But the shop was closed. She didn’t know what to do. She has a lot of good neighbors. One of them is Sara Khanim. She advised my granny to cook one of the national dishes of Azerbaijan, called ‘Arzuman Kyuftasi’. When we reached the village I was very hungry. I felt like eating everything. My granny and mother set the table. My father asked Sara khanim to join us at the table.

My granny cooked a delicious ‘Arzuman Kyuftasi’. Everything was on the table. We ate our dish with great pleasure. All of us thanked her for such a wonderful dish. After the meal, my mother asked Sara Khanim to mention the ingredients. My mother then learnt how to make it. When we returned home I asked my mother to cook this dish at home. However, my granny promised me that she would come to Baku to cook this dish for us.

So some weeks passed. My granny then came to Baku. I was very happy, because my granny had promised to prepare ‘Arzuman Kyuftasi’. We also invited our relatives. All of them liked it. They said, "How delicious this dish is," and "What a kind and friendly granny you have got!" Our relatives thanked us for a wonderful party.

First we chatted and then we danced. After that we fell down on the sofa because we were tired. It was time to have our dinner, but when I opened the fridge I saw that my mother had not prepared dinner. So I decided to make dinner myself, with the help of my friend. We started our work together. When we finished cooking we tasted what we had made. It was really very tasty.

For example, Lankaran is known for ‘lavangy’, Baku is known for ‘dushbara’, ‘plov’, and ‘pyty’ while the region of Sheki is known for its ‘halva’. I like pyty very much and I eat it with great pleasure. We often make pyty at home, because it is a very useful meal. When we cook it we add potatoes, onions, meat and peas. These vegetables are good for your health. We buy all these ingredients in the market. When the meat is fresh, pyty is tastier.

When pyty is cooked in our house I wait impatiently for it to be served. I always devour pyty. If you have flu, pyty helps you get rid of the illness! We eat pyty with bread. I always help my mother to prepare pyty. We also like to eat pyty with pickle. When my mother cuts onions, I peal potatoes. I wash peas and put them into the jug. Some people like to have pyty in its own jug, but I like to eat it in a bowl.

Not only pyty, but all the meals of Azerbaijan are tasty. When the guests from other countries come to Azerbaijan, they always say, "What tasty meals you have!"

Azerbaijan has national salads. Imagine a table without salads! Salads in Azerbaijan are mainly divided into two groups: holiday salads and dairy salads. Holiday salads include Baki salad, Tarragon salad and Khazar salad. I like Khazar salad best of all; it is very tasty. There are a lot of important vitamins in this salad. I advise you to make this salad. I hope that you will like it too. Enjoy!

Heat up milk the milk at between 30 and 35 degrees Celsius. Add yeast, salt, eggs, melted butter and flour. Keep dough for 1to 1.5 hours, then make 30gr balls and roll them out into 2cm-thick strips. Place stuffing inside and make screw—shaped edges. Pattern the surface. Bake at 160-180 degrees Celsius, for 25-30 minutes.

My granny then gave me a plate of ‘turshu syiig’. I ate it with great appetite and I felt better quickly. Granny then told me that when she was young they never got medicine; they used to eat ‘turshu syiig’ when they were ill. She advised me to not take medicine too much. It’s better to use traditional medicine: it is useful and safe. I agree with my granny.

When winter came it snowed a lot. Everywhere it was covered with snow. Everybody was playing in the yard. Muhammad wanted to play with snow too. Without his grandmother’s permission he went out. Muhammad played in the snow for a long time. After three hours he came back. When his grandmother Fatima came back from the market she saw that Muhammad had a high temperature. He was coughing as well. She didn’t say anything. She went to the kitchen and began to cook ‘umach’. After about ten minutes she came back with a full bowl of ‘umach’; she gave it to Muhammad. He ate this meal and got well. He never went outside again without permission. After this story I hope that everyone will do everything with their parents; then I think their works will be of high quality. Amen.

