choux

chou creme by delfine & eunice.
thank you del for everything.. spanks!

on food, music and travel

tried and tested!
Kim Dae Mun at Le Meridien Hotel - cheap and good korean food.

a good spicy korean fare always gives a warm, fuzzy, ahhhhhh feeling. just like the ramyun i had at Phnom Penh and the stew at Taipei 101. ahhhhhhhhhhhhh..............

on another note, this morning as I was getting ready to go out - blowdrying my hair with my radio switched on.... Olivia Ong's Close to You started playing. What coincidence and it was on 9.33fm a chinese radio station no less. That song is my morning alarm, which woke us up for the 12 days we spent in taiwan. listening to it every morning whenever the alarm rings still brings back memory of Taiwan even though there's also a big part of me groaning at the need to wake up at 6.30am to get to work.

Listening to Olivia ong's 'Close to you' (kope from eunice handphone) and it reminded me of the alarm we had in Taiwan. First night in Taiwanmex, we had to wake up 5 am in the morning, and this was the first song i heard. From than on, it kept coming back into my head in the mornings to come.
....yongbin

i suppose that's the beauty of our 5 senses - capturing memories and bringing a sense of familiarity and nostalgia in sights, taste, sounds, smell and touch.

早餐的意义

回国后最怀念的一件事竟是和大家一起吃早餐。因为回来后，我都睡到‘早餐’是什么都不知道了，所以我认为能和家人之外的人吃早餐是很难的。　它好像是‘我们曾经生活在一起’的最佳证据。


好想念在叶家对面的早餐店！有土司，蛋饼和寿司。


朱小姐是我的　ｆｏｏｄ　ｍｏｄｅｌ．不知道为什么，在餐桌上，她就是很习惯性的都坐在我的正对面。

有好多好多早餐在這裡
在我們最熟悉的早餐店裡
不管你睡的多晚
起的多晚
晨之美永遠在這裡歡迎光臨你

對阿對阿　對阿對阿
對阿對阿　對阿對阿
對阿對阿　對阿對阿
對阿對阿　對阿對阿

We share the morning
We share the milk tea
我一直在這裡陪你一起

...盧廣仲 - 早安，晨之美

　

on the 1st day of taiwan, my true love sent to me...

(21st May 2008) - Taipei
a 卤肉贩 for a hungry me...

we were starving by the time we got have our first meal after settling in, but this is the BEST 卤肉贩 we had in taiwan. with the first mouthful, we knew it was right to come to Taiwan! all for NT 20, <$1

卤肉贩 - 中山

寧夏夜市

challenging 臭豆腐

deep fried yam ball with salted egg. YUMM.

we spent a sleepless night over a gossip session at a dingy apartment at 中山. The cramp little lift was barely enough to hold 4 of us , together with the unlit corridors, it was as though we stepped into one of those old chinese ghost movie. 感觉好像在拍鬼片.

就这样度过了在台北的第一夜。

the food series - don pie club

Location: Don Pie Club
Add: 20 Cross Street. #01-34/35/36, China Square Central
fi's 2008 bday dinner with Norwegian exchange guests invited.
as usual we were too busy eating, so we didnt capture the pies which were better than their crab bee hoon, which we thought was too peppery.

the food series - macaroons

Location: Gloria Jean's
A birthday affair organized by del, fi and manda
completed with macaroons from Canele

manda says:
"good macaroons are not supposed to break
when you cut them up"
i hope that as we find our own standing in this transition
and despite our differences,
how difficult it is to organize gatherings
which may be even more so than ever in future
we can be a one darn good macaroon.

the food series - Melben Crabs

Location: Melben (Ang Mo Kio)
Participants: Senior Climb Retirees
Purpose: Graduation Feast
Damage: $240+ worth of food inclusive of chilli crab, butter crab & crab bee hoon down our stomachs.

another trip on the magic school bus.

this face spells h-a-p-p-y
all thanks to alan & the magic school bus!

i-cook-saturday

a phonecall from mum yesterday saying that she brought groceries and "tomorrow you are cooking for me". whoaa...

so after doing some additional grocery shopping for the meat & greens, i whipped up a lunch of cold soba noodles topped with minced meat along with a side of tofu salad. tres healthy. so now apparently, every saturday is going to be a i-cook-saturday.

some things i would like to try...
1) croquette
2) donburi

somehow recipes for Japanese food are easier to find.

cosy company

是超开心的!

