If you recall, i bought a blender about two months back. I have been having one cup of fruit juice everyday since then, even after my mom has returned to Malaysia.
Uh huh, you will be surprised to know that i do make juices every morning and this has become one of my routines.
Just to prove that i am indeed fully utilising the blender, i am gonna write about making avocado juice, which is one of my favourite juices. Well, to be exact, it is not really avocado juice but more like avocado smoothie. And it is really simple to make.
(There are different sources of information about whether or not avocado is fattening and will cause weight gain. Some say no since it is good fat, while some say it will still make you put on weight. Whatever it is, it tastes good and is very nutritious. And i love it!).
Here are the ingredients - avocado (only need half of it), milk and honey.
Cut the avocado lengthwise around the seed and twist to separate the halves. Then use a spoon to scoop out the flesh of the half without the seed.
Refrigerate the other half with the seed (do not remove the seed!) in a plastic bag (or what i do is placing it face-down on a small plate and then cover it with a bowl). As it will oxidise and the flesh will turn brown, it should be consumed the very next day.
Then measure the milk with a cup - use half-cup or 2/3 cup of milk for half avocado, depending on the size of the fruit and how thick you want the drinks to be.
Pour the milk into the blender.
Add honey to it. One teaspoon of honey is good enough if you are doing half, but it really depends on how sweet you want it.
Then blend it. It should only take about 15 seconds or so, depending on your type of blender.
After it is well-blended, pour it into a cup.
And here you are - a cup of healthy and yummy avocado smoothies to start off your day!
Mom has returned to Malaysia for about 4 days already. Since then, I have been waking up 45 minutes earlier every morning to prepare lunch.
No kidding, i actually cook my own lunch now, something that i've not done for many years. Mom has written some recipes for me before she left, and i also called her a few times to get some pointers from her about cooking. I must say that the result wasn't too bad.
Just to prove that i am not lying, here are pictures of my lunches for the past three days:
Monday, salmon fish and stir-fry veggie
Tuesday, chicken soup and fried egg
Wednesday, fried rice and veggie
Today i had mashed potato and sweetcorn, which i didn't bother to take pictures of.
Well, these of course could not compare with mom's cooking for the past two months, but they were good enough to fill my stomach in a healthy and economical way.
I seriously do not know how long i could sustain and whether or not laziness will soon get the better of me. I gotta spend time in the evening preparing the ingredients and waking up early in the morning to cook. That's putting a few good hours weekly in just preparing food when i could have simply made something simple like sandwiches or salad, or eating out (but expensive).
Let's see if i will still be bringing my own lunch a month from now. If by then i'm still doing it, then i'll post up some more pictures of my masterpiece. After all, if i were able to continue on with it, my cooking skill should improve by then and i'd really ought to be bragging about it.
Oh, and by the way, i've decided that Friday will be lunch-out day from now on, and so no cooking for tomorrow morning. That means more sleep, yay!
wah, don't know that in NZ also able to buy rice. NZ is angmo country right, known as western but then located at the east.... don't worry Pin, you got your blog reader here to pester you to keep up the habit, haha. simple food can turn out to be nice nice delicious food too, moreover you're cooking the food you like one :). and it's gotta taste different for own cooked food than by someone else, no, no, what i mean is it certainly taste better for the effort spent, don't get wrong hor. you might want to spend a little time to do some research on how to prepare simple happy food, goal after goal, week after week, and don't just always thinking of work and work only. isn't it there's saying don't be lazy when it comes to food . cheers, let's see what are you gonna have for monday, yummy, yummy, yummy :)
I came back to SG before noon today and had been working since afternoon.
Uh huh, i took leave yesterday, thinking that i wanted to have a long and restful weekend. Unfortunately, there are piles and piles of backlog to clear for my work, and my boss even asked me to cancel the leave yesterday to work from JB home. I was too tired and lazy to do so yesterday until late into the evening, and hence gotta catch up with my work again today after i was back in SG.
Sad to say but my life recently is filled with work work work. It is so bad that i don't even really have time to do things that i like, such as reading, blogging, or even playing Angry Birds!
So, over weekends, i would normally stay away from work even though i could have spent the weekends clearing the backlog, which is something i am unable to do on weekdays because more work will be coming my way and i'd often spend the days in meetings or managing people rather than doing actual work - yes, i do not consider these as productive work at all! On weekends, even if i spend the days doing nothing much but sleeping and spending time on FB, i'd think it's better than working. Well, at least i allow my body and mind to rest.
