MCO Day 25 ~ 11 April 2020

Hubs was in the mood to cook today, thus he took over the kitchen to dish out both brunch and dinner  for everyone today!

Brunch was pretty simple, composed of fried wallet eggs and onion tuna mayo on sourdough toasts. I've never really liked sourdough breads but have now gained an acquired taste for it. The secret to enjoying the perfect sourdough bread is to toast it till it's crispy. This is how I enjoy it and I discovered my love for sourdough bread at Tommy Le Baker @ Jalan Kg Attap.



For tea time, we had steamed Japanese sweet potatoes while our Baking Queen prepped a luscious mango banana smoothie bowl for herself and shared some with me.




To celebrate the weekends (though every single day feels the same when you're quarantined at home!), which we always do pre-MCO, we had pan-fried steak, a grilled root vegetables dish composed of carrots, pumpkin and sweet potatoes, steamed organic sweet corns and blanched organic spinach and lady's fingers.  Hubs pan-fried the steak and turned the kitchen into a greasy smoky mess!!! 😱😭  And I spent the rest of the evening wiping down the stove, tiled walls, glass sliding door, floor and sinks.  And this is the sole reason why I just hate frying anything in the kitchen that would create oil splatters everywhere.  The only upside is that after chowing down the calorie-laden beef steak, my tummy rumbled again two hours later as I'd burnt off most of the calories from a solid one hour of cleaning both the dry and wet kitchens, washed two bathrooms and moped the entire house.

Perhaps next time I should place flattened cardboard on the kitchen floor so that cleaning up is minimal, like how the village folks do 😬  However I know my idea will be rebuffed outright by the two chefs in the house!



Well done steaks for the kids, mom and wifey and medium rare with oozing blood for the bloody carnivore.

MCO Day 24 ~ 10 April 2020

And so today the whole of Malaysia waited with bated breath for the PM to announce his decision on the continuity of the MCO / partial lockdown. In a survey conducted by the Star papers recently, most Malaysians want an extension of the MCO so that the number of cases would go down further until there are no more new cases. If the MCO is lifted, all hell will break lose again and no one wants all our hard work, sacrifice and effort the past 3 weeks to go down the drain. Even hubs whose income is impacted unselfishly wants the MCO extended for the benefit of our country.  We are aware that having the restriction lifted too quickly can lead to deadly resurgence of Covid-19. This is something that everyone in our country must work together to prevent.

I am sure everyone already knew what the PM would say even before his speech at 4 p.m.. Yes, there's an extension of another 2 weeks, ending 28 April 2020. The school session would be delayed further even when the MCO is lifted as many parents are worried of letting their children go to school. Home based learning / online study will be further enhanced and we are all waiting for the Government to announce the next course of action for teachers and school children.

So, bring it one! Another 18 days to go! We can all do this because we are all resilient.

Will this be the final phase of the MCO?  Only God knows and we pray that it will be the final, period.

Our lunch of fried organic beetroot meehoon with MIL's homegrown mung bean sprouts, cabbage, eggs, fried fish cakes, eggs and pork slices.



Dinner of steamed rainbow trout, arrowroot + carrot + red dates soup, sauteed pork with Bombay onions, stir-fried celery + bok choy + mushrooms + red bell pepper + fish cake and blanched lady's fingers.


We've been having arrowroot soup for 4 or 5 meals already because hubby's vegetables supplier sent a big bag of it to us 2 weeks ago! 😂

MCO Day 21 ~ 7 April 2020

Hubs has been craving to dig into prawn noodles since the MCO started.  And so after 3 weeks of MCO, he finally satiated his craving.  Today he boiled a big pot of prawn soup whilst his mom blanched the prawns, pork ribs, fish cake and water spinach (kangkung).  The soup is from instant prawn noodles paste that he bought for his catering business. We only remembered that we left out the hard boiled eggs and fried shallots after walloping everything 😐



Brunch ~ oh so comfortingly good prawn noodles! What a hearty temptation after missing it for so long. We can't wait for the MCO to be over so that we can dig into our favorite outdoor hawkers' food again at our neighborhood coffee shop. We miss those vendors too as most of them have become our friends. We will definitely patronize them everyday to help them restart their businesses again.



Feeling really bloated and edgy in the afternoon, I pulled Cass along to walk the stairs with me. From the 5th floor, we walked up to the 18th floor and walked back to the 5th floor. Miss lazybones didn't want to continue working out with me, so I continued jogging outside our unit, back and forth the corridor and only managed to hit over 2,000 steps 😓   My typical pre-MCO daily steps is around 8k - 13k a day.




