Fong Lye Taiwanese Restaurant @ Gardens Mid Valley, KL

One of our favorite Chinese restaurants whenever we shop at Gardens is Fong Lye Taiwanese restaurant. We were there again recently and this time, these are what we ordered:


Deep fried sweet potato balls. I find the balls a tad too chewy, which suggests that too much flour is used. I prefer the ones sold at our pasar malam, which are softer and has more sweet potatoes. Nonetheless, we noticed that almost every table has a plate of this deep fried 'bombs', which look really alluring and too hard to say NO to.


A meal at Fong Lye will never be complete if we do not the 'sam pei jie' chicken dish. This dish is cooked with basil leaves, Chinese cooking wine, ginger and garlic. On the right is 'mein seen' in red wine soup.




A set of fish slice cooked with tomato sauce and fried egg, a dish that most kids will heart...




Chicken cooked in rice wine set - my favorite dish. I almost never got tired of this dish during my 3 confinements. During my confinement, I could finish every single drop of the wine soup served to me, as no salt was used to cook the broth.




Jar Jiang Mien set. Tasty but I think I can cook a better one for the kiddos. I think this one is too black and too salty for my kiddos.



If you are planning to have lunch at Fong Lye @ Gardens Mid Valley, you better be there early, to beat the peak-hour periods. There is always a long bee line outside this restaurant on weekends and peak periods.

Sherilyn And Cassandra

Baby and Sherilyn make good play mates. While Alycia takes her nap on most afternoons, my 2 other energizer bunnies will be playing. Sometimes Baby will take her nap too. But for Sherilyn, she hardly ever naps in the afternoon. She will play and play till no end. But sometimes when she's an angel, she will obediently bring her homework out from her school bag to do without any coercion from me.

Here, Sherilyn and Baby are in a playful mood. While Sherilyn is practicing for her spelling, Baby climbs onto the same chair.... and Sherilyn gives her a hug and calls her 'my bolster'. If only they can be such loving sisters everyday and not fight and squabble.

Painful Nape and Shoulders

I have been having this nagging pain on my nape and shoulder blades lately. I think the pain is caused by spending too much time sitting in front of the computer. To relieve the pain, I use my loyal OTO Hans machine to give me a good electrifying shock to loosen up the veins, nerves and muscles on the achy parts.

So here I am - typing and getting my treatment in front of the PC. Being a multi-tasker, I also mark the work that I give to Alycia while getting my treatment :D



And oh yes, nothing beats the massage from warm, little hands from my 3 angels. I bribe them for a good massage everyday ahahahaha!!

Bribing My Kids For A Good Massage!

Lately I have been having stiff and achy neck and achy shoulder blades, a result of working too long on the desktop computer. Sometimes I will 'electrify' my neck and shoulders with the OTO Hans machine to loosen up the nerves and sore muscles. But what I really love and need is a good massage - with human hands! So I have to rope in my girls to do it but the only way to get them to do it willingly is with bribes! And the TV is the reward. "NO TV if you don't massage me!!" How pathetic eh? I need to bribe my kids with kick backs to get them to give me a good massage! But the bribe is all worth it. My girls, especially Alycia can really do a good massage job, at the right points on my neck and shoulders. After each massage, I feel really good. I can feel my stiff muscles, veins and nerves all loosened up after the 15-minute massage session from my girls :D

Down Memory Lane

As I was going through my pictures folder on the computer desktop, I found some old pictures of Alycia and Sherilyn taken several years back. Looking at the old pix brought me back in time to the year 2005 and 2006. Gosh, can't believe how fast time is zooming past us. It really felt like it was just yesterday that I was at the coffee house of PJ Hilton having buffet lunch with my hubs, Alycia (who was then 3YO in this pic) and Sherilyn (who was then 1YO+) ...


I can still remember vividly that day when this picture was taken.




and that's us in May 2005 @ Genji Japanese Restaurant, PJ Hilton, when Sherilyn was only 3 months old and Alycia was 17 months old.

I can also remember crystal clear the events that transpired on that day. Good times will always be etched in our memory, don't they?

Funny Conversation With Baby, My Assistant

Funny conversation with Baby yesterday:

Baby is normally topless at home as she sweats easily. As I was bringing her to the bathroom to pee, I can't help but notice her protruding guitar-like bones on her body.

Me - Baby, you are so so skinny, like a skinny stray dog...

Baby - Then you give me some of your fat ok...

and then pretended to 'transfer' some of my fat to her own body with her tiny hands, LOL!!!

I was like huh? This 3YO girl talks like an adult. Where did she learn to say that?


2nd scenario

Whenever Baby sees her Sherilyn che che straying away at shopping malls, she will yell out to her che che, " hey come back Kay Yi!! Bad people will catch you, then cut all your hair, change your clothes, chop off your hands and legs and you will never see mummy again! Come back Kay Yi!!"

She is also a very good monitor. Each time we get into the car, she will remind her #2 che che to lock the door if daddy forgets to press the door central locking. She knows that her 2nd che che is very mischievous and she never fails to remind her che che to behave LOL!! I think she will make a very good class monitor in future.

