Daily Affairs

Kids Arts Village

2011-06-02T22:22:00.009+08:00

Today we visited the first kids arts village, which is part of the Singapore Arts Festival. If you have not caught it, you have until 5June to check it out. It is located at Esplanade Park, a short walk away from Esplanade, Theatres on the Bay. To learn more about it, read this link. Meanwhile, enjoy the visuals.

This art installation can be seen within Esplanade.

We were greeted by these colourful leaves at the park. They carry the thoughts of those who have visited the exhibition thus far.

While waiting for our turn to watch the drama, she decided to play on the blackboard.

We did some crafts with plastic. This is an octopus lantern made using a plastic disposable bottle.

Some very lovely decor lining the exterior of the craft room.

Cute characters made with wires.

Beautifully-painted pebbles.

Artwork that was seen in the scrapbooking room.

Outside the Esplanade, we came across these cute inflatables. Couldn't resist taking a photo. :)

Holiday home baking class

2011-06-01T22:10:00.006+08:00

I had arranged for a cleaner to come in today. At the last minute, she did not turn up. I had no plans and thus did not know what to do. The intention was to go to the hairdresser's, but as it was still early in the morning, I decided to bake some muffins and cookies with my girl.

During most of her school hols, I like to occupy her with activities. While looking up cooking classes for kids, I found a lot of them tend to be very highly-priced. The stuff that were interesting, she wouldn't like to eat them, and the basic ones were too boring. I thus decided that I should teach her on my own. My cousins are already on the list for the next couple of weeks. Their mum wants them to pick up some cooking and baking skills and I've been arrowed to teach them a lesson or two. Once it's not done in my house, I'm happy. :D Did you already know I hate cleaning? Well, I really do. Cooking and baking is fun but cleaning and dusting, not my forte. I clean because I need to, not because I want to.

So well, having recently done a volunteer session of baking with the girls at school, I had a tub of yoghurt leftover, and not wanting to waste it, decided to let her bake using the recipe I had gotten from here. I did not follow the recipe, just used it as a base. Oreo was the substitute for Nutella and peanut butter.

Here you go, princess' first muffins all done by herself except that I had to help her place and remove tray from oven. Mummy's fault that it was too brown as I had set the oven to bake fan-forced. Yikes!

There was plenty of time left so we decided to bake cookies as well. The girl had requested for soft and chewy chocolate chip muffins and I remembered watching Anna Olson on tv one time, making just those cookies. A quick google and I found it easily. I did not cut down on sugar and am glad that it was just a nice sweet. However, the Valrhona dark chocolate chunks I had used were a bit bitter, they are fine once you get used to the taste. I suggest sticking to the original recipe. It is perfect as it is. Crispy on the outside and soft chewy on the inside.

When we were finally done with everything, a big thunderstorm started and we got stuck comfortable at home. In the end, we didn't get our hair done, but we spent a most enjoyable day at home doing nothing. :)

Ingredients

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, cut into chunks

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 F (I used 165 deg C)
Cream together butter and sugars until smooth. Add egg and vanilla and blend in.
Stir in flour, cornstarch, baking soda and salt. Stir in chocolate chunks.
Drop by tablespoons onto a greased baking sheet and bake for 8-10 minutes, until golden brown around the edge.
Let cool slightly and enjoy.

Melt in your mouth ribs

2011-06-01T21:34:00.003+08:00

I'm glad to be able to blog tonight. It's been quite a while and I have missed the freedom of having time to blog like I used to. I've missed my friends here, but real life beckons. I'm back to share a recipe that I absolutely love, and am happy that I don't need to visit Tony Roma's to get my fix.

I've tried a couple of times to make great-tasting melt in your mouth-textured ribs, but have not been successful till I tried out this recipe shared by a friend. There is no turning back.

Baby back ribs are about the only pork I would eat besides minced pork, and sweet and sour. This one is super duper easy to do, but you must really have the time and patience. Sharing with you the recipe...

Ingredients:
2 slabs of pork (unfortunately I'm not able to gauge how heavy they weigh) - do not cut up into smaller pieces
1litre of coca cola (it is best to buy the 1.5litre one as a standby in case you need more coke to cover all the ribs)
4-5 cloves
6-8 star anise segments (not sure how to call them)
a stick of cinammon
salt and pepper
tomato ketchup

Method:
Place coke, spices and pork into a pot and boil for a couple of hours till meat turns tender and soft. Remove from stock and slather some ketchup over the top of slabs and place them in the oven to grill and crisp. When it turns a lovely brown, it is done.

Enjoy!

NB - It's great for bbq's too.

Why do you go to church?

2011-05-09T11:24:00.004+08:00

Dear Teens in the row in front of me,

It's not the first time you have sat there, sometimes it's behind, but really what I witnessed yesterday, annoyed me. From the moment mass began, and the fourth person in the group joined in, it was a non-stop chitchat session till the end of mass. You did not care that you were in the Holy presence of God, and did not respect the congregation or the priest. You didn't care at all about the people around you. You carried on with your chatter without listening to a single word the priest said, although you did stand and sit and kneel with the rest of us. Guy in the grey top, the Eucharistic prayer is the most important part of the mass, and the body and blood of Christ is at the altar, not found somewhere on your iPhone.

When we are singing the 'Our Father', it is really okay not to hold hands if you feel it's uncool to hold your guy friends' hands. You didn't have to play the clapping game or catching using your hands. The 3 yr old kid behind me, and others around were better behaved throughout the whole hour in church.

If you are just there to mingle with your friends and have fun, I would suggest KFC which is just a stone's throw away. You get to feed your tummies too.

Bento4Japan

2011-03-27T21:10:00.006+08:00

An onigiri bento to encourage the people of Japan during this very difficult time. May they know that there are many people in the world who care and are with them in thoughts and prayers. I know that I am a bit delayed in sharing this bento but it's never too late to donate. To find out how, check out this link. Bento4Japan

In the bento is a whole plum cut in half, 2 onigiri, Oreo star biscuits, Japanese nuts and 2 friends made from picnic ham joined in love. That is the message that I would like to send to our friends in Japan. Never give up hope. God bless.

Paddy's Day

2011-03-17T05:14:00.000+08:00

We're off on a holiday across the Causeway. :)

Ballerina bento

2011-03-11T14:43:00.003+08:00

Today is the last day of school. Hurray!! Right after school is piano make-up class (due teacher got dates mixed up and didn't turn up on Wednesday). While waiting to be done with class, I decided to update with today's lunch bento post. I made her a ballerina complete with hair tied up in a bun. I love the cute fringe which reminds me of my princess. The girl is made of rice with furikake in the middle. There are two cherry tomatoes, a strawberry, half a goreng pisang (banana fritter), a piece of Sea Shanty and some edamame. The word 'BALLET' is spelled out with alphabet pasta.

I couldn't take a better (sharper) picture as she was hungry when she got home and was rushing me to let her have her lunch.

Enjoy the holiday kids!

Farm loots

2011-03-10T14:14:00.003+08:00

These are the loots she came home with for free...

1) 2 heads of lettuce;

2) cherry tomatoes to munch;

3) A cherry tomato plant in the foreground.

She bought...

1) A bottle of Honey Aloe Vera for mummy;

2) A little plant to reduce electromagnetic waves;

3) A little bottle of peppermint crystals to perk her up during class.

Barcook Bakery

2011-03-10T12:09:00.008+08:00

My plan for today was to go Burger King and take advantage of their $1 burger deal. I had been looking forward to this promo since last week when I received a message on whatsapp from an ex-workmate of mine.

However, while waiting for friend to confirm if she can meet me, my plans were thwarted by a post I saw on FB. A friend was raving about these super decadently delicious cream cheese raisin buns from a certain bakery which has branches at Hong Lim Park and UOB Centre. Yup, that's right. For you Shenton Way peeps, if you don't know yet, tucked in the basement of UOB centre is a bakery by the name of Barcook. My curiosity aroused, I was out of the home in 2seconds to make my way there. While there, I love to browse a certain favourite shop in the same building, but before that, I had to get my hands on these yummies. I heard the queue can get quite long. Read this. While on SMS with a good friend working there, she shared that she loves the floss hotdog buns and could devour 3 at a go. That's it! Number 2 on my list of buns to try. She also said not to miss the bubble tea from a certain shop there. Oh how I envy these Shenton Way peeps. They get all the best foodstuff, all tucked in little corners that only those in the know, will know. ;P

Fortunately, when I got to the bakery, there were only 2 customers ahead of me. The staff were nice and friendly (maybe at this particular outlet), and even thanked me for my purchase. Wow, ok. The shop space is occupied by an open kitchen where you can watch the pastry chefs go about their job. The choice of buns were not that many, but I guess if they are all winners, there isn't a need to make a wide variety. I saw trays of buns on cooling trolleys waiting for their turn to leave the bakery.

I love love the plastic bags. :)

For myself, I ordered a red tea with sour plum as suggested and it's awesome! The pearls are of a really good quality and has a lovely bite to them. I can't stand those cheap ones which taste mushy. I believe these pearls are of the same quality as those you get at Koi. And for the girl, she gets a green apple ice-blended (non-tea based).

The hotdog buns were yum too but I don't think I could eat 3 at a go. I love the bread, but I find them quite solid as in not airy, which is excellent. Or maybe, I was already full from breakfast to begin with. The cream cheese raisin buns were lovely too, but I would have liked the cream cheese to be a little less runny. Give it a try when you are next in the area and you won't be disappointed.

Field trip (School bento #10)

2011-03-10T06:48:00.009+08:00

Dear princess has gone on a school field trip this morning. It sounds like a lot of fun visiting the aeroponics and hydroponics farms. I've never visited them myself, and had hoped that the teachers would ask for parent volunteers, but unfortunately, they didn't. So anyway, when my alarm rang at 5.30am, I pressed the snooze button and thought to myself, to sleep in for another 10mins, and there was no need to wake up yet, since hubby would take the girl down to wait for the bus. He had woken up at 3.45am to catch a soccer match. But, it suddenly dawned on me that I had to prepare her bento for her outing. So, I literally crawled out of bed, and put the pandan bun to steam. In the same boiling pot, I added the sausages which I prepared thanks to this friend's tutorial. I didn't have time but how silly of me, I should have checked out her blog before doing it, as I placed the petals on wrongly, so it doesn't have a lovely brown colour. I had used the back of the petal thus it's pale-looking. Oh well, you live and learn. Anyhow, I still think the flower was very cute. There were also three big fat strawberries to go along on the trip. The sleeping bunny looks so comfortable resting on a big cushy pillow.

I packed her a big box of snacks to share with her friends during the long ride in the bus. It contains a medley of little bites such as M&Ms, raisins, cashews, chocolate-coated sunflower seeds, coloured goldfish, sancha and Cheezels. There is also a packet of pretzel sticks with cheese dip.

All ready to go, but Mr Orange isn't too sure about going on the journey.

A birthday gift

2011-03-10T06:45:00.000+08:00

I made these two bentos for a friend's kids. It was meant to be a birthday gift for her girl, but I didn't get to meet her till a week after the day. I'm glad the kids were thrilled with them.

For CJ, I coloured her rice a shade of pink. The seaweed stood out against the light background and you can actually see it looked like an elephant. There were cherry tomatoes, a piece of seaweed chicken, baby corn, and some edamame on a pick resting on a bed of lettuce.

In the bottom compartment, there is broccoli, a fierce-looking Doraemon fishcake, and a lobster fishball. To finish off the meal, there was a packet of chocolate, a gummy worm, and some sweets.

JD had the same things except that his rice was coloured a greenish shade (I was going for a grey look but did not have the appropriate seasoning). JD's little elephant didn't stand out that well.

These were made in February but I had forgotten all about them till I was transferring photos out this morning. Stay tuned for another bento post coming right up.

