off the ends of the garlic. Smash with salt with a mortar and pestle or chop the garlic into fine pieces with dried coriander and salt to get a paste. Fry this garlic paste using a non-stick skillet.
Add the fried garlic with the coriander to the cooked molokhiya and remove from the fire.
Prepare the rice. In a pan, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil or ghee and add half cup of vermicelli and cook it in the oil until it gets golden color Add the rice and mix well and add the water or broth and salt and pepper. Cook for 20 minutes
Grill the chicken covered with the mix of yoghurt, tomato paste, cumin, olive oil and salt and pepper
How to make KOFTA HASSAN BASHA – Recipe for KOFTA HASSAN BASHA.
KOFTA HASSAN BASHA
Author: Marisa López
Ottomans had a large impact on the Arab world- specially the Mediterranean part of the Arab world. Their influence reached not only the culture, language, clothes …. but also in the kitchen. This is one of Ottoman heritage dishes and one of my favorites. I recommend that you try it! you’d love it! 😋😋😋
Ingredients:
For kofta:
500 gr. ground beef,
Parsley and coriander chopped
2 onions
1 egg
2-3 tablespoons bread crumbs,
Salt
Black pepper
Boharat
For mashed potatoes:
6 large potatoes,
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 cup milk
Salt
Black pepper
Garlic powder
Cheese grated
Elaboration::
In a large bowl, mix the ground beef, grated onions, parsley and coriander chopped, egg, bread crumbs, salt and spices together with your hands.
Form small patties from the mixture forming a hollow in the centre of each patty,
Place the patties on a greased baking pan and bake at 200 degrees C until they turn dark brown,
For the mashed potatoes, peel the potatoes off and boil them,
Mash the boiled soft potatoes with a fork,
Melt the butter in a large saucepan,
Add the mashed potatoes and stir,
Add the milk while stirring,
Add the salt ,black pepper , garlic powder and cheese and cook for 5 minutes over low heat,
Place the mashed potatoes in a piping bag and pipe them into the hollow of the cooked meat balls,
Bake them again until the mashed potatoes get slightly crispy and brown on the top.
Baklava is a sweet dessert made of layers of flaky phyllo pastry filled with crushed nuts and sweetened with honey syrup. This sweet is Turkish in origin but each country and each home has their own recipe and secrets.
BAKLAVA
Author: Marisa López Chicote
Baklava is a sweet dessert made of layers of flaky phyllo pastry filled with crushed nuts and sweetened with honey syrup. This sweet is Turkish in origin but each country and each home has their own recipe and secrets.
I will share my recipe with all of you.
Ingredients:
Phyllo pastry- find frozen phyllo dough in the freezer section
Melted butter or ghee
Nut mixture- Almonds,pistachios, walnuts, hazelnut, honey, ground cinnamon,. You can change the nut mixture according to what you have. For example, you can use just walnuts or pistachios or peanuts, but be sure to have enough of whichever nut you use. And if you’re not a fan of cinnamon, you can omit that.
Honey syrup- water, sugar, honey, and lemon juice. To infuse the syrup with more flavor, I add two more completely optional items, orange zest and cinnamon stick .
Elaboration:
Preheat oven to 180 C
Make the Honey Syrup Place the sugar and water in a saucepan ( 2 glasses of sugar and 1 and half of water) and heat stove-top, stirring occasionally, until sugar dissolves. Add the lemon juice, orange zest, and 1 stick of cinnamon; stir to mix. Bring to a boil, then lower heat and let simmer for about 25 minutes. Remove syrup from heat. Remove the cinnamon and let the syrup cool completely (it will thicken a little bit).
Make the Nut Mixture In the bowl of a food processor fitted with a blade, add the almonds, pistachios, walnut, and hazelnuts. Pulse a few times to chop. Transfer to a large mixing bowl and add honey and cinnamon. Mix well to combine.
Prepare the Phyllo Pastry Carefully unroll the thawed phyllo pastry and place the sheets in between two clean kitchen towels. This will help keep the phyllo from breaking while you work.
Assemble the First Few Layers of Baklava Prepare a baking pan. Brush the interior of the baking pan with some of the melted butter or ghee.. To assemble the baklava, take one sheet of phyllo and place it in the pan (for this size pan, I typically fold my phyllo sheet in half, and it fits perfectly. You can also do a bit of trimming using a pair of kitchen shears). Brush the top of the phyllo sheet with the melted butter.Repeat this process a few more times until you have used up about ⅓ of the phyllo pastry, each layer being brushed with the melted butter.
Distribute some of the Nut Mixture.Now, distribute about ½ of the nut mixture evenly over the top layer of phyllo.
Continue Assembling the Baklava One sheet of phyllo pastry at a time using another ⅓ of the phyllo. Again, brush each layer with a bit of the melted butter.
Distribute the remaining ½ of the nut mixture evenly over the top layer of phyllo.
Finish the remaining ⅓ of the phyllo pastry following the same process, laying one folded sheet at a time and brushing each layer with melted butter.
Brush the very top sheet of phyllo with butter.
Cut the Baklava into Pieces, Using a good sharp knife, cut the pastry into diamond shaped pieces
Bake: Place the baklava dish on the middle rack of your heated oven. Bake anywhere from 35 to 45 minutes or until the top of the baklava turns golden and a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. (IMPORTANT…Because ovens vary, be sure to check your baklava half-way through baking).
