One-Pot Dish - Curry Fish With Vegetables

Another one-pot dish for dinner on one of the school-going days last week...





Curry fish (Gold Pomfret) with brinjals, long beans, tomatoes, ladies fingers and puffed tofu.


I only used half a packet of instant fish curry sauce from Mak Nyonya to suit the kids.




Additionally, I added a handful of kafir lime leaves (these added so much flavor and aroma to the curry!) and 2 stalks of smashed lemon grass.   I also added about a quarter cup of santan (coconut milk) to thicken up the  curry sauce.

Still slow cooking in the pot...



The drama queen loves decorating her meals and this is her food art...



Grilled black pepper honey chicken fillet was leftover from last night's dinner, which I made.  Rice is cooked with fresh coconut milk.

Dishing up homecooked meals on busy weekdays need not be a nightmare. With proper planning and pre-prepping the ingredients on free days, putting fresh and wholesome homecooked dishes on the dining table for your family can be a walk in the park :)

Grilled Chicken Sandwich For Dinner

Here's one of the simple dinners that I dished out sometime last week.

Sandwich with pan-fried chicken fillet, spiced tuna fish, cheese, cool cucumbers and juicy tomatoes.





Ever since I got a new Tefal non-stick wok that's really efficient (cooks food really fast), I've since found a renewed love for pan-frying!  It does not cause as much splish splash of oil vs steel-cast wok.

The chicken fillet was marinated with coriander seed powder, black pepper, garlic powder, garlic oil and gula melaka syrup.  They were really delish!






Spiced tuna - I used canned tuna flakes in mineral water and seasoned it with black pepper, cajun, cumin, garlic salt,  light mayo sauce and spring onions.  Since I did not have enough time to chop onions, spring onions was my next best alternative.  With a little oil left after pan-frying the chicken fillet, I used it to heat up the tuna and mixed the seasoning.   And this spiced tuna tasted fantastic.  The cumin gives it a little Middle Eastern flavor.




The slices of bread were lightly toasted in the oven...




And the girls fixed their sandwich themselves with 5 layers of ingredients -- in the order of spiced tuna, cucumber, cheese, tomato and chicken fillet.




And this sandwich was seriously good. Way better than Subway!!





I had reheated some fried rice (I cooked that for lunch) for the 'rice barrel' girl but to my surprise, she ain't interested in rice!  For the first time!  She only wanted the sandwiches and after this delish sandwich dinner, she told me that she wouldn't mind eating sandwiches for one of her meals everyday!





Since the 'rice barrel' turned down the fried rice, Sherilyn brought it to school for recess the next day, with 2 pieces of chicken fillet :)

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Day Trip To Sekinchan - 3 May 2015

On our Wesak Day holiday yesterday, we went on a day-trip to Sekinchan with our usual group of buddies and their kids.  Sekinchan is a small fishing village in the outskirts of Selangor with luxurious fertile paddy fields.

First stop before we reached Sekinchan fishing village was the paddy fields.  Though it was really SCORCHING hot with temps of 36C, we got down the car for a camwhoring session. I summoned the hubs to bring down the XL umbrella to shelter me, else I melt under the blazing sun's wrath!



Green green grass of rice...









The girls and their playdates since birth.





We spent over an hour at the Paddy Processing Factory and Paddy Museum. We bought rice grains and attended a short video presentation on how rice is planted, harvested and processed.

At the Paddy Museum...


















At the paddy processing factory...










After the tour of the factory and museum, we had ice-creams sold at the paddy factory.

Next up, we adjourned to the fish products factory to see how salted fish and fish products are made.




Geez, the 'hum yue' (salted fish) sure smells fishy!!





Next, we  drove to the nearby Pantai Redang Beach to throw red ribbons onto a wishing tree.  The red ribbons are obtainable free from a Chinese temple situated just next to the wishing tree.  Whether your wishes come true or otherwise, the red ribbons entangled all over the tall tree sure provides a gorgeous backdrop for photography.












Cass' ribbon was nicely flung and lodged onto a high tree branch with just one good fling!  Bravo to this cili padi with good flinging skill, lol!   Alycia and Sherilyn had to make a few attempts though.




After the ribbon flinging session, we walked across to the beach.  We rented bubble makers for the kids to make gigantic bubbles!

Whilst the kids had fun under the burning sun, I sought refuge at a nearby gazebo and guzzled down a packet of Izumio Hydrogen water to hydrate myself. How I  hate the sun and was waiting impatiently for the kids to finish off their bubbles solution.













We had just only gotten back a fresh layer of fair skin after 3 weeks of sun-grilling in New Zealand just 4 months back, only to lose the fair skin to the brutal sun again.  Everyone spots a brand new tan now.








With everyone soaked in stinky sweat and a sticky body, we adjourned to an air-conditioned restaurant for lunch. Finally, air cond for all of us!!






The roe crabs were small and not meaty.  We could get much bigger ones in KL.




Ho chien (oyster omelette)




Ikan keli  spicy stew.




