I have met many experts in my lifetime, and most of the time they are kind of pretentious. Suffice to say that may not be true for all, and the ones that disclaim that they are, are ironically the ones that have a thing or two to share and their knowledge simply wows the daylights out of most people. So the question then is, why do some people like to make false claims or boast about their small achievements? Perhaps to bulldoze their points across, and maybe that makes them feel better.
I met this guy once and he likes to say something, and as soon as he detects any disbelief from his audience, he would punctuate his sentence with an “I know because I am blah blah..” Like for some reasons he seems to be afraid that people around him do not know that he has been putting in all the effort.
It seems like a holier than thou attitude towards debate of any sort, and these people don’t take no for an answer or any form of resistance. Interestingly, it might be easy to sell a lemon to people like that. All you need to do as a sales person is to approach them and then as soon as you encounter an obstacle in the conversation, you would promptly say, “I understand that you can’t make a decision now, but that is fine, you can check back with your supervisor and let me know. This is my card.”
Saying that sentence alone could cause bush fires in winter. That sentence would literally cause flumes to emit from the ears of these pompous experts. This is because their pseudo position is insecure, and now somewhat threatened by clever presentation. Actually there is no real threat or destabilising force present. It is merely a play on words, and this time these highfaluting experts will get a taste of their own medicine.
We all live in the world of cubicles. I used to wonder upon returning to Singapore a while back from my years of studying overseas and wondered to myself as to where did all the Singaporeans disappeared to. I soon realised that answer to my poorly thought out question that they were all around in reality, just that they only existed during rush hours to work and from work.
We have all “disappeared”, albeit into cubicles island-wide.
That seems to be the lifestyle design that we have chosen for ourselves the moment that we enter into the workforce. At least for the majority of us that is. It seems that this is the choice that we have all somehow decided was the best route to take while we decide what we want to do with the rest of our working careers.
Soon after taking on the cubicle life, we start our emailing campaigns to the world and to each other. I can almost imagine going to work in a cubicle and writing an email to another person in another cubicle. That seems to be the lifestyle that we design for ourselves. I am just wondering if this is what work should be like. I am not complaining though, just thinking about what we would do if we weren’t bound by our cubicles.
Would our lives be a lot more interesting or would it be the same? Just that we are bound somewhere else in another cubicle like location. If we were to consider working from a remote location, would that mean we would have a better quality of life? Would we get to enjoy the Singapore that our forefathers built for us to enjoy, or will we mostly see it in the wee hours of the morning (to avoid the rush hour crunch) and the twilight of sundown (to also avoid the rush hour crunch).
I want to write about the business of blogging and how we should approach it in this information age that we live in. These are indeed exciting times I should say. With social medias complementing our efforts, blogging in today’s context has never been easier. We are no longer like a fast food outlet opened in the middle of the desert anymore, everyone can see our posts virally through Twitter, Facebook or Google+ in a matter of seconds as soon as we publish our posts.
In fact, blogging is no longer just about personal anecdotes or quirky quotes as most bloggers would tell you today. It used to be just an online diary of our daily musings but these days blogging is a business. People have taken on blogging assignments and have in one way or another promoted products openly or subtly via affiliate marketing. Blogging in fact has developed into a very serious business that commercial entities with products to introduce to the masses have adopted the social media approach as a significant equal to print media.
Business today see social media almost on par as mainstream media, and that significance is unlikely to go away anytime soon. So are you ready to jump on the bandwagon of blogging hoping to strike it rich? Well, the truth is, blogging is hard work. In fact there is a saying, the harder I work, the luckier I get. I think that applies to anything that we do, especially blogging.
These days a blog is created in a matter of seconds around the world, each breathing air and fresh ideas into its online existence. Each trying to scrap off a little of that online gold rush. If you had started your blog early, and if you had timed yourself right, you would be an authority today, garnering traffic that is comfortable for your business. But for the rest of us newbie bloggers, there is still some fine grains of gold left over amidst the dirt, and if you sift through enough dirt, you will eventually find your niche, and find your fine grains of gold nuggets, and build yourself a suitable authority site in the topic that you have chosen.
If you’re exploring or thinking of starting a blog, then perhaps you might want to consider the cheap web-hosting that I am with, and that is Blue Host. You can literally start a blog in a matter of minutes, faster than you think.
That is the challenge of any newbie blogger, and I say that because naturally everyone wants to eventually become a blogger with authority and become someone that is an expert. That is however, easier said than done. Providing quality content means you need to do your research and you basically need to know what it is that people out there needs to know and would want to know.
But first, if you’re contemplating of going into the business of blogging, you would really need to consider how to ensure that the information that you put out will eventually find its way into the eyeballs of those that you’re intending to target. It might be a little bit easier these days with social media. All you really need to do is to write a blog and then share it with your Facebook friends for example, and then hope that they will read and find some semblance of meaning in your ramblings.
Or they may read and then have no basic inkling as to what you’re on about and subsequently dismisses your every sharing on your Facebook timeline. That would be tragic especially if you have something of value to share with them. So what key strategies would newbie bloggers need to know when they post material online or write a blog.
I think it is important to go back to first principles. Detail what it is that you’re hoping to achieve in your blog and state the reason why you started this blog and brought it into existence. That is important to both yourself as well as your readers because it sets the compass for the journey that you’re about to embark upon. Knowing why you started this blog will somewhat ensure that you will always have something to blog about and that you won’t run dry of content.
That said, content is king. Providing good content and content that is of value to your readers will go the furthest distance and will eventually set your site to become an authority site. You want to eventually become the subject expert of your niche and I can’t emphasise this point enough. You the blogger, need to rethink your mission and objective. For me, my purpose is clearly because I need a proper place to store all my recipes that I have tried and tested. For me, posting the recipes on Facebook just makes it difficult for me to track or refer. So having all my content published and located in one place helps me call out the recipes that I need to use really fast.
Of course besides being a storage place for my home cooked recipes, I would also want to provide content that is somewhat meaningful for my readers. Maybe some fun facts or little known facts or just generally on topics that interests me. So this blog is basically all abut what I want to do and what I would like to say.
It is like my own personal journal, and a chronicle of my thoughts and expression. One of the things that I really hope to do is also find out some ways where I can make an income online. That has always been a mystery to me, but I think it might not be that impossible coming to think of it. I mean I have seen friends who successfully earn an income online, and at the same time, passively. I think that is a powerful model to emulate and to think about since I am taking this step forward.
I used to write a blog way back in 1995 back at university. Back then the term blog wasn’t all that popular as it is now. It was more like a bunch of people writing content and then placing them up on the Internet. So much has changed since those early days of blogging, but essentially, the genre of blogging and the intent remains the same.
It is about the sharing of good content. I hope that I can also share good content, and become my own authority through my thoughts and writings.
I wasn’t feeling well over the weekend, and that sucks. Not only I wasn’t able to complete the tasks that I had plan to complete, I was subjected to a whole slew of lethargic feelings that I guess nobody really wants. It’s terrible to say the least, but I am feeling so much better. Suffice to say it is generally a bad idea to mix sashimi with wine and beer all at the same time. Someone told me that mixing beer and wine is actually toxic for the system. It does something like sending the body into a state of shock.
I guess there might be some truth in that because I realised that every time I mixed wine and beer together, something disastrous tend to happen. But this time around it seems to be the worse of the lot of bad experiences. I had a mini-nuclear explosion within my tummy and all that was inside became marsh. I could not consume anything solid for an entire day and all I could do was drink lots of water and get lots of rest. So what the doctors usually tell you when your body is not feeling well is basically true. The body usually has a way of correcting itself and it heals itself in a way. The challenge was to ride out the cycle. Sometimes it is a short cycle, sometimes it is a longer cycle to recovery, but usually if you drink plenty of fluids with lots of rest, you come into alignment with God’s design for your body and your system gets a reboot and resets itself.
I feel so much better now today then I was yesterday, and I am thankful that I did not get more sick. Potentially there was a chance that I could have got a fever, and that would have complicated matters. Thank God that healing came and I guess the rest was history. It is resurrection Sunday today, and I am glad that Jesus came to die on the cross for my sins. Without Him there would be no real purpose in life. Some people found Jesus today, and I am happy for them. I got the chance to serve today, and also spent time with family, and I am really thankful for that too.
This seems to be the national pastime of many in Singapore. But not only in this sunny isle, but possibly it could be a worldwide social phenomenon as well. I am almost quite sure of it because it’s what we do as humankind.
In fact, I am also quite sure superheroes do the dig and flick routine, albeit privately and away from the public’s sight. Batman must have done it as well, maybe while hanging upside down, Superman could have done it also while flying from one destination to the next. We only hear of their great exploits because that’s what people are mostly interested to know, but wouldn’t it be nice to know that our superheroes are also human, and that they also like doing the dig and flick routine?
It is as what someone said, this is what makes us human. My son here definitely have that ability as he is already showing competency in this area. He seems to enjoy digging and flicking the clothes in the luggage, out of the bag. Like a tiny explorer in search of hidden treasures. His actions are not as refined or accurate, but I am sure he will get there one day.
I was on my way to work one time and I was in the subway train and there in front of me was this lady deep in thought albeit in her own world. I say she was in her own world because she was enjoying every moment that she was digging her nostrils, her eyes glazed and hollow as she rolled the debris into a rounded mass before she flicked it. The flicking off part is perhaps the most scary bit as the ball-shaped object would be hurled haphazardly like a scud missile with an unknown trajectory into the air. All the best to whoever that is its intended beneficiary.
Then I got off the train, and got on the bus as I had to transit. While sitting by the window and peering out into the myriad of vehicles stopped at the traffic junction. I happened to chance upon another guy looking back at me from his van. Interestingly he was also picking his nose while waiting for the traffic lights to turn green. The man smiled when he saw my disapproving looks and turned away, but continued digging now even more vigorously as the lights suddenly turned green. Clearly need was above propriety.
I have always loved Prawn Noodles and for a long time now I have always wondered what it was that was included in that special broth that is synonymous with great tasting soup. I think it is largely monosodium glutamate is we were to consume the Prawn Noodles at the coffee shop or the hawker centre. But what if we were to try out that old local favourite at home? Would we do it the same way?
I chanced upon a packet of Prawn Noodle mix by Ah Hai (can find at NTUC) and at first glance, I thought that it was just another pre-mix recipe that will probably yield some salty end result. That may be true for some, but I decided to give it a try anyway, and it was one of the best decisions I made (alright you know I am exaggerating a little. This is Prawn Noodles that I am talking about.)
Most people would think that the pre-mix package is probably not good, and probably not great. But it was all good for me. The taste was just right. In fact I went on to make a fresh version of Prawn Noodles eventually, and it tasted just as good. But here is the recipe that I did for the Ah Hai’s Prawn Noodle paste. Enjoy.