View from the 16th floor, before rain bucketed down.



A wefie after we reached the penthouse on the 18th floor.




My temporary jogging trek - our corridor



Jogging back and forth the short narrow corridor outside our unit reminded me of my hospital quarantine with Cass 11 years ago in May 2009.   Cass and I were holed up for 3 torturous weeks at Gleneagles Medical Centre in Penang when she was 13 months old. She underwent a complicated Uretheral Reimplantation surgery, which had an unfortunate complication. Two weeks later she was operated in an emergency surgery after a battery of scans (including a CT Scan and a Fluoroscopy) did not pick up a kink on her intestines.  During our nightmarish 3 weeks stay in the pediatric ward, my only form of exercise was jogging back and forth the floor of our squeezy room.

So this MCO is not my first quarantine. It's my second and definitely feels better than our nightmarish 3-week quarantine at GMC Penang. Everyday was nerve wracking as I didn't know when Cass would ever get better. I wasn't even sure if she would survive. But God is great and we were discharged a day before hubs and my wedding anniversary on 27 May 2009!  You can click on the year 2009 - Month:May on the Blog Archive on the right side bar to read all about my stay with Cass at GMC Penang.

The calming view that kept me running back and forth on the dull corridor until it tipped down outside.




Hubs brought home a loaf of almond butter cake and best-in-the-world Portugese egg tarts from Red Kettle in the evening and these really made my day 😍  This also reminded me that whilst being holed up in the pediatric ward of GMC back in May 2009, hubs would bring me some tantalizing yummy Penang food everyday to cheer me up.  But nothing could really cheer me up as Cass just wouldn't get better after the first surgery and her belly just got bigger and bigger each day until it looked like a balloon about to explode and she kept retching green stuff  😭




Our dinner:



Slimy vegetable (Malabar spinach) egg drop soup, onion omelette, braised organic chicken with ginger, sesame seed oil and curry leaves and blanched broccoli.

MCO Day 18 & 19 ~ 4 & 5 April 2020

MCO Day 18 ~ I went to the supermarket today to pick up a few items, but that was just a stalking horse to get out of the house so that I remain sane. I've not gone out of my unit for exactly 7 days nor have I gone to do my pre-dawn brisk walking for more than 3 days.  Our condo Management office shot out a new circular with additional restrictions on residents, one of it is residents are not allowed to do any recreational activity within the compound of the condo.  This means I can no longer walk at our condo jogging trek until the MCO is lifted.  Without my daily pre-dawn quiet time, I feel crushed and even more depressed. I am imagining that I'll fall ill without my daily dose of workout.

MCO day 18 dinner: pan fried turmeric mackerel fish paired with a sauce of black vinegar, sugar and julienned ginger, braised organic miso and fermented black beans bitter gourd with chicken, sweet corn fritters and braised Hakka pork (given to us by hubs' aunt who lives on the 3rd floor).
The sweet corn fritters is made using leftover mashed potatoes, carrots and sweet potato from last night's dinner, with corn kernels added and pan fried.

Clear skies after a heavy downpour yesterday. Picture taken at 7:15 p.m.



MCO Day 19 ~  Since we have been advised not to partake in recreational activities in the compound of our condo, I decided that I have to start an indoor MCO workout. Though I have enough of movements everyday from house work and I have not gained an ounce of weight, I still need proper workout to break more sweat and for my heart health, mental health, bone health and overall health.  Since there isn't much washing and cleaning to do in the kitchen as hubs bought Yong Tau Foo takeout for dinner, I started my first HIIT workout with free online videos from You Tube, in front of our smart TV.

Alycia got up early today to attend an online youth church meeting via Zoom.  I got her to pan fry frozen Roti Canai for brunch, which she willingly obliged to. One of the upsides of the MCO is that this princess with royal fingers is more willing to help out in the kitchen as she's dang bored of being cooped up in her room.






Not crispy but still yummy!  We are all very deprived of Indian food, hawkers' food and Japanese food!  Next time, I will stretch out the roti canai before frying it (without oil) on the pan to get a crispy texture and fluff it up with my hands, just like how the Indian makes it!


Precious reheated chicken rendang from hubby's kitchen, cooked 2 weeks ago.  We are feeling the effects of the MCO now.   We try not to waste food and eat / cook mindfully. Another upside of the MCO ~ reminding us to eat / spend frugally and to reduce food wastage.



After brunch, I watched a streamed video of today's sermon by Pastor Lewis.



