(psst. i've been thinking about what to make for dinner since manda and i walked back from tescos)

the second i got back to my flat, i chopped up 3 cloves of garlic, bashed it around with some butter and olive oil, salt & pepper, spread it on some buns and popped it in the oven. next, i scrambled 2 eggs with sliced ham, put it in the pan, broke up 2 slices of cheese to melt in the middle, fried it for a bit more and voila! - ham & cheese omelette! it tasted even better than i expected :) yummmm.

after which, i fried 2 sausages and sliced a tomato (for some fibre) then finally, i took a photo!

dinner is served.

*yawn* this post is sooooo boring even i can't deny it. *wistful look* if only i could upload my pictures here, it would make a world of difference.

project fibre.

ever since coming to the uk, i've been stuffing my face with endless amounts of tomatoes so much so that i fear sooner or later i'm going to wake up (one day) and realise my entire body has turned bright red. ACK.

i put tomatoes in my salad, sandwiches, instant noodles, mee goreng, pasta (on a daily basis) - you name it, i bet i can tomatofy it.

i've been trying to eat healthily; bought 100g of grapes from portobello that i have yet to consume (it's so unpleasant trying to eat them and spit the seeds out concurrently) and a bunch of 99p bananas from the supermarket - my new fav. place, grocery shopping = new fav. activity - on saturday plus a whole bagful of firm/ripe/juicy tomatoes.

i shall cease the choc. biscuit bingeing (save it for a rainy day, ie: wintertime - when i'm immobile in my flat [freezing my ass off] and have no other means of obtaining food) and convert to drinking tea (no sugar, no condensed milk) instead of milo. i really should be drinking gallons of water.

*i just made one of the receipes off my cookbook for dinner: it was supposed to be salted fish pasta with vodka but i had neither salted fish nor vodka. the most readily available substitute was the leftover chicken pieces from saturday's fried rice and curry cream chicken.

this is what i did:
1. boil the pasta with a pinch of salt, until al dente. drain well, rinse with cold water. add slab of butter (to separate the spaghetti) then put it aside.
2. heat olive oil in the pan and fry garlic, chilli and fish (i 'marinated' the chicken in butter, pepper and a pinch of salt) until garlic turns golden brown.
3. add the tomatoes and fry until soft.
4. add pepper and remove from heat.
5. add spaghetti to the sauce and stir to mix well.
6. photograph the completed dish!

(i'm keeping a visual diary of all the dishes i've made so i have something to show the family when i go home in dec)

it was not bad for a first attempt, but i think i really need to buy salted fish or another alternative to combat the strong garlicky taste. other than that, it was relatively yummy - if i might say so myself - could be better, but there's always next time :)

i miss carol's spinach soup (spinach so soft it melts in your mouth), sambal chilli kangkong and long beans fried with hebi, honey chicken wings (delish!), sweet and sour pork or biscuit crumb covered pork chops, her renowned beancurd soup and steamed codfish with tofu!! (everyone who has tasted it has clamoured for the receipe), butter/sambal prawns (drool..), grandma's uber-famous curry crab (kill me now!) oh dear god. i miss 'asian' food.

i need receipes, receipes!

mee goreng, take #2

i made mee goreng (MG) for lunch today, yep once more. it says on the box that i have to use up the sauce within 3 days of opening it. looks like it's gonna be MG for the rest of the weekend.

i'm really proud of myself though, i noticed a few major improvements in the end product: the egg was more cooked (not burnt), the noodles were softer and boiled properly this time round, the overall taste had more flavour and the sauce wasn't as watery as before.

i added: chopped onions, luncheon meat cubes, shredded strips of crabmeat, tomatoes chunks, sliced fishballs, chilli sauce and alot of the spicy powder.

carol would be so proud. i took photos too! and emailed them to everyone at home :)

from now on, i will attempt to document all my attempts at cooking until i can officially prepare
a proper meal from scratch.