Recipe – Serving for four
Ingredients
8 Prawns (Large)
Egg Noodles (500g)
Kang Kong (one bunch)
Bean Sprouts (one bunch)
Yakibuta (prepared separately) [optional]
Fish Cake (1 pc)
Red Chilli (1 pc)
Ah Hai’s Instant Prawn Noodle Paste (1 packet)
Method
1. Cut off the heads of the Prawns and fry the heads in a large pot with a little oil. Fry till fragrant.
2. Pour Ah Hai’s Instant Prawn Noodle Paste (NTUC sells it) into pot and pour in 2 litres of water. Bring to a boil and keep it at medium heat for 30 minutes.
3. Sieve the broth and pour into another soup pot. Blanch the egg noodles, Kang Kong, Bean Sprouts and Prawns in hot water.
4. Place all the cooked ingredients into a bowl and ladle the steaming hot broth into the bowl. Serve with Red Chilli in dark soy sauce. I use Yakibuta as opposed to the traditional Pork Ribs simply because it is tastier.
Bon Appetit!
Bonus Recipe:
Yakibuta – Japanese Char Siu
Ingredients
Pork Belly (300gm)
Shao Xing Cooking Wine
Mirin (Japanese Sweet Wine)
Light Soy Sauce
Dried Kelp
Method
1. Sear the Pork in the bottom of a pot and allow the sides of the meat to cook. Be careful not to cook the meat for too long.
2. Add in the Shao Xing Wine (1 cup), Mirin (3 Tbsp), Light Soy Sauce (3 Tbsp) and fill with water until liquid slightly covers pork. Add in the Dried Kelp. Bring to a boil and cook the meat over a slow fire for about an hour. Use a wooden skewer to test for doneness.
3. Slice the Pork Belly and decorate over Ramen noodles or in this case, Prawn Noodles.
The psychology of investment as many a guru will tell you is very much like the price action mock chart above. This is how retail investors (myself included) get caught out from time to time. More often than not, it happens even to the best of us. It is what I like to call a level 10 out of 10 mind game. People get caught unawares that there are forces greater than the foreseeable economic forces and price indicators.
I like to refer to the Wall St. Cheat Sheet or as they say, the Psychology of Market Cycle. The cheat sheet shows how most investors get sucked into the cycle and most of them get washed out. The thing is, most of us know the key to investment and that is to buy low and sell high. It’s pretty much a no-brainer. However, when it comes to putting money down, we are swayed from course and if unchecked, can enter into decisions that most will regret later.
So how does anyone invest then? The key is really to educate yourself with as much financial education as possible. Lower your risk by knowing more about what it is that you’re putting your money in. Know your investments is the key to doing well in any kinds of investments.
Someone introduced me to this book, and I thought that I would have a read and see what all the fuss was about. It seems there is an online version in PDF format (for those of us that is keen to read it digitally) otherwise a hard copy version of the book can be easily found at the National Library Board.
So what’s the book about? I don’t really know except that the title suggests a reworking or re-look at the way we view work and how to make work the same but putting in the same amount of effort and time into it. The best part about the book is that it challenges you to make what you do now much better so that you can still have time to spend doing the things that mean the most for you. Like for myself, I have been thinking about spending more time with family and spending more time at home. Alas the nature of my work requires me to spend time at work. So the challenge here for me is to manage my time in such a way that I still achieve the things that I set out to do, as well as have more time to do the things that I want to do.
I also found out that there is the audio version of the book on YouTube. Isn’t YouTube awesome? So now I can listen to is and read it at the same time. Hopefully I will understand what Tim is trying to get across, and hopefully I will also be able to get towards that ideal in my mind.
If you haven’t got a book to read, maybe you should consider reading this book.
It was what someone said was a very third world spring chicken. To be exact, there was very little spring left in the chicken and most of it was sinewy muscle and crispy skin.
I wasn’t sure if I was eating chicken or some oily puff with chicken flavour. By the time I was done with the meal, I had felt inundated with recycled oil. I have tasted better western foods but this was presented in a manner that left me desiring for something else.
Ok, perhaps you might think I am being picky but to put things into context, I did pay for the meal. And for good money too. The coleslaw was unremarkable and the fries were just a small helping as if it they were rationing their condiments.
It looked ok in the photo but it tasted just plain in reality. Well that was one meal that I didn’t really enjoy. It was just food as they say.
Bananas are great for a lot of ailments like constipation or if you just generally want to eat it as a snack. My baby loves the banana and it’s great as a snack and it helps him with his poo poo too.
We like getting the local variety which is the small type because it is handy for kids and it is not too much to munch on. Great for when we are out for our meals and we want to give him a healthy snack. These miniatures are fantastic.
Preparing lunch for myself today on a lazy Saturday. I love lazy Saturdays. No need to think about too many things and only focus on what I love to do. Nothing beats cooking something new and adding it into my recipe listing.
My wife needs to rush some work, so I guess I will just have to chow down all that cod *grin*. I got a few bones leftover after feeding baby with the meat, and it’s gonna taste lovely baked with extra Virginia olive oil and sea salt. Simple and delicious. Finish off with a squeeze of lemon. I think it will be superb. A nice lunch.
What are you having for lunch today?
Recipe – serving for two
Ingredients
Cod steak
Extra Virginia olive oil
Sea salt
Lemon
Method
1. Preheat oven (fan mode with top heating) to 200 degrees.
2. Drizzle extra virgin olive oil over cod steaks and sprinkle some sea salt. Cod tends to be quite yummy as is already so just a little salt will be sufficient.
3. Bake the cod for 15 minutes and finish off with a squeeze of lemon before serving.
We are always experimenting with different flavours to get baby to taste and get used to different types of foods. One way is via the soup method as a stock for the porridge that we cook.
So hopefully he will like his green vegetables next time when we cook it. We love vegetables so it would be tragic if baby doesn’t. So we really need to engineer his meals so that he will eventually join us in our meals.
This is a simple three ingredient soup stock. Again it is for infants, so there is no salt to be added. It is just pure flavour and all the goodness in the ingredients. I just went to the wet market early this morning to get the best produce before some aunty gets it.
I got a huge bunch of baby spinach and a chicken carcass (bones only). And just a little ikan bilis for flavour. This recipe should make about seven 120 ml cups of stock for baby’s porridge for the week.
I included a little before and after photo for comparison.
Recipe – serving for seven 120 ml cups
Ingredients
Baby spinach (a huge bunch)
Chicken carcass (bones only)
Ikan bilis (7-9 pieces)
Method
1. Wash the baby spinach first as these contain a lot of sand. Wash till the water in the pot is clear. Soak also the Ikan bilis in a small bowl of water.
2. Place the chicken in a pot. Then place the baby spinach together with the chicken. Sprinkle the Ikan bilis all over. Pour about 1 litre of water into the pot and boil on low heat.
3. The soup is done when the flavour escapes the covered pot and you can see the fat of the chicken on the surface of the broth. Allow the broth to cool before pouring into the containers for freezing. This should provide for seven servings of 120 ml of soup stock for porridge.
Sometimes the words from the people closest to you hurts you the most. But you are expected to develop an impervious armour about you and take it like you’re invincible. The words come at you like you’re invisible. That’s the expectation, and you are expected to shoulder the blame, regardless of whether you’re at fault or not. But some arrows strike deep, especially sharp and poisonous arrows.
Words spoken in anger? Perhaps. But were they spoken in fairness? It’s hard to say. Spoken in truth? Spoken in love? The first casualty in any conflict is often the truth. But harsh words are conveniently spoken, and harsh words hurt.
Sometimes we say things to hurt the superheroes in our lives, just because we fall into the belief that they are really superheroes and that they can take the abuse. The right thing to do though, is really to take it in, and pray for a resolution. Take it in and really be that superhero for them. God will surely vindicate these superheroes.
Here’s a really delicious cheesecake (non-baked) that I would like to recommend to all. It’s undoubtedly the best non-baked cheesecake recipe in the whole wide world (think fairytale).
Tastes great served chilled with a cup of unsweetened earl grey tea or simply on its own. Serves 8-10 slices and it’s excellent for small group socials or office parties.
Light and creamy like gelato, yet maintaining a fresh fruity zesty flavour on a mildly salted crumbly digestive biscuit base.
Ingredients:
Biscuit Base:
120 grams Plain Digestive Biscuits
70 grams Unsalted Butter (Room Temperature)
Method:
1. Pulse Digestive Biscuits in the food processor until coarse grains. Remember not to blend it till it is too fine. If you don’t own a food processor, get one. You won’t regret it. Otherwise, you may opt to crush the biscuits into crumbly bits in a ziplock bag and hammering it with a rolling pin.
2. Add the already softened butter into the biscuit and combine. Pulse the mixture again until butter combines into biscuit crumbs evenly. Try not to short-cut the process by melting the butter in the microwave as many are tempted to do. You won’t want to cook your butter. I always use Pure Creamery as the type of butter you use makes a big difference. Never substitute it with low-fat margarine! That’s sacrilegious.
3. Pour the biscuit mixture into a grease-paper lined 20 inch Spring-Form Pan and tamper down the crumbs to compact it. After which, you can put the pan into the freezer to let the biscuit base set for about 30 minutes.
Cream Cheese Filling:
227 grams Philadelphia Cream Cheese (Room Temperature)
1 can of Sliced Peaches
200 ml Heavy Cream
3 tbsp Castor Sugar
3 tsp Gelatin
2 tsp Lemon Juice
rind of half a Lemon
Method:
1. With a wooden spoon break the cream cheese and mix it with the castor sugar. I like to use Philadelphia Cream Cheese especially the ones from USA and that’s why it’s 227 grams, however, these days Philadelphia makes its product in Australia, and it comes in a 250 grams pack. I found the Australian product to not be as smooth.
2. Do not over mix the cheese and the sugars. You just want it to be slightly creamy in texture and not stiff peaks.
3. Pulse the sliced peaches into smaller pieces but at the same time you want to take care you don’t end up turning it into a puree. I like using Sliced Peaches from Hosen because the textures of the peaches are firmer and it has a nicer bite and taste when it is chilled. I have used other brands, but they all cannot make it. Some peaches from other brands tend to become mushy and watery after you pulse it a little. Not nice.
4. Pour the peaches into the creamed cheese mixture along with the lemon juice & rind and combine the peaches with the cream cheese, using a wooden spoon. Again take care not to break the peaches into smaller pieces.
5. Double boil the gelatin in a bowl with half a cup of water and let it dissolve. Once the gelatin is sufficiently dissolved, pour it into the cream cheese filling. Using a metal whisk, gently whisk the mixture while pouring the heavy cream into the mixing bowl.
6. Ensure that there is an even consistency as you combine the ingredients.
7. Pour your cream cheese filling into the chilled Spring-Form Pan and again tamper it down at the bottom of the pan so that the filling sits evenly on the biscuit base.