However, this past weekends, i have done something more besides working and sleeping. One is of course participating in the Bersih 3.0 rally, which i'd share more in my next post. Another unusual thing that i did was... baking. *gasp!*
Yes, i actually did some baking on Sunday, with guidance from my mom of course! This was the first time ever that i baked cookies (not counting the times i did so back in high school during our home economic classes). I will not write about the purpose of baking the cookies, as i'd have to tell a longer story for that. For now, i'll just talk about the baking here.
Besides the usual ingredients of flour, baking powder, sugar and butter, the main ingredient of the cookies i baked was cornflakes:
Yeap, i was baking cornflakes cookies. Here's the dough after mixing all the ingredients in a bowl:
I then placed the dough in little paper cups for baking. It was quite a tedious job to fill up the little paper cups one-by-one. The first batch that we put into the oven came out over-baked even though we followed the temperature setting and timing stated on the recipe. This was because the oven we have at home tends to heat up more easily.
Despite the look of the burnt cookies, there was no burning taste at all. In fact, the people whom i made it for said the cookies tasted good, and they finished everything. :)
Anyway, after lowering the temperature of the oven, the second batch came out perfect!
Baking can be fun, if you have the luxury of time. I'm afraid that is exactly what i am lacking now, and hence i seriously do not think i'd be doing it again any time soon.
aiya, not to worry coz you'll have another long weekend coming :). so, you still be able to have another baking session, hopefully, hopefully :). and you should uphold this new hobby of yours, of course! isn't it nice when you get some sense of accomplishment, and praises from everyone who tasted the cookie ? don't let your mum's skill becomes waste hor! speaking of weekend hobby, it's been a long long time and kind of shame for me to unable to draw comic for your posts, so don't take me as example - sigh sigh. try to make time for the activities that you really want to do.
i wonder if it will help if you stay focused to clear all the backlogs at one shot. enough of the temptation for angry birds and fb on samsung tab, if the backlogs keep adding up like this, it's not going to make you good either even the job demotivates sometimes (or at all times). concentrate, pinpin, concentrate . once started, momentum should kick in to finish it. try to optimize and plan the execution with efficient and effective. work never ends but hope it stays at manageable level. (gee, i hope i'm not adding fuel to the already fire). stay positive!
eh, what about the crossroad you wanna blog about? that wasn't about bersih rally? glad nothing bad happened in johor, unlike the kl one. personal opinion, i don't think the gov will get the message into their heads anyway. but you have made your effort and do your part for what you believe in, unlike many others, including me as well. we'll see how the next poll goes.
oh, i noticed the timestamp is at 11:11 :). cheers, and take care of your health.
Wah! who are so fortunate to taste your cookies oh! Envy leh! Next time bake a birthday cake for me instead leh! :p However, it's good to "waste" some times to do something which we normally wouldn't do. At least free ourselves from our never-ending works.
Whenever i go to a supermarket, i'd grab a box of fresh cherry tomatoes. Most of the time, this is the type we can find:
Sometimes, NTUC sells a different type of cherry tomatoes that come with the stalks
They may look the same as the first type after removing the stalks, but they are actually juicier and fleshier.
Two different types of cherry tomatoes, but look identical
I would eat the cherry tomatoes like fruits instead of cooking them. Sometimes i would add them into the salad, but most of the time, this is how i eat them:
I was on leave (again!) today to go and collect my international passport at the Department of Immigration.
I love cheese, just like i love strawberries. I always sprinkle thick layer of grated cheese on my pizza and pasta; i love cheese flavoured biscuits and potato chips; i always pick up cheese bread at the bakery...
But unlike strawberry which is good for health, cheese is high in cholesterol and extremely fattening. Every indulgence comes with the consequence of increased waistline and big fat thigh. But then, things that worth indulged in are often sinful and yet so gratifying. I simply can't resist it.
So, for a cheese monster like me, i've always wanted to have a taste of cheese Fondue, a Swiss dish that have cheese melted in an earthenware pot (known as caquelon) served with bread and some other side dishes. Hey, we are not talking about cheese being one of the ingredients in the cooking. This is dipping everything into a pot of melted cheese -- EVERYTHING... MELTED CHEESE...