hallelujah.

kitchen disasters 101

i just munched on 3 bowls of frosties for dinner, it's time to stop now.

first and foremost: i made mee goreng today! the flavouring itself came from a box, BUT i totally worked the saucepan! *beams*

(prior to this, i boiled the egg noodles for a couple of minutes then drained the water)

1) heat the pan till hot and add oil
2) add the scrambled eggs, fry until half-cooked

all of the ingredients were supposed to have been prepared beforehand but i apparently missed out that section while reading the instructions on the back of the box. so there i was, frantically chopping (effectively squashing my poor tomatoes) and literally flinging stuff into the saucepan. the kitchen was such a mess by the time i was done 'cooking' heh heh. thank god i chose the right time; when none of my flatmates were home to bear witness to kitchen disasters 101, presented to you by victoria tan.

3) add the onions, tomatoes.. etc
4) add the seafood (in my case, fishballs) and stir for 1-2 minutes
5) add the noodles
6) add the sauce, desired amount of chilli powder and water

(i'm not sure if step 6) comes before or after but anyway..)

7) stir-fry until the noodles are dry
8) add the desired amount of lime juice over the dish and it is ready to be served

and... i think that's it.

to my credit, my mee goreng was edible okay. it tasted quite mee goreng-ish, which i think was the point of me buying the ready made sauce. what i've learnt through this daunting experience: cooking takes time, effort, patience and practice. no one was born the naked chef.

i was browsing facebook - yet again - currently obsessed with filling out proper information ie: dates on how i met my friends, for the sake of the end product: the social timeline, which i find thoroughly fascinating. in the midst of this, i recalled: in ij, mel and i made a pact to study in vancouver together. that didn't happen. then sarah sheryl and i promised we'd go on a roadtrip in australia after the o's. that didn't happen either.

as it is, we're barely on talking terms anymore, which can't be helped - due to unforeseen circumstances - completely out of my hands. *sigh*

in terms of education and life in general: i assumed i would take the safe route - jc, uni work. never once did i question the plan i had all mapped out in my head. until i went and did the complete opposite, and in reverse order too: i went to poly. worked (which i said i wouldn't do until after uni) then went to uni (in UK of all places, which i was initially completely against, for i felt the country was too cold, and i don't mean that in the literal [weather] sense)

my whole life was planned according to this so-called predictable order of events, and in the end, none of it materialised. instead, i set about doing took things - in a natural (albeit backward) fashion - as they came, and

here i am
happy.

you know that saying "when life gives you lemons, (you) make lemonade" ? so true.

i love midnight epiphanies.

p/s: this just goes to show, life cannot be completely planned, predicted or mapped out. occasionally, you just have to go with the flow, and pray damn hard you make it out alive.


LIST OF THINGS TO BUY:
- large saucepan
- frying pan big enough to fry more than 1 egg (thanks mum)
- set of knives
- chopping board
- big boiling pot
- wooden spoon

brrrr.

the weather today is frighteningly miserable.

first it was swelteringly humid in the morning, now the wind is sending a chill straight to the bone. i even turned stan the man's replacement heater on and surprise surprise, it works.

i took a short nap in the evening and when i woke up, it was freeeeezing. i slipped on a robe and padded around my apartment like that, bleary eyed and messy haired - because i. can't. care. less. i had some hot chicken soup with croutons and bread for dinner. yum. (not from scratch, from the box)

in a while, i'm gonna have to get ready to go out. partytime! in all honesty, i'm not really in the mood to get prettied up but it's a friday night (you know how i am about dressing up on fridays' even if you have nowhere to go) and i'm not bothered that it's a house party. i want to wear a dress anyway!

bite me.

ballet under the stars.

i spent the better half of yesterday (read carefully) in the kitchen, c-o-o-k-i-n-g. *laughs* hard-boiling eggs, peeling the eggshells off, slicing then mashing them with dollops of mayo, adding a dash of pepper and salt and slabs of butter - dish #1. EGG MAYO.

next up on victoria's menu; dish #2 - chopped up TOMATOES soaked in olive oil/a chunk of butter/1 clove of garlic with some random herbs (from the bottle), ground black pepper, a pinch of salt and 5 carefully sliced sheets of cheese sprinkled on top.