we had our cook-in session today & invited some of the guys in a spur of the moment. we were really impressed with our abilities to (1) whip up a food storm that is capable of feeding an army & (2) cook for 3 hours but finish eating within 15 minutes. it was also fun ordering the guys to do wash the plates, mop the floor. and also the talking, bridging & couch-potatoing. i love it when i spend time with them this way.

presenting yong tau food soup, inari sushi, deviled eggs, tamagoyaki, japanese curry, mushroom & asparagus stirfry & other carbohydrates.

inari sushi

saturday's our cook-in session so i thought i should try out something new so..... here's my.....

inari sushi !!
*sushi in an aburaage (beanbag)

inari sushi can be commonly at all sushi places including take-away counters. i really like the combination of rice and the sweetness of the sauce from the marinated aburaage.

pre-prepared bean bags apparently can be found but well, this isn't Japan exactly so they aren't so easily found. so i made my bean bags from sweet bean bag myself from normal fried tofu squares (i.e.: which is we Singaporeans know as tau pok) by marinating it with soy sauce & sugar. How to DIY.

sounds easy but not when you have to worry about whether it will be salty enough, sweet enough, soft enough. fortunately for me, my mum was there to help taste.

After squeezing dry the bags, i stuff it with sushi rice and scrambled eggs. of course, i would be biased so from a more objective point of view, my mum said it was nice too :D

p/s: but now i am not sure if i want to make them on Saturday again cos its alot of work!

pull me away from the crowd to be with you

1st week at school was a meetup with familiar faces and cringing at unfamiliar ones. girls in non-existent clothes are such eye-sores. other than that, lessons were okay with its fair share of droning and me zoning out, i enjoy my daily dose of teh tarik and hanging around familiar faces. thankfully for the classes i bidded alone, i actually managed to spot some faces i know. its good to know that its not going to be THAT lonely up there.

ooh, there is this new chinese restaurant at Bugis where I had my 1st try at slurping xiao long tang bao out of a straw! It is called Nanxiang Steamed Bun Restaurant and it serves good crab roe xiao long baos. Ooishi!

f.m & friend

In the day of first-times.

top 10 (or so) quotes for the day:

1. "watermelon watermelon. heeheeharhie. rararara!" -background playing random jaychou's song at random rap portion

2. lighted markings on screen counting down to que start of song "EH! AYE! SHIT! what's the first word?? what's that word!?"

2a. intro/middle section of random song with mtv characters talking "why cannot fast forward one? waste time!!" -gan asking quite innocently

2b. "okokok. you and your stupid cello. ngie ngie ngie" -jan grumbles while pressing the eject button after jaychou's qing tian mtv

3. "spice up your life" - with random shakes and other shoutings at high pitched voices

3a. "why english song always got the damn sea for mtv!?" -forgot who said this

4. jan/gan/man/fi snapping at eu "wa lau eh. don't make fun of other peoples' chinese la!"

5. "okok! i sing the english part!" -gan excited at cao ge's superwoman

5a. "eh since when dream a little dream got chinese part one?" -gan exclaiming at sun yanzi's concert dream a little dream

6. random chinese song playing with intermittent silences during singing. "this is exactly like primary school when my chinese teacher asks me to read the damn passage and i skip every other word!" -fi commenting on the uninitiated kbox singers

6a. "i dont need (insert random chinese singer's name) to sing with me loh!" -eu proclaiming

6b. random chinese song playing "who choose this song?" "i don't know!" "quick! somebody sing!" "i don't know what song is this" -of which almost immediately and totally in sync, all three microphones were pushed in front of eu's face

7. "what kind of lunch is this? cheat our money one!" -man poking at what was supposed to be chicken in her bento set

8. everyone exclaiming at seeing a s.h.e. mtv on screen "WHY is there S.H.E??????"

8a. eu says matter-of-factly "i want to see ahshin."

9. "NEXT!" -everyone said this at some point in time

10. "... ..." -moses
(i'm quite sure this appeared in moses' head alot during the outing with us whether singing or eating)


we amaze/amuse ourselves all the time!

.... from fi's on the 1st F.M & friend KTV session.

