Sitting in the back of a car on a long drive home, I decided that it was time to change my ‘About’ picture.

Hey there! I’m Amina Shah, and you would think that cooking is my passion! But to tell you the truth, I’m more interested in eating than in cooking! Cooking is more of a means to an end! 🙂

Like a lot of girls, I started cooking only after getting married and moving to the US, and since then I’ve done so much of it that I feel like it’s what I know the most about! When I came to America from Pakistan, I had learnt some basics (in theory) from my mother, but felt that a real resource was not available for me to refer to and being completely by myself here, I had to stumble through a lot of misses before I produced a hit.

Fortunately, my cooking did improve with time and effort, and it dawned on my that I could make the kind of cooking blog (especially for desi food) that I could have used when I was first learning how to cook! With my recipes I’ve tried to provide a wide selection of choices. Quick, easy recipes with few ingredients (like my Chicken Karahi Recipe or my Whole Pan Fried Tilapia Recipe)  for the rookie who just has to get dinner on the table somehow at the end of the day, crowd pleasers (like my Nargisi Koftay Recipe or my Sooji Halwa Recipe)  and some Knock Out Punches (like my Roast Leg of Lamb Recipe or my Gulab Jaman Recipe) that are sure to impress! I also want you all to learn from my mistakes (and I make many) with troubleshooting and damage control tips at the bottom of the recipes.

I also want to use this blog to highlight all the wonderful zabiha restaurants that we have discovered in our travels across the country. The good news is that we have managed to find some in even the most obscure and far flung places, so we didn’t find this lifestyle difficult to adapt to. In a lot of cases we were pleasantly surprised at the choices- Buffalo wings in Buffalo, Philly cheese steaks in Philly and the best fried chicken in Dallas! I mean if you can find zabiha options in all the signature dishes, what more do you want?

And for the all things that you can’t find in restaurants, you can always make at home! So go ahead, explore my blog for everything from restaurants to home cooking and feel free to contact me for questions, comments and especially to share your own recipes and /or reviews.

You will also see a gluten free section on my blog. Incorporating gluten free foods into our everyday meals is a part of our routine because of my daughter who, among other mild food allergies, has a severe wheat allergy. This was something unheard of in Pakistan, but is on the increase in the US. The good thing is, that there are many gluten free options, and they are on the rise as well.

I hope that the more we talk about our zabiha lifestyle, the more popular it will become. I would really like to encourage the people who are afraid to take this step, and help to make it easy for them!