[you can tell i made up this dish as i went along, right? ahem. i'm proud to say that i had to rely on my keen *coughcough* sense of taste and make adjustments accordingly.]

note: all this 'cooking' was carried out under the observation of carol. (safety first!)

all of this domestic toiling in preparation for?... ballet under the stars!

the moments are far and few between, but on occasion, i do acknowledge that my mind works in ways that most normal humans cannot comprehend. err myself included sometimes. and you can be sure to add my mother to that list *snicker* ---

i adore picnics, have i ever mentioned that? i keep harassing the COT to get their act together and drag their asses down to the botanic gardens one fine sunday morning (i also love sunday mornings, [but preferably in bed {and asleep}]) for a lovely breakfast picnic on the greens - given that i wake up before noon that is *guilty look*

--- and my point was... that despite all the other slightly more significant factors involved in putting a picnic together, all i could think about was the fact that i had the most perfect white picnic-in-the-park dress for frolicking around fort canning in.


*rolls eyes* see, i told you!

that aside, i'm super happy to declare that we had the most scrumptious feast, BY FAR! psst, i sneaked a peak at all the other groups!

note: the one & only time we attended BUTS, we had no idea that it was common practice to come a couple hours earlier and picnic, so we arrived emptyhanded. it was well and truly pathetic. it was all we could do to watch all everyone else (this one group in particular had WINE! & turkey *drools* damn you.) feasting away, in candlelight no less.

so this time was our turn to shine! our picnic was well-thought of/prepared, and immensely thorough in covering all ground ie: wet wipes for sticky hands and in my case, wiping food off my face (hey, it happened!), 10+ packs of tissue (mopping up spills), hand towels (v. useful during the rain), utensils - plate & cups, forks & spoons, 5 umbrellas, tealight candles.. etc

the food: i'm not very sure who brought what, but here goes
daph & sis - potato salad (with raisins), bread, bottled ice lemon/green tea
twins (dessert) - rice krispies in melted marshmallows, chocolate biscuits, chips
chinchin & bf - wine!, green apples, grapes, banana cake, bananas, ice
myself (filler food) - egg mayo, tomatoes in olive oil
rachel - roasted chicken



it was delightful just looking at the mouth-watering spread before us, and even better to put in your mouth! the picnic was the best thing to happen all day, given that it turned out to be more like ballet under the rain, (not a star in sight) rather than ballet under the stars. it was difficult to pay attention to the dancing going on onstage when on the ground, we were all trying to take shelter under our umbrellas and not get wet, plus the water kept rolling downhill and wetting our bums.

and i was wearing WHITE. why do our clothes always get dirty when we wear white? (why is the sky blue and grass green? = just because.) later on in the toilet, i discovered weird looking brown stains all over the back of my dress, thank god i had the foresight to wear shorts underneath.


honestly, the singapore dance theatre could have and should have handled it better. i can hardly remember a thing that went on onstage (the same goes for everyone else!) as the rain got steadily heavier and heavier, and more families evacuated out of the area, we thought that they would have the brains to cancel the rest of the performance and refund us, but NO - the show went on. in the end, they cancelled the last dance. and that was that.

EXTREMELY DISAPPOINTING.

all in all, i had a truly wonderful time catching up with my ballet girls one last time. it's so difficult to gather everyone at the same place and the same time these days. *shrugs* you know us, busy busy.


i love you guys,
i'm glad we all still look and act the same.
i had so many crazy times with you,
i will remember them all.
don't worry, no fake british accents for me!
come visit in UK! *hug*

p/s: pics to be posted soon.