Tuesday's Junkie Lunch

No idea what to have for lunch today. I was also too lazy to come up with anything fanciful. :) Browsed through the grocery cupboard and found a can of Campbell Mushroom Chicken soup and instant noodles. There was a packet of cheese sausages lying in the freezer too! :) So here's our lazy lunch. Lin called it junk food....which I kind of agreed. *_* Anyway I fed her this today. :)))

I had instant noodles for 2 consecutive days. No more of them for the coming weeks! Overkill...

Lemon Butter Prawns & Instant Noodles

Lin bought too many lemons for me over the weekend...so I gotta think of ways to utilize them. I wanted something that is quick & fuss free for lunch. So tada....my very own version of lemon butter prawns & instant noodles. :)

Ingredient (Serves 1):

3 prawns
A clove of garlic chopped for the prawns
Butter for the prawns (if you want them richer & more flavourful, by all means add more)
Freshly grounded black pepper
A slice of lemon for the prawns

Instant noodle (any brand of your choice)
A spoon of olive oil
A clove of garlic sliced for the noodles
1 tablespoon of chicken stock - optional
Half a lemon for the noodle(lesser if you prefer) 
Dash of grounded black pepper
Parsley

Method
I dislike cleaning greasy kitchen and keep frying to the minimum. I cooked the prawns in a toaster intead. ^.*

Prawns

• Place the prawns, chopped garlic, butter & grounded black pepper on a piece of aluminium foil.
• Squeeze a slice of lemon over them, wrap them up and throw the yummy package into the toaster for 8-10 mins.

Instant noodles

• Cook the instant noodle like you normally would, drain them, run them through cold water and keep them aside
• Heat some olive oil in a pan, add the sliced garlic and fry a little, add chicken stock and noodles and squeeze lemon over them. You could replace olive oil with butter, but I wanted something light for lunch today. Pour the juice from the toasted prawns over the noodles. Add in the parsley. Mix well. Serve them with the toasted lemon butter prawns.

Enjoy! :)

Weekend with Sleepy Friends

Wendy, Angie, CK and Zam came over for dinner tonite. :)

A super warm Zam wanted so much to play with Koka. But as usual our princess doesn't wanna play with other dogs... Poor Zam...

Here's what a heavy dinner did to our friends. Lol! :)))

Healthy Day!

Lin & I just got home from visiting our dentist, Dr Lee. Nothing major, just routine cleaning of teeth. :D They are even more sparkly clean now. :)

I figured today should be a healthy day for us & hence I decided to make tomato & basil bruschetta. ;) Not bad for my 1st try! ^.^ It's pretty simple to fix (recipe below). We wanted also Wild Mushroon soup for lunch, but Beanie being blur as usual, opened the wrong can of soup. So we ended up having Cream of Mushroom soup. Oh well, there's mushroom still...

Tomato & Basil Bruschetta
Ingredient (8-10 slices of bruschetta)

1 baguette
4 tomatoes
Some basil leaves
1 clove of garlic
Dash of grounded black pepper
Dash of salt
2 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil

Method
 Topping:
1) Diced the tomatoes
2) Chop the basil leaves
3) Chop the garlic
4) In a large mixing bowl, put all the diced and chopped ingredients together, followed by extra virgin olive oil, black pepper & salt. Mix thoroughly and let it sit in the fridge for at least 30 mins

Base:
1) Meanwhile slice the baguette diagonally
2) Use a garlic to rub on one surface of the baguette
3) Brush the same surface with extra virgin olive oil
4) Toast or bake them till they're a little gold & brown on the side

Assembling:
1) Carefully pile each baguette slices with the chilled toppings.
2) Alternatively, you may serve the toppings and base seperately and let your guests fill each base with the amount of toppings they want

There you have it, a quick, easy & healthy fix. ;)

Btw, there isn't any glam way of eating bruschetta. It's a messy business for me with tomatoes dropping everywhere and Koka vacuming them. Lol! :))) So get those serviettes ready...