School bento #9

2011-02-24T07:58:00.004+08:00

This week is bento to school week. I think she mentioned that she is on duty this week - cleaning classroom during recess. It's a real race against time all week. I wonder where the time flies. I woke up 15mins earlier this morning, having set my alarm clock 15mins before my usual time of 5.45am, but yet managed to hit the snooze button more than once. Most of the items in this bento do not need cooking, and others, maybe a quick blanch to reduce cooking as much as possible.

There is no time at all to decorate the elephant and a quick click of the camera before packing it off in the school bag.

The school bus comes really early these days and half the time, we only leave home when we hear the bus reversing. I'm afraid one day he is just going to drive off without dear princess. I need to re-adjust my wake up time as well as be more forceful in getting the girl to wake up. I am looking forward to next week when there is no more bento preparation. Hurray!

Happy Valentine's Day

2011-02-14T21:37:00.014+08:00

I made bento dinner for us all. The first bento is for the girl. As my fridge wasn't well-stocked and I had limited time to prepare, this was the best I could come up with.

In her bento, there is heart-shaped rice with minced meat filling which I had prepared earlier in the day, 2 pieces of ngoh hiang, cherry tomatoes, tulip-shaped strawberries, a small tangerine, hamburger biscuits, broccoli, tofu fishcakes, and edamame, as well as a packet of apple juice.

Hubby's portion has a can of beer instead of juice.

This is my portion with exactly the same things, minus a drink.

This is what the bento box looks like, a CNY gift from a friend.

A lovely gift from hubby... my new Canon Ixus 130 camera and a rose each for the girl and me.

School bento #8

2011-02-10T07:54:00.003+08:00

Wednesday's lunch is crazy. Even though girl comes home at normal time i.e. right after school ends, she has piano class the minute she is home. I pack her a bento lunch so that she can pick from it while she has her lesson. We were lucky yesterday, that her teacher arrived late, so she managed to polish off 3/4 of what was in the box. I made her cheese sandwiches and served that with cherries, a little tangerine, cherry tomatoes, some keropok french fries, a fortune cookie, a bottle of Yakult and some Smarties in the Pooh container.

Matcha cookies

2011-01-29T13:51:00.003+08:00

I have been busy baking the past couple of days. Of course it wasn't the non-stop baking type. It was done at a leisurely pace. I prefer to give homemade cookies to family and friends rather than buy them off the shelf. It's just a sense of satisfaction I get. Pineapple tarts and chocolate chips are a must. However, I'm a bit more adventurous this year. I still have a batch or 2 of tarts to do but as I went around the blogs looking for a 'melting moments' recipe, I came across this simple to do matcha cookie and it just called out to me, 'try me, try me'. Which I did as you can see. :) It's a cookie for matcha lovers but I'm not one. However, it's not too bad really, although the next batch I make, I might cut down on the powder used, so it doesn't come out too strong. I got this recipe from sweet decadenze. This recipe is for Peony by request.

School bento #7

2011-01-27T08:36:00.010+08:00

Blog hopping is not doing me any good. I'm trying to lose weight, but the tummy is growling from checking out blogs for cookie recipes. I think I had better continue with updating my blog.

The week is full with after school activities. The girl comes home early on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. By early, I really mean 2pm. We are in the midst of preparing for ballet exams, therefore Tuesday are tied up with writing class and ballet. Wednesdays are good as we have a 45-min piano lesson right after she comes home. She had not been having piano class for a few weeks' now due to her being sick. On top of that, she hasn't been practising on her piano at all. I'm glad she still remembers her work.

I made her a bento to eat just before the teacher came, and put it at a side table so she could reach for something while her lesson was going on. Timing is tight as the teacher's schedule is also jam packed. Girl had requested for a salmon onigiri which I wrapped with a Hello Kitty seaweed sheet that I purchased in Tokyo. She also loves the inarizushi with ebikko. There is a seaweed shape of Usahana on top of the ebikko. Usahana is also a Sanrio character that she loves. There are cherry tomatoes and broccoli as well as a stick of chicken balls.

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When the girl was absent from school, her Science teacher started them on a project on growing beans. She missed the visit to the Ecogarden in school. I think she is going to enjoy Science, as there is a lot of hands on activities to look forward to, I hope.

Her partner grew some beans for her, but we prepared the cardboard for it while she was recuperating. We had fun designing and colouring her garden, and bringing the baby beans home and taking care of them. Here they are 2 days old.

By the 4th day, the beans have sprouted. Can you see the little plant? So cute. It's grown even taller now. I need to take another photo of it.

School bento #6 + CNY baking

2011-01-27T08:03:00.008+08:00

A cutey rabbit char siew bun features in this recess bento. I had seen a bunny chocolate bun at Breaktalk but I think this one is way cuter. I got this from Four Leaves Bakery. It looks more like a rabbit than Bugs Bunny. My sis is born in the year of the rabbit and I know she will love this. Unfortunately I can't do one (bento) for her. Little oranges are seen here again (I have a whole basketful!). Normally, princess doesn't like oranges but she loves these as they are cute, sweet and seedless.

I've also been busy baking for CNY gifts. I really marvel those who bake to sell. Just making tarts for gifts and own consumption yesterday already zapped me of all my energy. From making the dough (thank you Kenwood), to rolling out the jam balls (no KW or KitchenAid can do this job unfortunately ;P), to wrapping dough over jam, to glacing, to finally baking. Remember those who eat tarts - think of the person doing them, the amount of hard work that goes into one ball. Please don't pop them like peanuts. It's a plea from bakers like me. Savour every bite and eat them with love, as much love as was put into making each and every ball, then you will feel the love of those who made them. :D

To get the ball rolling on my baking, I started with the very simple chocolate chip cookie. It was quick to prepare, bake and cool, thus making them great as a night time bake, which was the only time I had in the past few days. Afternoons are occupied these days with homework, tons of it. I'm glad that the girl has finally caught up on her hw. There is still one major compo to do and 3 short ones. Those are optional as she only needs to choose one out of 4, but she hopes to be able to complete all 4 at her own pace. Her bedtime has also been adjusted to 9pm, not by choice, but by her heavy workload. She has been quite good last 2 days as I was busy with work (my hubby will have you know that staying home is not work) - cleaning house, doing laundry, baking, cooking etc. Although having to do lots of hw, she did complain once or twice about her aching hand, but I just let her rest a few minutes here and there before continuing. There really wasn't enough time to waste. She sometimes completes them around 8-9pm, and it's off to bed. She gets a sheet of Maths problem sums to bring home every day, and that is on top of a few sheets that they do in school! For Chinese, there are also pages of hw. :( She doesn't have a life anymore! Why do they push them so hard? :(

Well, anyway, so here is my chocolate chip cookies. A big portion = two recipes.

My first batch. :)

This is the reason I hate making pineapple tarts... rolling them jam balls. They are sticky eeky and so time consuming.

Perfect circles.

Here they are, all ready to be packed.

School bento #5 + Muffins

2011-01-27T07:25:00.009+08:00

This bento was very hastily put together in minimal time. The only things that needed to be done in the morning were to put the McDonald chicken nuggets in the oven and cut up some dragonfruit.

I had baked some muffins for the girl the day before. Had planned to do them to put in her bentos, and I so happened to receive a mini silicon baking tray then, so it got me excited to try it out. The muffins were really cute, definitely mini! I made them in three flavours - blueberry, chocolate chip and banana. It's literally bite size so just pop them in your mouth and they are gone.

Thank you for the gift, dear friend. I love it to bits! Making more today to take to the nurses at the hospital as a thank you gift. :)

School bento #4

2011-01-24T07:51:00.004+08:00

Good morning. :) A new week has begun. I'm really not used to waking up at 5.45am. It just makes me so tired, with zero energy, but the thing with me is that unless I am super exhausted, I can't fall back to sleep after sending the girl off in her school bus. So here I am, with time to spare, updating my blog.

The girl starts her conversational Malay class today. She had showed some interest in the language when we visited the Peranakan Museum a couple of years back, and had picked up a book on learning the language. This is an optional MOE programme to get pupils to learn another language other than their mother tongue. I think it's a great move. Costs are covered by MOE. Being half a baba, I never was spoken to in Malay. My maternal grandmother spoke Hokkien and English to us, maybe for the fact that it was easier for us since we had a Hokkien paternal grandma. Therefore, I was glad that my girl showed an interest, and decided to sign her up for the class. I hope she has fun, and can soon be my teacher. :P

In the picture above is her lunch bento for after school. Malay class begins this afternoon for 2hrs after school. I decided to boil her some cha soba and put the sauce separately in a covered container so she can dip the noodles in. The instruction is for her to throw out the sauce after she is done. Hope she remembers. Sitting atop the noodles is Snoopy. There is a cuttlefish ball panda, leftover from a birthday party we attended yesterday. A little Mandarin orange, a cherry tomato and a packet of sweets from the goody bag complete the bento.

This below is the section for recess. There are two slices of leftover pizza from party, 2 pieces of homemade chocolate chip cookies, a food pick with several blueberries, and 2 pieces of papaya.

Have a great week everyone!

School bento #3

2011-01-21T21:45:00.002+08:00

The girl has gone back to school! Her MC ended yesterday and she was back today. As her health isn't that well yet, I decided to pack her bentos starting today, after all the beatings that her body has taken lately. Somehow, I can't trust canteen food, especially when the body is still weak. It still isn't as clean as when we prepare them ourselves. It was tough getting up this morning to prepare this, but thank goodness I did most of the preparation last evening. The onigiri was made after dinner and I made her some fresh salmon flakes in teriyaki sauce. While at the supermarket, the salmon looked really fresh, thus I decided to do that since I couldn't find any canned ones on the shelf. It was really easy to do. I just put them in the oven to bake, then flaked them and cooked in diluted teriyaki sauce till dry. She loves that. And I'm glad. :)

This is a new bento box which was a gift from her godma. So pretty it is.

She has to stay back at school three times a week, so not only do I need to prepare snacks for recess, I also need to do a lunch one as well. For recess, I made her a jam sandwich wrapped up in Stitch foil, some fruit balls using honeydew melon, papaya and dragonfruit. They are so adorable. I want them for myself. :) All three fruits fit nicely into the bean silicon cup. Spy the little piggy? That's a homemade pineapple tart which didn't turn out all that well, and was a lot of work. Doubt I'd be making those again in a hurry.

Hospital stay

2011-01-21T07:58:00.016+08:00

There are 2 viruses in the air now. One of them is a microplasma bacteria and the other is stomach flu. It has become an epidemic in Singapore. Lots of people, especially kids are susceptible to them. A number of friends' kids are either down with cough and cold or vomiting and diarrhoea. So, to be safe, try to keep away from crowded places, especially since Chinese New Year is round the corner. Both are contagious.

Unfortunately, mine happened to be one of those unlucky ones. After almost a week of being sick, she became dehydrated and had to be admitted to the hospital. We took her to the Emergency Room on a Sunday as she threw up after a cup of water. I knew how she felt throughout, to throw up till nothing is left but gastric juice. It was what happened to me many times during my pregnancy, and it broke my heart to see her experiencing what I went through. She could even joke that lucky I didn't throw her up. Hahah!

She threw up on Sunday morning after gulping down half a bottle of water. I decided we should send her in to put her on the drip, but that too was my greatest fear... having an IV drip going into her hand. I think hubby wasn't too keen on the idea at first, but I reasoned that she was not getting any better, and by sending her to the hospital, professionals were around to give her proper care, but he still wanted to hold on to one last hope. He finally relented after some persuasion and also seeing how weak his daughter had become.

Knowing that she'd most likely be admitted, I packed a sleepover bag and took it along. A big box of tissue for her runny nose, which was just flowing non-stop. And her little pink kitty to accompany her. :)

We chose the hospital which her paed services, as we decided that he would be the best person to take care of her, the only doctor 'that she trusts' (in her own words). Therefore, when the doctor at the ER heard that princess was Dr S's patient, he offered to call him over to have a look at her. The girl also requested that her paed fix up the IV for her, something which the ER doc said was what these paeds are used to, as we felt bad that he had to come back personally just to set up the drip.