8. Chill the cheesecake in the fridge for at least 8 hours so that the gelatin will hold the cake together.
I was at a coffee shop and I chanced upon a meeting with some elderly friends and one of them introduced me to this old uncle that had a different thinking altogether towards life.
At first he sounded boastful and almost to the point of bragging, but I got to admit that he does speak a lot of common sense and natural wisdom. For example he was boasting confidently that he can teach anyone to learn how to swim in just three easy steps.
I thought to myself “wow”. Here’s my chance to know that secret. So I asked him.
He simply said “Hold the bar at the side of the pool. Then dip your head into the water. And when your head is underwater, make sure you open your eyes. Look around.”
He then explained saying that most people when they start out learning swimming typically gag at lesson one. If they are unable to overcome their fear of the water, if they were unable to overcome their fear, then learning anything else about swimming was going to be very difficult.
So by opening your eyes while you dip your head into the water, it builds the necessary confidence.
Wow. That makes sense.
Lesson two was about floating. Learning how to float face down as well as learn how to float on your back. Once that is achieved, you can talk about swimming. Thereafter, it is just about moving forward.
I am inspired.
Then the full of ideas elderly went on to show me the MP5 player he had bought for $80 at a shop in town. He said the shop owner had a tough time selling the product to foreigners who did not understand the mandarin words on the device. It was the cheapest and best item for its value, yet customers were mostly browsing and mostly stumbled at the foreign words printed on the unit.
The innovator instinctively saw the problem and deciphered the words, then printed them in English on a used phone card and displayed it next to the device. The shop owner needless to say caught on the idea and printed the labels and start leveraging on that simple translation and eventually sold out all his units at the store.
The uncle proudly said “think different.” Essentially that was the gist of our entire chit chat. He then went on to share his life story and how he help this person and that group, how he joined the UN as a volunteer and helped rural communities build necessary irrigation and helped them gain access to clean water which was necessary for sustenance of life in villages deep in the recesses of the hilly regions.
He truly exemplifies the values of “Ho Sim Lang”. If I were to have an annual Ho Sim Lang awards, I would definitely put him up as a nominee for Ho Sim Lang of the Year 2014.
After a brief hiatus since my last post, I thought it is about time to share some new recipes that I have been working on.
Here’s my favourite laksa recipe of all time. Tedious to make, but guaranteed satisfaction for all of you Laksa lovers.
The ingredients are commonly found in NTUC or Cold Storage, so ingredient list building shouldn’t be a problem. Perhaps some of you experts out there might question “why no belachan?”, well I decided not to use belachan because good quality dried shrimp is good enough, but you may consider that if you like.
Ingredients:
Vermicelli aka Laksa Bee Hoon – 500 grams
Medium Grey Prawns – 250 grams
Fish Cake – 1 large piece
Bean Sprouts – 1 handful
Dried Tau Pok – 10 pieces
Blood Cockles – 200 grams
Laksa Leaves – 1 sprig
Dried Shrimps – 1 cup
Cooking Oil – 100 ml
Water – 750ml
Coconut Milk – 250 ml
Salt
Sugar
Pound into Paste:
Shallots (or Onions) – 2/3 Bulbs
Garlic – 4 pieces
Turmeric (Yellow Ginger) – 1 inch
Galangal (Blue Ginger) – 1 inch
Young Ginger – 1 inch
Candlenuts – 4 pieces
Dried Chillis – 10 pieces (soak in water first)
Ginger Mix
Fish Cake
Fresh Prawns
Pounded Dried Shrimp
Dried Shrimps
Laksa Thick Bee Hoon
Laksa Broth
Coconut Milk
Dried Bean Curd
Method:
1. Blanch prawns in 750 ml of water till 90% cooked. I gauge this cooking process by looking at the prawns and if they curl into a “C” shape. “C” means cooked, but if however, the prawns turn into an “O” shape, then that means the prawns is now over-cooked. Just a little tip for all of us servant-less cooks.
2. Once prawns are cooked, set them aside.
3. Add Laksa leaves into the broth, and bring to a boil. You can also shred the Laksa leaves to sprinkle over your noodles for that extra flavour.
4. Then turn the fire to a low simmer for about 15 minutes.
5. Heat 100 ml of oil in a wok.
6. Add in dried shrimp (pounded) into pounded condiments (paste) and fry for 5-7 minutes over a big fire until fragrant.
7. Pour the cooked ingredients into the pot of prawn stock. Again, bring to a boil.
8. Add in the coconut milk to thicken the broth. Add salt and sugar to taste.
9. Add in the Tau Pok (sliced diagonally) to cook until soft if you like, before serving.
Serving Suggestion:
1. Present cockles, bean sprouts, fish cakes (sliced) and tau pok (cooked) in a bowl of Bee Hoon Noodles before ladling the Laksa broth over the ingredients.
2. Sprinkle Shredded Laksa leaves for extra flavour.
It was kind of surreal hearing the cricket making its signature song levels underground at City Hall MRT. I was at the East Bound section when I heard the little fiddler playing its tune.
Contrary to popular belief the cricket actually makes its signature sound from the brushing of its wings against the serrated teeth on its legs. It is the males that does it more often than females but the loud sounds it makes is more likely a calling sound as opposed to a mating call as what most people would suggest. This cricket seem to be lost, the loudness of the chirp seem to ask for help more than to ensnare females.
Maybe it is frantically trying to send out a signal to clueless communters. Or it could be thinking that it is still night even though it’s clearly morning. How did it get there deep within the abyss that is the bizarre network of tunnels, its up to our imagination I suppose.
Well it was interesting to hear its cries for help, and even more interestingly, now I know a little bit more about the cricket. I actually did a wiki search on what makes the cricket chirp like it did. Imagine that.
If there is such a thing as comfort food, then mine would be fish sliced bee hoon soup with thick white bee hoon. Here’s a recipe for fish sliced bee hoon soup that I think will rock your socks off. This is why I think this recipe so totally rock. This is a recipe that’s been tweaked to my liking.
* please note that I have included amazon affiliate links to the products I use, so check them out if you wish to support me, and if I can get these items from NTUC Supermarket, I would just indicate.
Fish slices (fried):
Ingredients:
Fish *Use Angoli* 500g (Angoli is Hokkien for Sea Bream and not to be confused with Red Snapper which is known as Ang Kway in Hokkien which literally means Red Chicken, don’t ask me why)
Sea salt(alternatively, you could consider what I use instead, which is the TADKA brand Himalayan Pink Salt [NTUC])
Chicken Stock Powder(I use Knorr Chicken Stock[NTUC] most of the time for this as it’s really the best, mum uses it for her cooking, and I use it as well)
Egg(one)
Potato starch(any brand will do, even the house brand from NTUC)
Shao Xing Hua Tiao Jiu(there are many varieties and brands that you can find at NTUC, but the brand that I like best is the Pagoda Hua Tiao Chiew, it’s the most expensive bottle with similar looking bottle branding)
White pepper
Method:
1. Cut the Angoli into thin slices about 1cm thick and then salt lightly, leave it to marinate for about 30 minutes. If you don’t like your fish to be too salty, you can wash it after marination.
2. Then prepare 5 tablespoons of potato starch *use measuring spoons* and crack an egg into it. Put half a teaspoon of chicken stock and half a capful of hua tiao jiu, white pepper and then whisk with a fork into a smooth creamy mixture.
3. Then dip the fish slices into the mixture and deep fry it over low heat, this is to ensure that the fish is cooked while the batter doesn’t burn – you want the fish slices to taste cripsy, not rock solid. Also not having a big fire ensures even cooking.
4. Fry till light brown *not too long* as fish cook easily, the texture should be just right, and the fish is not cooked too long. The taste should be soft and juicy and the batter gives it a nice crunchy texture.
Fish Soup:
Ingredients:
Sea salt (you can omit this and use chicken stock only)
Salted vegetables (Kiam Chye)
Sour plum (preserved salted sour plums)
Carnation milk (if you like)
Tomatoes (quartered)
Spring onions (cut into 2cm lengths)
Ginger (thinly sliced)
Method:
1. Bring about 1.5 litres of water to the boil, and add either 1 teaspoon of salt or chicken stock. I use salt instead because I am using salted vegetables for flavouring already, you can use chicken stock if you’re not adding salted vegetables an alternative vegetable is szechuan vegetables as it adds a different taste to it.
2. Bring the water to boil, then add the salted vegetables, sliced ginger and sour plum to flavour the soup (if you like you may also wanna add 4-5 whole garlic). Only add the tomatoes, spring onions last as they cook very quickly.
3. For the bee hoon, I use laksa bee hoon from NTUC and one packet feeds about 4 people easily. Boil the noodles first and then add it to the soup. The trick is to prepare everything ready and then adding it together to make the dish.
Serving Suggestion:
You can either add the fish into the soup when you prepare the noodles or not. It’s up to you. I prefer not so that I can taste the crispiness of the fish slices.
As an alternative, you can add chye sim, although I prefer to add thinly sliced bitter gourd to give it that extra taste.
That’s it, perfect!
Bon Appetit!
Usually I would end here with “Bon Appetit!”, but there is a YouTube video with my look-alike Adrian Pang and the very lovely Michelle Chia, and incidentally they are both promoting Sliced Fish Bee Hoon, so what the heck:
Ever been on a train and be suddenly imbued with an awful scent of stench as if you just walked into a crap-filled toilet?
I have.
And I would peer through either ends of my peripheral vision and literally roll my eyes around my eye-sockets wondering where that amonious fragrance came from. After eyeballing the burly guy in the Armani suit for a while, no prizes for guessing who. Let’s put it this way, let’s just say the smell was emanating from that direction.
It’s not the usual pungent cheesy smells of unwashed hair or salty-pickled-in-sweat nasal-haired droppings lingering around the doorway to the cavaity. No. This was much worse. And I suspect it came from further south around the rolypoly-ness of his curvy tummy.
He doesnt look like he had dirty habits, nor dyfunctional issues. But then again, who really knows. And I dont really care. My only concern was my enjoyment of the train ride that I paid good money for. And I intend to make sure my enjoyment of the air-conditioning was well worth the money and hopefully not flavoured.
The only conclusion I could think of was that he must suffer from uncontrollableflickalytis. I cant think of anything else that could have such onimous impact.
So after a brief hiatus, this drink that made its debut appearance some years back has now decided to come back and flush our quest for thirst quenchers with a little bit of punch. The Somersby Pear Cider, an alcoholic (kids don’t try this drink) drink is now readily available island wide. So what is this drink actually? Honestly, to me it is just another drink. More importantly from the video, it seems to be targeting youths who can drink legally. So ok, it looks like a cool drink. Maybe I will give it a try.
Also, there seems to be some kind of competition or promotional contest to win some money (I like!) and it seems not a very difficult thing to do. Anyway, I checked out the video for more clues and guess what? I found absolutely nothing. In conclusion, I might not be very smart.
