The Making of Scones

This post is entirely copied from my batch's blog. It was the post I wrote pun.

__________________________________

Salam.

Alhamdulillah, hujung minggu lepas dapat join program ke-3 dalam siri 'The Open Circle'. Buat yang belum tahu, The Open Circle ni program bulanan khusus untuk wanita/gadis yang merupakan alumni Sekolah Islam Hidayah (PaLS). Masa program pertama dan kedua, diadakan sembang santai dengan Makcik Sumilah dan Ustazah Jamilah (respectively). Untuk event yang ke-3 ni, nak buat kelainan sikit, maka wujudlah idea untuk buat kelas baking. Hidangan yang dipilih ialah Scones sebab tak ramai tau buat, tapi sebenarnya mudah je nak buat, insya-Allah.

Scones ni merupakan hidangan British. Dia macam donut, tapi takda lubang, luar dia keras tapi rapuh (crumbly) dan dalam dia lembut. Rasa dia manis. Biasanya dimakan dengan jem dan krim. Oh, sedapnya.

Ini plain scones yang dah diletakkan jem dan krim. strawberi dan kismis tu hiasan je.

Kami belajar buat 3 jenis Scones: 1) Cheese Scones, 2) Raisin Scones dan 3) Plain Scones
Tak banyak beza pun dalam resepi ketiga-tiga scones ni.

Memandangkan kat FB dah di-share resepi yang English version, maka di sini ana share resepi versi Bahasa Melayu. lagi senang nak express. ceh.

Plain Scones

Bahan-bahan:

• 225g tepung naik sendiri (boleh campur tepung biasa), sudah diayak/sieved
• 25g gula kasta
• 50-100g butter sejuk
• 1 cubit garam
• 1 sudu teh baking powder
• 150ml susu
• 1 biji telur campur susu
• Aluminium foil (buat alas baking tray. Senang, tak perlu basuh tray)

Cara-cara:

1. Campurkan tepung, garam, gula dan baking powder. Gaul rata. Guna tangan je.
2. Masukkan butter dan gaul rata lagi. Pastikan gaul guna hujung jari je, dan gaul sampai dia jadi crumbs. Pastikan juga takda gumpalan-gumpalan kecil. Biar nampak smooth macam pepasir.
3. Buat lubang kat tengah-tengah, masukkan susu. Gaul rata guna sudu kayu.
4. Taburkan tepung (dusting) atas gumpalan mixture tadi.
5. Masukkan dalam fridge selama 10 minit. (Tapi kalau nak cepat, boleh skip this step)
6. Uli sampai dia jadi setebal 1-2cm.
7. Tekap guna cawan atau gelas. Elakkan memutar ketika menekap bagi memastikan scones dapat menaik dengan baik semasa dibakar.
8. Letak scones yang dah ditekap atas aluminium foil (yang kat baking tray, of course)
9. Sapu campuran telur + susu atas scones yang dah ditekap supaya atas dia jadi berkilat lepas dibakar.
10. Bakar selama 12-15 minit dengan suhu 220°c
11. Lepas siap, belah dua scones secara melintang, sapu butter, jem dan/atau krim. tutup balik scones, dan makan.

Senang kan?

Cheese Scones

 Untuk Cheese Scones:
- Tambah secubit serbuk lada hitam lepas no. 1
- Tambah cheese yang dah dicincang lepas no. 2. Guna goat cheese sedap, sebab rasa dia pekat lagi.
- Tak perlu makan dengan krim atau jem. Boleh makan terus gitu.

Untuk Raisin Scones:
- Tambah kismis lepas no. 2. 

Pre-baked raisin scones.
Macam chocolate chips pun ada kan?
Oh, raisins ni boleh ganti dengan chocolate chips pun, kalau nak.

Jadi, itulah dia resepinya. Mehla cuba buat.
Kalau batch ada buat gathering yang ada potluck, boleh la ramai-ramai bawa scones buatan sendiri. ohoho.

InsyaAllah program The Open Circle akan diteruskan setiap bulan. Ana akan terus update bila ada nanti.

Oh, dan tahun ni merupakan tahun ke-5 sejak kita habis sekolah. Jom buat gathering batch ~

Sekian, wassalam :)

How I Learn to Read Arabic and Al-Qur'an

Salam.

Here's another sharing of how I learn to read.

My experience of learning to read jawi/arabic letters and the Qur'an is rather different than learning to read Malay and English.

In Malaysia. kids normally started reading Al-Qur'an by reading Iqra' (book 1 to 6) followed by Muqaddam (consist of surahs from juz 30 of the Qur'an) and then Al-Qur'an.

Because jawi is a traditional writing of Malay, we also learn jawi during childhood. I don't remember I started reading jawi since kindergarten or primary school, but yeah, it was around that age. In primary school, the deeniyah (religious) subjects are taught in jawi, so I indirectly learn to improve jawi reading from there. I also learned the Arabic language there, so my Arabic reading also improved. but yeah, my Arabic proficiency was bad because I didn't like memorizing vocabularies..

