Labour Of Love: Part IV

And here comes another post abt my new found love of cooking! ^v^ I've included some macroshots as well, coz omg, food never looked this good with it!

Be warned to not read this post on an empty stomach! :P

Let's roll, shall we?

First up is stir fried bean sprouts.

carrots go well with anything, seriously.

told you macroshots make things look better!

Next up is a creamy pasta.

I used the three cheeses sauce from the bottle lah.. yum yum.

another proof that carrots go well with this as well!

I'm going to get hypercarotenemia eh? lol.

Thirdly, malaysian style curry chicken!!

am so in love with this

I'm gonna be able to satisfy all my curry cravings from now on :P

that's right, I just used the packets available - really simple

I will try the other flavours next time!

And next up is something that I decided to try coz I had a tofu craving... yeah I know, been having cravings for food that reminds me of home aikz.

And eating out here in Perth is so expensive that it's ridiculous! And sometimes the asian food is weird as well. Been angmoh-nized lol.

Tofu with mushrooms!

absolutely yummylicious! Recipe can be found here for ppl who are interested.

yeah I adore shitake mushrooms!

And miss eating all the different dishes of tofu back home *salivates* haha

And last but not least!! One of my star dishes currently is...

Sweet and Sour chicken! Yup that's right!

I had a craving the other day and voila, whipped up this according to this recipe (I substituted pork with chicken tho)

And lemme tell you, it tastes exactly like back home! Now I know how they make it back home nyehehe..

Aren't the play of colours just pretty? :D

I'm sure there will be more new dishes to comes when I've more energy and am bored of eating the same old thing again. I'm adventurous like that, can't keep doing the same thing everyday :P

Till then, do enjoy trying out these dishes as well! Hope it gives you guys who are cooking often an idea on what to try next! :)

Labour Of Love: Part III

Hey it's been a long time since my cooking posts, hasn't it? Time for another one! :D

First up is this new dish I tried - Lemon Chicken.

it doesn't look nice though and kinda failed too.

I put too much lemon so it became quite sour. maybe will have another go next time.

Next up is just nong shim noodles turned into quite a healthy meal.

spicy, the way I like it.

I added tomatoes, green leafy vege, spring onions, egg and fish slices to make it more nutritious!

Not bad for an instant noodle meal, right? ^^

Next we have a picture of a full meal I cooked ages ago. I think I overdid it on the amount. (now better at estimating haha)

steamed chicken, stir fry vege, fried egg and sausages

I think I probably ate all that in 2 meals tho haha

(yeah I'm bringing lunch boxes to hospital everyday, really saves lots of money hehe)

Okay, finally something new and tastes nice! Guess what?

A chinese favourite: Fried rice!

I fried overnight rice (apparently thats better) with leafy vege, carrot slices, meat and tomatoes.

But after this I never added tomatoes anymore coz it makes it too watery.

Last but not least, aglio oglio pasta, my own style! ^^

doesn't it look absolutely yummy? My stomach is grumbling just looking at this pic.

Basically the same thing, but instead of adding other sort of vege, use mushrooms (i love love shitake mushrooms!!), carrot slices and some spring onions.

Don't forget the meat haha and for some extra flavour, I added basil leaves and parsley as well! Squeeze in some lemon juice for that tangy taste!

close up shot! Me trying out the macro mode of my camera. Looks nice, doesn't it?

After frying, coat it well with olive oil and sprinkle on some cheese for that extra oomph!

And voila, you have a delicious dish on ur hands!

So that's it for now. I have a few more dishes I think and might try more new ones when I get bored of eating the same food over and over again. So watch this space for the next part of Labour of Love!!

(lol. I think I sound like some tv cooking show host or something. :P)

A Break And A New Start

The long easter weekend just whooshed past like that. In a flash. Well, fun times always fly. =)

Anyway, here's a summary of what I did in the past 4 days.

Went to the beach on friday morning.

look at the waves! beautiful and strong ^^

Then 4 of us imu peeps went to Caversham Wildlife Park on saturday morning.

Although it was supposedly a "wild life" park but a big part of it was kinda like a zoo. But at least there were some open enclosures that let us get close to the animals!

check out this cute koala bear!

they sleep 20 hrs/day so mostly is just sleep and stone haha..

Then I went to a uni mate's 21st birthday party that night.

Tried this alcohol drink called Mai Tai. Pretty good for something that sounded like some cheap drink back home haha.. Was a cocktail of pineapple and orange juice with some liquor I dunno lar. And damnit, I'm allergic to alcohol again!

And for sunday dinner, we had a cookout at our place. And guess what we cooked up? (pun :P)

msian all time favourite - nasi lemak!! yummy indeed~

And last but not least, I went to meet a primary school friend for dimsum on monday morning. Food wasn't all that great (I definitely had better at a much cheaper price too in msia, I miss good msian food T_T) but the company was great. Lots of jokes and laughter. :)

So! That was how I spent most of my 4 days of break. Pretty packed, huh?