Seafood was not that fantastic and I would definitely not make a 1-hour drive all the way to Sekinchan to sample the seafood.  And they do not come cheap too!  We could get much better fare in KL.

Of all the dishes that we ordered, I must say that the Teochew Oo-Ni (芋泥 - a yam paste) was the best.  It's absolutely one of a kind and really delicious!  It's  steamed pumpkin with yam paste and gingko inside the pumpkin.  It's my first time sampling this Teochew delicacy and anyone visiting Sekinchan must try this delicacy.  The kids did not fancy this dessert and we adults wolfed down both the pumpkins!



Restoran Guan Seng Loong, Sekinchan




After a heavy lunch, we strode across the road to buy some fresh fish.  We were told that the fishing boats return from sea at about 2pm everyday. There was a small shop selling the fresh catches. But the selection was not many. Hubs and I personally still prefer to buy our fish from NSK as the selection at NSK is really HUGE and cheap!   Still, hubs bought a pomfret (costing RM60+) and a packet of fish balls. We don't think that the fishes at this shop are that cheap, yet visitors were seen thronging and buying fishes without a batting an eyelid... like, are they really that cheap??








Baby sharks, anyone?






It was an enjoyable day-trip for everyone, especially the kids, who did not wish to say their good-byes :)

Should I Or Should I Not Let My Blogs Die?

My 2 dot com blogs died again!! Apparently, some Inode issues cropped up... yet again!  So pissed off with the technical staff at the website host.  They are suggesting that I pay several thousands to upgrade my Inode.  And mind you, I had just paid RM800 in November last year to renew the domain for 2 years! WTF!

Thankfully I still have my faithful  and super user-friendly Blogspot blog. This is my very first baby you know?  When I first started blogging in April 2007, I started with a free blog host, speaking of which, I just remembered that this blog is 8 years old this month!!!  I started to blog way before Cass was born.  This blog journals the moment I conceived Cass to when the gynae broke the bad news to me that Cass had a dilated right kidney, to the day she was born to the day she was operated on. And it pens down lots of happy moments and sad ones too. Oh, how I love my first baby blog!   It was only months later that I purchased my own domain.

If all avenues to save my dot com blogs fail, I may have to let them die *SOBS*  Honestly, do you think that it is feasible for me to pay a few  thousand Ringgit each year to save the 2 blogs?   Sometimes I wonder why I am paying so much to maintain 2 extra blogs.  It's not like I can earn thousands of USD  from the blogs like I used to way back in 2007.   Or  that I am a super star blogger garnering millions of readers each month, though I must say that I get tens of thousands of visitors each month to each blog :D

Decisions decisions to make now!  No wonder my right eye lid has been twitching the past few days. Each time danger, sickness or problem looms, my right eye lid would twitch on end for days as a sign of premonition to me. Pretty creepy eh?

So, wish Health Freak Mommy a very happy 8th birthday!  And honestly, do you think that I should  pay my website host to save my 2 dot com blogs?

Our Sunday - 26 April 2015

Yesterday hubs went round and round the KL city centre trying in vain to bring us to a restaurant for a decent lunch before dropping me off for a talk on Izumio and Super Lutein at Menara Multi Purpsose, where the Naturally Plus office is.

Everywhere that we went to, the restaurant was either closed or fully booked, dang it!

Finally he drove into Changkat Bukit Bintang and got a place to park his car. We walked into Magnificent Fish and Chips (it's been years since our last visit) and shiats, the place was full to the brim too.  Then we walked a few steps into Healy Mac's Irish Bar and Restaurant and got a table.  This Irish bar and restaurant is not exactly kids friendly as it's primarily a pub and even the bar stools were a tad high for the littlest one to climb up. But what choice do we have? I was already running late and only had 1/2 hour to gobble down my food!  The majority of patrons were Caucasians. We were the only Chinese in the restaurant!







As I was already late for the talk, we had the Hawaiian pizza taken away for dinner.





Pork chop was really meaty and chunky - as in really white and lean meat, thus was dry. Maybe Caucasians like it this way?  Gwai los like eating lean breast meat, no?  Not for us!




Hubs' roast beef was not too bad.






The bill - which I find on the steep side.




After lunch, hubs sped off to Menara Multi Purpose to drop me off for the talk. I was 15 minutes late but did not miss out too much. Luckily I did not miss my friend's talk. She was the second speaker.  It was a very interesting product sharing session and I learned a  lot on how Izumio hydrogen water and Super Lutein can heal and repair the body. I also met some of my blogger friends there, who are also consumers of the products.








One of the speakers, a businessman and user himself spoke of how the products have healed the terminally ill.   There was a doctor who is a user herself.  She was introduced to the products when she was wheelchair bound and was healed from the ailment after months of consuming the products.  Currently, she has over 50 doctor friends who are also users of Izumio and Super Lutein.  It's uplifting to hear of amazing stories of how some of the terminally ill patients got healed which left their doctors baffled.  My friend will soon be meeting the oncologist of one of her customers, at the doctor's request.  The doctor was amazed with how the products can reduce the cancer markers of this patient, though no chemotherapy was administered.