F.M & friend (ok, it's moses la) went for another food escapade to Aston's Specialities. thumbs up for the cheap and good western fare!

khmer cuisin

rarrr!!!!!! to khmer food.
taken: 22nd May 2007 - Siem Reap (At the hotel's restaurant on a rainy late morning)
even while i was eating it, i already know i will miss it when i come home.
1 of the most popular khmer dish is the amok, which is fish in curry gravy.
somewhat like the thai green curry.
ngong lam! (*very good)
ok that's in vietnamese but nevermind.

cooking in

i didnt burn the kitchen down, didnt kill myself .... just got attacked by the butter splatters. but let's skip that part of the story.

soba & salmon

1st bring the water to a boil then put the soba in ...

when cooked, sieve out the soba & 'wash' them in cold water. (like how one will washes clothes) this is to remove the floury taste and to give the noodles its elasticity. i suppose.


buttering up the pan


in goes the salmon
wait till its golden brown


taaa..daaaaaaaa

itadakimasu!

jan's birthday

In celebration of jan's birthday at Waraku's & dessert at Island Creamery after that.

Happy Birthday Jan!

As usual we were too caught up with food to take pictures of our food or full body shot of jan in her dress. I've got a feeling I will be having time-to-time craving for the curry kishimen. I love it from the curry to the kishimen to the nikku (beef) thumbs up! it is such a good thing to have friends who are foodies. will be better without the transfat talk though! haha

right now, I'm thinking about Teochew Muay.

eu can knead

my 1st attempt. tried it out with normal rice, shredded carrots & sweet potato filling. haha!! (smileys are drawn on) ok now, i just need to get the seaweed and the correct seasoning & filling. yosh!

Japanese cooking

learning to cook has always been part of the "to-do" in the holiday list. was into sushi making eons ago, my pralines failed terribly, so till date I am still best at maggi mee. if you want it to sound better, you can say you know how to cook ramen - which is essentially SHIN ramen.

in our last movie date, drey gie & i suggested a japanese potluck! I wanna try my hands at this ;D ...

Onigiri! (Japanese rice balls!) sushi is just too difficult. kawaii-deshio?

found a online help to easy onigiri making . and was superly inspired by this.

we can always do other easy ones like soba, somen. & the japanese egg-wrapped fried noodles.

and you know what is the best part of it all? DAISO. japanese cooking is not expensive anymore!

drey & maggie: when when when?

Hoi An

byebye Hue, we are going to.....

HOI AN.

The midpoint stop during our bus ride was at Lang Co beach. Beautiful beautiful beach. i really love the scenery with the sprawling beach infront of me and the surrounding mist. After hopping onto the bus, we drove through the Hai Van Pass which separates North and South Vietnam. Used to be a mountainous route and now the Vietnamese has built a tunnel which makes it easier and safer.

lunch was trying out the Hoi An's specialty - Cao Lao. And I drown it down with BABABA "333". Vietnam's local bia (beer).

fiona read from her book that white rose (another specialty) had shrimp & frog filling. FROG... during our shopping, we saw an old lady selling it by the roadside, and many locals coming out of their shops to buy. (which tempted us) we asked the lady in the bookstore we were in what was inside the innocent hargow (prawn dumping) like wrapping and she said prawn and beans. No frogs! so we tried. It was nice and tasted very much like hargow with a kueh like texture.

an old lady with her plate of white rose.

after a difficult time locating this place, we were abit apprehensive about eating there because it was at a ulu place + they were ALL locals. we decided to take the risk and had our stomach satisfied with the above. it was the vietnamese wrap your own 'po-piah' except it was rice paper & not popiah skin. and besides veggie, you can wrap a springroll inside your spring roll, or wrap in an egg (which had tau-gay wrapped in it), or the satay. vegetables aside, it was superb. and the female boss seeing that we were tourist, stood by to wrap our popiah and to feed us with it. (after she left fi & i proceed to remove trace of tau-gay discreetly) vietnamese are a friendly lot of people, and after the boss went away, the lady sitting beside us helped us with the ever-understood sign language. Ba Le Well Restaurant is a MUST-go. At this point, everyone has to applaud Fiona for eating veggies.

the rest of it are spent shopping, and we need no photographic evidence of that.

last day as a year 3

well, as the graduates gloat over my misfortune of having 1 more year of SMU to go, i mentally record down these gloatings and will repeat it back to them should they complain about work in future. when the 'time's up' was said, the end of the Strategy exam also marked a finish to Year 3. timely reward is always FOOD.

graduating: Dec'07, today, today, Apr'08


lunch at Food Republic which formed part of the discussion in our strategy project


the above is a very singaporean thing.

quoting xiaoyu
"this nail polish is matte right, when i apply will it be glossy???"

xiaoyu is not just really blurrr... we often wonder whats in her head. or perhaps the lackthereof. uh... it says matte right? how can it be glossy?. stupid times will make me miss xiaoyu.


- some others -


advertising group mates. kum ho ah.


hands paws i hold to sleep, sometimes.