Oh well. Maybe I will find more clues if I bought a bottle. You know how sometimes these contests usually hide their contest entry forms in the packaging. Who knows I might win something.
Starbucks have begun hiring elderly persons for their outlets. That to me is a heartening move. The elderly is a largely untapped human resource that could be harnessed for local businesses that require much needed manpower.
The elderly lady who took my order, knew exactly what it was that I wanted and she gave me the best starbucks service that was on par with any starbucks crew.
Wow. I am impressed. Kudos to the management for taking on the silver move. Employers who are able to, should consider training and investing in this resource. Elderly persons who are looking for part time or full time employment should also consider different positions like these. It is not so much about the work that one does, it is more about the meaning that the work gives to the person doing it.
Try it. Be like the 老 auntie barista. She can do it. Anyone can.
At times when taking the taxi, the uncle instead takes you for a ride. That happens to me more often then I would like to be honest.
I have motion sickness, and that doesn’t help me very much when I take public transport. Especially with the taxi cab. It can be equivalent to a roller coaster ride sometimes.
Besides that I would typically snooze off into a relatively deep sleep.
So in this instance, I too fell asleep and when I opened my eyes again, I was near johor baru. I asked the uncle why he brought me all the way out to the north when in reality he could have exited much earlier.
He conveniently said “I asked you just now and you said go further north.”
Of course I said no such thing. Then I told the uncle to go back to where he should be going. Which he did and when I finally got home it was $30+ just for a journey that would have cost much less.
I wrote this recipe out of boredom one fine day in I can’t remember when, and I decided that I would endeavour to make the best Pineapple Tarts in the world. At least the best according to my taste buds, and I am one to not easily like Pineapple Tarts. To be honest, I hate eating Pineapple Tarts that I buy from outside, they are just not to my liking for some reason.
There was always something wrong with it. Either there was some strange after taste of oil which makes my teeth “siap-siap” or the jam was just too sweet. I simply hated it.
As Chinese New Year was around the corner then, I thought it would be great if I can make my own Pineapple Tarts instead of buying them this year. This is an all time favourite for many, and for me it’s also one of those must do; must try recipes. And trust me, it’s true what they say about doing Pineapple Tarts the traditional way. It’s nothing short of tedious. But nothing ventured; nothing gained. So let’s try it!
If you want to learn how to do anything well the first time, you got to do everything from scratch, that means – no shortcuts!
So I bought a pineapple, one whole, from NTUC named “Sweet 16” – please don’t ask me why it’s called that – apparently it’s supposed to be a sweeter variety of pineapple. Alright, whatever.
I started scouring Google as well as asking around for the best Pineapple Tart recipe. There were many who ranted and raved about their recipes, and some even swore by their great-grandmother’s grave, but like they all say, the prove of the pudding is in the tasting, isn’t it? And after all that reading, I decided that if the pastry has enough butter, it will melt in your mouth; not in your hands. And if it has enough egg yolks, it will be soft and creamy as well. A little sugar for tasting and salted butter would give it that added savory flavour.
The difficulty in making Pineapple Tarts the traditional way is the grating of the pineapple – I did that by hand – and then afterwards cooking it in the saucepan till the sugars in the pineapple caramelised. This is a slow and tender process of stirring the mixture over a medium heat to allow the water content within to evaporate while preventing the sugars in the pineapple from caramelising too quickly. This whole painstaking process of cooking the pineapple filling took me about 45 minutes. And mind you, this is just for one pineapple. I don’t know how some people manage four pineapples at one go?!
As you can see in the picture, one whole pineapple weighs about 700 grams (minus the metal bowl), quite a lot of pineapple if you think about it. I grated the whole pineapple including the centre of the fruit and that’s how you get the stringy texture in the fillings.
I added 5 teaspoons of Castor Sugar into the pineapple mixture noting that this is not your garden variety of pineapple as it is already sweeter to begin with. Adjust the sweetness accordingly. I chose 5 teaspoons because 5 is the number of grace. You can also do likewise.
As the water content in the mixture dries, you can see (literally) the sugars starting to caramelise and the pineapple mixture starts to brown. This is the critical part because if you let up your concentration now, the mixture will burn and you will have to start all over again. Thank God mine turned out perfect.
For the pastry, I decided that I wanted a soft buttery and yet not too overwhelming feeling in the mouth – in other words – I can pop 5-6 Pineapple Tarts and still have an appetite for other yummy new year goodies. I decided to use 300g of Plain Flour combined with 45g of Castor Sugar and mixed in a whole slab of salted Butter – 250g (room temperature) and using the tip of a metal fork, I pressed in the Butter into the Flour and continued pressing until the Flour, Sugar and Butter was well-combined.
I decided that I wanted my Pineapple Tarts to be soft and creamy and that basically calls for more Egg Yolks. This is not your typical Lisa Leong Healthy Recipe. It’s sinful to say the least. I added 4 Egg Yolks (no whites!) and continued with the “Fork Technique” of pressing the dough instead of kneading immediately. The whole idea behind the “Fork Technique” is so as not to stress the dough with too much hard-hitting tension.
When it is fairly combined, dust the table with some flour, and massage the dough mixture a little more. And then leaving it to “breathe” for about half an hour. This is to allow the dough to “rest a little” (from all that tension from the kneading).
Then roll out whatever amount you want to bake, into whatever shape you want. I decided that I wanted to do them in the shape of rounded pillow cushions. You may prefer the Pyramids of Giza. Whatever. So I literally hand-moulded each one of these beauties, glazed the tops of each with egg yolk and water batter so that they will all glisten gloriously after baking.
I baked them in 160 Degress Celsius in the oven for about 20 minutes and then allowing them to brown a little in the oven for 5 more minutes with the power turned off. The oven that I am using is a Dual-Heating Element type (top and bottom) and with the tray placed in the middle, so that the temperature will be evenly distributed. Remember to pre-heat the oven for at least 10 minutes before putting in the tray. Then you get on your knees and pray that they turn out ok.
Once they are done, take out the tray to let the pineapple tarts cool. They turned out ok! Thank God. Technically speaking, they aren’t really tarts, more like Kisses. Well whatever, you should get the idea, right? And it’s ready to eat.
Melts in your mouth, not in your hands, filling is not too sweet, blends in perfectly with the pastry and the pastry is not too overwhelming, soft and crumbly. Perfect.
Here’s the ingredients list if you didn’t know what in the world I was saying just now.
Recipe
Ingredients:
Pineapple Filling:
1 Whole Pineapple (sweet type or honey pineapple) – if you choose the not-so-sweet type, you might have to tweak the sugars by taste. 5 teaspoons of Castor Sugar – remember 5 is the number of grace!
Method: 1. Hand-grate the whole pineapple including the core of the fruit. Do not short-cut the process and use a blender, although it would definitely make the whole process easier. Doing so would change the texture of your pineapple filling. 2. Cook the pineapple mixture over medium heat, and make sure it doesn’t burn. Note: Don’t be tempted to use high heat as it will make it harder for you to estimate when exactly the sugars will caramelised. 3. Keep stirring, and tossing, and turning the mixture with a wooden spoon till it is fully caramelised into a pulpy sticky mixture. Don’t let it dry up or brown too much. For one whole pineapple, this should take about 45 minutes.
Pastry:
300g Plain Flour 45g Castor Sugar 250g Salted Butter (room temperature) – Please don’t short-cut the process by melting it in the microwave or oven. You don’t want to end up inadvertently cooking the flour while mixing the dough.
Method: 1. Weigh the flour on a digital kitchen scale, make sure it is exact. Add in the Sugar and mix with a fork, so that the sugars are evenly distributed. Then add the Butter and continue to press the dough in using the tip of the fork. 2. Add 3 egg yolks (no whites) and continue to use the “Fork Technique” to press in the egg yolks until they are well-combined. Remember to knead the dough and then let it rest (or breathe) for 30 minutes before rolling them into shape.
All the best, and Happy Chinese New Year folks, even if it is not Chinese New Year, you also can make Pineapple Tarts.
If there is one thing that I love, it has to be seafood. Not because I love the cartoon “The Little Mermaid”, or their tiny sea creatures but because I love all kinds of seafood. Alright, maybe that was kind of like not saying very much.
My favorite seafood would be prawns, scallops, crabs and squids. All of them reputably not very good for you if you were to consume in large quantities day in day out. Good thing I only have it once or twice a week.
For the most times, we have fish and in all manifestations of it. Fried, steamed, or sliced into porridge, that’s basically how I like my fish. And the best place to get fresh fish is really at the wet market. They get it directly from the fishery port and anything fresher than that would be from the sea itself.
At this juncture it would be wise to also form good relations with your fishmonger as they are the ones who would be able to tell you which seafood item came from where and if they were fresh or otherwise (of course everyone proclaims to sell fresh seafood only). The problem comes when you get back home, when the realization happens. You then realize that the circle of trust might be broken.
I think it is also a matter of how popular the fishmonger thinks he is that day and on his willingness to strike you off his customers’ list.
Nobody sells only fresh seafood. It’s not possible.
Food wastage is a reality in the FNB industry and it affects anyone selling food products. There is always something fresh and something else that is going for a discount. The key is to let go that which is not so fresh and appear as if you are a great guy at the same time.
it also depends on his track record with you as well as the business performance of the only other competitor in the wet market. If the competitor consistently does badly, then this guy can take a chance and “offend” some customers or he could do the honorable thing by giving a discount.
That said, the catchphrase “I give you discount” or “I give you special price” is often a keyword phrase that might mean something else entirely. Most people would think that this is an attempt by the fishmonger to build social capital but really, you wouldn’t know until you get home to find out just how good a deal you really got.
Freshness is subjective and how fresh something is, is largely based on visual and smell and lots hours of wet market experience.
That all being said, I hope it does not deter your own discovery and experience. Jostle in and learn. You will never know what you will find.
My wife and I love ginseng flavored black chicken soup, especially the one bought by my dad from this stall at Jalan Bersih Hawker Centre. They also sell the best turtle soup I believe in Singapore.
Black chicken soup is also very nutritious and good for new mothers during confinement month. It is generally regarded as a delicacy. Very easy to cook and best if you double-boil it. Of course double boiling just means that it will take a while longer.
I usually buy the black chicken fresh from the chicken butcher at the wet market. He will help chop the chicken into pieces really fast and neatly. I usually get him to chop into four pieces but you get him to chop into six parts.
The herbal mix of ginseng and other berries and roots I usually get the pre-packed ones from NTUC supermarkets. The items there are sufficient for what I need to do and it is fairly fuss free. Alternatively you can also buy the herbs from shops like Hock Hua as they would carry the entire range or grades of herbs.
Preparation time for this soup took just 30 minutes to prepare but if you have more time it would be good to simmer the chicken till the meat falls off the bones. Try it.
