Rainbows and Unicorns Invitations: Alya's 5th Birthday

Do you remember when I told you that I will be posting a tutorial on how I made the invitation cards of Alya's 5th birthday party themed "Unicorns and Rainbows"? probably not, I made this promise four months ago but I do intend to keep my word, so here it is. If you want to read about the birthday party, click here.

Cranberry Beans and Sujuk Shakshouka: A Brunch Dish to Impress

I showed you last week how to make cranberry beans in olive oil which is a vegan Middle Eastern dish, I will show you now how to transform your leftovers (if any) into a wonderful comfort food style brunch dish: cranberry beans and sujuk shakshouka! Sujuk will be used with no shame, sorry my fellow vegans and vegetarians. However, you can still make the dish without the sujuk if you consume eggs.

Sujuk is basically a Middle Eastern/Armenian sausage that is heavily spiced with paprika, fenugreek and cumin. The casing is usually from bovine origin. It is fatty and cooks in its own fat, you really don't need to add any additional oil or butter to cook it. Sujuk is very flavorful and is good friends with tomatoes, hence the nice pairing with the cranberry beans in olive oil.

You can find Sujuk sausages at Armenian and Middle Eastern markets. You can substitute Sujuk with any other sausage type you like.

Cranberry Beans in Olive Oil, Borlotti Beans in Olive Oil, Fasulya Bil Zayt

Cranberry beans or Borlotti beans are similar to Pinto beans in shape but taste different. The pod itself is so beautiful, it is like a mad artist's project; strokes of every shade of fuchsia. The pleasure of looking at them makes up for their high price of 3.99 per pound. I was delighted to find them at my local Middle Eastern Market and scooped up 2 pounds with the intention to make this dish as soon as I get home.

DIY: Cookie Cupcake Topper

This year I decided to actually blog about all Alya's birthday parties. All those tutorials and recipes that I promised you but never really got around to do it. This year is the year of "No tutorial is left behind" and "No unfinished projects".
 Cookies are so much fun on their own but they can also be cute cupcake toppers! The best part is that you can use leftover cookie dough that is too small to be used for regular cookies to make small cupcake toppers. Last year, for Alya's Cowgirl party,  I made cowgirl hats and boots cupcake toppers from paper, click here to read about it.  This year I thought that I ought to change it up a bit.

Tortilla Espanola: Spanish Omelette

I am not a big fan of breakfast. I don't wake up hungry and eager to eat, let alone cook something for me. However, I do know that breakfast is the most important meal of the day and I can honestly attest to how I eat more at lunch time when I skip breakfast, thus I do my best to eat something. I normally eat a small Labneh or Cheese sandwiches in the morning, click here for my homemade Labneh recipe, here how to make the ultimate Labneh Sandwich and here on how to make Simple Cheese. Sometimes, when my morning schedule allows, usually on the week ends, I make Tortilla Espanola that we eat either for breakfast or brunch with a side of a simple Tomato Basil Salad.