Of different taste and place...

I don't normally do foodie posts as it's too tedious in my opinion, to document every single dish with review and note down locations and opening hours.  But here are a few exception:

Sitiawan 

The children's great grandma's birthday held at a local restaurant.  Food was Hokchiu, without doubt, and much anticipated as Hokchiu servings come big and plentiful with many signature dishes that I miss.  By the 3rd dish, the waitress will place plastic bags on each table for self-help take away.  No need to be shy here, because I notice locals will just ask, "Do you want this dish, or I will take it?"

RM1.40 for this big bowl of cendol come with generous helpings of kidney beans.  But a tad too little gula melaka.  A little bit more would have given it more "ummpphh"

My all-time favourite... the red wine chicken mee sua soup.  Mom cooks better than this

Egg with pork and fake shark fin and shredded vege, to be eaten wrapped in lettuce

Sweet dessert

Braised Pork Belly

Another one of my favourites - fish maw in spicy sweet egg gravy

And the "real" dessert comes in plastic bags like this.  Help yourself - mai pai seh

Then there was the fish head dish - super huge but very fresh fish head served with abundant garnishings and sweet soy sauce.

This is the place

Korean food with Korean friends... they always recommend the best places.  These were taken at Paniya Restaurant. 

No idea what are the names of each dish, and I notice that we can eat these Korean dishes at different stages - nothing goes to waste, even "leftovers" are made into a delicious, aromatic fried rice.  The waiters are ever ready and "on-time" to slice, flip and fry. 

And then there was Mexican with Gong Gong Popo... at Frontera Sol of Mexico at JayaOne, PJ.  If I recall correctly, the 4 of us adults had nearly 50 wraps that night for the eat-all-you-can buffet.  Money so worth it!

Kids made themselves at home at the bar.  They brought their homework along, much to the curiosity of the bartender.   Thankfully the boy didn't order a pint to go along.

The first order... then there were more and I lost count.  We had to refer to the menu again, and double triple check with each other on how many wraps we ate in total

And at Ho Ho Sek (former Chow Yang) at SS2, we had this glorious CKT.  My S95 tells no lie with the big succulent prawns and egg that you can bite into.  I likey!

Mid Autumn Festival

Frankly, I have no idea when this year's Mid Autumn Festival would be.  All I knew was it will be sometime end of the month, or nearing, or to be exact, sometime in September.  Please pardon my ignorance, because I do not have a Chinese Calendar but that itself is not an excuse I know.  Apologies beforehand if I offend anyone here who think I'm not Chinese enough.

But yea, I only found out the exact date from my aunt next door who passed me a pomelo bought by Great-grandpa.  When passing the pomelo to me over the gate, she suggested I slaughter the fruit on "Eight Month 15th Day" to which I replied, "What's that?"

She was obviously not amused, and asked me if I ate too much bananas.  Funny humour, she has.

Anyway, we did not really celebrate in any special way.  We bought no moon cakes, as in previous year, EXCEPT for one pricey organic Lotus Walnut mooncake for Victoria.  The mooncake was divided into 8 pieces, and each piece cost RM2, and Vic (bless her!) budgeted her mooncake and held on her excitement to gobble everything up.  By mid week, she was only 1-2 slices down, and I gingerly reminded her that she should finish it by end of the week so she gets to enjoy it fresh, as it contains no preservatives.

Even brother William wanted, but Vic and I felt he could eat the "normal" mooncakes - which we had none, at that time.  We don't buy mooncakes in previous years as people would bless us with more than enough and I had no plans to buy any this year too, however looking at how close we are to "Eight Month 15th Day", I may have to make an exception this year.

William shed tears as he expressed his disappointment that Jie Jie have mooncake to eat whereas he had none.  Vic gave him a small bite to pacify him.  A few days later at the night market, we saw mooncakes and I asked him if he wanted, but surprised that he answered, "No, I don't want.  I will eat mooncakes when I am older, like 8 or 10 years old."  Weird where he got this idea from.