Recipe – serving for two
Ingredients
Black chicken
Pre-packed ginseng herbal chicken mix
Sea salt
Method
1. Place the chopped chicken in a large pot. Add the herbs into the pot. Add a litre of water. Add quarter teaspoon of salt. Boil high heat until the flavor of the chicken and the herbs comes through.
2. Then turn down the heat and slow cook till the meat is just tender.
I can’t remember the last time I had a toast box coffee (kopi) or tea (teh), but I was quite taken aback that it was so cheap.
The lady at the Chinatown point outlet punched in my order and I took a quick glance at the cash register and it said $1.80 (SGD). Naturally I was happy-like-bird and gave her two dollars.
Cashier: “先生您叫一杯还是两杯呢?”
I looked at the cash register again and this time around it said $3.60 (SGD). To my embarrassment, I realized that each cup of Kopi C and Teh C was $1.80 each. Oh my. When did it become so expensive?
Of course this is still way cheaper than Starbucks, but then again this was not Starbucks but Toast Box, so it took me by surprise. If we put things into perspective, it would suggest that the drinks here are almost twice as expensive as any regular coffee shop.
I can afford the price increase, just wondering if there was a need to increase the price though. Oh well.
It’s a special title and an even more special place of honor. Not everyone can enjoy that title and it takes a certain passage of time and much uncertainty before someone is entrusted with that title of “daddy”.
Firstly the child needs to speak the words, but more importantly know the words. That day seems near as he knows who “papa” is already and fatherhood is certainly much more fulfilling in ways I could never have imagined.
Living life now is living life for him, to care for him and take care of him. He came as a tiny infant helpless and could only express cries or silence. His range of emotions simple and uncomplicated. Raw and immediate. There is hardly time and space that I am unaware of his existence. Our lives are forever intertwined. He is a part of me as I am a part of him.
It is a different way of life today than it was yesterday. A life with a child. A dependent, dependent on you. Your time of living your life and doing the things that you used to do has come to a good end. Now it is a season of routines, schedules and timeliness.
After being daddy, you assume responsibility and suddenly time becomes finite and I can almost see time in compartments and how I can and must manage it. It is a journey that I would encourage all to take. Never mind if you are unsure at this moment, but I guarantee you that it is a good transition, a good change.
This is how I like my potatoes. Boiled, then pan fried without oil so that the skins will brown. I usually dry-fry with fresh rosemary leaves and a sprinkle of sea salt.
When the pan is reasonably hot and slightly smokey, I will drizzle extra virgin olive oil and allow the oil to coat the potatoes and adhere the salt to the potatoes. I like new potatoes because they are easy to cook and are great for accompaniment with mains or stews.
Recipe – serving for four
Ingredients
New potatoes
Fresh rosemary leaves (two sprigs)
Sea salt
Extra virgin olive oil
Method
1. Boil the new potatoes in a pot of boiling water till they are cooked. Then douse the potatoes into cool running water to stop the cooking.
2. In a heated pan, fry the new potatoes with rosemary leaves and sea salt until smoking. Then drizzle the potatoes with extra virgin olive oil.
I am also starting OTS aka “one take sessions” on anything that might be remotely useful for people that stumble upon this blog. Also, it is more for me because I really really want to know how to chop chickens properly.
I got to admit it, I am bad at chopping chickens. I don’t know where to pull or where to chop. Sometimes the simplest of cuts can become a massacre of epic proportions. I wish I have the wisdom of the chicken butcher when it comes to cuts and then a brilliant idea popped into my mind.
Ask the chicken butcher at the market to do a demonstration. It’s not the most exciting of videos, but it’s a great “how-to” video. A fantastic OTS. Enjoy.
I woke up one night and felt this insane craving to make my own Runny Egg Yolk hard-boiled egg. And almost as quickly, I immediately whipped out my trusty Nokia e71 (Yup, that was how long ago this recipe was inspired) and googled the recipe online. It was undoubtedly the most rewarding experience because now I have Runny Egg Yolk hard-boiled eggs for my maggi noodles.
I think the inspiration for this largely stemmed from eating out at one of those Japanese Ramen shops, most notably the one at the entrance of Cuppage Plaza in town. The Char Siew Ramen was simply delightful, and the runny egg yolk that accompanied it was simply awesome!
Recipe – serving for one
Ingredient
1 Large Egg (55g) <<That’s it! *wide grin*>>
Method
1. Fill a sauce-pan pot with water till midway or until you can cover the egg(s). Bring the water to a boil.
2. When the water is boiling, place the egg into the pot with a ladle making sure that the egg does not break in the pot. Ideally the egg should be at room temperature when it is placed in.
3. Boil the egg for about 6 minutes using a watch to keep time. Afterwhich, you ladle the egg out of the sauce-pan pot and let it cool in cold tap water. This process helps the egg to stop cooking even after you have taken it out of the boiling pot.
The whole process shouldn’t take you more than 15 minutes and you should be able to eat the eggs immediately! Look at the glorious golden yellow yolk! Serve with a little sea salt or black soya sauce.
Tāngyuán is a kind of Chinese dessert made from glutinous rice flour and is mixed with a small amount of water to form balls and is then cooked and served in boiling water spiced with old ginger and castor sugar. It typically comes in one plain white colour, but some families have chosen to add a little food colouring to make the dessert a little prettier.
Culturally for many families in China and also migrant families overseas, it is a meal eaten together. The round shape of the balls served in round bowls symbolises family togetherness. Tāngyuán translated means “Round Dumplings in Soup”.
I got this recipe from my mother-in-law, and this is how it works.
Recipe – serving for a family
Method
1) Add 400g glutinous flour with 350ml water. Add the water slowly so that the dough mixture will not be too moist. If you accidentally added too much water, just simply balance it out with more glutinous flour.
2) Knead the mixture into dough. Then pinch a little and roll it in between your fingers. If the dough were to crack, it just means that it is too dry. If the dough ball does not hold its shape, then there is too much moisture in the pastry.
3) Divide into the dough into two (02) portions and with one portion, add a few droplets of food colouring – Cherry Red is good – and then knead the food colouring into the dough. The whole dough should now be pink in colour.
4) Put each portion of dough into a plastic bag and place them in the freezer for 30 minutes.
5) Remove from the freezer and begin to roll. (if however, after freezing the dough is too dry, just simply dap it with a little water.
6) Put the balls in boiling water, until they all start to float. Then off the fire and allow the dough balls to sit in the broth for about 5 minutes.
7) Scoop out the dough balls with a ladle and put them inside a bowl of cool tap water.
8) Prepare 300g castor sugar and put into the broth to boil a little, after which place slices of old ginger and pandan leaves into the soup and bring the soup to a boil.
9) Ladle the dough balls into the broth and allow them to sit in the fragrant mixture until the flavour has infused into the dough balls.
10) Allow the dessert to sit in the broth overnight, and when ready to eat, just heat up the soup and serve.
I thought that it wouldn’t be fair to do a review of the Qiji interpretation of the humble nasi lemak (I think they glorified it) but not do the heartland version.
So here goes. This is well and truly a more humbled version. It is so no frills I had no trouble identifying everything within the packet in a nano-glance. All I did was blink and that was the end of my meal. I saw in my mind’s eye exactly how I would chow down this plate and it was unglamorous.
My wife saw my somewhat bewildered expression and immediately offered some Belinjo crackers that she had bought earlier, just to make up the color. It sort of looked slightly better after that. But there was just too much white (rice) and not much of anything else.
This is truly the cookie cutter version with just the ikan bilis and kacang goreng all sealed in individual packets. This nasi lemak reeks of industrial kitchen-ness. Everything seems to be commoditized, right down to the chilli. All sealed ready to be assembled in a production factory-like style.
I had to top up 50 cents for a piece of otah-otah which kind of made it a little better. The only other thing that was not from the industrial kitchen was probably the kuning fish. Interestingly this fella was even smaller than the previous one.
I was so tempted to make my own masterpiece that I assembled the kuning fish as if like jumping out of a sea of nasi. Kids, don’t do this at home.
I guess you could say I was reasonably bored with my unflattering breakfast. Alright, to be fair what would one be expecting for $1.60 (SGD), by far it was the cheapest nasi lemak I have eaten in a long while. And it was just as delicious as the glorified version.
He screamed a loud screeching cry as air filled his lungs and he tasted unclean air for once in his life. His father stood by the side and smiled as the doctors pulled him from the gaping wound with umbilical cord still attached. His mother still in a state of semi-disarray, unaware of the happenings shielded from her eyes by the cloth. All she could hear was the sound of metal clanging and shuffling of feet and the words of the doctor telling the nurses to act and execute procedures.
Doctor: “Come come, Papa, come cut the cord!”
The doctor motioned the new father to cut the umbilical cord and for once in his entire life, he was VIP to the most significant moment in the life of another person. The feeling was indescribable. It was a good feeling. Like facing the sunrise on the edge of a cliff and just simply being awed by the brightness of the sun as it embraced him. He remembered that beautiful moment, and again felt it now albeit under different circumstances. The cold operating theatre is now filled with happiness, tears, and much joy.
The nurse wrapped the baby in shiny foil and tagged the infant after showing the father the baby for any distinguishing marks. He was perfect and without blemish. His father was pleased. Very pleased.
“He is a handsome boy!” He said to his wife. She smiled a faint gesture as she saw him for the first time, and felt all that she felt when she carried him for those days on weeks on months.
The three bears embarked on their strange journey once again into the deep unknown. This time around there is an interesting Chinese lady singing “hallelujah” and thanksgiving to Jesus. Strange indeed, this has never happened before. And that set the tone for their strange journey.
Ironically, they weren’t very conversant in mandarin either. They only knew bear talk and that takes up most of their lives and time together. They used to take journeys together but not strange ones. They were usually trips to honey hideouts and beautiful scenaries. So to have a Chinese lady accompany them and singing Chinese Christian songs, it was indeed a comforting change.
The glistening sun beaming through the window of their borrowed caravan spoke of certain hope. But they all thought little of it except for one of them. The journey was necessary and one that had an unknown outcome. So every little ounce of perceived hope was important.
That fact about the deep unknown was unsettling for them, but they were determined to find out the truth.
It’s really a 奇迹 how they managed to open their doors one day and became an instant hit with everyone. With simple staples like nasi lemak, mee rebus and mee siam, Qiji as their name in mandarin suggests has indeed become a household name and an FNB miracle.
I just had a nasi lemak, a local favorite amongst many. Steamy coconut milk infused white rice with an array of ingredients strategically positioned to maximize your dining experience. Unfortunately, their ingredients have been looking a tad tiny lately though.
Take the kuning fish for example, I couldn’t believe that it could be so small! I mean by Australian standards, a fish of this size would never pass through the fishery authorities and onto our dinner plates. That said, perhaps it was a midget kuning fish and it had stunted growth. Hey, it’s quite possible you know.
