Thursday, January 31, 2008

Happy Lunar New Year of the rat

This will be the last post.....of the Year of the Golden PIG!! *oinks* It has been a good year! YEar of the RAt.. give me more marnee!! loads!! heehe!!

Wishing everyone happy new year so early because I will be going overseas tomorrow!! Wee! cant wait!! With the trip, the gatherings when i am back and all the wondrous food i gonna stuff myself with, it will probably be quite a couple of weeks before i blog again! Dun miss me!! :p!

Some pre CNY preparations to share...

Went to my aunt's place during the weekend to help her to make pineapple tarts. Actually, she was making for us, so what we mainly did was shape the tarts.. quite fun! (psstt~...my cookies factory kinda stopped... too busy and too lazy... Unreliable factory! keke!)


She was making the "covered" kind of pineapple tarts. It was my first time rolling the tarts into the shape.. so the few few of mine turns out a bit fat, then a bit long, then a bit too skinny until i got the consistency! haha! Fun!!
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But i love the open tarts kind! So kind aunt went to make a new dough for the open kind. This was more fun! using the cookie cutter. I had fun luffing at my sister who made really ugly ones! Actually , mine was pretty ugly too.. haha.. there were differences in the thickness of the tarts.


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When the tarts were done, it was ready to pack in those red cover transparent container. I asked my auntie if she have those round lining or i can cut out square ones for her. She then teach me how to cut out a round shape out of normal baking sheets!! Basically, u have a square shaped paper ard the size of the container and keep folding in halfs until u cannot fold anymore. After that, use a scissors and snip the top off. N wah la! u get an almost round lining! I felt so stopid after that! haha! it seems like something so common sense and i felt so in awe seeing her do it. Old ginger are still spicer! haha! there's always something to learn!


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My dad decorated the house like shopping centre again! he really loves decorating the house up for the festive season! Mum complain we look like those shops in chinatown selling decorations. haha!!

Some photos to share..



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I really hate to use flash!! The colour is all wrong! But the wind was so strong and keep blowing the angbaos decorations causing my pics to come out blur! fed up! haha

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HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!
COLLECT TONS OF ANGBAO!
SHARE SOME WITH ME AFTER THAT OK??



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Sunday, January 20, 2008

Togi Again!

Went back to Togi with my colleague recently cause both of us were craving for the "Ra Pok Ki"

The side dishes were really nice this time round! So was the kimchi! Better than the previous visit!

My colleague introduced me a new dish! Kimchi soup & the black bean rice! I love the soup! So yummy and it seems that they have canned tuna inside the soup! Spicy and appetising!
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Think I am starting to like korean food. But i still prefer japanese food.. much gentler to my stomach. Moreover, its light & healthy!

The Sandwich Shop... Cant stop loving its sandwiches!

I tried the smoked salmon sandwich recently! My goodness!! It's so yummy!! The combination of the salty smoked salmon & the egg mayo was excellant! $3.50 for a sandwich is really really pricey but its jus too yummy to resist! worth the splurge!

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Beppu Menkan Japanese Restaurent

Went to Beppu with my colleagues for lunch. We have this decision to try all the yummy food near out work place before we move to the new place.

I used to eat Beppu once a month during attachment. It was like our pay day treat back with my other classmate during our attachment period.

Beppu is the place for spicy ramen! It has different level of spiciness for the ramen. I think there is level 1, 2, 4, 6 and 8. I heard they have even higher levels but not stated in menu. I remember level 1 is of "no kick". I stuck at 2. Its jsut right. Level 4 will be sucidal!

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My colleague's ramen '#18'. Haha! That's nt the name of the ramen. Its so popular that they remembered the number by hard. Its fried chicken. I had this recently.. O so nice and crispy the chicken.

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My teriyaki chicken ramen! The chicken skin of the chicken is so nice and crispy. Yumz yum!

We all took level 2 spiciness. 1 of my colleague told me he ever had a challenge with his fwen to finish up a level 4 noodles. Drink finish the soup to the last drop! Madness! He said they end up with a stomachache that same nite.

I kinda like it... its something u will crave.. esp on a cold rainy day!

Mandy got LUCKY!

I finally won in a lucky draw!! Wee!! First time! Won the 5th prize at my Company's Appreciation Dinner! I was ready to rush off early for my movie.. I am so glad that I stuck ard!!

Guess what i won? $250 Taka Voucher! Wee woo wee! Just nice! Me super super super BROKE!

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Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Sugee Cookie

It's saturday! Here i am at home, so early for a saturday night, blogging and baking sugee cookies in the oven. But it feels kinda failure today cause i could not get the knead out the dough today.

Baked sugee cookies on monday when I was in leave on tuesday! baked 2 types of recipe! baked till 5am! madness!

Purpose of baking so hard? Preparing CNY goodies for my relatives! something warm and personal.

Y sugee? because dad mentioned that he really misses the sugee cookie he used to get frm the coffee shop's cookie bottle. Me trying to recreate the feeling for him.


Sugee recipes are confusing! Sugee means it should contain semolina flour right?But most of the recipes I found does not use semolina. They used Ghee instead. Those with semolina, does not use ghee. So confusing... I always thot both was used.

Mmmm..... cookies aroma filling up my room.... *Heavenly*

Jus wanna share the recipes, and photos i took that night...