I was really nervous about it and was afraid that there'd be screams when the needle went in, so I was happy to make my disappearing act to the admissions desk to do the necessary paperwork. Alas, I was not let off easy, as the princess called for me to be there by her side. Daddy alone wasn't enough. I have to say I was extremely proud of her. She had asked to look while the doc was putting the needle in, but Dr S told her to look the other way instead, so we distracted her by chatting with her, and he did it so well and skilfully that she didn't even feel it go in. For that alone, I'm eternally grateful to him. Personally, I hate having that done to me, so can you imagine a child?

Due to her condition, she could only stay in a single room. And because they had a limited number of single rooms in the kiddies' ward, we had a converted double ward which they turned into a single. We got 2 beds, one for the parent (non-chargeable) as well as a meal for the accompanying parent. As the girl couldn't eat and wasn't allowed to, meals were only ordered for me. Knowing how horrible hospital food tastes, I opted for Malay food which usually comes with some form of chilli in it. The first meal that evening was a fried bee hoon dish that was mildly spicy. It wasn't too bad actually, although french fries and bee hoon seemed like a weird combination. The fries tasted awful of course, as it came with no salt at all. I left it all. Dessert was honeydew sago. The soup? I did not touch.

For the next day's lunch, I ordered seafood fried rice which was bland, and the rice grains weren't fully cooked.

Didn't manage to take a photo as we had visitors that afternoon.

The girl didn't sleep very well that first night due to her hand being uncomfortable and she had to sleep in a sitting up position. I, on the other hand, could hardly sleep. What with worrying about the girl accidentally dislodging her IV, the nurses coming in and out to check on her, the beeping from the IV drip to signal the need to change the glucose bag, to the little eerily irritating sounds in the corner of the room where the blinds met the control. I managed to dose off for about an hour or two, but I knew I'd suffer terribly in the day. When hubby went over in the afternoon to take over the shift, I went home and got 2hrs of sleep. That night, hubby stayed with her and I got to come home to sleep in my comfortable bed. It didn't help one bit. I tossed and turned in my bed all night. I can't remember when was the last time I had slept alone.

The paed was late in dropping in to check on her. He only managed to do so around noon time. Apologized that he was stuck in ICU, probably with a little baby, poor child. He said she was ready to go home, but princess protested and wanted to stay one more night. By that time, she was well enough and had gotten used to the call button for the nurses, people to wait on her hand and foot, giving in to her whims and fancies, and having many visitors to make her feel all special, she wasn't ready to give all that up. :)

The day that she was discharged, I had ordered mee siam for lunch, so here it is... it wasn't too bad actually. The best meal of all the other meals the two days before.

For the hubby, I prepared a quick bento which had more fruits than food. It was really quick and easy. I only really needed to make the tamago. I put his food in my newest Yoshinoya bento. It's a CNY promo that they have. You get it for $5 with any value meal purchase. Usual price is $12.90.

There's sausage wrapped in tamago, bak kwa and white rice with furikake.

In the top tier, there were little mandarin oranges, celery sticks with a Caesar salad dressing, slices of apples (turned brown due not enough salt to soak in), and some strawberries.

IV removed. Yay!! We could go home!

Thank you aunties, and uncles for visiting, and for the many gifts, stuffed toys etc.

The bestie's birthday

2011-01-21T07:39:00.005+08:00

The bestie shares the same birthdate as princess. I had planned to celebrate for the two of them by taking them both to a lovely lunch. However, since the poor child was ill for her birthday, I had to rush out these cuppies. Had planned to do them anyway, but there was no motivation to kickstart the process till the very last minute. Most of the decor was made 2 days in advance. The thought was there, but the execution took a lot of effort. I just had to surprise her!

I found a courier service that said they do delivery of cakes but when I called them up, they said they only did frozen cakes. Oh well, I had to send them personally to her. I had hoped for a much more 'wow' factor.

I'm not very creative and if friends have received cuppies from me, they will realize it's usually the same few designs haha. This one, however, has a wannabe Kate Spade tote that she was eyeing, as well as a pretty present all wrapped up.

I'm missing her now, but I know she is having a fun time in HKG. And she'll be back tomorrow! How fast the week has flown by. Can't wait to see what goodies she has bought. :)

Taxi drivers

2011-01-15T17:24:00.004+08:00

I had a bad spell with taxi drivers during the week. The first happened when I was rushing my girl to the paed. I usually like to go early in the morning so that I don't need to wait too long for her turn. When I left home that morning in a hurry, I had just changed my bag and thus forgot to take my umbrella along. It started drizzling when we got out of the lift but as we were in a rush, I didn't bother going back to get it. However, when we got to the main road to catch a cab, a queue had formed with approximately 4 people in line. I didn't think we'd have luck getting one and I wasn't going to take the girl out in the rain (she was running a fever at the time). Thus, I called for a cab and was lucky to get one with a 3-5min arrival time. When the guy arrived, I went out from under the block and waved at him. He didn't even look and just drove his cab along. I waved and shouted and still no response. He just went on. It got me really mad and I caught up with him and banged on the boot of his cab, with my girl trailing me in the rain. He really got it from me good. However, he apologized. I let it go at that. Important at that time was getting to the clinic on time, and besides he already said he was sorry.

On Tuesday, I had gone to get groceries as well as the cake for my girl. In my right arm were 4 heavy bags as I had to free my left hand for my bag as well as the cake. This driver of the cab I was about to board had a real attitude problem. Seeing that I was struggling, he just glared blankly at me. I signalled for him to help open the boot and he didn't budge. I shook my head at him and he reluctantly got out and said to me, 'don't shake your head lah'. I told him he was very rude and that I wasn't going to go in his cab. He then said to me, ' I also don't want to take you'. I was fuming by then and got the next cab driver to open his boot. In my anger, also due to a breaking arm and shoulder from the weight of the groceries, I had not thought of it, till the driver said to take down the number plate of the previous cab to lodge a complain. I have taken it down but due to taking care of the sick child, have not had a chance to call the company yet, which I definitely will do this coming Monday. I'm not letting that one off.

Sick + School bento #2

2011-01-15T17:00:00.006+08:00

Sunday was the start of our nightmare that has lasted till today. She had high temperature the entire Sunday and Monday, at times reaching up to 40.2deg C. I took her to the paed first thing on Monday morning, and with suppositories and panadol, managed to clear the fever by Tuesday, which was her birthday. However, that wasn't the end of it. She woke up with a very bad nosebleed which lasted from 8.30am till 4pm. It wasn't heavy flowing all the way, but because of her runny nose, it seemed to go on forever. That was also when her cough and runny nose started. :(

Poor dear was ill throughout her birthday but at least we managed to get her a cake and she was able to eat that. She went back to school on Wednesday and Thursday but when she got home from school that second day, she looked really terrible so I decided to take her to the GP for anti-biotics. She wasn't getting any better and was suffering terribly. She couldn't do her homework and was listless. There was no way she could have managed to absorb what she was taught at school. Thus, we got the anti-b and started on one dose. That night, she threw up a few times. It was really worrying so I took her again to the paed and this time he prescribed supps to stop her vomiting. The medicine did not work, so again I rushed to the paed that same evening, 7hrs after he had last seen her, and who thankfully had a night clinic 10mins from my house. He gave her a jab and poor girl cried. She normally is good with jabs but her senses must be really sensitive as she hasn't consumed anything or drank any fluid for a day. Poor child. She slept through the night without throwing up, except sleep was disturbed by coughing.

Hubby started her on 7-Up, which is what his mum used to give him growing up. So far, fingers crossed, she is responding well to it. She has just been sipping that slowly the whole afternoon. We hope that she will be well enough to start on some soup or soft food by tomorrow.

Everything has been on hold since this illness started. The house is in a mess from Christmas, till New Year till her birthday. I had hoped to do some tidying up after the girl went back to school and hubby went off back to work. I really hope everything goes back to normal soon. This has dragged on for too long and is draining me of whatever energy I have left.

This second bento was for last Wednesday when she returned to school after being sick. There were tuna pizzas made with half a hotdog bun, blueberries, strawberries and some flower biscuits. She usually wipes her bento clean but on that day, she returned with one slice of pizza, 3 pieces of strawberries and one biscuit, and I knew something wasn't right. She never leaves fruits.

I hope to return to do more blogging, but meanwhile, the most important thing at present, is to get the girl back to health. I also can't wait to start baking pineapple tarts and some CNY cookies. Have you started your baking yet? 20 days to CNY.

11111 + School bento #1

2011-01-11T13:11:00.007+08:00

This is my very first post of the year 2011. But of course, the date's been rigged. How could I not take advantage of this date to remember my girl's very special birthday. :P The year has started off not too well, with the princess being sick. It all started with a high fever on 9 Jan. She woke up with a grouchy face and I asked her what was the matter. She refused to answer me at first but later said that she wasn't feeling well. We took her temperature and it registered high, somewhere around 38-39deg C.

I wanted to cheer her up, so while I was out to run errands, got her a cake from Four Leaves (she had requested for a strawberry cake for her birthday but I had no time or energy to bake her one). I had ordered Jewelpets icing a few days earlier thus I decided to improvise on the store-bought cake by decorating it with the sheets. It turned out a success except that I should have placed the sheets on just before serving the cake, as they had started to sag in the 3hrs the cake was left to sit in the fridge. But at the end of the day, it was still a joy for her to see her favourite pets greeting her on top of her favourite cake. :)

For this new school year, I made her 2 bentos. On the first week of school, this was what she got... a mini bagel with ham roll and a slice of cheddar, strawberries and a cherry tomato.

Happy birthday princess. Get well soon!

The Lost Jewelpet

2010-12-16T12:41:00.004+08:00

Meet Sapphire the Jewelpet. She was 2 days old when this picture was taken. It is the only memory she left with us. We bought her at Puroland, when dear princess set eyes on her. We tried to show her others but her heart was set on this. It slept with her in the night and throughout the next day, it accompanied her as we went shopping, sitting snuggly in her backpack which she carried front facing so she could keep an eye on Sapphire, which she named 'Jewel'.

While waiting for our flight to come home, she took Jewel out and took a photo of her at the terminal. I then stuffed Jewel into her bag so that it will be safe in there. She watched some movies and played games on board the plane and then fell asleep around 2-3am, and when we arrived just after 6am, I waited till we had landed before waking her up so that she could sleep a little more. When we were halfway on the expressway home, she suddenly asked where Jewel was and I told her that it was in her bag and she said, no, that she had taken it out during the flight. My heart sank as I knew it was gone. I told her that and she started to cry. I tried calling the airport but they said we had to go down personally to lodge a report. Hubby took her down after having a nap and didn't even make it through to the lost and found counter. They wouldn't let him in, so he checked at the info counter and they made some checks and said nothing was found in the aircraft. I could have told him that without him even making the trip. Someone would have pocketed it. If she had told us she had taken it out, we would have remembered at the end of the flight but she told neither me nor her dad. :(

We were both very upset by the loss and I tried searching on the internet without much luck. I also sent out messages to friends going Japan, Taiwan, Korea, to see if they have any luck in finding a replacement.

What broke my heart the night of our return was that princess was concerned that her pet had been dumped into a dustbin somewhere, or that she would be in a washing machine with her tag all intact and that it'd be ruined. The next morning, she said she didn't sleep well the night before, thinking of her precious pet.

I really hope to be able to find a replacement for her and will continue in my search and also through the kindness of friends who travel.

Meanwhile, at least we have this picture of her which my girl took.

Road trip to Malacca

2010-12-16T10:11:00.020+08:00

Riding on the tailwind of our Japan holiday, we made our way to Malacca with aunts, uncles and cousins on a one night stopover. The trip was for shopping and eating, and we did a lot of both. It was a really intensive 2-day fully-packed trip. The girls were shopping most of the days and the men were left to mind the kids at the pool or in the mall. I am so thankful to both uncles for their patience in caring for all 4 kids while we were busy scurrying around for the best bargains. This time, hubby did not join us, but it turned out that most of the shopping was done for him. Very pleased with my buys. There was such a wide variety and I was spoiled for choice. I wanted to buy him everything! Hehe. He doesn't shop at all, and also in Singapore, it's difficult finding clothes in his size, so I went crazy.