I am just wondering if perhaps this little fellow could have had a much greater potential to co-create even more kuning for their mercenary masters. Instead here it is, on my green mock-banana leaf plate. All shriveled and parched.
The rest of the ingredients were suffering from a severe lack of color. Honestly they looked tired. It was as if they weren’t dressed up properly before they left the food counter. The paper-thin pale yellow egg was like two pieces of highly compressed cheesecakes sitting neatly on top of my nasi (rice).
The otah-otah was also a pale orangey hue of a puddle of *** amidst a setting sunset. Ok, nuff said, after all, I am still going to eat this. I am famished.
I was fairly disappointed at the quantity of ikan bilis (tiny anchovy) and kacang goreng (fried peanuts) though. Typically the macik (aunty) at the food counter would heap a full scoop. But the dude behind the counter today must have used a teaspoon to scoop the ingredients.
And to top it off, there was this nugget looking item that I couldn’t quite figure out what it was. It tasted like fish and chicken all at the same time with a pillow full of batter coating. Except that it was equally flat and off colored as its other buddies on the plate. Very mysterious nuggety item. It vaguely resembled an ingot of gold.
The chilli, perhaps the only item that steers everyone back on the same course was sweet and spicy and just right. Very nicely done.
It was a perfect nasi lemak meal to say the least. The taste was just superb. The brains behind the business have got their hearts in the right place. The looks of the ingredients could do with a little bit more color. That said I should qualify, that I don’t just go for looks but I like good quality food – I don’t eat for color’s sake. But it is liken to buying fish at the market, color denotes freshness.
Qiji is indeed doing the basic things well. They have morphed into a somewhat conveyor belt like production house of local common foods but yet maintaining a consistent level of quality and taste in all their outlets. This just means they have a tight control on quality. I like that.
Incidentally the nasi lemak above could have been neatly arranged by an artist of Bugis origins, it reminds me of a tiny sailboat awashed against the tides of changing times, fishing amidst the setting of a crimson sunset and perhaps scouring the seas for hidden treasure.
Nice.
You can have this same experience at Qiji. Just order set number two.
It’s the dreaded “train fault day”. Well the good thing is they aren’t saying that it is their trains’ fault today. Instead the messaging has been somewhat watered down to the usual automated voice message.
Voice: “if you are unable to board the train, please board the next train.”
Sounds like what most people would say 废话. But I can totally empathize with their unwillingness to say those two toxic words “train fault”. If well proven to be the case and if they were again unable to handle it, it would prove to be another costly episode.
Well we just have to suck our thumbs and wait.
Honestly, a 6 minute interval at rush hour is kind of unacceptable don’t you think? They could have at least display the 3 minutes train interval display and drag out those 3 minutes to 6 minutes and no one would have noticed.
These days with almost everyone glued to their mobile phones, it’s hardly a wonder if anyone bothers or care about the travel impasse. The bickering about whose fault is it seems to be a matter that is best left to the people who should be in the know of what is happening.
That said, it still doesn’t alleviate my problem. I still can’t get into crowded trains.
By crowded I mean everyone is reasonably comfortable with space enough to view their Korean drama on their phones. That’s our definition of crowded. We can’t compare with economies like Japan where crowded trains have a different meaning altogether.
Someone commented once saying, “if you can see the bus coming in India, it is probably not very crowded.” It might sound like a joke but the reality of crowded public transportation hasn’t arrived home for us.
Of course that’s no excuse for our transport operators to take us for granted.
When I first saw it on cable TV, I thought at first that this guy must be nuts. He did look like a nutty professor as well and who would have thought that he really has some good ideas up his sleeves.
Roast chicken, one of the toughest dishes to master. The roast chickens that I have had so far were all either roasted too dry or too hard. Some roasted chickens were so over roasted that they taste like rock cakes (over burnt cakes).
Heston promised to change all that forever. But there’s a price to pay – and that’s the price of patience. Coupled with that an insane obsession with perfection. Intermingle those qualities together and you would soon find yourself chowing down some really delicious roast chicken.
How I know? I tried it. And it works. The best part is, the juices in the chicken just oozes as you cut through the meat. The breast meat juicy as ever.
Recipe – serving for 4
Ingredients
Whole fresh chicken 1.5kg
Thyme 6-7 sprigs
Butter 80 grams
Lemon
Sea salt
Red wine 1 cup
Method
1. Douse the chicken in salt water solution overnight in a container. 60 grams of salt to a litre of water. Simple as that. Doing this boost the moisture in the chicken.
2. When ready to roast, pad dry the chicken, and rub butter all over the bird, giving it a good massage. You generally want to make sure the chicken is “relaxed” while you roast the bird.
3. Add thyme into the anal cavity of the chicken and wedge a lemon (halved) into it as well. Then preheat the oven to a temperature of 90 degrees for about 10 minutes. I chose fan mode with top heating.
4. Roast the chicken for about 1.5 hours at 90 degrees breast facing upwards. Remember not to tight the legs of the chicken but rather allow it to all hang out.
5. There should be no flavor lost and the chicken after roasting should also look pale and relatively uncooked in a way. But with a kitchen thermometer you can test to see if the chicken is cooked at 90 degrees.
6. Let the chicken rest for another 45 minutes before rubbing the chicken with another layer of butter. Doing so will enhance the flavor of the chicken and allow it to brown.
7. Once ready, preheat the oven to a maximum temperature of 260 degrees. And roast the chicken for about 15 minutes. The skin of the chicken should be crispy and slightly brown.
8. Deglaze the bottom of the roasting pan and turn it into a sauce for the roast chicken.
There is nothing more delicious than a dish of roasted mushrooms at the dinner table. That to me is the main meal, the highlight. It was what I look forward to at dinner time.
It may be odd to place so much emphasis on just the humble fungi, but we all know how much the truffle can fetch in the open market. A few grams can mean some serious dollars at the vegetable marketplace of high end ingredients.
For me, I am happy with the basics. The white button is probably one of the few mushrooms that I got acquainted with when I studied in Sydney. It was a must and it had since become a staple.
My most favorite way of cooking them would be just simply roasting them in a pan without oil at first and getting the moisture in the mushrooms to dry up and getting them to brown a little.
Then I would drizzle extra virgin olive oil and a sprinkle of sea salt for flavor. Sometimes I would add a little rosemary and a dash of cayenne peppers when serving.
Simply divine.
Recipe – serving for one
Ingredient
White button mushrooms
Sea salt
Extra virgin olive oil
Cayenne pepper
Rosemary (optional)
Method
1. Quart the mushrooms and then fry them on medium heat without oil. This is to brown the mushrooms.
2. Add a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and sea salt. This will give it the shine and the taste of sea salt just makes the dish exciting and delicious.
3. Add a little rosemary for that quintessential flavor.
There is a strategy unbeknownst to mankind, but only woman-kind or perhaps it is privy to a kind of woman to notice these things.
I am glad that I married such a kind of woman. She has the ability to make me look good without me trying too hard. For that matter I usually don’t try to impress. She takes care of all my needs. All I need is to take care of her.
So we got on the train today and she immediately assessed the situation and said..
She: “stand here.”
I usually would challenge or query any decision but my lightning quick mind instructed me to implicitly trust and obey. I immediately took her cue and shifted an inch nearer to the macik that sat in an edgy sort of way (sat on the edge of her seat).
True enough the seat became available not only for my wife, but for me as well as we both were strategically positioned and ready to take action and take the opportunity.
This is also true with life and the decisions that we make. If you have a dream or aspiration (I know this is going off tangent from my train muse), not only is it important to keep dreaming, but it is equally important to open your eyes, important to position yourself, and when the opportunity comes, albeit a small window of opportunity, to take action and take it without hesitation.
Sometimes it helps if you have a discerning partner to help you leverage your positioning. But most times if you keep yourself prepared there are always opportunities for you to take action on.
Stand ready on the foundation you have built yesterday, and reach out to tomorrow with your feet firmly grounded in today.
“Boeuf bourguignon, French beef stew in red wine..” Says Julia Child, one of the most inspiring cooks (home cooks) that ever lived. She represents to me hope that anyone can take mastery of their kitchen and cook up awesome French cuisine from the comforts of their humble home.
Julia to me personifies French cooking for servant-less home cooks. A socially awkward lady yet adventurous and passionate in her craft, her example inspired many to try, fail and subsequently succeed in following her footsteps.
Maybe I might eventually do all the recipes that she has in her book. Well we shall see.
Julia Child – Boeuf Bourguignon
For this classic, I would usually take reference from her YouTube video and then make up as we go along. Some of the ingredients are not locally available but the spirit of Julia is always to make do with what you have.
I had fun making this dish my own, and I have been making it my own way for a while now and getting the same awesome results each time. I hope it will be the same experience for you as well. I don’t use the oven as the recipe calls for it, but I use a gas stove to cook the beef.
Recipe – serving for 4
Ingredients
Beef cubes (for making stew) 750 grams
Streaky bacon (ask for more fat) 50 grams
Garlic 10 wedges, 4 to minced, 6 to braise
Yellow onions (medium) 2 whole
Tomato paste 3 tablespoons
White button mushrooms 15 pieces
White onions (small) 15 bulbs
Carrots 2 whole
Thyme 5-6 sprigs
Bay leaf 2-3 leaves
Olive oil 2 tablespoons
Red wine 750 ml
Beef stock 4 cups
Salted butter 250 grams
Method
1. Add oil to a large pot. Heat till slightly smoking. Add sliced bacon to fry til crispy. This is to extract the fat from the bacon and saltiness.
2. Remove bacon and discard. Add beef cubes and sear beef till brown. The key is not to crowd the base of the pot or they won’t brown. Once done, remove from pot to allow the beef to rest.
3. Add minced garlic to pot and fry till fragrant. Then add chopped onions to fry until soft. Then add beef cubes into the pot. Now pour in the beef stock about 2 cups. Add the red wine about half a bottle. Add thyme, bay leaf, tomato paste and continue to stir. Add carrots, remaining garlic. Continue to cook at high heat.
4. In another pot fry the mushroom in salted butter and olive oil mixed. Fry until mushrooms are slightly brown. Reserve the mushroom aside and continue to cook the white onions in salted butter and olive oil. Cook until onions are soft.
5. Once the beef is sufficiently cooked and tender. Combine the mushrooms and onions together. Serve with baguette or steamed rice.
The water melon is one of the most easily found fruits in Singapore. You can literally find the tropical fruit at every fruit stall or fruit juice seller.
Sweet juicy fibrous textures with volumes of water sacks, the fruit is well loved by many for its naturally refreshing juice and is also a good source of vitamins and fibre.
You can blend it, freeze it into a fruit sorbet or simply have it on its own. Either way it is perfectly fine. I remember going Korea once and the water melon over there is worth at least 70 USD per whole and if it comes in an odd shape, it will fetch a 250 USD price tag.
