When I’ve nothing much to do….

I think I’ve been struck by the cooking bug. All day instead of working (actually I don’t have much work, at least not until later this week) I kept thinking of the next recipe I can try.

Today at work, I came up with a dinner menu which I can serve when I’ve guests over.

My Personalized Dinner Menu

Appetizer

Mini curry puffs
Nutella Hazelnut Challah
Corn & Carrot Consommé
Home-made Bak Kua
Home-baked bread with home-made kaya

Entrée

War Dan Hor Fun
Shrimp Scampi Linguini
Jap Chae


Dessert

Green Bean Sweet Potato Soup
Tau Suan with You Tiao
Mango Glutinous Rice

Except for the curry puff, kaya and mango glutinous rice which I haven’t made before, I should be able to cook the rest pretty easily. The appetizers can all be made in advance say in the afternoon before the guests arrive. All I’ve to do is concentrate on preparing the entrees (entrees are main course in the US. Don’t ask me why). As for dessert, they require even less preparation time. All I have to do is ensure that the soupy ones don’t dry up when simmering and don’t burn the glutinous rice when cooking.

I think I really got nothing better to do. What’s happening to me?!!

Small boo boo

My office phone rang...

Moi: Hi J, how are you doing?

J: Doing well, how are you?

Moi: I'm good. How are yo.......(voice faded off with an awkward laugh and tried to change topic)

Photos galore

Posted photos of our final farewell with Celia & Wen on facebook:

And since I've been pretty free this few weeks with nothing much to do at work, I decided to "pursue" my so-called "passion":

Beef Rendang

Courtesy of Prima Taste again. Really flavorful!

I made the nasi lemak rice from scratch though. The rice was good but not fantastic, i bet it's cos i didn't put any pandan leave.

Stick Pecan Caramel Cinnamon Roll



This is the first time I tried baking. Not too bad for a first try i must say.

Jap Chae



Had this Korean dish for the first time when a Korean colleague's wife made this for Pangie's CNY party last year. Been wanting to try to replicate the dish for a while. Finally tried cooking it yesterday after one year.

War Dan Hor Fun



Cafe Malay, a Malaysian restaurant in Houston, sells very good War Dan Hor Fun. So whenever we have craving for hor fun, we would just drive 30 mins out west to have it. But recently, the restaurant changed ownership. The food was not as good as before. So I decided to make my own War Dan Hor Fun today. I must say, it was a SUCCESS!

For more photos check out Facebook.

2nd weekend without our dearest friends

Then New Year’s eve came. Having reunion dinner on New Year’s eve somehow had lost its meaning for us. Reunion dinners are usually eaten with one’s family. Since we did not have our family here, we could only have it with friends. To create some CNY mood, I decided to cook reunion dinner for the four of us. I even came up with a menu with all the auspicious food. In the end, Zing couldn’t make it cos she had to work. Only the three of us had dinner together.

Prosperous Abalone, Nian Nian You Yu, Herbal Chicken Soup, and Black Pepper Prawns

On 1st day of CNY, I decided to fully utilize the flexible work arrangement (in another words, to chao geng) that my department is famous for and worked from home. In the end, instead of working, I chit chatted with Teck Sh*t for 2-3 hours on the phone – talking about the Edison Chen sex scandal among other stuff.

That Friday, we had steamboat at Kim Son with two interns from Beijing and another Shanghainess (we got to know them at the Pangie's party). All three of them are here on rotation. This is our way of being close to Wen and Celia - by experiencing how they'll feel in China by surrounding ourselves with Chinese. That Sat, we ate at a authentic China Chinese restaurant. Another of our ways of pretending we are in Shanghai with them.

That Sun, we had another reunion dinner cos Zing missed out on the actual one.

Cereal prawns, carrot corn soup, steamed halibut, nian gao, chilli beef.

First Weekend without our dearest friends...

Hmm....it's been more than 2 weeks since my last entry. Here's an update of some of the stuff we did since then:

Wen & Celia left. But we seem to have more friends than ever....

The first Friday that they left, we met up with some of Zing's church friends who each brought along some of their friends. So a group of Asians (Viet Chinese, Singaporeans, Malaysians, French Chinese, Filipino Chinese, Hong Konger) hanged out at a pub in Midtown Houston. Why is this special? That was the first time the four of us went to a pub here in Houston. When Wen & Celia were around, we never went drinking together at all


That Saturday, we went to the Pangie's (Peter & Angie) CNY party. Peter is a Taiwanese. Angie is half Indian, half Japanese. They communicate in English of course since they've been living in the US since young.

We've been to their house for several parties before. Last Sat was our second CNY party at their house. The Pangies are great hosts. They will come up with whatever reason just to host a party and will prepare lotsa food and liquor to entertain the 30 people invited to their house. It was at their house that we got to know some great friends.


This year's CNY party, the Pangie invited close to 50 people. It was the first time that they had so many people over at their condo. They decorated their place with CNY paraphernalia and even had to hire someone to clear up the place. And they even gave out door gifts - paper brollies and fans.


Kudos to the Pangie! We love goin' to your parties!


That Sunday was SuperBowl weekend. Two years ago when we first came to the US, we tried watching Superbowl together. But after watching for probably just 10 mins, we changed channel and watched some repeated soccer match instead. None of us understood the game then.

This year, the four of us were so into football that even though we had a musical to go to that night, we tried to catch the game by going to Hard Rock Cafe located near the theater. We reached Hard Rock at 5pm and were one of the first few customers. The rest came after the game started at about 530pm.

We managed to catch 2 quarters of the game before we had to leave for the musical - Jersey Boys. We bought the tix to the musical back in Sept 07 and had no idea that the musical was gonna clash with the Superbowl then.

We missed the biggest Superbowl upset ever! New England Patriots who never lost a game the whole season lost to New York Giants, the underdogs.
When the game started I asked everyone who they supported. Three of us supported Patriots. Tim was indifferent. He just wanted a good game. When the game started, Zing and I automatically switch side. I changed side cos the Giants were wearing red jersey. So it was a natural instinct for me to support the red team. Somehow the blue team just looks like the bad guys. As Chris would put it, "Strange but true..." See Tim, I support.....................
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Arsenal! or Liverpool for that matter. hehe....

Jersey Boys is a musical that uses the hit songs of the Four Seasons to tell the story of group's rise to fame in the 60s/70s. Although the songs were catchy and sentimental, I didn't think that it is so good that it deserves to win the Tony Awards for Best Musical.

A musical should have music and lyrics that help to tell the story as the musical develops and bring out the scenes played out. Jersey Boys is merely a regurgitation of the songs sang by the Four Seasons at different stages of their career. It feels more like a concert rather than a musical. I wonder if it won the Tonys because of its popularity with the baby boomers who grew up listening to their songs.

Granted, the acting and dancing by the cast were really good, but probably it's just not the kind of musical I like. I prefer musicals like Les Miz and Wicked with great singing, original lyrics and a strong storyline.

So that's our first weekend without the Thongs.