News flash
Pizza Hut turns 4!
On December 6, 2007, Pizza Hut celebrated its 4th Anniversary in its Gulshan branch. As a token of its celebration, it introduced a new addition - the Premium a new line for the pizza lovers. The Premium includes Red & Hot Pizza, Surf & Turf, Premium and Tropical Pineapple pizzas. These new additions will also be available at the Chittagong outlets. On this momentous occasion, Pizza Hut expressed its deep gratitude to all its loyal customers and well wishers.

To comment on the occasion Akku Chowdhury, Executive Director, Transcom Foods Limited adds, “Pizza Hut's vision is to be the best casual dining restaurant in Bangladesh, where consumers can enjoy a wide array of food in a cosy and relaxed ambience. Today, celebrating our 4th anniversary, we would like to reiterate that we are constantly striving to be the favourite restaurant of our customers. Pizza Hut Gulshan outlet has a seating capacity of 200 persons- where customers get a new dimension to the dine-in experience and can have the same experience at all our outlets. I express my heartfelt gratitude to our customers and extend my sincere thanks to all my colleagues at Pizza Hut for their outstanding contribution to make Pizza Hut an exemplary restaurant among the country's burgeoning food business.”

To note, Pizza Hut is the first ever-international restaurant chain that commenced business in Bangladesh market by opening its flagship restaurant in December 06, 2003 in Gulshan. In September 12, 2005 its second outlet was opened in Chittagong GEC Circle. Very soon Pizza Hut will open the third outlet in Dhanmondi Sat Masjid Road.

-LS Desk

Method
Mix together the minced beef, coriander, blackcurrant puree and seasoning. Divide the mixture into twelve portions and roll into balls. Chill for 30 minutes.
Blanch the onions in boiling water for 2 minutes and drain. Thread on to four skewers, alternating with the mushrooms, beef and tomatoes. Brush with a little oil. Grill for 8 - 10 minutes, turning occasionally.
Meanwhile, bring the raspberry, soy sauce and sugar to the boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves, and season to taste with freshly ground black pepper.
Serve the kebabs with boiled rice sprinkled with chopped herbs and the raspberry sauce.

Barbecued Leg of Lamb with Yogurt

Ingredients
10 pounds lamb, leg whole
1/2-cup yoghurt, plain
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon turmeric
2 tablespoons paprika
1/4 cup cumin
2 teaspoons cloves
2 teaspoons nutmeg
5 tablespoons vegetable oil

Method
Bone the lamb and cut into 1 inch cubes. Combine all ingredients in a
large bowl, mix, cover and refrigerate overnight. Skewer cubes and
grill over charcoal about 7 min. per side.

Beef and Mango Kebabs

Ingredients
8 ounces beef - cut into 1 inch chunks
8 ounces mangoes -- peeled, cored and cut into 1 inch chunks
1 onion - coarsely chopped
1/2 cup sunflower oil
1 cup orange juice
1/2 cup soy sauce

Method
Combine onion, oil, orange juice and soy sauce. Add beef and mango pieces. Coat thoroughly. Cover and chill for 5 hours. Preheat grill. Using metal skewers, pierce centres of each piece until full. Balance skewers on a grill pan and cook for 5 minutes each side, or until juices run clean. Serve hot with a spinach salad and soft crusty rolls.

Honeyed lamb with rhubarb salsa

Ingredients
2 x lamb racks (12 cutlets), trimmed
¼ cup honey
Freshly ground black pepper
Rhubarb Salsa:
1 tablespoon oil
2 cups trimmed, finely chopped rhubarb
¾ cup sultanas
1 red onion, finely chopped
2 chillies, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
¼ cup honey
2 teaspoons mustard
½ teaspoon ground cardamom
¼ cup coriander leaves

Method
Preheat oven to 200°C.
Place lamb in a baking pan and brush with honey. Season well with pepper, then bake for 30 minutes.
Rhubarb salsa- Meanwhile, heat oil in a frying pan. Sauté rhubarb, sultanas, onion, chilli and garlic for 4-5 minutes or until rhubarb is just tender.
Stir in honey, mustard and cardamom. Cook, stirring, for 1-2 minutes. Remove from heat and stir through coriander, if using.
Serve lamb, warm or cold, with Rhubarb Salsa, salad or vegetables, and potatoes.

By all estimations 2007 has been one of the most difficult and trying times for the people of this land. Crippled by natural disasters, choked by political strife and caught up in the vagaries of change, Bangladesh has struggled through a year stumbling from one problem to another, never managing to get the new start that looked so probable at the dawn.

Another year that began with optimism born out of resilience nears its end with suffering at top of the agenda. Which is why, December 16th takes on such great meaning. This Victory Day, evoking memories of a triumph against all odds 37 years previously, should provide us not only with a feel-good factor as always but work as a springboard to heal our wounds and move on.

It is something that we do well, have kept on doing for a while now and therefore should use to the best of our abilities to provide us some respite from a year that included Cyclone Sidr, ravaging floods and a huge change in the political landscape.

240 km/hr winds of destruction hit on November 15 killing thousands, affecting millions, ravaging livestock and leaving innumerable not knowing how they will go through the next day.

Unfortunately this was not the only display of Mother Nature's wrath.

Floods continued to wreck their yearly havoc across the length and breadth of the country, leaving over six hundred dead and millions displaced. Although the waters have long since receded damage to crops however, water-borne diseases remain rampant.

And proving three is the number of misery, a dramatic cold wave early in the year left nearly two hundred dead to compound the woes of the oft-suffering people.

That was just in the natural font.

Change swept its flighty wings across the political landscape.

A year, which began with the now well-known 1/11 and which has seen emergency rule and a caretaker government for the most part of it.

As with most things Bangaldeshi, that too started off promisingly but has tended to peter off with the passing of time.

The optimism and vigour that marked the opening few months, the setting right of all who wronged in the past all promised so much but has failed to deliver.

Disillusionment has set in again and all the new beginnings are being judged as false dawns.

The familiarity of failure threatens to overwhelm us yet again. But disappearing into mediocrity is not what Victory Day is about. Which is why it comes at such an opportune moment reminding us that while so many things have gotten away from us this year (and the year before and the year before…), there is one that shall stay with us forever.

The memory of a day when our nation was born is still churned out of folklore by the new generation. But if anything can provide riposte to the certainty of failure it is that. So come December 16, let us celebrate and embrace a great victory, perhaps the only great victory that we have won.

Let us shed all that threatens to swallow us up and revel in the few minutes of greatness that all of us are due. No matter how corrupted we get, how much flood water seeps in or how many promising governments fail, Victory Day is something that will afford us that bit of pride in having achieved something. Maybe it will only be a brief time-out from reality but as they say, something is better than nothing.

Here is, where we raise (for as many times as necessary) our glasses for the hope of a new and improved Bangladesh.

December 16 is our Christmas miracle....as unexpected and impossible as a virgin giving birth....but it happened.

And just once.

Maybe that's what makes it so special.

By Quazi Zulquarnain Islam