A glass of water melon juice in Korea strangely enough costs more then a can of their locally produce beer beverage.
I call it simple salad because I am always doing these salads with no names or maybe there is a name but I can’t be bothered to name it.
Anyway I make salads that I think are fun to eat. This one that I made today is exactly that. Simple and straightforward wholesome yummyness.
Recipe – serving for two
Ingredients
Baby spinach
Wild rocket
Button mushrooms
Cherry tomatoes
Buffalo mozzarella
Balsamic vinaigrette
Olive oil
Sea salt
Method
1. Wash baby spinach and wild rocket. After washing, toss it into the salad bowl.
2. Slice cherry tomatoes and toss it in. I didn’t specify the quantities, but if you like cherry tomatoes as I do, you will know how many to add.
3. Half the button mushrooms and fry them in olive oil. Make sure the mushrooms are seared before adding in the olive oil. Add sea salt to taste. Once ready, toss it into the salad bowl.
4. Slice buffalo mozzarella and toss it into the salad bowl. Add balsamic vinaigrette according to your love for sour stuff.
Chris Tomlin, David Crowder & the Passion Worship Band came by to church today and led worship. Awesome worship. But what was most awesome for me was this heavily bearded guy that was playing the guitar who sang the next song, and honestly, that song rocked. I have no idea who David Crowder was, but I think he truly has a heart of worship.
The lyrics of the song How He Loves just resonates with me. I hope you enjoy the song as much as I did.
I remember going to Perth, Western Australia once to visit some friends and take a short holiday and I had one of the best spicy mussels in the world at Fremantle Market or Freo as they like to call it.
When I got back home, I knew I had to make it. And make it just as delicious.
I realized the key to great spicy Mussels was to get the black lip ones and they sold some at cold storage supermarket but sadly they don’t carry them very frequently or most of the times when I get them it is always near expiry.
So I tried the next best alternative which was the local green Mussels which were sold by the local fishmongers at the wet market.
The one at my place sold a kg of fresh Mussels for $2 (SGD). Unbelievable price and value. The cold storage ones were 750 grams for $19.95. Ingredients for the dish was also bought at the vegetable seller for $4 all in.
The wine and some other ingredients had to be purchased at the supermarket but the costing for my dish has significantly become cheaper!
These days I do my marketing at the wet market. Cheaper, fresher and you get to choose what you need.
My version of the spicy chilli mussels bears the following characteristics. Sweet, sour, spicy, salty.
Yum.
Recipe – serving for four
Ingredients
Green Mussels 1 kg
Yellow Onions (Medium) 2 whole
Tomatoes 6 whole
White wine – sauvignon blanc 2 cups
Garlic 5 wedges
Red chilli 2 pieces
Red chilli padi 5 pieces
Tomato paste 3 tablespoons
Brown Sugar 1 tablespoon
Sea salt 1/2 teaspoon
Bay leaf
Olive oil
Method
1. Heat a saucepan with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Add minced garlic slices to fry till fragrant.
2. Slice and chop the yellow onions and stir-fry the onions until they turn transparent. Slice all the chillis and add into the pot to fry. Add salt and sugar.
3. Chop and discard the insides of the tomatoes and add to the saucepan and continue to cook with the rest of the ingredients until soften. Add tomato paste. Squeeze juice of 2 lemon and grate in the rind of one lemon. Add a bay leaf. Continue to cook until ingredients become a thick pulpy texture.
4. Taste test the mixture, it should be spicy, sour, salty and sweet. If so, it is done and the spicy sauce is ready.
5. Wash Mussels and remove any “beards” or barnacles.
6. Add two tablespoons of olive oil into another pot and fry minced garlic. Add the Mussels to the pot. Add the white wine. Turn the heat up and cover the lid to steam cook the Mussels. You know the mussels are cooked when they all open up. Discard those that did not open.
7. Add spicy sauce and mix well. Serve with a toasted garlic baguette.
This is another all-time classic soup stock for infants who are ready to eat watery rice porridge.
However it is an acquired taste for my boy, maybe it would have been more palatable if I added red dates.
But this is a super easy two ingredient soup stock. It’s really a no-brainer.
Recipe
Ingredients
Watercress
Chicken carcass
Method
1. Place chicken bones in the pot. Then place watercress on top of chicken. Add 1.5 litres of water. Turn up the heat until boiling and then slow down to a simmer.
2. When you smell the flavour of the soup and see the fat of the chicken on the surface of the broth it is ready.
One of the last surviving eco-icons in Singapore. The ground up initiative (pun intended) have been operating in the Bottle Tree Park for the last 5 years and counting. Hopefully they will be given a new lease of life and perhaps go on for another 5 years or even longer.
Today is technically their last day of operation. And perhaps after today, their doors might be closed forever and their voice for environmental consciousness for Singapore might also be forever muted as well.
It all depends on the SLA and hopefully this initiative can continue to engage unique groups from near and far and make this their own Kampung. In a sense, Balik Kampung is a public programme to bring the quintessential village lifestyle of sustainable living back to modern metropolis conditioned Singapore.
Their programme offers a semblance, albeit naive, perspective on the importance of eco-consciousness and the protection of the environment that we so depend upon. The public are encouraged to create and craft their own work spaces. Since those early days of putting heart and minds together, they have managed to come out with relevant products like the iBam iPhone speaker (Google it) and therein continued to sustain their project.
Their dream? An eco kampung campus. A university of eco learning for students wanting to expand their horizons without leaving Singapore. It’s right here in our own backyard.
This recipe has become a staple for my baby. A simple corn, carrot, chicken bone broth with no salt or any other flavourings.
Perfect as a flavour boost to the soup stock for infants learning how to eat very watery rice porridge. My wife usually adds a portion of vegetable puree and a piece of codfish for nutrition.
As you really want to extract every ounce of goodness from the ingredients, you might have to boil this soup until you smell the flavour escaping from the lid and the fat from the chicken floats on the surface.
These ingredients are best purchased from the wet market as opposed to the supermarket. Price wise much cheaper, plus you can buy what you need.
Recipe – 7 servings of soup stock each 120ml
Ingredients
Corn
Carrot
Chicken carcass
Method
1. Chop and slice the carrot and corn. Place it into the pot with the chicken bones.
2. Fill it with water till it covers ingredients. Cook at high heat until boiling then turn it down to a slow simmer. Cook until flavour escapes the lid and the fat from the chicken floats on the surface of the broth.
3. Once cooked, let the broth cool. Discard the ingredients and reserve the soup stock in small cups for freezing.
The Red Date Tea is more like a fruit tea that is good for mothers during their confinement months. This traditional recipe for mothers who are breastfeeding is a time-tested recipe that will help mothers “make” more milk and produce more breast-milk for their newborn babies. Red dates are easily available at the Chinese medicinal shops and can even be purchased online if you live in remote places.
Besides being a remedy for most ailments that new mothers would experience, the Red Date Tea – with its myriad of ingredients – is more than likely to cause the body to be heaty for the guys but for mummies, it actually helps to stabilize their confinement month and even help to lose weight.
I am using a crock pot to prepare this herbal brew for my wife who just recently delivered our newborn baby boy. I learnt this from the confinement nanny and I think this recipe rocks for those who are wondering what are the ingredients that go into this tea.
Recipe
Ingredients:
Wolfberries Seeds
Dried Longans
Black Dates
Red Dates
Tang Sheng (Dried Roots)
Method
The confinement nanny says to prepare a thicker Red Date Tea, the proportion of the ingredients will have to be increased. The crock pot can prepare enough tea for the whole day.
Wolfberries have a naturally sweet and herbal taste, so you can put more of these if you like. I usually put two handfuls. Dried Longans are sweet, so depending on what you like, you can put in about 30 pieces. The Red Dates 20 pieces and Black Dates 4 pieces, these are great for that special herbal taste that does some wonders to the body, and Tang Sheng – Dried Root – that looks like ginseng, I will put in about 5 pieces as these can make the Tea somewhat sour. Don’t ask me why.
Pour in about 5 litres of water, and turn on the slow cooker for maybe 4-5 hours or overnight. That’s it.
The Battlestar Galactica Ride – still close as at to date 27 March 2014.
Not that I am complaining or anything like that. For the record, I have motion sickness.
But for a structure so big that barely has much, if any, airtime, it seems like it is just waiting for the paintwork to tarnish or the parts to rust.
I am sure everyone including those who have motion sickness or other inconveniences would love to stand at the bottom of the structure and wow in awe or shiver or tremble. But too bad there is none of that.
In fact, I heard someone said that some tourists said that it is part of a display set.
Anyhoo. I hope they will get it up and running soon.
I have always secretly wanted to be a Neurosurgeon.
Thanks to my wife’s love for beef steaks, now my dream will finally come through – that is to be a 牛肉 (Niu Rou), Surgeon.
This has got to be an all-time favourite of ours. Beef steaks. We love it. No doubt about it. My wife loves it medium rare whereas I can only stomach a medium.
On this day I thought I would try cooking this simple yet impactful dish. It’s like a rite of passage for me before I can well and truly say that I have tried my best before giving up.
You see, this is not my first attempt. I have failed many times trying to time the doneness of the steaks and frankly, steaks are expensive mistakes if not done properly.
The problem I believe is because firstly the steaks from Cold Storage are not as chunky as we think. Secondly, our cooking utensils or at least mine are not cast iron where cooking temperatures are moderated and more even.
So taking those factors into consideration, my cooking temperatures are different. I think if you are doing your own steaks, just bear in mind the cooking temperatures and cooking equipment and you should be fine.
All the best folks.
Recipe – Serving for Two
Ingredients
Ribeye steaks from Cold Storage
Fresh rosemary (2 sprigs)
Sea salt
Black pepper
Baby spinach
Cherry tomatoes
New potatoes
Red wine – merlot is best and especially if they are half drunk.
Method
1. Boil the new potatoes in a pot, water must cover the potatoes. Do this until they are all cooked.
2. Salt the steaks on one side lightly, sprinkle coarse black pepper as well. Leave it for 5 minutes.
3. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a wide frying pan until smoking. You want the pan to be really hot. Once the pan is sufficiently heated up, place seasoned side down for searing. This is steak, so there is no need to spin it in the pan. 4 minutes on one side and then with tongs flip the steak on the other side for another 3 minutes. Make sure the fat is cooked (if any).
4. Remove the steaks and plate it. It is important to allow the steak to rest at least 10 minutes.
5. Pour half a cup of red wine (can be remnants of a bottle) and deglaze the pan. Add a little salt to taste. Allow the alcohol to reduce and this will form a light red wine sauce for the steak.
6. Roast potatoes with rosemary and salt until slightly smoking then drizzle with extra virgin olive oil for shine and flavour.
