Author Archives: Iraqi Thistle

Radish leaves Trial 1 – Radish Laban

Radish laban

Green smoothies have become very fashionable these days. Try searching it and you’ll probably get a million hits, each one claiming to be the best.  Would I claim this radish laban to be the best green smoothie ever? No, because I know every single one of us have their own preferences when it comes to food. Whether sweet or savoury smoothie, if there is such thing as a savoury smoothie!!, it all depends on one’s desire on that day. Continue reading

Radish, braod bean, quinoa salad

Avocado, quinoa, radish and broad bean salad

If you’ve ever experienced growing your own humble selection of vegetables in a small patch, then you’ll know that radishes are the easiest to start with. They are the vegetable to grow if you are a novice gardener, yielding a satisfying crop in less than 4 weeks. In fact if you forget to pick the tender leaves soon enough they grow so fast that it feels as if they are taking over your garden, preventing the sun rays to reach other tender seedlings. For a bowl of pink bright radishes, you’ll get almost trice or quadruple amount of leaves, slightly hot, stingy and bitter. The first time I picked them, I had a really bad rash for a couple of days; I now know to use gloves! Continue reading

Mr A salad

Mr A’s Salad

I kid you not when I say I prepare this salad, every single day, seven days a week, 365 days a year! Well.. apart from the days when we eat out I suppose. I call it Mr A’s salad, because this is what my husband likes with his every meal. Is it worth posting? Probably not, but since I prepare it for him all the time, you might as well know about it. I’m on auto-pilot mode when I’m chopping the vegetables, and I’ll happily do it for him, for as long as he’ll make me his signature omelette. Continue reading

Rhubarb Compote with Yoghurt

Rhubarb compoteWhenever we are driving along small A/B roads in the UK, going past the green hills and ancient stone walls, I picture myself sitting under a giant tree transformed back to one of my favourite childhood scenes from Peter Rabbit illustrated by Beatrix Potter. The curious side of me always wants to step over the fence and run into those hills to discover what its really like to be on the other side. Mr A and I had been on a holiday to North Yorkshire recently, admiring the breathtaking landscape the Yorkshire Dales had to offer. There, I got to experience this amazing feeling of climbing over the walls, scaring away a few wild sheep and finally descending into a hidden cave – the excitement I encountered that day was truly priceless! Continue reading

Rye Bread

rye bread

The first rye bread I tasted was those square sliced ones you see in a vacuum packed bag with an astonishing expiry date of another whole year. The funny thing is that as I went through the list of ingredients I couldn’t really see anything peculiar, all sounded normal and non-artificial with no non-pronounceable preservatives. Maybe it was just the vacuum packing? Although I finished the pack in the end, I didn’t particularly enjoy eating it and didn’t fancy trying rye bread again.  Continue reading

Lentil Rice – M’jaddarah

Yes I’m back again..

lentil rice

It’s been a few busy weeks and yet still more to come! Do I just have to stop staying “I’m busy”, as this always seems to be the case? I know.. from now on I’ll only mention it if it’s been fairly quiet, how about that? Whichever the case, “Determination, perseverance and patience”, I always tell myself. Continue reading

Kale, Cannellini and Quinoa Pilaf

kale and quinoa pilafThis is a quick post about this simple meal which I can’t seem to get enough of at the moment. I was going through Anjum’s Indian Vegetarian Feast  and thought I’d give the recipe a try. Two days later and I’ve made it 3 times already, and becoming addicted to it. It only takes about 20 minutes to make too. Continue reading