We left Singapore at 8am and arrived in Malacca around 12pm, as we made many toilet stops along the way. I had the front seat in the car, so this was my window view. :)

We had booked to spend the night at Equatorial Hotel, but as we were early, we couldn't get our room keys, so we set out to have our lunch at a nearby restaurant called Ole Sayang.

I love the container for the rice but couldn't find it in the shops to take home.

Ayam pongteh.

Chap chye.

Sambal Udang.

Love the colours of this wall at the side of the restaurant.

After lunch, we made our way back to hotel to leave our bags and set off for some retail therapy at the very big mall right beside our hotel. Yippee! The men and kids got bored and decided to go swimming at the pool, and we were left on our own for 4hrs, us 4 ladies. At the end of of it all, we picked up some cheese tarts from this shop called Opps. I love their packaging and the very colourful, cutesy image.

Business seemed good as the chiller was mostly empty.

Aren't they all so pretty?

Pretty, right, both the box and bag?

We also stopped by a bubble tea shop and can you believe the price?? It costs M$1.80! That equates to S$0.75! We ordered 7 cups. The pearls were of a very good quality unlike those sold at the cheaper shops in Singapore. The texture is equal to that sold at Koi.

We had dinner at a seafood place facing the sea in the Portuguese town. Someone recommended that we try the seafood at No.7 stall.

Carollers entertained us while we waited for our food and little kids dressed as elves and santarina went around offering sweets at the tables to little kids, and some little ones went around with a little donation tin, although that was optional. It was lovely to see them share the Christmas spirit and also their generosity in giving a little something to those around them. The houses were all beautifully dressed up for Christmas but I did not take any photos of them. I sent the girl off to take photos and this was the only photo she took, while the rest were videos.

It was an extremely long wait for our food, almost an hour, so when it was finally served, everyone was onto the food and thus no pictures were taken except for the calamari which was placed in front of me. However long it took, it was well worth the wait as the quality of the food was excellent. The garlic prawns and scallops came in gorgeous sauces.

Mango juice was highly recommended by our server and princess could hardly refuse it as mango is her number 1 favourite fruit. After taking a sip, she turned to me and told me I HAD to try it, and so I did. It was very nice. :)

Breakfast on the second morning was at Jonkers 88. If you intend to visit them, take note that they do not open their doors till 10.30am, so there is no need to rush out early in the morning.

Lots of people were there when we arrived at 10am. While we were waiting for them to open, we popped in to a shop nearby. I managed to snap a photo before being stopped by a staff member. No photography allowed.

They have an extensive menu to choose from.

The desserts area.

Kueh Pie Tee.

The decor of the coffee shop was very unspoiled, very rustic, and I loved it.

Both uncles had the nasi lemak, which they claimed, wasn't that great.

I had the fishball noodles, and found the sauce too salty for my liking.

Both aunties had the baba laksa which was pretty good.

Saw this beautiful and impressive snowman at Aeon mall, made from recycled plastic bottles.

Shopping in Tokyo

2010-12-16T09:48:00.005+08:00

I was very selective in the merchandise that I bought on my trip. Even though I had packed an extra suitcase for all my shopping stuff as well as a fold-up bag, I didn't want to fully utilize both, so in the end, I managed to squeeze most of the shopping into the suitcase. Shopping is not the expensive thing. It's the airport transfers and travelling 2 or 3 times in cabs in the city, tickets to Disney as well as to Puroland that put a dent in our budget. Most of the bento shopping I did, those bento books etc, were actually affordable and the books were half the price of those sold here in Singapore.

Princess was given shopping money by her granny and grandaunt in Ireland. It was supposed to be for her shopping in Disney but in the end, hubby paid for her stuff, so she spent most of it at 100 yen shops. This is her loot.

As for me, these were the stuff I picked up.

I'm sure there are other photos of things I bought but my photos are all over the place at the moment so will update as and when.

Pokemon bento

2010-12-16T08:49:00.002+08:00

This bento was made on the day we got back from our holiday. I had bought some pokemon-shaped seaweed and have placed pikachu on the onigiri. There was a fish sausage which was supposed to be an octopus but the girl was very hungry and pestering for her lunch, so I couldn't give it eyes and a mouth. There was blueberry and corn bits and a chewing gum wrapped in pikachu paper. In the bowl is seaweed soup with pikachu sprinkles which cannot be seen.

Day 7 - Last day in Tokyo

2010-12-16T08:02:00.009+08:00

We planned our trip such that we would get 7 full days in Tokyo. Thus, we took the midnight flight out of the city that last night. We slept in till pretty late and checked out by 12pm, made our rounds to places such as 100yen and Daiso to go through the shelves one last time. I'm glad I did as some new stuff had popped up.

We went back to Shibuya, and with GPS, managed to find Tokyu Hands and the Loft. Yippee!

I bought a few items for Princess from Uniqlo, such as a pair of jeggings, a denim skirt and some thermal wear. They do not carry a wide range of kids' items in Singapore, esp their signature Heat Tech range of thermal wear.

In Daiso, I found these bento tools. In fact, they are now available in Singapore. I saw them last week.

While chatting with a friend on Viber (free Iphone to Iphone calls), she told me to check out the snacks available for sale at the airport. I bought a few items as gifts for my parents, and family. I also bought fresh udon and ramen which were very delicious.

Bought some famous banana cakes. They were very cute and pretty in their packaging.

A bento box filled with goodies from Disneysea.

More gifts for the family.

Mickey Bento

2010-12-10T13:02:00.003+08:00

Just taking a break from updating blog re: Japan trip, to bring you this bento I just made for snack this morning. In my newly-acquired Minnie bento box, I lined it with Mickey aluminium foil, pity it's all covered up. There are pieces of palm-shaped dragonfruit, strawberry with chocolate filled daifuku and a piece of strawberry banana cake with a cute imprint of a tiny strawberry on it.

Day 6 - Puroland (Take 2)

2010-12-10T01:50:00.018+08:00

Sweet city map, all in pink.

Hello Kitty and Dear Daniel were there to greet us as we entered the park. A photo with both characters was a must.

Shopping!

Kuromi was next in line to take a photo with. She was very cute and sweet, not like the little devil she is supposed to represent.

We went on a boat ride through the park.

These below were taken during our visit to Miss Kitty's home. Her very cute bathtub.

This is where she checks her email and surfs the web. ;)

The Jewelpets and Cinnamoroll in concert.

Very cute vending machine with Hello Kitty prints.

The birthday meal which comes with a hat of choice and a take home bento container. Hubby had the gratin set while I had the carbonara. I don't usually eat cream-based pastas but this one was the only one that appealed to me, out of the 3 choices.

Part of the bento set, these very cute Hello Kitty printed sausage and fishcake.

This really is a big set for a child. Added to this portion of pasta, sausage etc, was a hamburger in the upper layer of the basket. We kept the burger for our meal the next day.

For those planning a trip to Puroland, here are some directions to guide you to your destination. From Shinjuku station, take the Keio Line to Chofu, to switch train to Tama Centre. All in approximately 1hr travelling plus waiting time for train switching. From Shinjuku, the fare costs 330yen (adult) and 170yen (child). We had missed the direct train the previous morning, therefore we made sure to be there slightly earlier to catch it, which we did. It takes approximately 40mins to get there via direct line. If however you need to switch train at Chofu, remember to stay on the same platform where you got off the train and wait for the connection. It'd be best to check the board for timings. There are English words on the boards. Wait for the right train and timings. It is pretty easy to get around.

Day 5 - Puroland (Take 1)

2010-12-10T01:04:00.016+08:00

We were so close yet so far. Tama Centre is where Puroland can be found. For those unaware, Puroland is the home of Sanrio. It's an indoor theme park for Sanrio-crazy fans like ahem, me. My girl too is a fan. We left the hotel a little late that morning as we didn't realize that it would take us almost an hour to get there, what with the switching of trains as we had missed the direct one.

Excitement built up in us as we walked the pathway from the train station all the way to the entrance of Puroland, stopping to take photos along the way, but the closer we got to the entrance, the more we were suspicious. Why was it so quiet? Was everybody inside? Maybe we were too late? I decided to go right up to take a closer look and what was it I saw? A chained barrier? Oh no, my heart sank heavy. My girl was nearly in tears. Puroland was closed for the day. There was a board just outside which showed some dates and it read as Dec 29 16. We knew it was closed for something but did not understand the dates. We thought we'd never see the interior of Puroland this trip to Tokyo. It wasn't till we got back to the hotel that we read the fine print on the literature and saw that they were closed on Dec 2nd, 9th, and 16th. There was hope yet!

A colourful sculpture along the way.

Our travelling there was not in vain as we spent an hour in Daiso right outside Puroland and picked up more stuff. To appease the upset girl, hubby spent some time with her at a games arcade playing Pokemon on the machines.

Not wanting to waste the rest of our day, we went back to Shinjuku and visited Isetan departmental store for a spot of window-shopping. Isetan in Tokyo is very impressive, unlike the Isetan we have in Singapore. There are many annexes and buildings belonging to Isetan. We didn't know where to begin. After leaving the store, we made our way across the road to H&M. This outlet had a kids' section, unlike the flagship store at Shibuya which only carried Men & Ladies' clothes.

Hubby suggested that we walked back to our hotel and I nearly fainted at the suggestion! However, we took a slow stroll and made it back in 45mins if I'm not wrong. I didn't check the time. We stopped off halfway to check out a Sanrio Gift Gate shop, as well as pick up dinner along the way. We had dinner most evenings at the hotel as it was more comfortable eating there. Most times, we would pack food back from wherever food hall we were close to, else it'd be cup noodles from 7-11, or sushi sometimes. I was travelling with 2 boring eaters so it wasn't fun eating and trying stuff on my own.

We ate curry a lot on this trip and that evening, hubby had a curry hamburg cheese rice set. It might not look too good in the photo but it was delicious. The cheese went very well with everything else.

I opted for the chicken. For the girl, I chose a simple bento of curry and rice but the portion was really tiny. Lucky I had some leftover rice in the fridge from another dinner. I also shared some pieces of chicken with her.

The large sized curry hamburg rice cost 730yen, while mine cost 380yen and the miserable kids' portion cost 200yen.

Day 4 - Kabukicho & Harajuku

2010-12-10T00:12:00.010+08:00

Throughout our stay in Japan, we took our time to have a good rest each day before heading out. We could have maxed out our time there by going out very early in the morning and not returning till late, but all that walking around got us very tired and besides, we were on holiday. There was no need to rush around. We just went with the flow, which was a good thing, as that meant that we missed the rush hours on most days, thus on most of our train rides, the carriages were mostly empty. That was good. We did get caught once or twice at the train station during peak period, but it was fine, as the places where we were headed were mostly located outside of the city. So going against the flow was a good thing.

After 3 days in Tokyo, I still hadn't chanced upon any Daiso or CanDo 100 yen outlets and it was pretty frustrating for me. On the first day there, due to disorientation, we never found nor looked for Tokyu Hands in Shibuya. We revisited Shibuya on the last day we were there and with the help of GPS, we managed to locate the building.

I asked for directions at the hotel desk and judging from the map, it looked like Pepe Building, where I was headed, was at the end of the road where the hotel was. So I decided to try taking the bus down. I got all the instructions and directions I needed and we proceeded to the bus stop which was literally a stone's throw away. From that day on, we didn't bother with walking to the train station. It was so easy going via bus to Shinjuku station from where we were that even though it cost us more, it was our preferred way of commuting. It costs us 200yen for adult and 100yen for kid. Bus travel is definitely more costly than travel via train, but nothing can be compared to the taxi fares in Tokyo. We took cab a total of 4 times if I'm not wrong. Twice was to and from the airport shuttle stop and hotel, and twice were because we were simply too exhausted to walk anymore. Each cab ride cost us around 1000 yen or slightly less each trip, so that worked out to $16 or so.