Now it's time to come back to reality. Just started surgery today and looks like it's gonna be a busy busy 8 weeks ahead!

I heard teaching for my team is good though (and quite a lot of things seems to be organized for us!) but I will hvta buck up to meet their higher standards too. o.O

So expect more nerdy times ahead!

PS: For more pics of said events, check out my facebook, thks.

PPS: Oh and we learnt how to scrub in today! Rather fun! Hope we get to observe many interesting cases and assist if possible. ^v^

Labour Of Love: Part II

Hi guys, time for part 2 of my cooking series! Are you excited?

I'm definitely improving, well at least on the time spent part. Taste? I'm biased so I can't judge but I think I'm not bad for an amateur lah. hehe :P

Okay without further ado, here are they!

Stir fried vege with sausages

and one of my favourite dishes in the world, sesame oil chicken!

I liked it so much that I cooked it 3 times ade since being here. lol. Well it reminds me of my mother's cooking, cannot meh? A little slice of home. :)

Next up is a repeat performance.

Spaghetti Boulognaisse with melted cheese on top

and an extra omelette I made

And I had a craving for sushi the other day. But sushi here is too damn expensive to enjoy it to my heart's content. So DIY!

Looks nice, doesn't it? alas, I bought the wrong vinegar, so tasted a lil weird.

But no worries, I bought the correct one already! (well hope it is)

As usual stir fried vege and chicken with worchestire sauce (spelling?)

and new star of the day is Ginger Onion Fish!!

I made this long ago with Kee, so decided to try it again. Success! Yummy indeed! :D

And last but not least, also a favourite since Bukit Jalil days.

Fried noodles!

I liked maggi goreng alot but didn't buy the paste coz not worth it.

But fried noodles are yummy on their own too!

So that's it for today's cooking session. What do you guys think? ^^

Sweet Surrender

This is just a temporary interventional post. while I bide time to mug for exams =/

They say chocs in Aus are really nice, especially Tim Tam.. So I decided to try this one out.

black forest flavour! sweet surrender series

they have many flavours and I plan to slowly try one by one hehe

you will see a very round zzzyun the next time you see her! =(

pretty good but I was expecting more awesomeness.

Maybe some other flavour eh? hmm...

To Ikea I Went

Today I didn't have classes and at first planned to stay at home to study for my upcoming msk exam this friday.

But in the end I decided to make a quick trip to Ikea (well as quick as I could) to get a new table lamp. Coz the old one was really irritating and impairing my ability to study :P excuses! haha but really, it was kinda dark and the bulb was sticking out of the shade so when I look straight ahead, it was too glaring. make me go @.@

Anyway, so off I went. It was good weather to me. Cloudy and windy.

I had to take the train to a suburb then take another bus to Ikea. And the murals in the train station there were really pretty. So I managed to take some photos to show you guys what I mean. (putting my camera to good use eh ^^)

Enjoy!

corridor to the other side

depicting the perth train - looks pretty real to me


interesting - her facial features are so sharp!

this is what happens when you have long hair in space! lol

giant at bridge?

omg love those fusion of colours there!

animals having recreation time, haha!

So what do you guys think? Really beautiful works of art, huh?

It's amazing how they encourage this sort of creativity here. A lot of imagination must have gone into this, these few pictures aren't really enough to show you the whole big picture!

Anyway, since I was there, decided to have lunch at Ikea. The lunch there is really delicious and cheap too (comparing to other food outside)!

And my absolute favourite there is Swedish Meatballs!

If you thought the ones at Ikea Malaysia are good, you haven't tried these yet!! Seriously, these are really to-die-for-melt-in-your-mouth meatballs!!

Chye reckoned it's because they added pork inside, thats why it's so tasty! hehe

I decided to have dessert too, but instead of the Daim cake which is as yummy as the one I had in Msia, I decided to try the chocolate mousse.

my verdict? too damn sweet even for me. I couldn't finish it, which was a pity =/

Anyway, so that was the part of my day which wasn't spent trying to force myself to concentrate on my lectures notes.

And yes, I'm very satisfied with my new table lamp now. :) Hopefully I will be able to study better!

Okay back to my notes! Wish me luck. kthxbai.

Labour Of Love: Part I

Edited again: And yet again, I have replaced and added some photos to this post. It gets better eh!

Edited: Finally managed to get photoshop in this comp. so the photos have been replaced with better ones! haha, enjoy!

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Yesh I know my blog has been devoid of photos recently, that has been due to a combo of = lack of own camera + lack of photoshop on this new comp yet + lazyness on my own part.

Anyhow, with Debbi's camera (thanks!) + smothering the perfectionist in me by allowing these photos to go on my blog without photoshop, these photos are finally able to see the daylight. Do pardon me if the lighting and what not is not perfect.

Okay I will go get my camera soon! Saw some pretty good deals. What do u guys think? Which brand is better? Canon, Olympus or Samsung? Pls lemme know!