Vitagen Ice Lollies

Good quality ice creams like Haagen Dazs, New Zealand Ice Cream and Baskin Robins are very costly. My hubs like to buy these ice creams and I think it's such a waste of money to splurge on branded ice creams. I will never buy them for sure for I am an el cheapo! My girls love ice creams and so does everyone else in the family. Since I don't know how to make ice creams and don't have the time, I made the easier and faster version - ice lollies... with Vitagen, Ribena, yoghurt drinks, red bean tong sui and freshly squeezed orange juice. They are a hit with my girls and cost way cheaper than expensive branded ice creams.


Ice-lolly moulds from 100 Yen Shop costing RM4.90 and 4 bottles of Vitagen... total cost is less than RM10... cheap and nice!!



And my girls love them just as much as the 5-star ice-creams. So why not? Make my own el cheapo ice-lollies LOL!!

Japanese Kindori Ice Cream @ Tokyo Street, Pavillion KL

Our last stop at Pavillion was at Kindori Ice-Cream. Kindori Ice-Cream uses 100% blast frozen fresh fruits, 100% fresh milk, no colouring, no preservative and made on the spot! It's the ice-cream for health freaks and diet freaks as it's not very sweet. It's my kind of ice cream, iLike!






My strawberry + pineapple Kindori ice cream, very Kindorilicious!





Website : www.kindori.com.my

Reading Spree

Lately, Alycia my 7.5YO has gone into an explosion of reading as a hobby. Initially, she only liked to read comics, sports news and celebrity wedding news. But lately, she is obsessed with Geronimo Stilton books and books on adventure, mystery, humour and ghosts! She can go on reading continuously for 6-7 hours reading 1-2 thick books, resting only to take her shower! I have tried introducing her to Enid Blyton books but this fella is only interested in books that I mentioned above.

The Loaf @ Tokyo Street, Pavillion

Our first stop and purchase at Tokyo Street, Pavillion was at The Loaf. Hubs had heard about the tasty Japanese-style bun, Oyaki which is a cross between bun and doughnut with fillings. There were 5 flavors on display that day, namely green tea, lemon cream cheese, chicken mushrooms, chocolate walnut and almond with cheese.

Oyaki can be found in most of the bazaara in Japan and outside Japan during the Japan’s Festival celebration. The Loaf has modified the traditional Oyaki to The Modern Taisho Oyaki by using Butter Roll Dough stuffed with more than 10 varieties of sweets and savories ingredients each to bake in oven instead of using the frying pan.


The Loaf kiosk @ Tokyo Street, Pavillion...







Our pick - all 5 flavors, which entitled us to 1 free piece.


Verdict : very tasty indeed! Sure tastes better than doughnuts and buns. Very unique and not too sweet. Because of the petite size of the bun, I can easily chomp down all 6 for my dinner and if I did that, that would corrode me with a fat guilt and send me into an insomnia spell for I would be raring to hit the gym the next morning to run away all the calories!
My favorite is the green tea and almond flakes with cream cheese. Will surely get another half a dozen the next time we go to Pavillion.

Singing Jigging Sisters

2 potential singers in the making...



Baby is taking after her #2 che cheh as she loves singing too. Lately, she has been creating her own lyrics for songs about anything and everything... a song when mummy is angry, a song when she gets scolded and whacked by mummy (these 2 songs never fail to put a smile back on my face whenever I am angry with her), a song about holiday, a song about taking her bath and the list goes. This fella sings all the time. I am indeed very impressed with this 3YO rascal! With good vocal training, I am pretty sure that these 2 girls will be very promising singers in future :D

Mummy's Little Helper

My little earnest helper who will help me on mornings that I have parcels to be collected by the courier guy. I have taught her how to separate the consignment notes and to place them in 2 separate stacks. She can do this job pretty well! Well done baby girl!




My skinny 3Y 4 M girl, who looks just like an Ethopian baby when she's topless.

Our Raya Holiday In Ipoh

The girls, all set for their journey back to Ipoh yesterday, to meet koong koong and granny over the Raya holidays.







We are now back in Ipoh and enjoying all the good old Ipoh hawkers' food. We went to Kwong Heng and Chun Tien in Ipoh Old Town for lunch today. But the queue and wait were horrid. The coffee shops were a sea of people. Even bowls and cutlery were not properly washed. And #2 and #3 did not behave themselves. Pretty stressful for me and I told my hubs that the next time we go there, we better go without the #2 and #3 so that I can enjoy my food.


Logging off now to enjoy a massage on my mum's Gintell massage chair and then my 2nd round of jogging to burn off some fat, before digging into a sumptuous dinner tonight!

Do You Allow Your Kids To Read In The Car?

On most Sundays, my girls will each borrow a book from the church library. Once they get into the car, they will enthusiastically read the books that they had borrowed. I think that reading in the car is better than having their eyes glued to the 2 screens watching DVD in the car. I don't like my kids to be such TV addicts.