Now I want to tell you a story about Sulu Khingal. When I was at my granny I was ill. I had no appetite. I couldn’t eat anything. Then my granny said, "I will cook you a tasty meal. And you will like it!" It took more than an hour to cook! The smell of this meal is very pleasant. I ate with a great appetite and I was healthy again in two days. My granny always says that Sulu Khingal is the best medicine from any cold. From that day, I eat it very often during winter. Good appetite!

I was alone. They knew that my mother was in the countryside. They said to me, "We wanted to celebrate your birthday again!" Then they went to the kitchen and didn’t let me to do anything as they wanted to surprise me. After an hour they began to set the table. They decorated the table as my mother had done on my birthday. They made ‘Walnut Kuku’, according to my mother’s recipe! Then my father came home. He was really hungry. It was a great surprise for him too as he did not expect my friends to cook for him.

Kuku cooked by my friends was very tasty. It tasted good. But I have to say that it did not taste like the dish that my mother prepared. We had a wonderful time on Saturday evening, though.

I eat kyurza willingly and afterwards I feel as if I have enough energy to cope with my lessons. We need different foods to cook kyurza and as a result kyurza is delicious. One of the types of kyurza is Nakchivansayagi kyurza. It is very important for humans. It differs from other meals. There are a lot of useful things in this meal. I know it well and I advise you to have this meal that respectable Americans also cook and eat. Good appetite!

There we fished for sturgeons. It was a great pleasure to watch how my uncle fishes. We returned home and then my uncle had an idea. We took charcoals and started preparing shashlyk. My uncle can prepare very tasty shashlyk. We cut sturgeon into pieces, salted and then my uncle roasted them. Soon the shashlyk was ready. My mother served it with narsharab and sumac separately. We ate surgeon shashlyk with great pleasure. Narsharab gave special taste to this shashlyk. We enjoyed it. We thanked my uncle for this tasty shashlyk.

Some months passed. We invited my uncle to my birthday. We asked him to prepare shashlyk. He did it with great pleasure. We sat at the table. All our guests praised my uncle for his delicious shashlyk. You can only eat this shashlyk in Azerbaijan. I wish you a healthy life and many tasty dishes!

First she put rice on water for 1-2 hours. She then broke up the rice and added to the milk; she didn’t forget the sugar and salt. She added butter to the milk when it was near to readiness. Then she poured it onto plates and waited for it to cool. I saw how she decorated it with cinnamon. I liked the process of decoration and did the same and helped my grandmother to decorate "firni". It was lunchtime and all family was at the table. I tasted the strange meal; it was wonderful! Taste it and you’ll see what I mean!

Do you want to know how she did it? First, she cut herbs and stewed them in butter. Then she added salt, pepper, lavashana and mixed it all thoroughly. She added eggs, yeast, salt and rolled 2mm-thick ringlets. Then she wrapped stuffing in crescent shape and fried both sides without butter in a special pot. When serving the kutabs she poured heated butter over it, as well as sour milk.

Now my grandparents are refugees; they live in a hostel in Baki. Sometimes she buys spices in a market and then she cooks kutabs, but these kutabs do not taste as good as the ones grandparents cooked in the village.

There are still several regions in the modern world where people can’t forget weapon for a minute. After the Soviet Union broke up, several conflict regions can be added to the list: Abkhazia, Karabakh and Chechnya. A lot of young boys are dying in this war. Before the war in Karbakh my grandparents lived there. Karabakh was one of the nicest places in our country. Nowadays, Karabakh is horrible.

People who lived there are refugees now. Children from Karbakh live in tents; hungry and cold. The places where they are supposed to study are so-called "tent-schools". We must help them. We have to protect them from cold and hunger. I hate wars and want all the people to live in peace and mutual consent. Then everybody will be really happy. Peoples of the Earth, I ask you, "Stop War!" Let’s save our children from hunger and poverty.