7. Plate the potatoes, arrange the baby spinach and cherry tomatoes (halved) around the steaks before a drizzle of the red wine sauce. You may pair it with a Cabernet Sauvignon (Chilean) if you like.
I got home slightly later today because of an Excel test that I had to sit for. Managed to get a good grade which was nice. Anyway, so I realised the value of rushing back home during peak hour traffic. I can’t imagine having to fight with the same bunch of people day in day out for space at the MRT station. It can be quite a terrible thing especially if you have to do a long commute to get to work.
Thankfully I managed to get out of class at about 5.55pm which I reckon is the thin line between being caught in the rush at 6 pm or the calm before the storm. People in the city go back home on time surprisingly.
So the wife asked me what I would cook for her tonight, and I couldn’t decide, we had already run out of ingredients at home, so she said why not cook a cream based Salmon Pasta. I replied, “Yuck.” and just nice my phone ran out of battery. So maybe the message didn’t manage to get through.
So it came as no surprise when a packet of fresh salmon landed on the kitchen table-top and a packet of glorious Portobellos. Surprisingly she bought Scallops as well. It was a gathering of all my favourite friends.
Recipe – Serving for Two
Ingredients
Fresh Salmon – a fillet for me and a fillet for you.
Fresh Scallops – I like at least 5 pieces for my plate. You can have lesser if you like.
Portobello Mushrooms
Fresh Rosemary – 2 sprigs
Lime
Garlic
Cooking Cream – 1 small packet will do.
Milk – 1 cup is sufficient.
Mixed Italian Herbs
Black Pepper
Cayenne Pepper
Sea Salt
Olive Oil
Method
1. In a pot, cook about 200 grams (dried) Fusilli Pasta (this type of pasta is fantastic for cream-based sauces). I use Barilla Brand because it is one of the better ones. Cook the Fusilli Pasta for 11 minutes in hot boiling water mixed with a generous helping of salt and a tablespoon of olive oil. Once pasta is cooked, strain it immediately and douse it in cold water to stop cooking. Pasta should be just nice.
2. Heat a saucepan of two tablespoons of olive oil until slightly smoking, then add in minced garlic (3 wedges) and stir-fry gently until the garlic is fragrant. Meanwhile, de-bone and slice the salmon against the grain and add to the saucepan once garlic starts to brown a little. Fry the salmon until flesh turns pinkish. Do not fry the salmon too long as it tends to become dry. Once all the salmon turns pinkish (which is about 3-4 minutes) remove from saucepan and set aside.
3. In a frying pan, heat a tablespoon of olive oil (you can use butter if you like, but be careful as it burns easily) and place the Scallops to allow it to sear and burn on each side. My wife bought 4 pieces! Remove the Scallops after a few minutes of frying over medium heat.
4. In the same frying pan, fry the sliced Portobello Mushrooms and rosemary leaves with a sprinkle of sea salt. Stir-fry the mushrooms, sea salt and rosemary until it starts to burn a little, then add a tablespoon of olive oil and sauté until the portobellos turn soft (and delicious).
5. Assemble the Pasta (weigh about 180 grams per portion, 200 grams if you prefer a heavier meal) with Salmon on top, scallops on the side, and the rosemary-infused portobellos. If you have some leftover baby spinach or rocket from yesterday it would be great!
6. Now in the saucepan, cooking about 200 grams of cooking cream and about a half a cup of fresh milk. Add black pepper, mixed Italian herbs and a little salt to taste. Allow the cream to cook until it bubbles and forms a thin layer. The cream sauce is ready at this point. Ladle the cream sauce onto the pasta and serve with a wedge of lime (I ran out of the lemon!). I like my Salmon with a light sprinkle of cayenne pepper.
Bon Appetit!
So you may ask, why go through all that effort for a simple meal – as in cooking everything separately and then assembling it later? Well, I like to taste my food, so that’s why I cooked them separately, it just tastes better that way don’t you think so? Furthermore, different ingredients have different cooking temperatures and I have to respect that. Seafood tends to be a little more temperamental and less tolerant of mistakes.
It was a good decision to cook it this way. The wife loves it, and I must say it’s not too bad either.
This is the famous Peanut Ice Kacang from Healthy Dessert stall at Tanjong Pagar Hawker Centre.
While walking back to our table, I could see the envious looks as people whispered to each other.
It’s ice kacang for goodness sakes.
Coated from head to the sides of the metal bowl was a generous dressing of roasted peanuts. It did not look very appetizing, to say the least. In fact, it looked quite messy.
I took a spoonful and started chowing down the cold dessert. The confluence of flavours was just simply perfect. Not too sweet (thus healthy dessert) and yet not compromising on sweetness.
A very nice dessert. Kind of reminded me of the last time when I had it (some years ago). It is still as good and it is sufficiently differentiated from the rest of the regular flavoured versions.
Verdict? 4 out of 5 thumbs up!
Stall: Healthy Dessert at Tanjong Pagar Hawker Centre, level 2
Just bumped into one of the most inspiring trainers I know – Thaddeus Lawrence. The man’s an awesome motivational speaker and very inspirational.
I remember taking one of his modules on motivation once (yes i needed motivation) and he spoke with such clarity yet without referring too much to the slides. Only taking glances to reference where he was at.
Content-wise it is the same as anybody else’s slides but the delivery of that content was crisp, sharp and superbly enhanced through his words chosen.
I thought then that every speaker should be as good as Thaddeus.
He engaged and challenged mindsets and at some moments he showed that while he was superman, he was human and vulnerable. The amazing thing was he did all this through the medium of voice and intangible imagination.
One thing he said and I remembered, he said that he was going to run the four deserts of the world. That to me was one of the most awesome call to action of any speaker.
For more information on Thaddeus, you can check out his business.
Baked Salmon with Pan Roasted New Potatoes with Simple Salad
I got home early today and I thought maybe I can quickly whip up a simple dinner for my wife and myself.
So here goes, Baked Salmon with Pan Roasted New Potatoes and a simple Salad.
OK. So it wasn’t really that simple to prepare, but I enjoyed preparing it anyway, and I did it pretty quickly too. Here’s the recipe in case you want to make your own.
Recipe
Ingredients – Serving for two
Fresh Salmon Fillet – depending on your appetite, you may wish to get more slices.
New Potatoes – a small bag would be sufficient.
Portobello Mushrooms
Wild Rocket
Baby Spinach
Buffalo Mozzarella
Green Pitted Olives
Fresh Rosemary (a few sprigs)
Lemon
Sea Salt
Black Pepper
Cayenne Pepper
Mixed Italian Herbs
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Method
1. Marinate salmon steaks lightly with black pepper, cayenne pepper, mixed Italian herbs, sea salt and a generous drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
2. Pre-heat oven (fan mode with a top element) to 250 degrees. Place salmon to bake for 10 minutes when the oven is sufficiently pre-heated.
3. Boil new potatoes until cooked. Discard water. Then pan roast (without oil) the new potatoes with 2 sprigs of rosemary and sea salt. When potatoes are slightly brown on the sides, add in sliced portobello mushrooms and a little of the extra virgin olive oil. Continue to cook/coat the potatoes with the olive oil.
4. Wash rocket and baby spinach and slice the buffalo mozzarella and place in a bowl, then add the green olives.
5. Once salmon is baked, plate it with salad, and potatoes/mushroom.
If you dare to, you can venture out to try Teppei. Alright, perhaps I am being vague here, but Teppei has gained popularity for their Omakase style dinners and amazingly value for money Japanese cuisine. It has become one of the most over-booked Japanese restaurants in Tanjong Pagar, possibly in Singapore.
My wife and I tried queuing for lunch once, and it was an experience in and of itself. My wife got so fed up with the inconsistent queuing system that she confronted the errant queue-cutters at the front of the store who arrived magically just minutes before the shop opened for business.
It seems Mr T himself is not really bothered by this – his policy it seems is, “if your members are all gathered by the time we are opened, we will serve you. For the rest of you in the queue, please wait your turn.”
Of course it all seemed unfair when 15 people magically appear in front of the 2 hour long queue just minutes before the petite restaurant opens its doors at noon. It also seems even more unfair when the servers do nothing but simply shrug their shoulders and point to the arbitrary service policy pasted on the glass door. I guess they get that everyday.
But unhappiness aside.
The food is amazing. My favourite being the Borachirashi (whatever that means), their signature dish. I haven’t really tried too much of their menu to be really honest. Every trip there is kind of hurried, so I don’t really get the opportunity to savour or take it all in.
I would like to do one of their dinners though, that famous Omakase – let the chef decide what goes into your mouth thing. The problem here is the rigid reservations for dinner for their tiny 20 seater restaurant is so over-booked that by the time I do get a chance to make a reservation, it might well be 4 to 5 months down the road. They seriously need to expand! Thankfully it seems, they managed to secure (or put the guy next door out of business) the unit next door. Woohoo!
So maybe I might have a chance to book for dinner between July to September 2014. That’s if I managed to get through their hotline on 29 March 2014. Alternatively I can like their Facebook page and watch out everyday for “no-shows” for dinner. I have a feeling an army of Teppei fans are already stalking their Facebook profile for these offers.
I guess this is a subject of much national debate for many years now. Perhaps the term family planning might conjure imagery of a bygone era where young couples were cajoled into accepting the notion that two was indeed enough.
Perhaps at that time and place, it was indeed enough but social engineering against the course of human behavior might have some repercussions. Are we seeing those effects today? Maybe. Is there a work around to the declining birthrate?
That answer is not quickly found I suspect. Thus our continued quest for answers through many platforms of questions and conversations.
So are we now on a subtle campaign for more babies?
It seems to be so. Just the other day I was at MBS (Google it) with the family and there was a night water display with faint images painted across a spraying fountain and flashing lights.
I was just admiring the sounds and display with baby when the initial images of little toddlers playing and laughing started the show.
Incidentally there was an AngMoLang (Google it) and his Asian looking female friend having a somewhat interesting conversation.
AngMoLang: “ah.. you see this water display? The babies, children.. ?”
Asian Friend: “yes.. ?”
AngMoLang: “you see, the national birthrate is on the decline so the government is putting up all these subtle messaging to help increase the birthrate and get people interested in family planning all over again.”
Asian Friend: “wow..”
Yeah. Wow.
Clearly the social engineering of the day is working. Even the AngMoLang knows there is a problem. I am not so sure if there was that much subtle messaging in the water display though. Or perhaps he was trying to suggest something to his unsuspecting female friend.
Baby was so not ready for Durian, but we thought that he should give it a shot anyway. Hopefully he will grow up to enjoy the king of fruits in the near future because Daddy and Mummy loves durians.
There is nothing more satisfying than the ability to be random. That being said and done, of course it takes certain genius and much effort to be consistently random. Plus, you would need to have the all sensitive element of time as well. That is well and truly challenging.
