Category Archive for ‘food’ at Jasiri

Archive for the 'food' Category

Strawberry Pickin’

Published by dara on May 21, 2008 in Greensboro, food and green living. 18 Comments

We had a ball this past weekend! This year our city turns 200-years-old. On Saturday we enjoyed some of the bicentennial festivities, like the parade and downtown birthday bash.

Afterwards (yes, we were trying to wear the kids out), we went strawberry picking at a local farm. Locally grown, pesticide-free, juicy, sweet strawberries…yum!

Fact: 1-year-olds think slightly mud-covered strawberries with bits of leaves are just as delicious as washed strawberries. I tried to keep Nia from eating the strawberries before we had washed them, but my attempts were futile…she managed to gobble up 3 during our picking.

The Most Beautiful Birthday Cake

Published by dara on May 10, 2008 in celebration and food. 3 Comments

Anaia's yummy birthday cake

You see that beautiful birthday cake posted above? Best cake I’ve ever tasted!!!!!!!!! My sister wasn’t planning on throwing a party for her daughter’s 3rd birthday. But since Nia’s fiesta, it’s all the child’s been talking about! And she had 2 specific requests: blue and purple colors, and Dora! Man I’m happy she caved in, this cake from Maxie B’s had fresh strawberries inside and tasted delish!

Baskin-Robbins 31 Cent Night Smile

Published by dara on April 30, 2008 in food and quickie. 0 Comments

Just found out Baskin-Robbins has a 31 cent scoop night tonight from 5 pm to 10 pm. Wanted to spread the word to all of you who love ice cream as much as I do! I’ll be stopping for a scoop on my drive home from work — a nice (cheap) evening treat!

Yummy Peanut Butter Oatmeal

Published by dara on April 29, 2008 in food. 1 Comment

I credit my daughter’s father with two things — contributing half of Nia’s genetic material and introducing me to peanut butter oatmeal. The dish is one of my and Nia’s favorite things to eat for breakfast. I used to eat oatmeal with brown sugar, cinnamon, butter, and vanilla extract. Good, but not great. Now I purchase the large-sized Old Fashioned Quaker Oats. After cooking I add peanut butter and honey for Nia. For me I will sometimes add raisins and mixed nuts. This keeps me satisfied throughout the morning, until around 1 p.m. when I typically eat lunch. Keeps me regular too — if you know what I mean

Testing Another Recipe From The Blogosphere

Published by dara on November 6, 2007 in food and nablopomo. 3 Comments

This morning for breakfast I had spicy egg bread — a recipe borrowed from Chachi’s Kitchen. I used potato bread instead of white bread, and ground coriander as opposed to coriander leaves. I failed to create near perfect eggy bread slices like Saju, but it was delish nonetheless. The bread was great with a mug of chai, hmmm yummy!

This Cooking Thing Is Not Too Bad

Published by dara on October 16, 2007 in family and food. 4 Comments

When I was younger I never liked to cook…as recently as a few years ago, I didn’t like cooking. And really, growing up, I never had to. I have a large family (6 siblings) that includes three sisters older than myself. My mom cooked everyday. There was none of this quick-fast, pop in the microwave stuff going on in my house. In fact, we didn’t get a microwave until I was 15, which I actually felt embarrased about at the time. Anyway, when my mom was unavailable to cook, one of my older sisters took on that responsibility. Cooking duty rarely trickled down to me. I typically stayed out of the kitchen until it was time to eat (and usually I was first at the table

). I regret all of this now because my sisters know how to prepare my mom’s dishes, and sadly I don’t. I’m playing catch-up. Well, in the last couple of years, I’ve grown to love cooking. Since we’ve been roommates, my sister Noni and I have enjoyed attempting new recipes. We both love Ethiopian food and after discovering a local Ethiopian market that sells injera, we decided to make our own dishes (from recipes found through the internet).

There’s a Tanzanian recipe site that I love to visit, but I always just read and salivate at the photos of the delicious dishes. Well I sent the link to my sister, and sure enough she came home that day wanting to try out a couple of dishes. The pilau recipe was first on her list, and she also wanted to make a simple vegetable dish called kachumbari. She took care of those, and I made onion and potato bhajis. I also made a curry yogurt, and a cucumber and yogurt side for the bhajis. They turned out denser than I would have liked them to be, and Miriam’s pilau looks more appetizing than ours, but everything was very good. And I just enjoyed trying something new. Now I’m on the hunt for my next recipe. Anyone want to share? I love Indian and Thai food, but I’m open to anything (meatless).

Ethiopian Food is Divine!

Published by dara on October 7, 2006 in food. 0 Comments

I fell in love with Ethiopian food when I lived in Washington, DC. My first experience, however, was quite horrible. I went to an Ethiopian restaurant (of which I will not name) with a friend who had already been taken under the spell of this delectible cuisine–and he was attempting to pull me under with him. I ate a few bites and thought it was absolutely disgusting. My friend, feeling that he was quite the Ethiopian expert, informed me that the injera was not very good because it wasn’t fresh. He later convinced me to give it a second try (at a different restaurant of course), and to this day he teases me about how I attack the food when it’s placed in front of me.

When I moved to Jacksonville, Florida there was not one Ethiopian restaurant there, and I suffered serious withdrawal. One did open there a few months before I relocated. Here in Greensboro, we don’t have any Ethiopian restaurants either. My sister and I decided we had to take matters into our own hands. I found a local Ethiopian market that sells injera, so we decided to make our own dishes and buy the injera from the market. The picture above was our first go at it. Since then we’ve made it several times, and we get better with each attempt. Now if I could only find a place that sells Tej–yum!