catching up with family friends...

over dinner of course
your first attempt in making taw yew bak (soy sauce braised pork) and it was a success both family and guests love it...

 the five spice rolls, the batch you made for the new year gathering at friend's place and the remaining you freeze them in the freezer, it's handy for the day like this when you're not really in the mood to cook out...

 fried wanton made by your mil

 salted chicken made by him, the chicken was marinated overnight and then oven baked, moist and the just right saltiness came through...

 on his request, you baked a rose chiffon cake.  it's been awhile since you last bake a cake.  thankfully you still maintain the standard, the cake is light, airy and fluffy with just a hint of rose came through...

kids loved this can chomp down like no body business..
time really flies, it's as if you just celebrated the new year and now you're at the last day of january...

curry.noodles

instant noodles, the food that you normally refrain yourself from, yet today, you open your last packet of kuali penang white curry noodles. you're hungry after the gym, so you whisked this up quickly so that you could have a decent lunch and make the meal not so instant noodle like by adding prawns, fish balls and tofu...
it's satisfying despite this is by all means violate your principles and food value system.

ais.kacang.morning

 you woke up to an ice kacang morning, a relatively thick layer of snow.

 the snow is rather coarse and resemble the shaved ice dessert that you grew up with...

 it's quite a pretty scene but you haven't got the time to enjoy...

you're not a fan of snow regardless you stay put at home or need to get out of the door.  in this case, it's the later, you have a meeting in office, so you have to make a move.  you hope the snow winter will be over soon.

yellow.wine.chicken.黄.酒.鸡

a day trip to brussels. you're in the office for a kick-off meeting and later hop on a ride in your colleague's car to brussels for another important meeting.
weather was bad, so was the traffic in brussels city center. in short, you didn't reach home until 9.30pm with a brief dinner break.
what delighted you is this yellow wine chicken. he is into hakka dishes lately and have experiment a few dishes.

and you had it with mee sua, it's really perfect for a tiring and cold night.  the mee sua absorbs the booze wine, that's a perfect ending of a hectic day to you!

berrie.good.pound.cake

you went to market and thrilled to see your favorite fruits make their reappearance in the market stall and affordable price.  these fruits are from spain as the weather in lowland is still to cold for these berries to blossom.  but at least there's link at the end of winter endurance, before these fruits re-appear you're relying on pears and only pears for your breakfast.
you had this as afternoon tea with a slice of home baked butter pound cake, top with vanilla cream and generous portion of blueberries and two giant strawberries.
happy fruits make happy you! the truth is you can't wait for spring to arrive, it will be and hopefully not too long anymore.

weekend.treat

when you're bombarded with work, travels and routine, despite of how much you miss the home cook meal, you still itch to get out of the norm and go to for a drink, quick bite or dinner.
this weekend is a quick bite because you already had dinner at home. it's the fact that going out and spending time together that matters most.

::piloxing::

finally you decided to get yourself this pair of hand gloves. it has 2kg weight padded on it.  after doing piloxing on a regular once a week or twice a week basis for more than half a year, you think you're ready to put on more weight to aid the muscle toning.
you kinda enjoy piloxing aside your routine zumba sessions.  it's fast pace like zumba, while zumba gives you a good sweat and burn of calories, it doesn't tone your body.  piloxing on the contrary helps you to tone your abdomen, shrink your shaggy tricep and your waist line.

gentlemen's agreement

the meeting went well, the conversation was challenging but you strike a gentlemen's agreement albeit you're in a team of three ladies and a gentleman.  you went out for an 'informal' celebration at this restaurant that you been once before. great food and even better dessert that you're so carried away with the conversation and eating and didn't even snap a photo.  among the four of you, you had a chocolate slice and an apple cooked with raisin.  rustic but so good, your colleague had tomato cake (yes, tomato!) that's also yummy and light,
on the side note, your role or major duty has been done, the rest is up to the commercial team to make it happened and perhaps you will be back to this city again in a month or two.

::enoteca::

it's a long trip since you first travel to brussels for some preparatory meetings and then fly out from brussels enrout milan before you finally reached your destination.
despite the long journey, you're still up for a light dinner and drink, hence you went out with one colleague that opt in (while the other two opt out).
when in parma, you must savor the local delicacies, it's been awhile and you last taste the prosciutto and the cheese. and it washed down well with the bottle of rose.
and you absolutely don't find the dinner in enoteca style!