*goes check on cookies....... eveything looks good... yEAH!*

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*sifted flour* As u can see...I was taking my time tat night

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Icing Sugar...

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Ghee, butter & icing sugar..

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Ghee, butter & icing sugar..combined till light!

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Added sifted flour & gound almond into the mixture..

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To refrigerate for haf an hour...

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The end product!

The cookies here were too brown to be called sugee. Mum reckon i cooked too long. Also, it is those crispy kind of cookies. Not soft and melt in your mouth kind. But it was pretty good! I thot pple will find it too hard so I decided NOT to give it as gifts and try the other recipe. However, i gave some of this recipe to BC and PGY and they kinda like it and din think it was hard at all! how comforting! :)

Second recipe I got it from the Ghee's website... keke! I am sure the ghee company will gif some very good recipe to promote their ghee. N I wasnt wrong!

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This recipe 250g of Ghee!! Scary! Ghee overloaded!!

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Icing sugar, flour, salt, bicarbonate soda. almond powder (replace 50gm of plain flour with it)

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Melted Ghee!

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The dough!

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Before entering the oven...

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Look wat came out frm the oven.... this is still a bit too brown! but the 2nd and 3rd batch were perfect!! White and cracked!! Beauty!!

The taste?? melts in yr mouth kinda feeling!!! Mmmm!!! was so happy! worth staying up all night!

will post the recipes another day... tired! heez

Yummy "Canadian" Food

Mad woman me is baking.....for CNY! On Leave tomolo! i mean today! very fwee right? Waiting for my cookies to cool..... so here i m, blogging!!

We had a family fwen from Canada who came to visit us last weekend. Keep hearing frm relatives who have been to Canada that he cooks really well and makes the best salad!

He kindly whipped up a delicious meal for us! Greedy me jus took pics of his yummy food instead of helping out!!!

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When I saw this salad, i thot it looks pretty normal. Nothing special. Jus different veggies, tangerines and grapes... UNTIL....

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he added his special sauce! My goodness!! such an appetising salad!!!! Its sour, sweet, light and really appetising!! I couldnt stop eating! If mum made veggies like that all the time, she wuld never had the trouble of trying of getting me to eat them previously!!! He sae secret recipe... cannot divulge.... O WHY!!!

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NExt on the list... potato Salad!!! MMmmm!! yumz! Once again, secret! All i noe its potato, mayo and egg! HAha!

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CLosed-up!! I am jus having fun taking pics! Haha!

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Cream of mushroom soup! Everyone loves it! I jus thot it is a bit too creamy for my taste but it seems the rest loves the thick soup!

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Lontong made by my auntie. SHe complains the canadian relative is stealing her "business", everyone was too busy eating his!

N CHeck out his bbq food!!!..... RESTAURENT CLASS!! Pity i was not into meat that day. Tasted abit.... they were GREAT!!

Some pics to share!

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My bbq pics still kinda sux... sad...

time to pack cookies!

Monday, January 07, 2008

Mandy goes JB...

Finally got a chance to go feast at JB again... This time it was not jus the 2 of us. Went with 4 other frns. It's something they always toked about but never had a chance to realise it.

The weather was not on our side that day. Heavy downpour whole day long. Thankfully, the rain kinda stopped in the evening.

Did a little shopping. Actually, only me. The purpose of the rest seems to be just to go JB and eat dinner. Feel alittle wierd. But i got myself a cheap buy! Wee!

This time, B bought us to some place near "The Store" shopping centre. I believe the road is called "Taman Sentosa".

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He said he ordered 'Rat' meat for us to eat. Trying to cheat us as usual! it was chicken.

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Frankly speaking, from afar, it really looks kinda like a rat laid flat out. But its actually the wing joint that had been rearranged. I love the marinate of this chicken. Think its some chilli powder and its really spicy!

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N the one we were all craving for. Good. But i still prefer the chilli of the roadside stall. That one is 'Sedap'!

and some dishes we ordered from the restaurent.... i think only the butter squid was nice.

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and 1 more round of chicken and grilled prawns~ (prawns were fresh!)
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The food were really cheap though even if I did not feel it was that fantastic. We took a cab back to the streetstalls area (near city square) to fill ourselves with fishsticks and fried chicken skins! Absolutely sinful!!

We were 6 full satisfied pple heading back to singapore. :)

The daily scoop. - again! :p!

Went to daily scoop again on new year's eve. Sorta of celebration of the coming new year since we did not have anything exciting on that night. Well...suppose to go to frn's hse for a drink... too tired.. too lazy. Old boring pple! :p!

This time i ordered 2 scoops! 1 lychee martini and my favourite, green tea and red bean! I wanted to try the baileys! But stopid B said he refuse to share his lychee martini with me. selfish!

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This time round, i feel that the ice cream is a bit too icy. The green tea and red bean really cannot beat that of azuba sabo. Firstly, the red bean they used is wrong. I think they use those local red beans kind. Also, the green tea ice cream is jus not creamy and fragrant enuff. Haagen Daaz green tea ice cream is really good.

Also tried the chempadak, like the durian, the flavour is rich and strong like the fruit itself. kinda like that. hees!

O! by the way, jus realised that the ice cream at island creamery is even cheaper. $2.50 per scoop! haha! Had some ice cream there when I went to order my logcake. But this place is so much more conveinient for us. But no more green tea ice cream for me.....