Pour Syrup. Let COOL. Garnish: As soon as you remove the baklava from the oven, pour the cooled syrup all over the hot baklava. Make sure you distribute the syrup evenly. Let the baklava cool completely (it’s best if you leave it for several hours, or at least 1 hour, to allow the flaky phyllo layers to absorb the honey syrup completely). Cut through the pieces you marked earlier.
And if you like, garnish with a little sprinkle of pistachio before serving and enjoying.
About the Author: Marisa Lopez Chicote is an event planner and mother of 5, living in Cairo and Muslim since 1985, alhamdullah. She loves travelling and cooking.
We pray, we fast, we follow the rules and laws that have been sent down to us by our Creator. We do the absolute best that we can do to live a life that pleases Allah swt. So what happens when after all of that, we sincerely ask for His help in something that we genuinely need, and our request seems to have gone unanswered, or worse we receive an answer that we didn’t want. Why does He remove things from our lives that we clearly need? Why does he put us in situations that we know we can’t handle? Why does He give us tests that seem impossible to pass? Why, why, why?????
I keep going back to 2017 when my husband lost his job. I learned so many lessons that year. And in such an unfair manner. Why? He did nothing wrong, and Allah knows how much we depended on his income. So why allow something like that to happen? I lost count of the number of times I asked why. Sherif however, would always say: you have a plan, I have a plan, but He is the greatest of planners.
Allah swt had a plan for you before you were born, and He still has a plan for you. Allah’s plan for you is necessary and glorious. His plan is vital to your success and important to the world. There is no doubt that Allah has decreed everything that happens in the universe from the beginning of time to the end.
“Know you not that Allah knows all that is in heaven and on the earth? Verily, it is (all) in the Book (Al‑Lawh Al‑Mahfooz). Verily, that is easy for Allah” (Quran, al-Hajj 22:70)
Everything happens by the will of Allah. Whatever He wills happens, and whatever he does not will does not happen. Nothing in this life happens without His say so. So knowing this, why do we continuously ask why? Is our faith that small or rather weak? Do we not trust Him? Allah (swt) loves us many times more than even our own mothers. Sometimes, He takes things away from us or puts us through experiences that give us pain. But He always does what is best for us. We may not see it now. We may not see it for years. We may not see it till the next world. But we must have faith that whatever He does is always for the best. There is always some good in a loss, in a trial, in a difficulty, or in a suffering. Trust Allah. He is Al-Hakeem, the Most Wise. He is Al-Aleem, the Most Knowing.
How many times have you been upset at how things are unravelling only to understand some months or years down the line that this is how it was intended to be. How many times do you find yourself looking back over the years and realizing why certain things indeed happened for the best? Sometimes time helps us understand, but at other times, it is difficult even to understand years later why something was for the best. At times like these it helps to remember the trials and difficulties the Prophets and other righteous people in the past have faced and how seemingly unfavorable circumstances have turned out for the best. The Quran is filled with such stories. When your heart is heavy with grief and you find Shaytan putting thoughts like ‘why me?’ and ‘what good can there be in this?’ in your mind, go back to the Quran. Read the stories of the Prophets and the righteous about how they were tested. Musa pbuh mother was told to throw her newborn baby into the river, Yaqub pbuh was separated from his son Yusuf pbuh for years, Maryam gave birth to a baby alone and feared accusations by those around her. Each of these circumstances turned out to be for the best. Musa pbuh was returned to his mother even as he grew up in the palace of Pharaoh which was necessary to prepare him for his task ahead. Yusuf pbuh had to be left by his brothers in the well to reach the positions that he reached later. And Maryam was honored throughout history and was defended by her infant son.
“If we had perfect power to determine our destinies, and perfect vision to see the future and know what is best for us, we would choose exactly the fate that Allah has chosen for us.” – Imam al-Ghazali (rahimahullah)
Part of our belief in Allah, part of our trust in Him is to have faith in Him being All-Knowing and the Most Wise. Difficulties and trials give us the opportunity to practice this belief. When we are brought to our knees by difficult circumstances, when we see our plans failing and when we are blocked by circumstances beyond our control, it is difficult to see the good in the situation. But when we tell our hearts that there must be some good in this, that Allah (swt) has a plan for us, we set our hearts on the path towards healing. Trusting Allah means that we tell ourselves to move forward on the path He puts us on even when it hurts. Trusting Allah means we do not question His decree, even as the tears stream down our faces. Trusting Allah means we have faith that He will bring us through this and place us exactly on the path that we are meant to be on, and that we will eventually understand why this was for the best. InshaAllah
Sometimes when we do not understand how something was for the best, or when we feel overwhelmed with emotions, it helps to just turn to Allah and talk to Him about your feelings. Cry out to Him and tell Him how you feel. Yaqub (عَلَيْهِ السَّلَام) said “I only complain of my suffering and my grief to Allah” (Yusuf 12:86)
Ask Allah to heal you and give peace to your heart. Ask Him to help you understand how this was for the best. Ask Him for the strength to stay strong and move forward. Allah has a plan for each and every one of us. We must trust His plan.
“When Allah tests you it is never to destroy you. When He removes something in your possession, it is only in order to empty your hands for an even greater gift.” – Ibn al Qayyim
About the Author:Sister Rebecca is a SAHM living in Houston Texas. Married for 13 years with two children, and a revert since 2014, her hobbies include cooking, reading, and spending time with family.
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