:misty::

your outlook this morning when you driving to work at 9am.  you have to drive through the thick mist and the visibility is relatively low.
let's hope the weather will be better tomorrow as you have to drive to brussels, otherwise you will need a lot of journey mercy

cake.delt

 a lovely cafe in delft, perhaps the hippest and most popular one...

 other than a cafe that serve simple food, the entire place is a show case for designer goods that are for sales

this tea intrigues you...

 it's busy on saturday but you didn't wait long for your table, so first up is a cup of tea for him and a cappuccino for yourself

 your salad

 his sandwich with bacon and many other goodies

his brownie...
all in all, it's a good place to eat simple, fresh and quality food, cakes are home made, but if you would come again, you will rather drop by on week days when the cafe is less crowded...

:sunny::

finally a bright and sunny weekend! you decided to have something special for your breakfast.  just two brioche toast with a sunny side egg and drizzle with maple syrup. a sweet start to your saturday!
happy weekend!

::greetings::

you are thrill to receive a chinese new year greeting card from a good old childhood friend. that said, the spring festival is just round the corner.  you aren't sure where you going to be and if you're going to be on business trip or home, either way, this festive is not celebrated in your adopted land but you will make it just a little memorable this year...
happy weekend!

yatsuhashi.八ツ橋

you ate this when you're at kyoto before. you had both the raw (nama) and baked (yaki) version. you had this recipe for many years but it never occurs to you to give it a try until you sorted out the cookies recipes and found it.

 you decided to do a trail batch with cinnamon flavor. the steps are simple and doable, but the outcome is ugly and too much air pockets caught in the cookies.  as such it's a fail batch with only a few crunchy ones and you find this way too sweet to your liking.

and the next day, you give the recipe another go... reduced the sugar and replaced the flavoring to japanese green tea (matcha), extend the baking time and let them cool down in the oven. this is a satisfactory batch. they are crisp and crunchy just like the ones you ate in kyoto albeit not as pretty as the store bought version.

you will bake more when the festive season is approaching and you already have in mind what flavors and shapes you will do with your yaki yatsuhashi.

new year gathering V 2.0

another new year gathering at friend's place. again with abundance of food!

perhaps it's a tad too far from lunar new year lou sang but you did it anyway... the snacks are mainly  prepared by the host...

the lou sang in action, it's always fun to do this ^^

the dinner, with each one bring one dish type, so you do have enough food for everybody

the carbs consists of bee hoon kerabu and fried noodles

and desserts, from handmade chocolate, coconut based bubur cha cha to some store bought cakes... a sweet ending to the evening.

dependence:independence:inter-dependence

 the first fresh anointing for you. you haven't been to one of these thursday evenings meeting for a very long time. so while you're grounded you just seize the opportunity to absorb more word of God.

particularly this evening a sharing from  a pastor that you really respect and a teaching that refers to the stage of life.

• the dependence, a phase of life where we rely on other eph 4:11-15 and high maintenance
• the independence - a phase of life where we are self sufficient but do not really care about others
• the interdependence - a phase of life where we understand the bigger picture, have a giving attitude, low maintenance with high commitment.

the ultimate purpose in life is to be fruitful not just successful.
as you progress with your life, from dependence to independence and now in the stage of inter-dependence.  it's relate really well with your own progression and age. you want to be successful and also be fruitful, because when one is fruitful it's about others, not just about oneself.
solid food for thought in the beginning of 2015!

Ephesians 4:11-15 And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,  for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ,  till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;  that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,  but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ

::january::

well, the festive month is over. january is always a sober month to you. you have stopped making new year resolution but you definitely want to eat and drink sober this month.

you fall back to your oat porridge breakfast alternating it with different fruits topping and sometime swapping oat for granola.  lunch and dinner will be more soup dishes, be it western or cantonese soup. it fills your stomach and last longer.

so while you're grounded.  you will try your best to hit the gym for 5 times a week, you need to sweat and shake out the indulgence you ate over the december month that's 2kg increase in body weight and 0.5% increase in body fat mass.

new.start

after two weeks of end of year holiday, you are now tidying up yourself for the first working day of the new year. the christmas tree is out of the house, the christmas decorations along with these christmas cards are now being collected.
you haven't got any project yet, so your first working day of the year is going to be a slow start and hopefully you will get a new project soon since you have rested and is eager to start something new.

cha.boey.菜.尾

chai boey (菜尾 ) or choi kiok (菜脚 ) however you called it in hokkien or in cantonese, it denotes a leftover dish that cooked in the based ingredients of assam keping (tamarind slice), dried chilies and bruised lemon grass. it's simple and you basically pick and choose the leftover dishes that you want to be included in this dish, the only addition is the salted mustard green.
it's spicy, it's sour, it's appetizing. you just going back for more!
this is your first attempt, but you will definitely cook this again when there's surplus of leftover food.