Pepe building houses CanDo 100yen, and I spent over an hour there going through each rack and shelf and item, but not before sending hubby off to Starbuck's first. Princess had lots of fun filling the baskets as she was given shopping money by her granny and grandaunt to spend on her holiday. She bought stuff for herself and gifts for her friends.

Our next stop after 100yen was Harajuku.

The streets of Harajuku were pretty empty at this time of the afternoon on a weekday. Weekends were crazy filled with chock-a-block of shoppers.

Hubby took a picture of this sign. Spot the mistake?

We were pestered to have a meal at Mac's. It was our first fastfood meal there and fastfood doesn't come cheap.

The main reason for going to Harajuku... Daiso!

Day 3 - Disneysea

2010-12-08T22:40:00.011+08:00

We didn't manage to arrange well with cousin as to what time we'd be at Disney, so we decided to go ahead and start on the rides. Coincidentally, we bumped into them while on our way to the first ride - Aquatopia. The kids loved this ride and went on it at least 5-6 times.

Cousin wanted some Asian food, so we settled on Indian food. The naan and curry weren't too bad. I got princess the cake which came with the souvenir plate.

Following Peony's lead, I went about or rather sat around admiring all the plentiful popcorn containers which I saw people lugging around. There were more than 12 different types, but I later found out that some of them had actually brought their own containers to refill with popcorn for a lower price. I loved the Halloween-themed ones, and some others I believe, were from Disneyland. I had my eyes on this one below, and hunted around for it before finding it on the way to lunch. Love it to bits. It's a gorgeous little picnic basket.

Among the stuff I bought at Disneysea was this pair of Mickey and Minnie pouches. Kawaii!

We were sad to have missed the finale of the evening - the fireworks, but we wanted to catch the 8.30pm bus back into town and if we had stayed on, it would have been very late by the time we got back to the hotel. Besides we were there an entire day and were tired out from all the walking and playing. I do regret not having gone to Disneyland, but that will give me an excuse to visit Tokyo again. :)

Day 2 - Asakusa & Ueno

2010-12-07T23:10:00.021+08:00

We started off the day with breakfast at the hotel. Most of the food were dry stuff such as Danish pastries, bread, cereal etc, so I stuck to the pastries throughout my stay there. There weren't even fruits or omelette. I guess fruits in Japan must cost a lot. I missed breakfast on two occasions as I got pretty sick of seeing the same food laid out on the tables every day. It did fill us up a little, such that we usually had lunch only when we were hungry, that is around 2-3pm. Breakfast was served from 6.30 - 9.30am on weekdays and a half hour extra on the weekends.

On the second day, we set off on the Ginza line with the intention of visiting Ueno for the wholesale street markets at Ameyayokocho, but while on the train, I saw that Asakusa was a few stops after Ueno, and that was one of my planned destinations. We decided to change plans and start off at Asakusa before heading down to Ueno and Shinjuku.

Asakusa is where the oldest temple in Tokyo stands. Its name is Sensoji. Read about it here if you are keen to learn more. I took many pictures here so will let the photos do the talking.

The girl spotted a toy dispenser machine.

As we made our way towards the temple, stalls and shops lined the walkway, which provided a lot of distraction for tourists and pilgrims alike. It was an interesting sight. We spied a pancake shop and couldn't walk past without first getting each one of us a pancake. They were delicious.

This man was baking fresh rice crackers, like the ones you see two photos down.

These fruits fell off those yellow trees. I'm not sure if those were gingko trees. They turn a lovely shade of yellow and orange in Autumn. We saw a couple of people picking those fruits up, but when squashed, they gave out a funny yucky smell. They are really soft and fragile and squash easily when pressed. I had forgotten that they were in my coat pocket and accidentally squashed one of them. Yikes.

Time to stop for a drink before we headed off to Ueno. Oh the many choices...

A friend recommended that we visit Ameyayokocho while in Tokyo. It is in Ueno. The streets are full of shops selling items at discounted, wholesale prices, and there is something for everyone. From food to shoes, to a wholesale shop selling Japanese snacks, gift packs, chocolates etc. Great for gifts. We filled up our shopping bags easily here. Although it is very close to Kappabashi, we never made it there, as hubby was bothered about being in this shopping area. He didn't enjoy it one bit, so we couldn't stay for long. Street markets just aren't his kind of thing.

These were some of the goodies we bought.

Takashimaya Times Square was where we were headed right after Ueno. It took us a while to find it, as it was only our second day there and we were unfamiliar at all with our surroundings. I'm glad I found Tokyu Hands there. From Taka, I got these seaweed.

We parked hubby at some waiting area and girl and I went over to Kinokuniya to look for bento books. I was very lucky to find a few titles by Kaerenmama and Akinoichigo. I even found the latest Kaerenmama and Asami jointly published book. Woohoo. Happiness.

It was a great shopping day. :)

Day 1 - Arrival & Shibuya

2010-12-06T22:57:00.025+08:00

We left on the midnight flight to Narita. Flight timing is great, and it took us slightly over 6hrs to get there. It's a nice change from having to fly over 12hrs to get to Ireland. It's bearable enough for me. For that alone, I will visit Japan more. Hahaha. Subject to approval by the hubby hehe. But this time, we have to stay in a hotel with wifi! The poor guy was cut off from the world throughout the trip, truly suffering for him. Not just that, he was dragged around to go shopping most days. It was funny watching him check on wifi connections wherever he went. To make up for the lack of internet access, we were rewarded with a nice and big room (by Japan standards). I hear that most rooms there can only fit a queen sized bed. We were lucky to get such a nice-sized room, even though we stayed in Shinjuku (a half hour walk away from Shinjuku station, or maybe 45mins for me). I will try as best I can to recall our journey starting from our arrival. The exciting thing was that we flew on the A380 over but we didn't realize it until the day itself, or we would have asked for the seats upstairs. Hehe. All in, loved the aircraft, indeed more spacious in terms of personal space.

We arrived at 7am plus and upon disembarkation from the aircraft, it was an unbelievably long walk to immigration and customs clearance. My suggestion? Go through Haneda airport. It takes not more than 10mins to walk from one end of the terminal to the other, unless you get distracted by the shops along the way. ;P Not only is it a very small airport, you will save more on the price you pay for limousine service to the city. From Haneda to the city, it costs 1200yen (adult), and 600yen (child). It takes 1hr on the airport limousine as opposed to over 1-1/2hrs from Narita to Shinjuku West station. For Narita to Shinjuku, it costs 3000yen (adult) and 1500yen (child). As I was saying, after customs clearance, you exit the arrival hall and facing you on the left and right are Airport Limousine counters where you can purchase tickets on the spot, to get to town or the hotels that they service. We didn't have to wait long for our ride. The service is very regular. We got into town around 9plus and took a cab straight to the hotel. Unfortunately we were not able to check-in till 2pm, so I decided to give cousin a call before arranging to meet up with her and her family at H&M, Shibuya. We were totally exhausted from not having slept on board the plane, so even though the hotel receptionist said the station was a 3-4min walk away, it really felt like a 20min walk. Our first stop was at 7-11, 4 doors away, and princess wanted a sushi roll as she was feeling hungry. It became our daily stop when we got back after a day out, be it for cup noodles, bread, or her daily dose of sushi roll, the same chicken-flavoured roll as the one she had on the first day. There is also an atm in the shop which allows our local atm cards to be used.

Arriving at the station, it took us a while to make out the train fare as the entrance was at a side gate, not a main station, thus there was no one there to help us. After figuring it out (thanks to hub), we went on our way to Shibuya, and that was our introduction to the Japan metro system. It takes a while to get used to. Getting to Shibuya wasn't a problem, thanks to directions by the hotel staff, but finding H&M and meeting cousin at appointed time was. We eventually met an hour after our appointed time (as they too couldn't find the shop), and had lunch together, followed by a bit of window shopping before hubby couldn't take it anymore, and we went back to check in. I think he went to bed around 6pm till the next morning.

We stopped by an udon shop directly across the road from H&M. Food was reasonably priced and affordable.

Kitsune udon is my all-time favourite. I love the fried beancurd skin and this one did not disappoint. It was a rather large piece, unlike the ones we get here which are only a quarter of the size.

Hubby had the Tori Karaage with rice which came in a set with the plain udon below, which the princess ate. I think this set cost around 500yen (approximately S$8).

Hubby also picked out a piece of sweet potato, while I got a couple of tori karaage for the girl and a potato croquette for me. They were fried to golden perfection and the croquette was gorgeous with the very natural taste of potato. I think the ones we get here are made with potato powder as they taste nothing like potato except in texture. These cost in the region of 150yen each.

After filling up our tummies, we took a walk around Shibuya and make our way to a shop called 小黑屋 in Shinjuku to get discounted tickets to Disneysea. This chain has a few shops dotted around the city which I later discovered while on my bus rides. The discount wasn't significant, only 100yen less than the normal price you'd pay for a ticket. It wasn't worth our while. My advice is to get your tickets in Singapore before you leave.

The streets of Shibuya.

A very famous landmark in Shibuya is Hachiko the faithful dog. It's a popular meeting point.

Hachikō, an Akita dog, was born in 1923 and sold to a well to do family in Tokyo while still a puppy. The father of this family, Eisaburo Ueno, a Tokyo University professor in his 50's, loved Hachiko very much and doted on him constantly, taking him for long walks, always brushing him, and even taking baths with him inside the home. He treated him truly as one of the family.

Up until Hachiko was two years old, he always walked to the station with the father and after the father went through the stalls he would go home by himself. But, then he would return every day to wait outside the stalls to meet the father coming home. All the locals and train station people knew this man and this dog had a special bond.

One day however, the father died while he was teaching at the university. Hachiko went to pick him up but he never came. And, Hachiko never stopped waiting. Every day for about 10 or 11 years he went and waited. The story was picked up and popularized by Japanese newspapers, and Hachiko became a minor celebrity while he still lived, attending the inauguration of his own statue in 1934. He passed away the next year, but his story lives on — and you can still pay him a visit in the collections of the National Science Museum in Ueno.

Now, let me take you on a tour of our room, our home for the next 7 nights.

We had a queen sized as well as a twin sofa bed. It left us with very little space to walk, but otherwise, it was a nice sized room.

Right beside the sofa bed was this wash area.

My most favourite place of all - a little kitchenette where we had the use of kettle, microwave, toaster, electric cooker, fridge, a cooker hood, pots, pans, plates, bowls etc etc, a fully functional kitchen.

Guess which was our favourite button on this control? ;P

The ever famous Japanese toilet bowl. Wish we could install one in our home. :) This one was very basic. I saw others which had buttons for sounds, fake flush sounds, perfume etc. There were also ones which came with warmed seats. Those are perfect for winter. Hubby and girl said there were also ones with blow dryer which I didn't notice. Ours only had the water spray and it made a fake flushing sound when you sat on it.

We managed to pack some food back to hotel from Odakyu foodhall in the basement of Shinjuku station.

These cream puffs are to die for. They have a beautiful custard within that just flows out the minute you bite into them. We brought 2 of these home, reason being they were the last 2 left on the shelf at 7-11 that evening of our return. Hubby got addicted to these after I made him try one.

Lovely bento from the boxes above. There is glutinous fried rice, two pieces of siew mai, tomato sauce chicken, and some pickles. It wasn't too bad but would have been nicer had I put it in the microwave first. I didn't think to do that.

Princess preferred to get her dinner from 7-11. The pokemon is a bubble gum, a gift from cousin.

That ended our first day in Tokyo.