School Dining? :)

Dining at Waffle Place Cottage brings you back to school. One should not expect too much of the food & dessert. Rather, appreciate the laid back, easy, school-like setting. ^.^ When you stepped into the place, you're greeted by colourful post-it messages on the bricked walls. :) An ingenious way to dress up an ordinary wall economically!

The place has expanded and has more offering on its menu. As the name suggested, they started off selling sweet & savory waffles. Now they offer side dishes and laksa.

A strange combination I know, but I just had fries craving that I needed to satisfy. So, we ordered a plate of cheese fries. I couldn't taste any cheese...Lin said it was becos the laksa taste has overpowered everything else...

We had waffles & triple chocolate ice cream for dessert which we were kind of disappointed. The ice cream wasn't rich enough. We should have gotten waffles with durian instead.

If you're in a mood to leave a message on their walls, by all means do so. ^.^ We were rushing to meet Murphy at the Singapore Garden Festival, and did not do so.

Details of Waffle Place Cottage:
Suntec City Mall MPG #03-025G
W: http://www.cwp.com.sg/

A Walk in the Garden

Thanks to Lin's ex-colleague, Murphy, we got complimentary tickets to the Singapore Garden Festival. :D What a fabulous way to unwind after a day's of work. ;) Murphy was really kind to show us around, knowing it's our first visit to the impressive floral carnival.

I managed to capture some blooms that caught my attention. :)

We were greeted by a gorgeous glow at the entrance. :) Absolutely stunning.

How can you not love the willow heart display??? ^.^

Orchids were hung upside down to create a beautiful floral canopy. :)

I always feel that orchids are such elegant and timeless flowers. It's amazing the variations of orchids we have today. :)

The ever grand phalenopsis... :)

I hope this humongous bouquet makes it to the Guinness World Record! :) It's impressive in size & design!

The man who believes in trees and planted trees when everyone thought it was impossible...A 5m green statue of him...
: O The light changes colour to reflect the various time in the day.

We were awed by these extraordinary tree branches. ;) They look like window grills. :)))

We would love to have these rotating planters in our balcony...If only we have one...:) They provide great privacy, shield us from direct sun and beautify the home. :D

I like the bubbly floral designs too! :)

A refreshing combination of anthuriums, lilies & poms poms. :)

These blooms resemble pies? :))) ... They are like a hybrid of hydrangea and scabiosa. :) Pretty.

The Singapore Garden Festival takes place every two years. The next one will be in 2012. Hence look out for it if you're planning a trip here. It's worth a visit! ;)

Our walk in the garden ended with drinks with two uni seniors, Mong Hoe & Chester whom we ran into at the garden. ^.^ We've not seen them for years. It was awesome catching up!

For more details of the Singapore Garden Festival:

http://www.singaporegardenfestival.com/

Just A Simple Tea Affair

It's rainy today and I'm loving it! :) I'm finally done with redoing a call list for Wendy. Our PC crashed last weekend before I could save any document. : ~( Anyway to reward myself for completing this tedious task all over again and uncovering more companies as a result, I made myself tea!

It's a simple tea affair, but satisfying. ^.^ I prepared some Paris-Singapore tea from TWG to go with Sara Lee's chocolate swirl pound cake. :D I like the soft & moist texture of the cake. Yum... I would be happier if I could also have TWG scones. Anyway, always be contented! ;)

Sara Lee pound cake brings back memories of the many Chinese tuition sessions we had years ago. Our tutor served us Sara Lee pound cake and Yakult in between lessons. :) Isn't it fabulous to enjoy the cake without the tuition now? :)))

Pre Roadtrip Get-Together!

Lin and I organized a pre roadtrip get-together for two gfs, Wendy and Tina and our cousin, Yahui. We'll all be going on a roadtrip to Hokkaido and Osaka with our parents in two weeks time! :D Yeah!