Better stop digressing. Anyway here are the photos of some of the food that I cooked in the past 2 weeks. I need more ideas! haha..

claypot chicken rice without claypot!

haha I love shitake mushrooms so much! yummy. Recipe here.

steamed chicken and stir fried vege

one of my standard favs.

pasta with boulognaisse sauce!

hoho chicken rice! cooked from scratch! yes i'm serious

Recipe available here. and because I was having a craving for chicken rice at that time. lol

this is the pasta that I said we copied from italiannies last time.

Very simple. Just pasta mixed with raisins and apple slices and with a dressing of mayonaisse. I added sausages though

and tada~!! fish and chips!

very simple to make using my mum's recipe hehe. if you wanna know can ask me :)

Okie that's all for now. Hope you all enjoyed the photos! And gimme more ideas for cooking pls. I don't like eating the same food again and again. haha. But I always take so damn long to finish cooking. It is indeed the labour of love for me. Must..be...more..efficient!!

And guess what. It's finally friday again! I hope I will have time/energy to blog more during the weekend. Cya for now!

Kelantan Trip

This post will be abt my family trip to Kelantan a few weeks back. Just a brief one, so will be mostly pictures k!

All of the pictures below were taken by my bro coz he is the one with the camera.

After an excruciating 6 hours drive of being squished in a car, Uncle Chew (my dad knew him when he worked in Kelantan as a HO long ago) welcomed us warmly and took us for a late lunch at this kopitiam, at first glance it doesn't look much, but the food was certainly yummy!

fried chicken that tasted absolutely different!

probably because it was 'ayam kampung' so the meat was really lean & crispy!

delicious mutton that is oh-so-tender

And there some other dishes too but dont want to make you guys salivate too much over your keyboard la haha.

After that, we went to this place that sells batik/sarong and the women start ooh-aahing over them while the rest just hung about. Personally, the batik isn't too bad looking (have some nice patterns too) but I'd prefer them in a more unconventional design! [think those normal fancy gowns you see outside but made with batik]

We then went back to the hotel to refresh ourselves. We stayed at the Grand Riverview Hotel and for its reasonable price, the room and decor was really nice and comfy. I didn't have any 'initial insomnia' problems that I'd normally have while sleeping in a new place. Btw it was really beside a river! Luckily it didn't overflow!

After that, Uncle Chew brought us to have a sumptuous dinner with his whole extended family too!

look at all the clean plates! was that a 10 course meal or what? oh my!

and I think my bro only rmbed to take photos after everything was cleared haha

There was a lot of seafood (which is not my fav btw) but most of it tasted nice. Personally loved how they fried the kangkung till it tasted so crispy! A good way to bluff vege-haters to get some vege into their system! :P

Well, we then went to KB Mall, which is the largest mall in Kota Bahru.

eh not bad, this mall lives up to expectations!

Oh ya, the only way this mall is different from a normal one is that it doesn't have a cinema!

Yes, apparently cinemas are not allowed in Kelantan unless all lights are on (yaloh can do hanky panky in the dark hor) - which defeats the purpose of going to a cinema in the first place, right? That's why all the cinemas close shop after that rule was set out. *shrugs*

Okay la better go to Day 2 or you all will be bored to death ade. For the second day, we went to visit some touristy sites.

And believe this or not, despite Kelantan being an islamic state under PAS, they have two huge-ass Buddha figurines here and it's really peaceful actually.

enormous Sleeping Buddha

smaller Buddhas, and they have all the zodiac animals too

you can see the snake one here

We then went off for lunch. Banana Leaf Rice!! One of my favs after I was introduced to it in that mamak shop in Sri Petaling.

and can you believe how long a history this shop has?

coz my dad enjoyed the very same dish years ago! haha

And guess who has the same discerning taste buds? :P

our very (in)famous Dr. Chua Soi Lek!

Nah, this picture as proof if you don't believe me hehe

Then the next site we went on to visit another huge Buddha. The Sitting Buddha!

see how large the buddha is compared to us!

And the last place we went to is this famous beach in Kelantan called Pantai Cahaya Bulan (Moonlight Beach). If you still remember your history, this was the first place the Japanese troops landed in Malaya in 1941.

And no, I didn't remember my history. That nugget of infomation was provided by dad.

blue skies, palm trees, a sandy beach

And here's another interesting trivia. It wasn't always Moonlight Beach before this.

Its old name was Pantai Cinta Berahi (the Beach of Passionate Love!!) and no prizes for guessing why they changed it to its current name haha.

Maybe it gave people ideas, huh? *wink wink*

see how strong the waves were! coz it was near to the monsoon season

Anyway that was it for Day 2, well the interesting parts anyway. No more photos so I dunno what else to elaborate from my shrinking brain.

Nothing special for the last day, we just said our goodbyes and went on our way.

Thank you for your kind hospitality, Auntie and Uncle Chew! :) We certainly enjoyed ourselves!