Japan 2010

2010-12-06T22:34:00.004+08:00

We arrived home yesterday morning after a very exhausting 8-day trip to Tokyo. I didn't know what to expect on my first trip there, but have lived to tell that my fears were unfounded. Language was not a barrier and I'm glad that my command of Chinese is strong enough to help me get around. Chinese words can be found everywhere and it is pretty easy to travel around after the first 2 days of figuring out the metro system. We did lose our direction once or twice but at least we didn't get onto wrong trains. The princess proved to be a very good gps system and she saw and observed things better than we did, and was thus able to point us in the right direction more than a few times. Thank goodness for that. I've heard nothing but praise for this country and how my friends who've been loved it so much, they wish to return over and over again. But one thing they didn't tell us was the amount of walking and stair climbing we had to do, and that 3-4mins actually meant 15mins or more! We had a great time there, despite all the suffering our feet, or rather mine went through. The weather wasn't as cold as we would have liked it to be, but what to do, we couldn't get tickets for travel in December. Will I visit it again? Yes, I would, but next time round, I'd be ready to cover more of the areas outside of Tokyo.

A dream come true

2010-11-27T19:28:00.002+08:00

In a couple of hours, we are setting off on a holiday to the place of my dreams. It's a childhood wish of mine to visit this wonderful land that I've seen so many pictures of and heard so much about. Blame it on my dad who went on a holiday to Japan when we were young and brought back with him many souvenirs, pictures and stories of his trip. It became for my sis and I a dream which we would like to fulfil one day. That day is here. Thanks to my wonderful hubby who agreed to this trip instead of our usual home visit to Ireland.

Am I excited? I can't say I am exceptionally excited about it, because it is after all, my first trip to a land where the people speak a language different to what I am used to. Secondly, I planned the whole itinerary on my own, not having been there and not being familiar with the city. Hubby asked me earlier if I knew how to get to the hotel from the airport, and my reply was, err, we'll find our way there, and isn't that the fun part about travelling? However, I am looking forward to meeting up with cousin and family who have gone on ahead of us. From the smses exchanged, it seems like they have already been busy with lots of shopping. Oooo, can't wait!

Life Skills Cooking Class

2010-11-15T21:30:00.012+08:00

The school has a programme for the kids at each level they are at, beginning with Primary One where there are parent volunteers who help out with teaching the girls life skills, such as how to pack their school bags, fold their uniforms, comb their hair etc. At the upper primary level, they are taught to sew and cook. I think it's a great programme to expose the kids to, equipping them with skills which they need for their life ahead.

I'm proud to have been given this opportunity to play a part in this very meaningful exercise. Even though my child is only in lower primary, when the request came via sms from the Central Parents' Council, I signed up for it, eager to teach the girls how to cook. I knew it was going to be a fun journey with them. I didn't know what to expect, and the thought of teaching a group of 11-12 year old girls was pretty daunting, but I had the confidence that I would be up for the task.

We assembled in the school kitchen at 7.30 am, but I was there the earliest as I had to send the girl to school before 7.20am. Once the other mums arrived, we set about getting ready the foodstuff which we had prepared at home. Each one had to cook enough rice for 15 kids. We put all our rice and ingredients together before dividing them up into boxes to be brought to the classrooms. As it was my first time doing this, I was assigned a partner, who had actually requested for one as she doesn't cook at home and wasn't confident about going solo. I'm glad I had her for company.

Here, we had put together a few desks and the portable electric stoves.

The ingredients such as rice, sausages, mixed vegetables, eggs, and the various seasonings.

I don't remember having such nice pans when I was in school.

A hands-on experience for the girls. Some got to break eggs, beat them, and some got to season and fry. Among them were girls who cook at home. Wow, that was impressive. I hope that by the time my girl is at that age, I would have trained her enough that she will be able to do some simple cooking.

I'm glad to have spent a most meaningful morning with the kids and I hope they went away with the confidence that they might possibly be able to cook a simple meal for themselves or their family.

My first Pokemon bento

2010-11-15T20:35:00.007+08:00

This is my first character bento in a long time. It's all due to the food colouring I got hold of a few weeks' ago, but have been too lazy to do anything with them.

Thinking I should make use of them soon, I chose to go with the red seasoning and created a Pokeball. I got the girl to draft out for me what it looked like, what colours I needed etc, and she did a great job.

The bird on the bottom right was for the hardboiled egg which I added at the last minute due to her request for one. I'm pleased that she has started eating hardboiled eggs, even though it's her first time today. In the Old Chang Kee curry puff which she had in the afternoon, there was a piece of egg and she said it was nice, and that she liked it. After confirming with her that it was an hardboiled egg that she liked, I decided to add it to this bento, not that a chick had anything to do with Pokemon, or does it? Who knows?! I don't even know the characters.

As I've not made bento for a long time, I couldn't find my tools at the last minute, especially my punchers thus the chick's eyes are super tiny. They look really weird on a big body. ;P

In the bento was a rice ball, a skewer of chicken balls and crabsticks, cherry tomatoes, a tempura prawn, blueberries and some lettuce.

BeanSTRO by Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf

2010-11-07T15:07:00.019+08:00

Have you been to Marina Bay Sands? Hubby said he'd take me there one day, so we finally made it today. We met the girlfriend and her family for brunch at the new BEANstro at The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands. If you go there by taxi, be sure to tell the driver that it is at Tower 1 or 2.

We started off with drinks...

I opted for the White Chocolate Latte, which is very rare for me as I do not normally consume caffeine. It's just the words 'white chocolate' got me interested. Truth be told, it wasn't worth the caffeine intake as I could hardly taste any white chocolate. Maybe the hot version would have been a better choice.

I ordered, by special request, a hot White Chocolate for the girl. I requested for a special something to add to her drink but I will not reveal what it was, else I might get my head chopped off. :{ Oh Mr GM, is it possible to add a caffeine-free hot White Chocolate or ice-blend for kids onto the menu please? Hint hint.

Godbrother no.3 had a Chocolate Banana ice-blend, a favourite of ours too.

Breakfast specials include the delicious and tummy-filling Buttermilk Waffle with caramel sauce and freshly-whipped cream.

Princess had this for her main course and godbro no.4 had it for his dessert after trying a piece of hers. Hehe. Yums!

And the very popular and beautifully-done Eggs Benedict for godbro no.2.

For starters, we (the gf and I) shared an Ahi Tuna Nicoise Salad,

as well as Skinny Fries which were very well-done and super crispy.

Godbro no.3 had the Fried Pacific Dory for his main, which came with a side of skinny fries and salad.

The adults mostly had this, except hubby who went for the Caesar Salad with roasted chicken which we did not take a photo of. This is the delish King Prawn Fettucine. Uber delish! Ask for more black pepper.

Godbro no.4 had a Herbed Chicken Club.

To round off her meal, the princess had a serving of Berry'd Treasure yoghurt swirl with an extra 2 servings of marshmallows. Indulgence or what?

This cafe is rather big and has plenty of seating. The best seats are the ones outside, around the fountain area where you can watch the boats going by, somewhat like those gondolas you see at The Venetian, Las Vegas. However, it's more like wannabe gondolas which don't quite make it. The fountain in the middle of the roundabout is not working and there isn't really much to be seen in that small man-made river, nothing like that of The Venetian. One word of caution... flies! If you don't like them, then I suggest you find a seat within the cafe. Or, bring your own fly swatter. The server explained to us that the flies came in through the opening above the 'fountain'. There is a hole there as the roof doubles up as a wishing well. It is for the coins to go down through, but due to the poor design, most coins get stuck at the bottom of the 'bowl' ceiling and gives one the impression that there might be mould all over. It is pretty unsightly. Our server also explained that the flies are coming due to the ongoing renovations around the place. Let's hope the fly situation clears up once all the renovations are done.

Pricing for the food and drinks here aren't the same as what you would expect to pay at most CBTL outlets. The quality of food here is higher and according to hubby, the ice-blends are smoother than what you would usually get. There is also a wider variety of food choices.

We enjoyed our brunch very much, and also the company of our friends made it all the more enjoyable. Thanks for the lovely meal. I would go back again another time, just to try the eggs ben and the eggplant lasagne which I believe, is to die for.

2010-11-06T20:32:00.004+08:00

It's been too long since I last made pizza. I don't know what got over me yesterday when I decided to cook for aunt and family who came over to play the xbox. I guess it stems from my love of feeding people.

I made Hawaiian pizzas,

Garlic-based cheese and basil pizza,

using roasted garlic, which I put in oven to roast till soft before squeezing out the flesh and added olive oil and some black pepper to that. I used that as a base instead of tomato sauce.

We also had a dried version of bolognaise,

and a fried pasta dish.

I'm glad everyone enjoyed the dinner. For pizza recipe, see here.

A pressie

2010-11-05T12:10:00.006+08:00

My girl has caught the reading bug. I used to have to force her to read. She only wanted to buy many books and store them on the bookshelf. She used to read, but stopped for quite some time. Suddenly, in the middle of her exam period, she sought out her books again. She was reading pretty ferociously. In between doing lots of assessments in preparation for her exams, she would ask for a rest and turn to her reading. I didn't stop her, as I felt she needed a diversion from all that concentration.

I couldn't wait for exams to be over so she could indulge in her current passion, thus I decided to get her an 'end of exam' pressie consisting of books, meringue, and a painting kit. I stumbled upon the 'Ramona' series by Beverly Cleary and she loves them. We're only short of 2 books to complete the series.

Home visits

2010-11-05T11:27:00.007+08:00

My social calendar since the last exam paper has been unreal. Since last Friday, I've had guests every day to my home, minus the weekend though. This week alone has seen three days of impromptu visits. One from mum, another one from aunt & uncle, and another aunt and family will visit tonight. A friend commented that I'm celebrating Deepavali, and it almost feels like it. Haha. On a good note, my house hasn't been so clean over a period of a week. It's usually in a mess and it does feel good to have squeaky clean floors, an empty dining table as well as a coffee table not stacked with loads of junk.

We were out with aunt and uncle on Tuesday and since the girl had been bugging for a steamboat dinner, I had to get that out of the way, so after seeing her off in the school bus that morning, I made a trip to the wet market and bought whatever stuff my hands could carry for the dinner that night. I decided to invite aunt and uncle over for dinner as it's more fun to have steamboat with a group of people. They were thrilled to be invited and that made me really happy to have made that decision to include them. They enjoyed dinner very much and it's been a long time since I had seen them eat so much. They have been ill and haven't had much of an appetite. It felt good that I was able to do something for them.

We came home last that afternoon so I had to set about getting dinner ready. It couldn't have happened if I had done it all by myself. Thankfully I had my girl who was ever ready to help out. She made the wantons all by herself. Don't you think she did a great job? I think she did them so beautifully.

We had a simple dinner, but it was the company that made it all special. I wish I could invite them over for dinner more often. We have already made plans. Next on the menu is chicken rice. :D

Halloween 2010

2010-11-04T17:58:00.006+08:00

Halloween last year was fun, but in a different way. Fun, as it was a good gathering with the family, spending time together, with cousins and all. My plan then had been to visit Woodlands, to the famous streets where trick 'o' treat was big there and where all the action was. My aunts wanted to go to the Science Centre instead. So, it wasn't till this recent Halloween did we get our wish fulfilled. This time we didn't plan anything with the family, but instead arranged to meet SS and her family at Woodlands. The atmosphere was really good, with many kids dressed up as all sorts of characters. Some of them were very creative, and they made their own costumes from recycled materials, cardboard boxes, and some even wore handsewn ones. It was indeed a feast for the eyes, as well as the tummies of all the kids present there that evening. According to a friend, last year's was better and more houses were dressed up, but there were fewer this time round.

I will let the pictures do the talking...

This is any parents' worst nightmare!

Mango Pudding

2010-11-04T11:27:00.006+08:00

I don't usually test pudding mix unless it's been tried and tested. This one I was introduced to at a party two weeks' ago, and I kinda liked the taste. It is cooked with evaporated milk thus there was a nice flavour to it. I added cubed mangoes to push it up a notch. The next time I try this out again, I shall add a few drops of mango essence. I didn't follow the instructions on the package which said to use 3000ml. Instead I cut it down to 2800ml so that the end result wouldn't be too watery like the one I had tasted earlier. I love this firmer texture.

I'm not sure where else you can find this, but I was told that it is sold in Sheng Siong and that was where I got mine. One packet makes a whole pot. You do need a big pot. There are many flavours to choose from.