Now I could only remember some of the Arabic words and simple sentences. uhuhuhu. My Arabic language proficiency has declined since I finished school. I only practice Arabic in my prayers and in Qur'an reading. hm hm.

I think this is how my Iqra' looked like

Moving on to reading Al-Qur'an;
As a first step towards learning to read Al-Qur'an, like other kids, I started by reading Iqra'. I learned Iqra' since kindergarten, in Tadika Cahaya Iman. However, I never finished the whole Iqra'. I guess I wasn't as passionate as when I read Malay. From reading Iqra', I also learned to read jawi a bit. Hence, I could read jawi and some arabic words (duh, they're the same letters).

I don't remember why I didn't finish the whole Iqra', maybe because I was too slow or because I always skipped going to kindergarten. Although my ability to read jawi and Arabic is limited, I could still memorize some duas, recitations in prayer and short surahs in the muqaddam because we recite it every day in kindergarten and it continued when I enrolled to the primary school, SRIH.

At SRIH, I straight away read muqaddam because we had to memorize surahs from the muqaddam. Fortunately, I could already read the short surahs at the back because I had been reading them during kindergarten.

During Ramadhan, there was always tadarus for kids and teenagers at our neighbourhood's mosque, Masjid Jamek BBU. Mama was one of the mosque's committee (still is), so she brought all my siblings to the tadarus session. I can't remember very well, but I think I got grouped with those who read muqaddam. But one day, I wanted to be in the same group with my older sisters who could already read the Al-Qur'an. That was my first time reading surahs other than in juz 30. I was around 7 or 8.

I was very excited that I got to read new surah from Al-Qur'an, not from Muqaddam. Because I was in the Al-Qur'an group, they started tadarus from the beginning of the Qur'an, which is Surah Al-Fatihah, followed by Surah Al-Baqarah. I was excited looking at the long verses. I heard to people reading the verses and check the verses in the Qur'an I held. Then, it was my turn to read the Qur'an.

Since it was the first time I read new surah, I read veeeeery slowly, recognizing each letters in the words. My groupmates had to patiently wait for me to finish reading the verses. My big sister who sat beside me (I think it was Uswah) corrected my reading a lot of time, patiently. I think I sweated because I wanted to finish reciting the verses quickly but it was hard. Because I read too slowly, Mama asked me to read only two verses when it was my turn. Huahua.

I think it was because of the tadarus that I grew interest to improve my reading of the Qur'an. I envied people who could read the Qur'an smoothly and quickly. I wanted to be as good as them.

During the end of Ramadhan, there was a 'Majlis Khatam Al-Qur'an', like a closing ceremony for the tadarus programme. The participants of the tadarus got duit raya and a new Al-Qur'an.
I really liked my new Al-Qur'an, so I immediately wrote my name on the first page when I got home.
Since then, I began to read Al-Qur'an as a daily routine after performing maghrib prayer (but I do skip sometimes, hehe). Mama is my teacher and Abah also sometimes corrected me when he's near.
I started reading by myself when....I can't remember when.. but maybe when I was in standard 4 or 5? at around 10 to 11 years old.

The tadarus programme was an annual thing (because Ramadhan used to be during our school breaks), so every year, I would join the tadarus. After form one, Ramadhan started to be during our school days, so we stopped joining the tadarus at masjid. During my last year of joining tadarus, I got a new Al-Qur'an with translations. Just as what I need to enroll secondary school.

Alhamdulillah from the tadarus programme and making reading Qur'an a daily routine, my Qur'an reading got better. I also improved in tajwid as we learned tajwid in school and there were ustaz and ustazah to check and correct our reading. But it was only in secondary school that I really became cautious on tajwid in reading the Qur'an. Hence, it was in secondary school that my Qur'an reading got more proper.

Alhamdulillah now I could read the Qur'an well. yeayy. but of course, there are still a lot of things to be learned. There are still tajwid rules to master and surahs to memorize. gulp.

 May Allah implant love towards Al-Qur'an in our hearts,
and may we got to be in the Quranic generation. Yoshh!

*sambil berdebar di dalam hati, layakkah aku? oohhh.. takpe kita berusaha je.

This is how I learn to read Arabic and Al-Qur'an.
to summarize,
Age 6: Read Iqra' (not finished)
Age 7: Read Muqaddam (not finished)
Age 7-8: Read Al-Qur'an
Age 10-11: Learn tajwid
Age 13-14: Become conscious of reading with tajwid

Yeahh, it's  a looong journey of learning to read Qur'an properly. May Allah count and bless the effort. wuwu.
It's hard to be istiqamah in learning to read Al-Qur'an. During the early times, I was quite ambivalent towards reading it. Ye lah, iman goes up and down.
but,,, may this heart always be close to Al-Qur'an.

That's all.

Salam :)

P/S: All pictures in this post aren't mine. Those are results from Google Image search.

How I Learn to Read; Tadika Memory

Salam.

Just a random sharing on my early memory in Reading.

(padahal esok ada paper lagi. huehue. oh yea, it's the final exam season now. but I really feel like writing now. It's a way of relieving stress. aiceh)

Some kids start reading at the age of 5, some at 4, some at 6. It depends on the age they started going to school or kindergarten.

