The holiday season is coming up and with that comes tasty treats! One of my favorites is banana bread-it never lasts very long in our house-it’s that good! This is an easy recipe that makes a great gift for your neighbors or loved ones! My journey to bake banana bread started as I was inspired by my sister.
The aroma of freshly baked banana bread is unmatched. I would like everyone to experience the joy this banana bread has brought to my family. Here is my recipe:
Ingredients
- 4 over-ripe bananas mashed
- 1 cup dark brown sugar
- 8 tablespoons unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 large eggs
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1.5 cups chocolate chips (1 cup mixed in batter, 0.5 cup saved to be sprinkled on top of loaf before going in oven)
- Optional: can add pecans or walnuts
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 350º. Coat loaf pan with butter and dust with all-purpose flour, being sure to shake out any excess flour. Set aside.
- Mix butter and sugar until smooth. Add mashed bananas and beat until well blended.
- Add eggs one at a time-fully incorporate after each egg.
- Add flour and mix until smooth.
- Add baking soda, salt, and vanilla extract and stir until well combined.
- Stir in chocolate chips.
- Pour batter into prepared pan.
- Bake until golden brown and butter knife comes out clean when inserted in the middle, approximately one hour.
Save this recipe, it will come in handy during the holiday season! Once you’ve tasted homemade banana bread, you’ll want to bake it again and again!
Let me know if you try out this recipe! I usually reply to emails within 24 hours 🙂
-Tabassum
Bringing Back Family Dinner Time
We are all going through different emotions during this pandemic. I am sure my children are going through emotions as well since our socializing has reduced. During a conversation, my son asked me if we could have a fancy dinner. I was inspired by his creative energy and thought it was a brilliant thing to do and decided to set up my blank table and make it festive.
Here are some awesome tips for you so that you can bring back family dinner time to make it feel special:
- Dinner time need not be boring! Make it fun by decorating the table, here I did an autumn theme.
- In December I plan on doing a winter theme. Who does not like snowflakes, candles and gold decor?
- Involve the kids in the process. They can come up with great ideas too. These are the memories they will always remember and cherish
- You can also extend the decor to the rest of the house. I like minimalism, so I made an autumn wreath for our front door
Share your ideas with me of how you set up the table at your home to make meal times fun!.
Until next time,
-Tabassum
Roasted Red Pepper & Tomato Soup
With cooler weather comes comfort food and for me that’s some hearty soup! We had a big harvest of tomatoes from our backyard vegetable garden and I put them to good use. But that’s not all-my parents gave me some beautiful cherry tomatoes from THEIR backyard vegetable garden and I also added those into this recipe. The flavor of homemade roasted tomato soup is unmatched!!
The store-bought tomato soup does not even come close to the depth of flavours of the homemade kind. I also love that you can control the amount of salt added to the recipe. Here is my recipe:
Ingredients:
- 4-5 ripe tomatoes, diced
- 1-2 cups cherry tomatoes
- 1-2 red bell peppers (seeds removed, diced)
- 1 onion, diced
- 3-5 pieces of garlic
- 1-2 tsp olive oil
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- salt and pepper, to taste
- optional: coconut milk
Method:
- pre-heat oven to 450 degrees
- in a baking tray, add the diced tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, diced bell peppers, onions, and whole garlic cloves
- drizzle with olive oil and coat vegetables
- season with onion powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper
- mix with hands so all vegetable are coated
- roast in the oven for 30 minutes or until vegetables are soft
- let the vegetables cool down a bit
- add to blender (I have a Vitamix) and blend together until smooth
- Optional: at this point, I added in some coconut milk to give the soup some extra creaminess. (You can also add vegetable stock, but please note this will change the flavor slightly)
- serve warm and enjoy!
Save this recipe, it will come in handy for the next few cold months! Once you’ve made homemade tomato soup, you’ll never go back to the store-bought one again! Happy cooking!
Let me know if you try out this recipe! I usually reply to emails within 24 hours 
-Tabassum
@kashmirifoodie
Watch me on Food Network Canada’s Wall of Chefs
Asalamu alaikum & hello everyone! Last week on Tuesday October 6, 2020, my episode of Wall of Chefs on Food Network Canada premiered! Thank you to everyone that tuned in and joined in on the excitement-I have received an overwhelmingly amount of DMs, emails, texts and phone calls and I am so appreciative of the love that I have received ! It was a wonderful experience competing against three other home cooks while 12 of the country’s culinary icons watched! It was an experience of a lifetime 🙂
If you haven’t had the chance to watch yet, don’t fret! Here are the details on how to watch:
Watching from Canada:
Title: Wee, That’s Fire!
Link: CLICK HERE
Watching from anywhere in the world:
Title: Wee, That’s Fire!
Instructions:
1. Download CyberGhost VPN – this is a service that allows you to privatize your online server location so you can access any geolocked content anywhere in the world.
They have a 1-Day free trial – no credit card required.
2. Install CyberGhost VPN & allow permissions on your computer. Once you have verified your email, select your server you want to access from. In this case, choose “Canada”.
3. Once cyber ghost is active from a Canada server, visit the episode webpage: https://www.foodnetwork.ca/shows/wall-of-chefs/video/episode/wee-thats-fire/video.html?v=FOOD0056135750000000
Enjoy!
I’ll be posting more behind the scenes and articles soon, so make sure to follow along:
xoxo
Tabassum
Back to School 2020-Lunch Ideas !
Hi friends 🙂 2020 has been an incredibly difficult year for everyone, especially parents. As a parent myself, I completely understand the challenge that awaits us with the new school year beginning. Whether you have chosen to send your children to school, or have decided to keep them home to learn online, I know it was not an easy decision either way and I pray that all of our children have a wonderfully safe educational year ahead 🙂
Irrespective of the method of learning you’ve chosen for your child(ren), one thing that remains the same for all parents is…..preparing meals for the kiddos!!! YEP!!!!!!!!
I’ve taken the liberty to put some lunch ideas together, which to be honest, I would take to work as well :):):) ** Dual purpose woohoo!!!**
Feel free to peruse the photos below, links to the recipes follow under each photo:
Slice the sweet potato and pop it into the toaster! THAT’S IT!!!!
As always, send me an email: kashmirifoodie@gmail.com or DM on Instagram
if you have any questions.
xoxo
Tabassum