I told hubby about this.  A few days later, hubby brought home a beautiful pink fabric box of mooncakes from Shangri-La Hotel, courtesy of a friend.  It was an answered prayer!

A day or two after that, another box came in, this time they were homemade mooncakes from a colleague who gave them to hubby out of the blue!  More mooncakes!

Victoria's lantern

William's lantern

Blessings of mooncakes

The kids made lanterns at Art Class, and they hung them proudly at our porch.  So beautiful!

On the day itself (Thursday, 19th September - see, I know now... hehehe) I slaughtered the pomelo and we ate it after dinner, with mooncakes of course).

How was yours? 

His favourite singer has to be Matt Redman

William loves to listen to Matt Redman's song.  It started with this song entitled "Blessed Be The Name of The Lord" from the same-name album.  He almost drove his sister crazy by turning on this song everytime he gets into my car.  (As for me, I have been immuned.)

Matt Redman

 After he "mastered" this song by listening to it 1000 times (kids do this so effortlessly) and watching YouTube a couple of times, he has added a few more songs in the same album to his list of favourites.
 He now sings and part murmurs the following songs...

 

Everytime for the past few months, whenever I send him to school in the afternoon, he'd quickly switch on these songs and sings along all the way to school. Sometimes we just listen and enjoy.

Wondering if he'd still sing for me when he's 18... : )

The little or not-so-little blue creatures

Look who we bumped into the other day at Pavillion Shopping Mall?  The kids' favourite cartoon characters!  We even brought them for a cinema night to watch Smurf 2 and had sooooo much fun! 

Victoria with the Smurfette.  She already has 2 Smurfettes at home.

The Smurfs are taller than the kids in real life! 

Thereafter we had dinner at Morganfields to celebrate Theodore's 5th birthday.  

Morgan field's... Home of Sticky Bones??

Kids had free meals.  

Hickory BBQ Spare Ribs

Garlicky BBQ Spare Ribs

And the colorful jelly cake with the Lego theme for the birthday boy

A Day in the Park

When I dream of parks, I dream of clear blue lakes with rows of swimming ducks, oblivious to their surroundings, and graceful swans and hungry geese strolling alongside waiting to be fed by generous park-goers.  I dream of sunshine with cool breeze and pigeons and maybe seagulls too. 

But alas... this dream is only a dream and a memory of the parks we know from UK.  Last school holiday in August, we visited our very own City Park in Seremban 2 where the kids can play on the playground, feeds the fishes albeit most are overfed already, and where we discovered the crows have made this their hangout place too.

Forget pigeons and seagulls, here are the crows...  they remind me of the evil guys in the animation show, "Epic"

Gong Gong drove all 4 grandkids there - Andrew, Grace, Victoria and William.  Sharon stayed home with Popo for her bath and morning nap.  Not long after we just arrived, Andrew had a nasty fall head first from the slide and bit into his lower lip.  Poor boy was crying due to the pain and hubby went across to an eatery to get ice for Andrew.  The other three kids ran around and played whilst we 3 adults tried to pacify him and assure him that he will be alright. 

After some time, the other 3 cousins came over and prayed to God to stop the bleeding, then we decided to move on to feed the fishes.  The bleeding stopped soon after - praise God for answering prayers - and the 4 kids were then engrossed with feeding the fishes and tortoises in the pond.  The fishes are now very big and didn't seem so interested in the bread crumbs that we threw in. 

Here fishy fishy... eat your breakfast

See how chummy and adorable this two can get - William (5yo) and cousin Grace (6yo).  At one time, Grace got upset when William didn't hold her hand... hehehe.

Here's one with all four kids taken from Gong Gong's camera.