Though I had told my kids many times not to read in the car, lest they get dizzy, they keep telling me that they are just fine! No dizziness or motion sickness. I can't believe that they are fine reading in the car coz I am one lousy fella who will surely have a bad bout of nauseousness if I ever read in the car. I remember one incident. I was 8 years old and had read a book that I borrowed from the library in the car, all the way from my school back home, for a good 20 minutes. When I got home, I got really nauseous and then developed a fever that left me puking for many days! Maybe it was just mere coincidence but that incident had developed a phobia in me reading in a moving vehicle.

Do you allow your kids to read in the car?


Pix of my girls reading in the car, taken today, after church... on our way to Xenri Japanese Restaurant. My girls read their books for 20 minutes in the car and were fine. No motion sickness and no nauseousness! Thank God! I would have puked!

My Kind Of Breakfast

While most Malaysians prefer to dig into a packet of nasi lemak, char koay teow, porridge, fried noodles, chee cheong fun and kuih for breakfast, my kind of breakfast is pretty simple and wholesome. I still prefer bread (strictly no white bread. Only wholemeal bread or multi-grain or multi-seeded bread) or the occasional whole wheat cereals.

Here's my kind of breakfast : a mixture of tuna with hard boiled egg, raw onions, a squeeze of lime juice, chopped spring onions, mayo and ground pepper... spread on a warm toasted wholemeal walnut bread. Yums!! And a big mug of hot green tea to wash away the fat and to jump start my metabolism.

Miss Dilly Dally

Rascal #2 is the most 'lau hei' girl I have ever met. She has no urgency at all in completing her homework and has no sense of punctuality too. She dilly dallies away everyday - to school, to tuition, to ballet class and just about anywhere *BIG sigh!!* Everywhere that she has to go to, I have to pull my hair and remind her to no end to hurry up. The moment I leave her alone, there she goes... ding dong ding dong wasting her time.

These days, the only way to get her to do her homework is to forbid her from having dinner if she does not complete her homework. But this girl will only start doing her homework the moment we are about to eat dinner, sigh!!

Do you have a child who is like this? I really need help for I really don't know how to manage this fella!


A common scene every evening. While everyone is eating dinner, this fella will be struggling to complete her homework, crying and whining.

Out-Talking Me

Yesterday after dinner, Baby went to the kitchen drawer, rummaged through it and found a packet of cheese rings. Then she ran to me with high hopes....

Baby - mummy, can I have this?

Me - NO, its' rubbish!

Baby - no it's not rubbish! It's cheese rings!

Me - yeah, cheese rings are junk food and junk food is rubbish. Cannot eat.

Baby - but M kam moh bought it (my sil bought it). It's so long d. If you don't eat it, you will waste it. Don't waste food!

O_o, I was lost for words. My 3-YO girl managed to out talk me to trick me into giving in and I did, albeit only 5 small rings :D







My online store's most highly paid junior model!

Buffalo Kitchens @ Bangsar (Opposite Bangsar Village)

We were at Buffalo Kitchens 2 Sundays ago. The first thing that caught our eyes and attention when we went up to the restaurant was the various 'F' words written with colorful chalks on the wooden steps leading to the restaurant, located on the first floor of a corner shop lot (opposite Bangsar Village). Don't get them wrong. The 'F' words have nothing to do with vulgarity. 'F' simply means FUN FILLED FOOD here :D

The next few things that caught my attention were the Buffalo brand pots and pans hanging on top. That is expected from a restaurant that is owned by the Buffalo pots and pans Management.


The open kitchen concept with tummy rumbling aroma of food and herbs cooking wafting everywhere in the restaurant will definitely move your heart to order every single dish on the menu!

Here's what we ordered:

Bread with vinegar and olive oil dipping - this was given on the house...



2-way deep fried soft shell crab with Thai sauce...


Grilled chicken salad...


Seafood pasta for my pasta craze girls...



Love this fusion spring chicken. It has generous amounts of pound turmeric and herbs, served on a bed of mashed pumpkin. Very flavorful and lip-smacking. The only complaint is of its meager size.



Grilled fish....




Hubby's steak...



A plate of pasta was not enough for my 3 girls, so we ordered another plate of creamy vegetarian pasta...








All in all, the food was pretty good, albeit a tad pricey. But it is expected when you dine in a restaurant located in the up-class Bangsar area.


F Concept Dining by Buffalo Kitchens,
69-1, Jalan Telawi 3, Bangsar Baru.
Tel: 2201-1710
Opening times: Open daily, 12noon-12midnight
Located above Chawan and opposite Bangsar Village.

Ribena Ice Lolly

Here's another way of getting the kids to drink water in an enjoyable, healthy and tasty fashion - by making ice lollies from Ribena, Vitagen and fresh fruit juices. Best of all, it's fuss free, albeit you have to bear with wiping away the drips here and there.


Baby's treat for finishing her lunch quickly -- Ribena ice lolly.

Black Vein Mango

Hubs bought a mango from his regular supplier of fruits and the mango cost a whopping RM9 each and it wasn't even an Australian or an Indian mango. When I cut it cup and saw what's inside, my tummy churned. The veins are all black. The mango looked really gross and there was no way I would eat it.



Eessshh, so geli!!

I cut away the top layer of black veins and the bottom part was ok. Would you still eat the bottom part if the top part of the mango has such horrible looking veins?