It's over

My heart died last night...

The precise moment? When the pit crew allowed Massa to leave the pit stop with the fuel pipe hanging from the fuel tank. :((((((

I say, bring back the lollipop man!

Thank you

Late this morning, I made a cake for D who took care of princess yesterday and today so we could go to the race free of any worries. Thanks very much for your help.

I made her a marshmallow cake. I think it's the best thing that I've learnt to make in a long time, after the snow skin mooncake. It's beautiful & yummy. I used my new heart-shaped mould and also a flowery plastic film for the perimeter of the cake. I had literally minutes to beautify it before they were knocking on the door. Hope they enjoy the cake.

While I was in the midst of assembling cake in the morning, hubby woke up so we went out for a late lunch at Suntec City. We couldn't decide on what to have before we spotted a sign at Bakerzin which advertised an all-day set menu which cost $13.80+++. After checking out what the choices of main course were, we decided to have a go. It is really value for money. You get to choose a drink and main course, and it comes with a soup of the day as well as free flow of bread. My main course alone cost $14.80 and hubby's sandwich cost $12.80.

We both had the Italian peach soda.

This was the soup, tomato I think.

As much bread as you like.

Prawn sandwich.

Chicken thigh in teriyaki sauce.

Oops... more carrot cake

After my dinner of Fried Carrot Cake, I was presented with a different style of carrot cake this morning. Thanks to D's mum, who so kindly thought of me and got me these for breakfast. It's 11plus and we have yet to have breakfast. It's highly unusual to wake up late, it was 9plus for me, but I intended to get more rest with little one away. I mean, how often do I get to sleep in? My 'alarm clock' wakes me around 7plus every weekend. The house feels so quiet without her and no tv sounds, and lucky hubby gets to sleep in with no one to disturb him. ;)

I wish I could have slept in more, but D's hubby kindly thought of princess and bought her an outfit from Beijing and was delivering it to me. He leaves tonight to go back to the US and what a pity he doesn't get to catch the race 'live' today.

F1 qualifiers

The butterflies in my tummy started at the home bus-stop while waiting for the bus to town. Just the sheer excitement and anticipation was enough to create those flutters. I felt kinda naked cos I never leave the home without a bag & of course, my mobile, but advice from dad was not to carry anything unnecessary. It would make the entry much easier. N besides, it will be too noisy to use a phone. Alright, so, it wasn't noisy all the time and it is possible to use the phone, but I was just afraid of the crowd and I might lose it as well. Hubby was busy all evening getting updates on the Liverpool match. But it was good news for him as Liverpool won and Massa took pole. :)

We went into Raffles City for some aircon before proceeding to the grounds. It was really convenient getting to the location as we had a direct bus from our home and were there in no time. The traffic was ok, no jams. At the lobby of RC, we saw the Williams F1 car...

... and the kiddy race. I think my girl would have loved to be a part of this race... it costs $5 per ride which would allow them to go approximately 8 rounds. I think it's so cute.

We were at the grounds at around 6pm. It was a relatively smooth entry, and they have a lane for people without bags. :D

At our first pit stop, we picked up ear plugs as well as a poncho for $2. Proceeds go to the Singapore Red Cross. If you miss this stand, there are actually people going around selling them, so not to worry. Best, though, if you can bring your own. The plugs are not that great quality and you can so easily misshapen them. However, they do block out the noise quite well, but it's a bit tricky getting them to fit in at the right angle.

The next pit stop was the F1 merchandise stall, of course. ;) You do have to shop around as different stalls carry slightly differing items. And the one that I bought from did not give plastic bags with the Ferrari logo, just a plain red one. :( Items range in price from $20 for a little keychain, $30 for a little bear, $40 for a mug, $70 for a cap etc. I know now what you mean, S, a real rip off. But I guess we have to pay a price for that little logo.

We caught the practise session 3 at 7pm, prior to the qualifying round at 10pm. It was such a thrill the moment we spotted the first car zooming past. The noise was overpowering and the speed... WOW! It's really tough getting a photo of them and I only got Massa the one time in the right corner of the photo below. Too quick and they are not even close enough, too slow and they are gone. Many frustrated amateur photographers there. Hehe. By the time the qualifiers began, I totally gave up and just enjoyed the race. ;)

An ugly Singaporean. Imagine what kind of an impression we are leaving our visitors with.

After the practise, it was time for dinner with a 2-hr break till 10pm. Lots of hawker stalls and almost everything was a standard $10. I was lucky my small packet of fried carrot cake was $6. Hubby had the mixed rice, which in my opinion is the most tricky one, cos when you pick one wrong item, the price just goes up. He was expecting to pay $10, but ended up paying $15.

