Italian Cuisine 101

I've been craving pasta for a couple of days now, but not just any pasta; I want real professionally made pasta :)

As far as most Jordanians are concerned, all pasta is “ma3karona” which is fine when you cook at home, but when you’re at an Italian restaurant the case is different, and all those restaurant owners are always being such smartasses and they write the menus in Italian, w ya raito mazboot :( it’s filled with spelling mistakes, which makes my skin itch.

So I wanna get this out of my system, and list the most common types of pasta served in restaurants in Jordan, oh and also 3ashan el kol yestafeed w ye3raf shw yotlob :)
Fisrt, pasta refers to all types of ma3karona, it means ‘pastry’ in Italian. Other types are called according to their shape.

Spaghetti is the most common type; it is the long thin cylindrical string-like pasta, spago in Italian means ‘string’ and adding the –etti in the end is to signify the small size. (nerd I know)

These are Maccheroni, often prepared by adding cheese to make, well, Maccheroni and Cheese!

Next are Fettuccine (pronounced Fet-tu-chee-neh not Feetocheeneeeee) which means little ribbons

Below are Penne, Italian for ‘pens’

The widely misspelled famous Lasagne (plural of Lasagna)

And finally these are Fusilli, they sometimes come in green or orange colors, and it's not just food dye, spinach juice and beet or carrot juice are used in those

The previous types of pasta can be cooked in any sauce you choose, Fettucine are always thought to be cooked in Alfredo sauce, which is not entirely true, the main three Italian sauces used in restaurants around Jordan are Marinara, Alfredo and Pesto Sauce, red, white and green respectively, just think of the colors of the Italian flag ;)

Marinara sauce is mainly composed of tomatoes with onions, garlic and some herbs plus olive oil (this is not a recipe :)), Alfredo sauce is the white creamy buttery one and Pesto sauce is made mainly of basil leaves and olive oil plus lots of garlic and grated cheese.

Finally, if you can’t handle spicy food, you might want to steer clear of Salsa Arrabiata (Italian for angry!) another form of marinara sauce made by adding crushed red pepper or sometimes chili pepper to make it spicier.

Buon’ appetito :)

#Bottom50Jo!

Following the Jordanian Tweeps' top 50 reasons on why they love Jordan, and being in my see-the-glass-half-empty mood, I'm going to list my top 25 things i DISlike about Jordan :) 

1. People throwing trash out of their car windows especially when streets are perfectly clean, so they want their cars to be clean but not their streets, or, throwing trash in dirty places with the lamest excuse: "it's already dirty, one more soda can won't make a difference"!!!
2. Driving in Amman. All drivers will know what I mean.
3. Speaking of driving, cab drivers, enough said.
4. All the matabbaat and manahel in the streets, which get worse after a couple of rainy days.
5. The fuss that is about to take place next week and every 6 months when Tawjihi results are announced. (Good luck everyone by the way).
6. Da2eret al qobool wal tasjeel in the University of Jordan. 
7. All those taxes! what the hell is a "dareebeh 3ala al dara2eb"?
8. The fact that there is no Jordanian football, people here are fans of teams based on their origins :s
9. Oh, Jordan TV Channel and their news cast.
10. When you're walking in the street or any public place and people give you a death stare, like you just insulted them by being you.
11. Worrying about getting food poisoning every time you eat outside your home.
12. Gas prices which seem to always go up no matter what.
13. Honor crimes.
14. Boys' public schools. 
15. Jordan Telecom Group (Orange), their Internet services, and their customer service employees. Horrible.
16. All telecom companies actually, and the 1000 SMS they send everyday.
17. The 1000 beautiful places that could be very popular tourist attractions but are not because they are neglected to the point where they became hidden under layers of garbage.
18. Controleyyet el basaat, actually make that Jordanian public transportation in general. 
19. Speaking of which, and sorry to mention this, men who grow their pinkie fingernails. Gross.
20. Girls who wear so much make up that you can practically peel it off their faces.
21. Girls who wear high heel, pointy toed shoes and go shopping. They walk super slow when they cross the streets it makes me want to run over them by my car.
22. Men who let their wives hold a baby, push the other's stroller and carry the shopping bags while they walk in front of them.
23. Guys who spend hours putting wax on their hair to make it so spiky that it looks like a weapon, it's stupid, disgusting and I can't think of one girl who finds that attractive.
24. Men who send their children to beg on the streets. 
25. The disappearance of middle class Jordanians. 