When I was 5, I got into Tadika Cahaya Iman (one of the many kindergartens under Iman ELC), now known as Tadika Iman BBU. When I entered level 1, my sister Safiah was in level 2. Because I'm very close to Safiah, I wanted to be attached to her all the time. I cried a lot when my teachers told me to enter my own classroom because I wanted to be in the same classroom as my sister's. I remember when my teacher had to hold me to get me in my classroom while I cried loudly. And there were also times when my teacher just let me sit with my sister in her class. Yeay.

Because I was too attached to my sister and protested to not enter my own class, I then stopped going to the kindergarten. Huehuehue. I don't exactly remember for how long I went to kindergarten during level 1. But I do remember my class' name. It's either 1 Cerdik or Cerdas. (haha takla ingat sangat)

Us in our kindergarten uniform.
I'm on the left, Solehah in the middle, Safiah on the right, holding Hayat.
neomu kyeopta.. huahua

The year I was turning 6, I enrolled in the same kindergarten again and started a new life. Because Safiah had enrolled in primary school, I went to the kindergarten alone. I still remember the first day I entered my class in level 2. I was in 2 Pintar. I could still remember some faces I had met during level 1.

Anyway, it was when I was in level 2 that I started learning reading. Cikgu Ros was my homeroom teacher at that time, and she's the one who taught me reading using the 'Bacalah Anakku' book. I remember that it has its, um, volume, I guess. Bacalah Anakku 1, Bacalah Anakku 2 and so on.

When I started learning, my pace of reading was rather slow. I slowly got to new Bacalah Anakku book. Finishing a few pages of Bacalah Anakku took quite some time. But that didn't demotivate me. Cewah. I had liked books even before I learn to read. So I guess I just went with the flow.

Because I was still learning to read, I also wrote slowly. There was this one time when my teacher (can't remember her name, but she was quite fierce, I was super scared of her) asked us to copy what she had written on whiteboard. She wanted us to copy that before we went home. Then, she said the scariest words kids ever heard "siapa tak siap, tak boleh balik." (those who don't finish, can't go home). Once I heard that, I really tried to write quickly, but it was too hard. When my friend had finished, she told me to hurry because our van might arrive soon. I was too scared to the thought of not going back home that I cried while writing. I don't remember what happened next, either I finished writing or the teacher let me go, but afterwards, I went out of the class still crying. Yeah, I was very kememeh.

yeah, get them today! These books helped me to read.
The Bacalah Anakku series

Back to books and reading. I like books because Abah always bought books with beautiful pictures. Our siblings' favourite was the Martini series. The Martini book has beautiful illustrations. (not the Martini cocktail tau. I tried googling for the images of this martini book, but only the pictures of the cocktail showed up -__-"). Well, I guess my family did play a crucial role in getting myself to be interested to read. I always saw Abah, Mama and my sisters reading. I also saw my sisters read the Martini series, so I sometimes joined them. But of course, they read the words while I just looked at the pictures, and tried to connect the pictures with the words my sisters read.

One day, I picked up one of the Martini series book and 'read' it to myself. I 'read' it out loud. Actually, I didn't read the words. I just made up the story based on the pictures in the book. I remember Abah and my sisters giggled watching me 'reading' that.

I didn't exactly remember when, but that was one of the moments during the times I started reading at home too. Because I also read at home (I think it's with the help of Mama or my sisters, can't remember), my reading improved.

At the kindergarten, I quickly finished one after another Bacalah Anakku book. Aicewah. Bangga plak. and finally, I finished the whole Bacalah Anakku series. yeayyy, alhamdulillah.

There was one day when Cikgu Ros told everyone to sit according to their book number. Bacalah Anakku 1, here, Bacalah Anakku 2, there, Bacalah Anakku 3, there and so on and so forth. Finally, she said that those who have finished all the books to sit at the centre of the class with her. So I went there with others who have finished. She said something like complement and that she loved us because we have finished the books. That moment, I was very happy. teehee.

I could officially read normal books (not books with suku kata) from that moment on, at the age of 6.

This is not me.

Oh, I also learned to read English around that time. That time, we read the Peter and Jane series. But I never finished the whole series. Huehue. Well, at least I could read Malay.

But yeah, my English was bad when I was a kid. During the entrance exam for primary school, I was confused of the names of blue and green colours. I even read mother as 'moder', not 'mader'. Alhamdulillah my English now is OK. Yeayy.

Ehm. Back to reading.

Alhamdulillah my family members like to read, hence I felt interested to read too. When I look at them looking at books, I thought that it must be interesting. That motivation boost my enthusiasm to read Bacalah Anakku at the kindergarten. I remember when I finally could grasp the readings of suku kata, I read each suku kata in the book boringly and quickly (bajet tere sangat), so I could finish the book quickly.

That was my experience of learning to read.

Alhamdulillah for this nikmat and ability.

Ah, reading Malay and English is one experience.

Reading jawi and the arabic letters is another experience. I shall share it later.

Thank you :)

P/S: All pictures in this post aren't mine. Those are results from Google Image search.. except the first one.