For tea time, we had tang yuan with black sesame filling in pandan + ginger sweet soup. Sherilyn made a batch of super fluffy and delish chocolate pancakes.

We bought the mini glutinous rice balls (Kg Pastry brand) in December last year, meant for Winter Solstice Festival but never got a chance to cook it until now! The tang yuan balls are mouth-wateringly good with generous amount of black sesame filling oozing out as you bite into the balls.



Sherilyn made chocolate mousse a few days ago. Today she whipped up some egg whites and added a little flour into the chocolate mousse to churn out some really fluffy chocolate pancakes that are eye-rollingly delicious. Not a cinch to make but since she's got all the time in the world in a house quarantine, what's there to complain?  She really knocked it out of the park with pancakes this time!


We had a very early dinner today, at 5 p.m.! Hubs bought takeout Yong Tau Foo from my favorite shop in our neighborhood.


Since there's not much washing and cleaning to do in the kitchen, I started my first in-house MCO workout at 6:30 p.m. and pulled Cass in to follow.  Hubs, Alycia and Sherilyn later joined in with their own workout.  Our living room has turned into a gym throughout the MCO. Everyone has to queue to use the house gym 😆

MCO Day 14 ~ 31 March 2020

The pork that hubs ordered online last week arrived today and that's a LOT of meat! This amount is definitely sufficient to last us until the MCO ends in 2 weeks. That's if it ends on 14 April. But again, although the curve has started to flatten, I seem to have this bad feeling and hunch that the MCO will be extended by another 2 weeks until new cases dwindle to near zero.😭

The box  of face mask that hubs ordered from his friend arrived today too, via Grab. As hubs was at his shop, Sherilyn was tasked to collect it at the lobby. Armed with face mask, a disposable plastic glove on one hand and hand sanitizer rubbed on the the other hand, the girl fetched the box of face mask back. Once she stepped into the house, she decontaminated the box of face mask with sodium hypochlorite water before decontaminating herself in the bathroom.  Each time we bring groceries or stuff home, we go through this tedious and tiring process of disinfection. 😴😫






Lunch was noodles with fish paste, bitter gourd, celery and foo pei.



Dinner of braised pork ribs with tomatoes, sand ginger and onions, stir-fried asparagus, stir-fried chicken thigh with ginger and mushrooms, lotus root + arrowroot soup and leftover turmeric chicken.

MCO Day 13 ~ 30 March 2020

Cass' school teachers were finally ready to start hosting online lessons via Zoom today.  It was only for a short 1+ hour today. From tomorrow onwards, online lessons will be held at 11 a.m., from Mondays through Fridays.





Breakfast was fresh breads that hubs bought from Red Kettle and The Kneady Baker yesterday.  We now have a goodly supply of breads and pau in our freezer, as well as canned food and noodles that's enough to last us until the MCO is over in another 2 weeks.

Did I say another 2 weeks? Praying hard that the MCO will be lifted and we can have back our normal lives. However, to say that life would be back to normal immediately after the MCO is lifted seems far-fetched. Businesses require time to rebound. Some businesses may  never recover. Some analysts are predicting that it will take anywhere from 6 months to 12 months for our country to recover. Am hopeful that hubby's catering business does not need too long a period to rebound.  I can only cast my worries on my Heavenly Father.

Peter 5:7 ~ Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
Philippians 4:6-7 ~ Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.


Our stock of breads, cake (finished as of typing this post) and cookies. There's still more bread in the freezer, which is not in the photo.

Dinner: steamed fish, blanched broccoli with fried garlic, immunity booster turmeric chicken (chock-full of fresh turmeric, onions and curry leaves) and leftover takeout fried noodles from lunch. There's also an immunity booster meatless Great Burdock Soup boiled with white radish, carrots, burdock and Shiitake mushrooms which I've totally forgotten to snap a photo of.

MCO Meals

We still have nutritious and balanced meals throughout the MCO period.  Breakfast is normally bread with eggs, butter and jam and occasionally sausages (hubby bought a big packet 😐 ). Sometimes hubs will tapau noodles from nearby coffee shops.

Lunch is usually something light like sweet corns, sweet potatoes or just anything that we can find from the kitchen. Most days, we will just have brunch and the next meal will be dinner.

This is what we had for dinner on MCO day 9 and day 10.

Day 9 ~
Chicken + abalone porridge; mil specially cooked fried rice (ginger + eggs + leftover char siew + dried olive leaves + garlic + sesame seed oil) for the fussy pot who doesn't fancy porridge; blanched broccoli.