The picture above shows the plain pudding without addition of evaporated milk. The picture below has additional evaporated milk added just before serving. I made this dessert when my friends came over for brunch today. Right beside the pudding is creme caramel which M brought. It's also made from an instant mix you can get at Phoon Huat. It was a bit too sweet.

Glad that my friends enjoyed their little lunch today and I had fun cooking for them. :)

Cuppies for a special friend and updates

2010-11-04T09:07:00.006+08:00

Hello everyone, I'm back! Not sure how long I will stay, though. Over the past month, it's been crazy preparing for Princess' final year exams. I'm glad it's all over, a weight has been lifted off my mind and shoulders. I'm happy that the hard work paid off, and she improved in her weakest subject. I'm glad that I made the right decision in sending her for enrichment class after her dismal results at mid year.

In between exams, I took time out to make some cuppies for a good friend of mine for her birthday. I'm happy that she liked them. There were a few more that I made, but I need to find the photos for them.

I also stopped making bentos. Just lost the interest for making them. Hope to regain it again soon. I did make a simple one for school one morning. In the bento was a ham and cheese sandwich, some homemade croutons, a box of Smarties, cubed dragonfruit and a cherry tomato.

The wonders of baking soda

2010-09-15T11:18:00.006+08:00

I have been missing for quite some time, but real life beckons. I have been cooking but been lazy to take photos or blog about them. Wasn't feeling in tiptop shape over the past weeks due to changes to the dosage of my medication. Hope I will adjust to it soon enough.

However, I had this little tip which I wanted to share. It has to do with the very insignificant baking soda.

My aunt has a neighbour who is a fanatic over organic living. She hails from Taiwan and has one room designated to all her organic products. Stepping in, you'd think you had stepped into a mini organic mart. Each time she goes home for a visit, she fills up her suitcases with rice, coconut oil, all the many bottles of sauces, grains etc that she consumes on a daily basis. It was really very interesting to learn about each product as she very patiently took us through on a visit to her home once.

Due to the language barrier, as my aunt isn't very strong in Mandarin and the lady doesn't speak English to well, there are many things that my aunt can't make out. However, she understands enough. The recipe for this baking soda mixture was what she picked up from the neighbour.

She convinced me that it worked wonders so I figured, since I had a big box of the powder in the cabinet, I would put it to use. It's really easy. Just 2 tbsps of baking soda dissolved in 500ml of water. Shake it up and it's ready to use. I put mine in a bottle with a nozzle to spray on, as and when I need it.

It is great on greasy surface, thus cooker hobs are a great place to begin this experiment. I had a glass chopping board which was black in one corner as it was the closest in proximity to the stove. Oil and dust collected over time made it rather dark. When I began my experiment on the baking soda solution, I didn't intend to use it on the board, but rather on the backsplash, and the area behind the stove. A little bit of the solution did drop onto the board and I noticed there was one streak of white. I decided to spray over the entire section of black and everything came off in an instance!

Try it! The right way is to then go over it with a vinegar solution and wipe over. The reason for this is that soda removes the grease while vinegar kills germs. I will check for the recipe for vinegar solution before updating here so look out for it.

An environmentally-safe product good for the Earth as well as for our own health.

Bento for the family

2010-08-25T22:53:00.004+08:00

I finally made dinner bento for us all. Bought 3 bento sets around the Chinese New Year period. I didn't pick them up personally, but according to friend, they were quite cheap so I got her to get them for me. They seemed too big at first, but after using them this evening, they aren't too bad. I just wish there weren't so many gaps in-between. Anyhow, I thought it'd be fun, for a change, to serve dinner this way. The girl was excited and ate everything except the baked teriyaki wings. There is a serving of black pepper salmon, xiao bai chye with crabsticks, some maki, green kiwi for her and a slice of orange each for hubby and me. I sprinkled some seaweed pork floss on our rice , whilst hers had some beef furikake, a mini pack of Milo and to round off, we all had a Ferrero Rocher each.

Fluffy pancakes

2010-08-24T09:03:00.011+08:00

Sharing a pancake recipe which I found in Allrecipes.com. It's my to-go place for any recipe under the sun. I'd been wanting to make some pancakes lately to serve with my homemade jam, along with some freshly whipped cream. I finally did them yesterday for tea, but have no photos to show. Photos were taken very quickly using my iPhone and the quality was terrible. I had to hurry in case the cream melted, and it did slide off the pancakes as I was trying to capture a good shot of it. So I gave up, and instead, borrowed this picture from the site.

I had been using a buttermilk recipe before this and though nice, I felt the pancakes were too wet and soggy. This one turned out really nice, and I didn't have to go out specially to buy a carton of buttermilk which I would then have had to think what else to do with it after making pancakes. Vinegar in milk has the same effect as buttermilk and creates bubbles, which is what contributes to the fluffiness of the pancakes. Don't worry about the vinegar, you won't be able to taste it.

Ingredients: (makes 8 regular sized pancakes)

3/4 cup milk
2 tablespoons white vinegar
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons white sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 tablespoons butter, melted
cooking spray

Directions:

Combine milk with vinegar in a medium bowl and set aside for 5 minutes to "sour".
Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Whisk egg and butter into "soured" milk. Pour the flour mixture into the wet ingredients and whisk until lumps are gone.
Heat a large skillet over medium heat, and coat with cooking spray. Pour 1/4 cupfuls of batter onto the skillet, and cook until bubbles appear on the surface. Flip with a spatula, and cook until browned on the other side.

Serve with jam and fresh cream or banana and strawberries, drizzled with some chocolate sauce.

Lemon Curd muffins

2010-08-24T08:35:00.005+08:00

I have been itching to bake lately and have been spending quite a bit of time in the kitchen. From jams, to pancakes, to now, muffins. There were cakes along the way, and biscuits too.

I have limited butter in the fridge, actually after this recipe, it's 'had'. To be exact, only 33gm left and it was just perfect for this half recipe which I found in Noobcook and made my own variation based on her base recipe.

Instead of blueberries, I made use of the lemon curd I had made 3 months' back. I liked the end product and it was very easy to do. However, I didn't bother sifting the flour, as a characteristic of muffins is density and not a cake-like, airy feel. I'm glad it turned out well.

Ingredients: (Makes about half a dozen muffins )

- 3/4cups plain flour
- 3/4egg, beaten
- 1/4 tbsp baking powder (oops I made a mistake and used a tsp but it still rose perfectly)
- 1/2 cup caster sugar
- 6 tsp lemon curd for filling
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1/2 tsp vanilla essence/extract
- 33 grams butter, melted

Method:
1. Mix flour, baking powder and sugar together.
2. Add in milk, vanilla extract, eggs and butter and stir until just blended (and lumpy). Be careful not to over mix as it will result in a tough texture.
3. Place baking cases in muffin tins. Spoon a teaspoonful of mixture into the cases. Fill with a teaspoonful of curd and then top it up till cup is 3/4 full.
4. Bake for 20 minutes in preheated oven of 190 deg C or until slightly golden brown. Allow to rest for several minutes before serving. Store for a day in an airtight container.

Hello Kitty moonie bento

2010-08-18T10:45:00.004+08:00

I made two simple bentos for the girls this morning. Nothing that needed any cooking. Just the pandan cake I baked 2 days ago, mooncakes which I bought yesterday and sliced apples. My girl's bento had cherry tomatoes, and J's one had some biscuits to fill the gaps. I'm not sure if J eats mooncakes, but they were too cute to resist even though they don't look like the real kitty. :)

Strawberry Blueberry Jam

2010-08-18T07:38:00.004+08:00

While on Facebook the other day, I saw that a friend was attempting to make some jam to give as gifts to the teachers in her boy's school as Teacher's Day is round the corner. It seemed very easy, so I decided to give it a try. Blueberries are still at a low price while the American strawberries are what we find on the shelves now. As they come in bigger boxes, they cost more than the Korean ones. I can't wait for Korean strawberries to be in season again. They are almost always guaranteed to be sweet. And cheaper. I wanted to make a jam with a combination of blueberries as well as strawberries and while hunting for one, came across Happy Home Baking's jam recipes. I think making jam is an addiction. Once you've tried it the first time, you will want to make more. The downside is that since we don't consume a lot of jam, I can't try out a variety of flavours as they don't keep for long, probably 2 weeks at the max.

Double Berry Jam

Ingredients:
(yields about 300ml of jam)

200g fresh strawberries (I used 275g)
200g fresh blueberries (I used 125g)
120g granulated sugar*
2 tablespoons lemon juice** (I think this can be cut down to 1tbsp)

Method:

Wash and remove the stems from strawberries, cut into halves or quarters(for bigger ones), leave whole for small berries. Wash and drain blueberries.
Mix strawberries, blueberries and sugar in a bowl. Cover and leave in fridge over night, or let it sit for at least 30mins.
Transfer the mixture (including whatever juice that was drawn out from the berries) in the bowl to a stainless steel pot or a large saucepan. (Note: use non-reactive pots made with stainless steel, glass or enamel, avoid pots made with copper, aluminum or cast iron which would react with acid).
On medium heat, stirring constantly with a heat-proof spatula or a wooden spoon, bring the mixture to a full rolling boil (when the bubbles do not stop or lessen when you stir it). Once the mixture starts to boil, skim away any excessive foams or bubbles (I didn't bother skimming off as the fruits were in the way and the foam goes off eventually), stirring constantly all the time.
Keep at a slow rolling boil for another 5 ~ 10 mins, stirring constantly till the mixture thickens, becomes clearer and transparent (no more foams).
Drizzle in the lemon juice and cook for a further 2~3 mins.
Remove from heat. The jam will be a little runny when hot but the consistency will be just right after it has cool off.
Ladle hot jam into hot sterilised jars, fill to the brim. Secure lids. Let cool. Once opened, store in fridge and best consumed within 1~2 weeks***.

Sterilisation of jam jars -

Wash glass jars and lids in hot, soapy water, rinse well. Place jars and lids in a pot. Fill with enough cold water to cover the jars. Place over high heat and bring water to the boil. Reduce heat to medium and boil gently for 10 minutes. Remove jars and lids from boiling water and drain upside down over a clean tea towel. Fill with jam once jam is done and put cover back on. Boil covered bottle till you hear a pop in the cover. Turn off flame and leave jar to cool down before storing in fridge. If consuming jam immediately, there is no need to reboil it after filling.

Pandan Chiffon Cake

2010-08-16T16:11:00.008+08:00

It sure took me a loooong time to get round to baking my very first chiffon cake. Have been obsessed with the thought of baking it lately, and did quite a bit of homework before deciding to try this one I found through baking mum's blog. The part in the recipe that bought me over was, "I actually like this recipe better than the other one I have shared. When I do this recipe, I only need one bowl to beat the egg whites. As for the egg yolks I only need to use a whisk and whisk it by hand. No need to be thick and creamy texture". I knew this had to be the one for me. I love doing things the simple way. If it works, why bother with complications, right? ;)

The only thing wrong with this recipe is that it is enough for an 18cm tin while mine is a gigantic 23cm. And just when I was about to get the baking tin ready, I noticed a part in it had a dent and that was bad! I did not have a receipt and I was dying to bake it after putting it off a whole week, and now that I had everything I needed in the recipe, I couldn't wait. So, I had to make do by using some foil to cover the outside of the tin. I do feel so cheated as the tin didn't come cheap. It was partly my fault for not having checked thoroughly before my purchase.

While preparing the mixture, the smell permeating from it was heavenly. There's nothing like the combination of pandan and coconut. Absolute match made in baking heaven.

This was what my cake looked like when ready. It wasn't all that bad. It's just shorter by half than the usual size you get at the bakeries.

Once out of the oven, it had to be turned upside down to cool. Now I know the purpose of those little feet jutting out of the tin.

The end result? I managed to get it out perfectly in one piece, and it had a lovely golden colour on the bottom which is now the top. Texture-wise, a bit denser than what you get at the bakeries. It's a great challenge, but really much cheaper to buy it from the baker's. Haha. Flavour-wise, I think sugar could be increased by another 20gm as it was a bit short on sweetness.