Cheese Fondue is just like the king of all cheese cuisines you know.
Too bad that JB, being a pseudo city, doesn't have any restaurants that serve Swiss cuisine. It was also a pity that the last time when we went to Switzerland, we were too broke to try the authentic Swiss cuisine there and had fast food for all our meals.
Well, my yearning for cheese Fondue was finally fulfilled yesterday.
贝 gotta go back to his office to restart the servers because of building maintenance that shut down the electricity in the morning. We went across the border in late afternoon. After 贝 had finished his work, we went to Kinokuniya book store in Ngee Ann City at Orchard Road to look for some books. Then we had dinner at Swiss Culture Restaurant in Suntec City.
贝 had checked the Web the day before and found out that this is one of the restaurants in Singapore that serves Fondue. So our dinner was of course none other than cheese Fondue.
The standard set of cheese Fondue comes with a pot of melted cheese and bread cubes.
There are side dishes that can go with the cheese (at additional charges of course) and we ordered sausages.
The melted cheese was heated in the caquelon over a portable stove. Wine and seasoning were added to the melted cheese that gave it a special aroma and taste.
We waited for the cheese to boil, which only took a minute or so.
Then we used the Fondue fork to prong the bread cubes and sliced sausages to dip in the melted cheese.
I'm not sure if the bread and sausages would taste as good if eaten on its own, but everything just tasted so delicious after swirled in the creamy melted cheese.
Unlike other cheese cuisines that often make one feels sick and disgusted from the surfeit of it, the wine and additional seasoning seem to have lessened the cheesy flavour and lend it a vermouth-like taste. So even though we almost finished the whole caquelon of melted cheese, we simply felt satisfied without satiety.
The meal cost us SGD64.68 (two mushroom soup + cheese Fondue + sausages), which was quite reasonable for two persons.
The only thing was that when i saw the oil on top on the remaining melted cheese in the caquelon, i felt so guilty and wondered how many extra pounds i've added to my tummy.
Ooohhhh, I love it too. But I had only tried it once. It was 5 years ago, when I was working in Singapore too. I had it at the river side - Clark Quay (sp?). I doubt the restaurant is still around. :p
Don't bother the fat lah, indulge yourself once a while mah. :)
I'm on my way to Cameron Highland now. The post today is kinda like a prelude to my 3D2N trip as i'm really looking forward to all the freshly-picked strawberries at Cameron Highland. Yummy!
I don't fancy red color but i love strawberries.
Like any other fruits, strawberries are good for health. Research has shown that strawberries are rich in heart-healthy vitamin C, contain compounds with cancer-inhibiting properties, and help to reduce the risk of disease and needless aging.
The benefits aside, just the smell and the taste are sufficient for me to love this fruit. Really, i love it so much that the lip balm i use is of strawberry flavour.
Among the variety of snacks provided at our canteen during tea break, i would choose strawberry sweet roll.
When i was shopping for yoghurt or yoghurt drinks, i would pick up those in strawberry flavour.
For chewing gum or Mentos, i would also go for strawberry flavour.
Even the tissue box on my desk in the office has a picture of strawberry on it.
Yes, that is how much i love strawberries.
There are many ways to eat fresh strawberries, but for me, i always have it in one of the three ways:
Just eat it plain.
Have it with icing sugar.
Have it with whipped cream.
The last one is my favourite, even though the cream can be very fattening. I just can't help but indulge in it all the time.
So the other day i bought two packets of imported strawberries.
Firstly, of course i gotta rinse and then dry them.
The strawberries were quit big in size (hmmm, i wonder if the ones in Cameron Highland are also as big?).
Instead of buying those expensive whipped cream in pressurized can, we can make the whipped cream ourselves at home. Buy a small carton of whipping cream (it can be found in most supermarkets).
Shake the carton of whipping cream and then pour it into a big bowl.
Add sugar to the whipping cream (the amount of sugar to be added depends on individual's preference).
Use chopstick to whisk the cream until it thickens. The whisking motion must be consistent in speed and in the same direction. (It's quite a good way to train up muscles).
After a minute or two, viola, we have our sweetened whipped cream to go with the strawberries.
Mmmmmm, the taste is just.... ooooh, i'm in heaven.
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