Day 10 ~
Steamed fish, fun kok + lin ngau soup (arrowroot + lotus roots), stir-fried water spinach with red chilies and garlic, sauteed lean pork slices with preserved vegetables and stir-fried celery with abalone mushrooms.




This is my breakfast of sugar-free skinny yoghurt with sugar free + salt-free peanut butter.  Added some fried onions for the savoury taste. Yeah, I have a weird taste bud; don't like eating sweet stuff,    although sometimes I will drizzle a little Gula Melaka syrup on it.

MCO Day 8 ~ 25 March 2020

How is everyone keeping up this week?  It seems to me that each day things get a little crazier and sometimes it's hard not to get pulled into the uncertainty and fear.  And the cabin fever has started to hit me.

The moment that we've been waiting for since day 1 of MCO finally arrived today - our PM's announcement on whether the MCO will be extended or lifted. I already knew the answer looking at the new cases each day but hearing the confirmation from him somewhat disappointed me.  An extension of two more weeks would mean more stress for me, having to be cooped up at home 24/7 with kids, spouse and mil doing tons of washing and cleaning as our part-time helper is prohibited from coming during this time.  And hubby's catering business will be affected longer, which means that our finances will be affected too.  The girls' exams will no doubt be postponed. They are getting lazier each day but thank God for technology, they have no choice but to do their homework and attend online lessons.  And I am missing mall shopping even more! I've not gone out to do any groceries shopping for two days and it looks like I will remain homebound too tomorrow.

Never have I felt such joy bringing out the trash to the refuse chamber, which is a mere 25-30 steps from our unit and going to the basement to collect groceries from the head of the family 😆  Today I brought the trash out 3 times just to enjoy being 'outdoor' HA HA HA!

This is our brunch today ~ the head of the family went out to tapau curry noodles, pork noodles and tong sui.  He's having a rather serious bout of cabin fever and craving for hawkers fare! 😁




People are all very obedient outside. As you can see in the pic below, there's very good social distancing while queuing up to buy food.

Each time hubs comes back from shopping, he stays outside the unit whilst I disinfect him with Sodium Hypochlorite water spray all over his body and the groceries that he brings into the home. All canned food will be washed and dried before storing. All plastic bags used to store the groceries will be binned immediately.  We have all turned into OCD freaks because of the silent invisible killer. Pathetic.

Dinner of fried mackerel with sweet and sour onion sauce, chicken herbal soup, stir-fried lai park, braised leek with leftover siew yoke and reheated frozen chicken rendang from hubby's kitchen cooked earlier this week.



Post dinner time is the most tiring for me, having to clean up the kitchen and mop the greasy floor and stove. Fortunately I don't have any other errands and school / tuition runs to do anymore, so it's still manageable. Tomorrow I'm going to wake up at 5:15 a.m. for my quiet pre-dawn exercise again.

MCO Day 6: 23 March 2020

Our dancing queen went to bed early last night and got up at 3-ish a.m. today to attend a free online dance class conducted life by a dance teacher in Australia.  After the session, she went back to sleep.  I got up at 5:15 a.m. to exercise at our condo jogging treks.  All other condo facilities are off limits.  It's so peaceful and quiet at pre-dawn where there's hardly anyone except for the guards patrolling the condo. I've been practising pre-dawn exercise for almost 20 years now.  I really need my quiet time everyday doing what I love most, even if it means sacrificing on my sleep, just to keep sane being cooped up at home 24/7 with kids, spouse and mil! 6 of us in total in the household in a tiny space.  Without my exercise, I can check myself into Tg Rambutan after the MCO ends.

We're staying in a condo where space is minimal - everyone faces each other during our waking hours and we often get on each other's nerves.  Alycia has her own room where she can hibernate and do her own things.  Cass' study desk is next to mine, Sherilyn's study desk is a few meters away from mine; and the mil and spouse will be seated behind my work desk at the dining table! They can see what I do all the time.  I feel for those who have claustrophobia and live in a tiny space during this time.

Ok, back to food!  This is our MCO day 6 dinner:


Hakka braised pork with black fungus and dried oysters, blanched brocolli, 'tai yi ma kar lui' (dish of sauteed julienned hairy gourd with glass noodles, sliced pork and dried shrimps), fried vermicelli and sweet and sour pork.




Extra servings of Hakka pork, stored in glass containers for lunch and dinner tomorrow:




Every night at around 9+ during the MCO period, our two teenage girls will turn the living room into a home gym.  They spend at least an hour working out and dancing while watching free videos for guidance.