PANDAN CHIFFON CAKE (recipe taken from Prima's website)

100g Prima brand Top Flour
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tbsp Pandan Juice (I used 1tsp pandan paste)
100ml Coconut Milk
4 Egg Yolks
50ml Corn Oil
¼ tsp Green Colouring (omit this if using pandan paste)
5 Egg Whites
¼ tsp Cream of Tartar
100g Castor Sugar (can try adding another 20gm)
pinch of Salt

Instructions -

Preheat oven to 170°C. (I used 160-165deg on my fan forced oven)

Extract pandan juice from finely pounded pandan leaves and add to coconut milk.
(**) I did not use pandan juice but used about 1 tsp of pandan paste instead.

Add egg yolk, 50g sugar, oil, colouring and salt to the coconut mixture. Mix well using hand whisk.

Sift Prima brand Top Flour and baking powder and fold into mixture. Mix until smooth. Set aside.

Beat egg whites and tartar at high speed until foamy. Add remaining 50g sugar and
beat until stiff.

Add 1/3 beaten egg white to the yolk mixture and mix using a hand whisk.

Slowly fold in this mixture to the remaining 2/3 of beaten egg whites.

Pour mixture into an ungreased 18cm chiffon tin and bake for about 50mins. (I used a 23cm and it took me 40mins)

Turn tin over on a cake rack to cool before loosening cake using a sharp knife.

Fried Fish Bee Hoon Soup

2010-08-15T20:37:00.008+08:00

Before this, I never knew I could reproduce this dish at home. It is one of my favourite dishes at the food courts and I always thought that it was a difficult dish to prepare. The first thing being the soup stock, and second being the fried fish. Thanks to a friend, I now know that it is actually very simple to do. Best of all, girl and hubby gave the thumbs up! Dear princess even requested it for her lunch tomorrow. :D

Here's the recipe. Thanks M, for sharing it.

For fried fish -

Use Ang Kor Li

Seasoning:

Salt

Pepper

Spring Onions

2-3 slices of ginger

1 tbsp each of cornflour and potato starch to coat fish before frying

For fresh fish -

Use Bak Tang Fish

Seasoning:

Salt

2 tbsp of potato flour

Mix potato flour in water and put fish inside. Put in fridge for 20mins to season.

Ingredients for fish stock:

1 inch of ginger (bruised)

4 to 5 garlic (bruised)

Fish bone

1 tomato cut into wedges

Evaporated milk

Hua Teow Chiew (or Chinese cooking wine)

Method:

1. Fry in oil the fish bone, ginger and garlic till fragrant.

2. When fragrant, add water.

3. Add 2 cubes of chicken stock.

4. Salt to taste.

5. Add about 2 tbsp evaporated milk or slightly more if preferred.

6. Add 1/3 tbsp cooking wine and turn off the flame immediately.

For the noodles, I used laksa noodles or thick bee hoon. Garnishes include seaweed, spring onions and fried shallots. You might like to add Szechuan vegetable to the soup if you prefer a slightly tangy flavour. Tofu is sometimes added to this dish as well.

Super simple bento

2010-08-15T20:24:00.004+08:00

I prepared this bento for school last week. It's rather sparse as the shortbread cookie was very fragile. If you look closely, you can see that the neck of the snail is broken. I couldn't possibly put anything under it as I was out of bread that morning. I love the cutie peas in a pod baran as well as the peapod food pick. In the bento were also blueberries, tamago sushi and homemade orange cake.

Some new toys

2010-08-15T20:01:00.003+08:00

I'm a lucky gal. Dear friend, M, got me these on her recent trip overseas. These are a few things I've been eyeing for quite a while now, and the bonus was this Care Bear bento box. I love it, and so does she. It was tough trying to decide which colour to go for, but in the end, pink won!

Last Tuesday was a day off school to make up for the National Day holiday. We made plans with a friend from ballet to go for a movie and a playdate. As we had to leave home early that morning for my regular check up appointment at the hospital before going to meet her friend, I packed her a simple breakfast bento. I knew there was no way for us to have lunch before the movie began at 12pm.

In the bento was a lotus paste bao, blueberries, a Piglet biscuit, a slice of homemade lemon cake, a piece of Laughing Cow cheese and some pieces of bak kwa.

Spam filter on Blogger

2010-08-13T09:08:00.002+08:00

I discovered something this morning as I signed onto Blogger. Maybe it's been there for a few days but I do not often go to the Dashboard page to approve comments, so it was with great delight that I discovered it today, that Blogger now filters junk spammy comments, such as the ones that Peony wrote about. So listen, you weird and annoying people, there is an auto rubbish bin now for all your nonsense. Yippee!

B.O.M.B (Bento of the Month Bento)

2010-07-30T23:02:00.005+08:00

Hapa Bento organizes a B.O.M.B challenge each month with a different theme. I very hardly join contests but this was very easy as the theme for July is 'picnic'. It so happened that I had made a bento for a recent picnic, so it was a matter of leaving a comment and linking my post to it.

I checked 2 days ago but there were no results yet, and just an hour ago, Angeleyes sent me a message to congratulate me on being the winner. Total happiness, not that there was any prize involved, but the mere fact that I actually won a contest!

This was what I submitted. You can check out Hapa's blog here.

Squirrel bento

2010-07-30T09:39:00.002+08:00

Princess came home with 2 slices of chocolate bread from her playdate yesterday. They were so pretty I had to do something with them. I recently got hold of a set of cookie cutters and have been wanting to use the squirrel one. I think it is perfect. So pretty, although it kinda looks more like a skunk now haha. The bit on the nose was there by chance. Didn't realize I had cut off a bit of the chocolate part of the bread thus it worked really nicely for the nose. I punched the nose and mouth out of nori and just placed them on. Dragonfruit was cut for yesterday's bento so putting this all together was easy peasy. A piece of Sirotan cake fits nicely into the little section on the top right. I also included an apple in case the bento is not enough for her.

Have a happy weekend!

3 bears bento

2010-07-29T12:57:00.004+08:00

We planned a playdate after school yesterday with a kindy friend of Princess', since she didn't have to stay back for extra class. I offered to make bentos for the kids and though exhausting, having spent 2hrs on preparation, I'm glad I managed to complete them on time. It is my first time making these bears. I had a tough time at first, coming up with a theme. Planned to make a boy bento and two girly ones, but in the end, decided that bear was the best for all. It made things easier for me seeing that these two mums made them recently, so I chose to use theirs as guides. Angeleyes made a teddy while Lia Chen made doggies, but they are generally the same shape. Thanks to them, it made my job all the more easier.

The 3 bentos contained mostly the same things except Princess' one had some fried breakfast noodles to cover up the gap, and T's one did not have mangoes as the box was too full. There is a cocktail bear each in the boxes as well as dragonfruit, carrots, cherry tomatoes, chicken and some sweeties.

We had a fun time at their house and the kids couldn't bear to part with each other. It's been a long time since they'd played together. We used to go over to their place for playdates but since going to primary school, this is the first time it has happened. We also hope to plan a sleepover but that will need proper planning, and having to find a time most suitable to both parties. Look forward to more playdates in the future. Thanks J!

My breakfast bento

2010-07-29T07:48:00.003+08:00

I haven't been feeling all that well the past couple of days. A bad ear infection was keeping me awake most nights and the pain was so intense in the left ear that I could only sleep on one side. I don't usually like to visit the doctor but am glad that I made the trip to the clinic this time, even though I had to stand outside waiting an hour to see him. I never like to sit in the clinic knowing there are all kinds of germs in there. The anti-biotics helped a lot in clearing the infection out, but even though most of the pain and swelling is gone, there is still discharge so hopefully it will dry up soon.

There was a breakfast date yesterday with 2 mums, which was cancelled at the last minute due to an impending storm, thus I ended up having breakfast at home. Of course, the storm didn't really happen in the end but we were treated to light showers instead, despite the sky being a scary black, with lightning blazing across the sky at 6am while I was up and getting ready for school.

I decided to prepare a bento for myself with chee cheong fun that I had bought the day before. While that was steaming in the wok, I made a sealed floss sandwich, packed some biscuits in, and made a cocktail bear and used a cherry tomato to fill up the gaps. The Pooh bear biscuit was bought at school fiesta while the star-shaped shortbread was a gift baked by a friend. If I am not wrong, this is only the 2nd or 3rd bento I have ever made for self. Was very pleased with the end result even though it was simple. :)

Rilakkuma wanna-be

2010-07-26T14:21:00.002+08:00

To be very honest with you, I didn't do my homework before setting out to attempt this Rilakkuma bento. Everything else worked out fine except for the nose and mouth bit. I should have taken out the oval cutter I needed before starting work on it but as I did not and later could not locate one, I ended up with a weird-shaped piece of cheese instead of Rilakkuma's oval mouthpiece. Oh well, lesson learnt.

In the bento are a pair of mid-joint chicken wings (I had cut them in half so it's easier to eat); two-tone rice, the pinkish part was mixed with some tomato sauce to achieve the desired colour; some cherry tomatoes; apple donut with carrot in the middle; dragonfruit; and two small onigiri with spam cutouts of rabbit and car; and Rila's face is made from Japanese fishcake.

A beautiful Monday

2010-07-26T07:49:00.006+08:00

It is a very beautiful Monday morning and we couldn't ask for better weather. The breeze that is blowing into the flat is so chilly. The rain is not heavy thus is perfect. Unfortunately the night wasn't so good and I was awoken by an irritating car alarm that just went on and on for approximately 10mins. Hubby got me to call the police and while I was on the phone to them, I could hear a man down the road on the phone as well, informing, I would assume the police, the address here. Looks like we were not the only ones irritated by it. The time was 3.20am, and after that I couldn't fall back to sleep for over an hour as I nursed a terrible aching left ear as well as a blocked nose. I'm not having a cold or anything. It's when the air quality is bad that I suffer from it. Thank goodness it is not bento preparation morning. I did pick up some cutters over the weekend and am excited to use them. I'm also on a roll after fixing so many bentos last week which got me started on a bento frenzy. Spent the weekend going through my bento books from cover to cover. I just love browsing them, not just to get ideas, but also to marvel at all the wonderful creations by talented ladies out there.

I'm waiting for the doctor to open so I can get my ear and nose treated and hopefully sleep better tonight. :/

Susan got me excited about Pillsbury Buttermilk biscuits and I spied a couple of bottles at Cold Storage last week but as they were near the expiry date, I didn't pick one up. I failed to see them yesterday when I went again. Instead they had everything else like pizza dough, crescent rolls (which I got), cinnamon rolls, and breadsticks. From Susan, I learnt that the biscuit dough is very versatile and you can prepare lots of stuff with it. Hope they bring in some stock soon. Meanwhile, I will just make some basic crescent rolls aka croissants and see if they taste good.

Brownie Bear on a picnic

2010-07-23T07:33:00.007+08:00

A good friend from out of town gave me a packet of instant brownie mix when she was here recently, after 10 years of being away. I am so glad that she visited as she had been a very dear friend and I missed spending time with her. We even got to meet her 6-yr-old boy for the very first time. :)

I have not baked in ages and just couldn't get the engine going. But I had to start somewhere, and what better to bake than instant something. I have another 3 packets of mixes but this one was calling out to me, and I've also been wanting to make use of these bear silicon cups, no they are not new, just thought they'd be perfect for the brownies. I made two of those, one for Princess and the other for her bff, the one I've been making bentos for lately. It's finally Friday and I can take a break from bento-making, yippee! While I was at it, I even made cheese cutout biscuits. What a fulfilling day it was. :D

The main character in the bento was the bear so all I needed was to place everything around it. Princess' box had a lot more food items compared to J's. There was golden kiwi, blueberry, baby corn sticks and cherries. They both had apples, chicken nugget, homebaked cheese biscuits, a snail made from mantou for the body and half a cocktail sausage for its head, a Daim chocolate and a small container of tiny sweets below the bear's head.