My carrot cake was not too bad, with a good chilli kick to it, but bearing in mind there were lots of tourists and I saw quite a number of foreigners buying this item, maybe they could have toned down on the chilli? But I loved it. And it wasn't too sweet. Pity was, I didn't take note of the name of the stall. However, I believe they all belong to Food Republic.

Hubby's rice with curry chicken, fish I think, and baby Kailan (baby in size & portion, but not in price) ;)

This was the entrance to our seats.

A view of Swissotel the Stamford (Southeast Asia's tallest hotel) with Raffles City office tower to the left and Fairmont behind it.

There were 3 of these tv screens at the padang grandstand so we could follow the race.

The toilet cublicles which we searched everywhere for, but were right under our nose.

A view of the Anderson bridge, Shenton Way (Central Business District) in the background, and the Esplanade bridge on the left.

Getting home after the event was a real breeze. As our stand was right beside one of the entry/exit gates (4) along Coleman Street, we managed to get through it rather quickly and got our bus immediately. We were home by 11.45pm, which was really good as we expected to be stuck in traffic or cramped in the mrt, but thankfully we didn't have that problem. In fact, the bus was rather empty.

Growing up and being exposed to this sport and now watching it 'live', the feeling is wonderful. I'm so proud to be a part of Singapore's history, in witnessing the hosting of F1's first ever night race. I think all Singaporeans should be too. It was a great party last evening and it was indeed a great show put up for all to see. You don't have to spend loads of money to experience it. I was lucky enough to be given a ticket, but there are spots where you can catch it for free. A one-day walk-about ticket is not costly (I read it in the papers but do not have the price), and I saw many people on the city hall steps facing the padang and they were closer to the track than we were. However, a friend of mine who was seated in the first row says that the noise is more unbearable down there.

Be sure to catch the race this evening at 8pm. Go Ferrari Go! :D

Sandwich

This very desperate and lazy person looked in the fridge and came up with this concoction for breakfast. It, being a rather wet (stormy in the early hours) morning, I wanted something hot for breakfast, not cold milk and cereal. With one last slice of bread and a bread end, decided to fry an omelette and sandwiched it with some leftover hae bee hiam, and voila, breakfast! Mmm.. satisfaction. :P

Chocolate Ice-Cream

Was blog hopping when I came across small small baker's recipe for homemade ice-cream. Following all her links & feedback from those who made it, I discovered it was real easy to make some ice-cream at home, without any need for an ice-cream maker. Now, with all this contaminated food business going on (even ice-creams are not spared), I decided to try it out. At least I know what is going in our tummies, and melamine sure isn't one of the ingredients (or so, I hope).

As I did changes to the original recipe, I thought it'd be easier to just type it out here -

Ingredients -

3 egg yolks
50g sugar
45g dutch-processed cocoa powder
50g Nestle 'Go" chocolate milk
200g milk (I didn't have full cream on hand, so used low fat that was in fridge)
250g whipping cream (I used Phoon Huat's whipped topping)
4 pieces of Chipsmore Double Choc Chip cookies, broken into pieces (optional)

Method -

1. Whisk egg yolks and sugar till white and creamy.
2. Double boil the egg yolk mixture and stir constantly. Pour in cocoa powder, and milk, and continue stirring until mixture is hot but not boiling.
3. Remove the milk mixture from heat and set aside to cool. (I plonked the bowl in a basin of water to quicken the cooling down process)
4. Whisk whipping cream till fluffy and fold in the cooled milk mixture. Fold in chocolate chip cookies
5. Pour into container and freeze overnight or until firm.

N.B. Kids came over for a playdate and when realised there was ice-cream, insisted on eating them. 2-1/2hrs after storing in fridge, it wasn't very hard, but rather the sides were and the middle was soft, still they wanted and it tasted like chocolate pudding. Haha. By evening, it had hardened but I found water crystals. Could it be because I 'disturbed' it while it was freezing or maybe I should have fluffed it during the freezing process? Overall, is a good & easy recipe. Great base to experiment with different flavours. The ice-cream was a lovely bitter, not too sweet. Reason I cut down lots on sugar was because the chocolate milk and whipped cream were sweet.

Various buns

Just haven't made bread in a long while and thought of making some today. So I used this recipe. I really need to sit down one of these days and sort out my labels which are kind of messy. I know I've made buns before but can't find them anywhere in my cloud label. Going to bring some to swim class today. Hope they pass the taste test.

Cheese Sausage buns

Ham & Cheese buns with spring onion garnish

Chocolate Chip buns

Otah buns

Made in China?

What do you make of the recent scandal that is making the headlines every day?