The girls have not stepped out of the condo building throughout the MCO, except for walking to the refuse chamber to throw rubbish and to the car park to help cart groceries up.  Every step that I take now matters and I find every reason and excuse to walk so that I can still chalk up at least 3k - 6k steps in a day. My usual step count is 8k - 13k in a day.

MCO Day 5 - 22 March 2020

Today the 'head of the family' went out to get food supply for the family and his shop. Hubs has a catering event tomorrow (packed food boxes). After today's restock of fresh produce and dry food items, I think we have enough ration for at least 3-4 days. Whenever I task the hubs to do grocery shopping, he will always end up buying more than what is on the shopping list and today's haul was O.M.G.!   No photo taken as I was too busy carting the items up to our unit (making 2 rounds on 2 carts) and keeping them.

The Government's latest order is only the 'head of the family' can go out to buy essential items and only 1 person is allowed to go out at any one time. So I'll leave this to the hubs, though there can be a representative from the household. After all, he won't be busy with work throughout this MCO period.

Today there were road blocks by the police at several locations at our neighborhood. Finally the Government is upping the enforcement and with this, I think people will be obedient and just stay home.

Our breakfast today - left over roast chicken breast + egg mayo + avocado sandwich.  So happy that hubs managed to grab 2 loafs of Ted Boy wholemeal bread from the supermarket this morning. These days, it's a privilege to be able to eat fresh, soft bread!




The head of the family bought 10 boxes of sushi to feed his 3 forever hungry piranhas 😍




Dinner: steamed minced pork + egg, steamed brinjal with fried garlic and toasted sesame seeds, blanched vegetables (not in photo), Tomyam mackeral fish slices and ABC soup.



You have no idea how much of washing and cleaning are involved when we have to prep 2-3 meals for 6 people everyday. Even a simple breakfast of what we had today involved a lot of washing -- 10 plates, 6 cups, 6 pairs of cutlery, pot and other miscellaneous kitchen items.  There's so much of kitchen waste that we have to bring out the garbage to the refuse room 3 times a day vs once a day on a regular day. My poor hands feel so dry, rough and battered now and today is just the 5th day 😓

9 more days of house quarantine to go. Bring. it. on. We will get through this 👍💪💪💪

MCO Day 3 - 20 March 2020

Today is day 3 of the Movement Control Order (MCO) and I have not gone out of the condo to buy food supplies and groceries. From our condo we have a very good view of KLCC and KL Towers.  When I gazed out of the condo and saw the beautiful view of KLCC this morning, I had this urge to go to KLCC or just any shopping mall to do what I love most. I really do miss going to the malls 😞  And it will be another 11 days at the earliest before the MCO is over provided the number of Covid-19 cases decline.

The Health Ministry announced 130 new Covid-19 cases as of noon today, bringing the tally to 1,030! If the numbers do not go down, the MCO will be extended and it will be everyone's nightmare!  Even Alycia is complaining of boredom being stuck in the house with nothing much to do.

This morning I got up at 5 a.m. to resume my pre-dawn exercise at the jogging trek of our condo and it felt so good after a week long hiatus.

Hubs spent all his free time Marie Kondo-ing the house. Day 1 he MK-ed the store room.  Day 2 the cupboards and Day 3 the TV console drawers. When he got tired from all the clearing, vacuuming and cleaning, he plonked himself on the daybed and glued his eyes and hands to his phone.  After doing this the entire day, he stared at the clock at 8:50 p.m and said "What, it's only 8 plus now?!"  😆  And with nothing much to read and see from his phone anymore, he toddled to the bedroom and plonked himself on the bed.






This kind of free and easy life with nothing to do and with lots of sleep everyday is something that the both of us have always yearned to have but now that we've gone through it, we rather have back our busy lives 😁

On hindside, the MCO is a very economical and healthy way of life for us. We get to sleep early, wake up late and get 12 hours of sleep (for hubs but definitely not for me!), eat homecooked food 3 meals a day, we hardly spend any money on some days and even on weekends we eat at home and don't go out 😂

Our MCO Day 3 brunch of roast pork bones porridge:




Sherilyn cooked mushroom pasta as she wanted to finish off the box of cream that she used for the tiramisu and strawberry lemon cakes that she baked earlier this week.




Very toothsome mushroom pasta with grated lemon zest, washed down with a mug of matcha, our antioxidant drink everyday.




We had old cucumber soup, blanched broccoli and celery and sauteed pork with big onions for dinner but I forgot to snap photos of the dishes except for the soup 😑



This is the very reason why I have to move my arse from my cozy bed so early in the morning to exercise, else this is going to be me when the MCO is over 😂