Delicio Recipe List

I remember when I was small, my maternal grandfather would sometimes come home   from the mosque, I think it was during evening or early morning prayers, his handkerchief filled with jasmine buds. We used to put them in our cupboards to let  the flowers perfume our clothes. I love the smell of his handkerchief, he always had this big handkerchiefs that  he would keep rolling around his hand  and then again unroll it again. Anyway , these jasmine buds are not only used to perfume the washed and pressed clothes but also to make jasmine water. Like rose water and orange blossom water is used in the middle east, here in Maldives Jasmine water plays a very large role in sweet dishes.  I recently got some  jasmine buds  and I used it to make some jasmine water. Its this jasmine water that is used along  with rose water to make most of the sweet dishes.  The jasmine water is usually used as a base liquid to make the sweet dish , while the rose water...

"Mumma You love  passion fruits right?", my 10 year concluded one day.  Ok so  I love  passionfruits and its something you can get  easily here in Maldives, sadly  our passionfruit vine that my husband and I were trying to grow on our balcony back fired when  we discovered a rat had invaded the  vine and chewed off most of the leaves and was planning to use it to build a home on our balcony. We freaked out  and have taken all the plants downstairs much to my mum's delight . Anyway, I have become partial to passionfruit curd.  I love it on pavlovas , spread on victorian sponge cake instead of the usual jam  or even on its own.  I used a recipe for lemon curd which I found in  Williams and Sonoma  Tools and Technique book and used passionfruit juice instead of lemon juice. Recipe: Passionfruit Curd   2 egg yolks and 2 whole eggs 125 ml juice extracted from  about 3-4 passionfruit 90g butter, cut into cubes 1...

Getting a good quality mince is not easy.  Not knowing whats inside a packet that comes from abroad keeps me back from buying it. But every now and then I buy a pack , I prefer the Ayam brand which tastes the best or I mince  some boneless chicken breast in the food processor.  I make a batch , cook them and then freeze them so I have a batch to make pasta or pop into rice or even for sandwiches during the week. Recipe : Chicken Meat balls Makes 20- 22 meatballs 400g chicken mince ( store bought or freshly ground in food processor using 400g boneless chicken) 1/2 cup  quick cooking oats  2 cloves garlic, grated 1 tsp grated ginger 1 tsp ground black pepper 1 tsp salt (level tsp) 1/2 tsp ground  cumin 1 tbsp finely chopped parsley ( if available) 1 small egg, lightly beaten Oil (2 tbsp) Place the oats in a spice grinder and pulse a few times. Place the chicken mince in a bowl ( always have a separate bowl for uncooked meat and fish ).  Add the spices ,...

During the first term mid term break , my husband and his three sibling and all the  families , headed to his island  , Lh. Naifaru.  This was our third visit and I have to come to love and enjoy my time in this small island. One of the things I love about this island is the strong communities and one of my favorite streets is Thitha's street ,where  hubby's aunt Thitha lives in an old run down but cosy  home. The street is old and narrow  and can see inside the coral walled houses . The neighbours are hard working  people and they chip into help one another. If one is making a big batch of masmirus , the rest of the women offer to slice onions and will sit gossiping  and laughing while busily slicing the onions. Once while we were heading home  along that street,  each lady from each house was sitting with a tray of moranga branches  busy pulling the leaves. Hubby commented  are you all cooking moranga today and one lady g...

Growing up , my knowledge of local food was pretty limited, I knew a few things but the amount I have come to learn during the past few years  has been a lot compared to my childhood. And one of them is this roasted curry powder. I used to depend on store bought curry powder, still do but I learnt that  store bought ones tend to go stale if left opened for a long time. Then I asked my mother for the  hanaakuri havaadhu (roasted curry powder) recipe  which I have used to till now., but that was actually kothanbiri havaadhu or rather coriander based curry powder.Then I found out there was another hanaakuri havaadhu recipe that used fresh coconut.  I asked K dhatha  my aunt,  how it was made  and after a little chat this is what I came up with. Hopefully it tastes good as the original. Recipe:  Hanaakuri Huni Havaadhu, 1 cup grated coconut 5 tsp cumin seeds 5 tsp coriander seeds 2 1/2 tsp fennel seeds 1/2 tsp tumeric 6 dried chillies 1 sma...

Tuna is a well loved fish , let say its our main source of protein. When I was growing up we usually ate Skipjack tuna  which is a smaller tuna with blue or black lines  going on it. Now adays we get Yellow Fin tuna and I recently bought these fat  fillet of Yellowfin Tuna and  cut it into  steak pieces.  I prefer to cook it all the way through but not tough and chewy. I once went to this  well known restaurant ,here in Male' ,with a couple of friends and one of my friends ordered grilled tuna steak with oven roasted veg  and rice.  On the menu it sounded pretty good but sadly what arrived was over cooked with no sauce and a sad looking piece of carrot and plain  rice.  I am not saying I am a very good cook but as a  customer , had it been  served to someone like Gordan Ramsey    who  would probably send it back or as Manu fidel says 'where is the sauce!!' So it got me thinking  how would I like a piece...