Now don't get me wrong, I love my country very much, and I agree with most of what the Tweeps have mentioned in their Top 50, but there are also things that get on everyone's nerves, and someone has to point them out. 

What are your dislikes? Can they be reversed?

Matloob 500 Fataah

This is probably a couple of months old, but this guy never ceases to amaze me, I mean, WOW! I think he will be the saviour of all Arabs one day :S

القذافي يقضي ساعتين بصحبة 200 فتاة ايطالية جذابة تتراوح أعمارهن بين 18 و35 لـ"دعوتهن للإسلام

(صحيفة الساحة)
ذكرت وسائل اعلام ايطالية الاثنين 16-11-2009 أن الزعيم الليبي معمر القذافي الذي يزور روما لحضور قمة الامم المتحدة للغذاء قضى عدة ساعات بصحبة 200 ايطالية وحاول اقناعهن باعتناق الدين الاسلامي.

وقال اعلان نشرته وكالة هوستس ويب ونقلته صحيفة كورييري ديل سيرا "مطلوب 500 فتاة جذابة تتراوح أعمارهن بين 18 و35 الطول 70ر1 متر على الاقل يتمتعن بحسن المظهر مع الابتعاد عن ارتداء التنورات القصيرة والثياب مفتوحة الصدر".

وحضر نحو 200 امرأة في فيلا بروما بعد ان ابلغن بأنهن سيحصلن على 60 يورو (90) دولارا و"بعض الهدايا الليبية" وكانت من بينهن صحفية تابعة لوكالة الانباء الايطالية "انسا" التقطت صورا ووصفت وقائع الامسية.

وتقول انسا ان غالبية المشاركات توقعن حضور حفل لكن بدلا من ذلك طلب منهن الانتظار في قاعة ضخمة حتى وصول القذافي الذي حاضرهن عن ليبيا ودور النساء في الاسلام.

واستغرقت المحاضرة نحو ساعتين وتضمنت اسئلة واجوبة عبر مترجم واختتمت بدعوة من القذافي "لدخول الاسلام" وحصلت كل امرأة على نسخة من القرآن الكريم وكتاب من أقوال القذافي.

وقالت احدى المشاركات لانسا "كان أبعد ما يكون عن حفل لعلية القوم كما توقعنا لم يقدموا لنا ولا حتى كوب ماء".

وقال السفير الليبي لانسا ان القذافي يخطط لامسيات مماثلة خلال زيارته التي تستغرق ثلاثة أيام لحضور القمة.

حصلت كل امرأة على نسخة من القرآن الكريم وكتاب للقذافي

So, when you see an ad in "Al-Waseet" that states "matloob fatayaat fawran" don't let your imagination take you far, it could be just Al Qathafi throwing a Da3wa Ela Al Islam party :)
These are the people that give Arabs and Muslims a bad name...

Egypt to Final of CAN 2010

Egypt qualified to the final match of Africa Cup of Nations last night, after a 4-0 win over Algeria, I think the team deserved to win, not only because of the four goals, which I found amazing by the way, but also because they played fair compared to the Algerians.


Coffi Codjia, the referee from Benin, managed the game pretty well considering what everybody had expected.
I'm not sure whether this win will put an end to the Egypt Vs. Algeria saga, or do just the opposite and make it worse!


Personally, I think I prefer CAN 2008 and 2006, mainly because this version started out with the deadly attack on the Togolese team bus, while the only attack that I wanted to see was something that would end in scoring a goal, or even a missed chance! 
However, I'm glad that a new Egyptian star is rising, Mohammed Nagy 'Gedo' scored his fourth goal in the championship last night, and it has been reported that the English club Fulham is interested in him.
Here are the four goals :)

Transparent Smiles

Do you remember this gem? my cousin recently reminded me of her, they used to play it so much ayyam el lulu, I love the "dala3" in her moves, so feminine and girly :)

Enjoy

Feels Like the First Day at School

Hello guys :)
I'm obviously new to the blogging scene and all, but i thought i should give it a try and see how it goes, it's actually harder than it sounds so it might take me a while to get a hang of it.

I haven't been reading that many blogs either, but recently i found myself hooked on Hareega's, Roba's and Whisper's blogs :) nice job guys.

So here we go, wish me luck.