So what's for dinner tonite? Well, it's gonna be ramen, sushi, maki & green tea ice cream! :D

To start off, mom taught me how to do the perfect hard boiled eggs. *.*
The perfect hard boiled eggs should have runny yolks. ;)

The Perfect Hard Boiled Eggs
Method:

1. Use high heat to bring a pot of eggs & water to boil
2. Once the eggs and water boil, immediately reduce high heat to low heat, and boil for another 3 mins exactly
3. Turn off the stove and transfer the eggs to a pot of icy water
4. Peel & half eggs, keep them aside

We got some ramen from the Singapore Food Expo some time back for tonite's dinner. It's really easy to prepare & delicious. The ramen's Q and the broth's porkily tasty. :))) I told Yahui we prepared the broth from scratch! Lol :D Don't you love the Hello Kitty fishcakes? They tasted as good as they look.

Koka wanted to be part of the cooking process. Her role? Kitchen supervisor as usual. ;)

Our finished product! ;)

Everyone gave a thumbs up for the ramen! *.*

We like variety, so we bought some sushi and maki. :)
I'm loving the colours... ^.^

We took a break from feasting to review the itineary Lin did. :) She's a super detailed planner! :D

Our nite was sweetend by Meiji green tea ice cream. The ice cream was smooth and rich, and every mouthful was delighfully green tea! :)

Counting down to our Hokkaido & Osaka roadtrip! Exactly 2 more weeks to go!!! :D

My Fav Junk Food ;)

One of my fav junk food is KFC. :D I love their crispy & juicy drumsticks. Yummm...Not too long ago, I discovered KFC offers Snacker. The Snacker consists of only 1 drumstick and fries! Isn't this brilliant? ;) Brilliant cos I feel guiltless eating my fav drumsticks. :D For individual who succumbs to yums easily and finishes everything on the plate (I do that for stuff I like), this is good. :)))

Mikan Jellies for Dessert? Anytime! :)

Lin came home for lunch today. :) And guess what we had for dessert? Our all time fav, mikan jellies. ^.^ Yeah!

We never feel guilty eating them. Look at the generous serving of wholesome mikan slices. Sweet, juicy...need I say more? :)

These mikan jellies are available at Meidi-Ya or Cold Storage (Ngee Ann City) supermarkets. :)

Grace's Burger Birthday Party!

We celebrated Grace's birthday last Sat. Lin and I had been so busy we didn't have time to prepare for it. Fortunately, there're convenient & yummy snacks you can get easily from the supermarket. ;) We decided to get everyone to work for their food, hence it's DIY Create Your Burger Birthday Party for Grace. Here's the spread we prepared. Enjoy!

We bought two types of buns, burger buns and sausage rolls. For fillings, there were tomatoes, chicken or beef patty, sausages, lettuce and sunny-side up. Oh we got a bottle of MasterFoods Fine Wholegrain mustard as well. Without it, the burgers will not taste like what they are supposed to be. :))) I like the tangy flavour of the mustard. :) We also bought a Dr. Oetker Ristorante mushroom pizza. I must say it was really good... :D

It's fab to DIY. You can add anything you want in the burger. :) Everyone's happy!

For people who love hot dog rolls, there you have it. ;)

Mom marinated some mid-wings the night before. They were hot sellers. Grace ate the bulk of it? :)))

Here're snapshots of us, hungry people. :D

The boys were engrossed with the soccer match, Germany vs Argentina. They had to make do with watching the game over my lappy cos we didn't subscribe to the sports channel. They were so accomodating, cheering for my camera! lol. :))) Our nephew, Jarius proved it's never too young to appreciate the game. :)

Grace's birthday cake was a pint of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. We just love the sparkly candle! :)

Blessed birthday dear cousin! ^.^

DIY Paint Box From Mom :)

I took this pic last month, but had been too busy to post it up. It deserves every mention cos it was made especially for me, with love by mom. ;) A paint box made from the inserts of our new laptop box. Mom does her bit to recycle! There's even a compartment to hold my brushes. :D Neat.