It is kinda scary to know that at one time or another, we have consumed them.

The current list is this - (It's what I got from the newspapers today)

Banned :
1. Dutch Lady pasteurized strawberry flavoured milk
2. White Rabbit milk candy
3. Yili yoghurt ice bar

On the list of things that are being recalled are M&Ms, Snickers peanut bars, Dove chocolate bars, Oreo wafer sticks, Magnum mini classics ice-cream, Monmilk milk, Walls Mini Poppers ice-cream, Mentos yoghurt bottle, Wall's all-natural mango, Moo sandwich ice-cream, mini Cornetto & Youcan ice-cream. These have not been proven to contain melamine, but are recalled for pre-cautionary measures.

When the first problems with China products came to light, was it last year, starting with White Rabbit candy, I was on the alert. It hit so close to home - these are the things we grew up eating. It's really scary to think when did all this begin. I have been avoiding MIC foodstuff, all kinds, since last year, including fresh fruits, frozen seafood, etc. I make sure always to check the labels. I guess it's only right to be super kiasu and wary of the stuff we put into our mouths. I loved the Moo sandwich ice-creams and thought it was a good ice-cream for kids, till I found out on the back that it is MIC, and that's when I stopped purchasing them. With fruits etc, I mean, how do you know what they add to the soil etc? It's scary to think. I miss my favourite haw flakes, which my little girl also loves, but I guess it's just a little sacrifice that we have to make.

There was also a problem with toys, and imagine a brand name such as Fisher Price being affected, how do we know if the cheap toys that we find being sold everywhere, are safe? I got an email about used condoms being recycled to make cute little hair ties for our girls??? It's gross!

I quote this from the email I received :-

BEIJING (AFP) - Used condoms are being recycled into hair bands in southern China threatening to spread sexually-transmittable diseases they were originally meant to prevent, state media reported Tuesday In the latest example of potentially harmful Chinese-made products, rubber hair bands have been found in local markets and beauty salons in Dongguan and Guangzhou cities in southern Guangdong province, China Daily newspaper said.. 'These cheap and colorful rubber bands and hair ties sell well ...... threatening the health of local people,' it said. Despite being recycled, the hair bands could still contain bacteria and viruses, it said. 'People could be infected with AIDS, (genital) warts or other diseases if they hold the rubber bands or strings in their mouths while waving their hair into plaits or buns,' the paper quoted a local dermatologist who gave only his surname, Dong, as saying. A bag of ten of the recycled bands sells for j ust 25 s en (three cents), much cheaper than others on the market, accounting for their popularity, the paper said. A government official was quoted as saying recycling condoms was illegal. China 's manufacturing industry has been repeatedly tarnished this year by a string of scandals involving shoddy or dangerous goods made for both domestic and foreign markets. In response, it launched a public relations blitz this summer aimed at playing up efforts to strengthen monitoring systems. Check your kids hair bands and make sure they do not put them in their mouth while trying to plait or tie their hair.

It's real!

It's finally here... the tickets for the F1 qualifiers! I was beginning to doubt it was true. :P

Hubby's colleague kindly offered race tickets for Friday and Saturday to his friends, and really, I wasn't supposed to be going, but when I found out he (hub) was invited, I kicked up a fuss and said, if I wasn't going, he won't be going either. When I first heard news of F1 coming to our little island, I was very excited and said we should go watch, but he said tickets would be very expensive so no way. I really need to thank WL for sacrificing his ticket so I can go instead. Thanks so much!

Sleepover has been arranged and Princess' little girlfriend is too cute. She's rather 'deprived' according to her mum, and has never had any friends over to her house before, so when D told her about it, she started counting down the days like more than a month ago and has been bugging her mum about it ever since. Me? I chose not to say a thing. But dad leaked it out to her.

I had my own race yesterday... from one party to another. One was from 2-4pm, and the second was from 3-7pm. For the past year, I think this is the first time two parties have overlapped. By the end of yesterday, I was exhausted even though I didn't do much. My joints acted up today and I haven't been very mobile. Still, preparing lunch and dinner is a must! This little packet caught my eye when I was at the supermarket and I decided to give it a try. It's not too bad. I used pork fillet as that was the only meat in my freezer, and was quite pleased with the taste. I'm not into Korean food, so I can't comment on it, but it suits my palate.

My Ah Ma used to cook this cauliflower in tomato sauce when I was young. It isn't my favourite vegetable but I would eat this version. She used to cook the plain ones for everyone and the one with tomato sauce for the kids. :) Basically it's just tomato sauce, a little bit of salt and sugar to taste.

Spinach soup. I used ready stock and just added the ingredients.