A Couple Getaway

After our little escapade to Bangkok in June for just hubby and I went down the drain, with air tickets bought and burned, hotel room booked and fully paid and non-refundable... we finally got our couple holiday in August, but this time to nearby Langkawi.  The last time we were in Langkawi was back in year 2000.  This trip was the last holiday booked for this year, although the second lined up.  It was initially planned to be our second couple getaway, but looks like it's the first.

Since we lost a bit of money for the Bangkok trip - thank God it was all at unbelievable promotional rates - we weren't feeling very benevolent for the Langkawi trip.  That, and also because the hotels were either obscenely pricey to begin with, such as The Andaman and The Datai or they were too shabby for a 4 star price.  Finally we decided to settle with a reasonably priced hotel along Cenang beach - Fave hotel as we were impressed by the exterior and interior of the rooms, plus looks new and clean.

New it was, but clean not up to standard.  Probably Malaysian clean, but not Korean-hotel clean.  If that means anything.

We left the kids in good hands of Mama Yeh Yeh, and took the late afternoon flight to Langkawi.  When we arrived the airport, our car was ready (thanks to some people and a few phone calls) and we took a slow drive to our hotel, stopping along the way for a quick look-see-look-see at the stalls.

We travelled on this during our stay on the island... most grateful!

Prices were not cheap, and goods were old and dusty with no variety.  Put it simply, nothing we've not seen before.  I think even our local night markets here offer better.  Yes... that badddd!!

The pool at the hotel was nice, only that it was too open for people walking in and out of the lobby or hanging around the cafe to see.  Plus I forgot my bikini swimming suit.

Enjoyed a local coconut and a plate of rojak by the road side.

At night, hubby didn't bring me far for dinner.  We merely had to walk down to the pool side, where he had pre-arranged and fully paid for the dinner even months before.  The hotel arranged a special table with candle lights at one corner of the pool just for us.  Although it was a nice quiet corner, we were not alone, because the mosquitoes decided to join in the fun!  The waiters thoughtfully brought 4 mosquito coils to stink them away.

During the dinner, a cricket jumped on our table, and in the midst of our main course, I saw movement behind hubby's back and almost screamed my lungs out... it was Frederick the Frog (or the Frog Prince if you like) who sneaked up behind him, and jumped near my Coach, and that freaked me even more... thank God my bag was zipped up because I wouldn't want to bring home a frog as souvenir!

That aside, the dinner was very pleasant, because it's rare times like this that we get served without feeling hurried, no kids to hush or mind over, and full privacy to ourselves.  Hubby, when he made the booking - did asked for a butler to be nearby throughout dinner, but I guess the hotel staff didn't understand him clearly.

After dinner, we went out to check out the night life  - there was almost none.. by this time I was really disappointment with Langkawi... c'on, it's a tourist area with beaches and duty-free liquor, so where's the dancing and music and gwailos??  We chanced upon a small shop offering fish spa, and this being our first time, dipped our legs into the aquarium of garra rufa fishes.  It was initially so ticklish for me and I was really tempted to take my feet out if not for the vain pot in me to have my dead skins exfoliated!!  Total RM10 for 10 minutes for 2 pax... reasonable mou?

The next day, we went to town for shopping.  Was nice that we had a mission - to buy a Yamazaki 25 years, on top of shopping for our own liquor.  I was too excited at the prices and almost planned to buy half a dozen wine plus a bottle of Sheridan coffee liqueur (cheapest was RM57) when hubby reminded me that we are only allowed 1 litre each through customs.  Wanna take the risk?

Well, at the end, no shops had Yamazaki 25 and we brought back only 2 bottles of wine, plus a lot of chocolates and a little souvenir for the kids.

We visited Nusantara selling traditional remedies made by jungle harvested herbs and a sea cucumber species where we bought some to try (help local industry mah)   

Massages in Langkawi were all full and no opportunity for walk ins, plus they were really expensive.  In my mind, I was still comparing Bali and Thailand with Langkawi where massages and shopping was so invitingly cheap.

On Day 2 dinner, we ate at Porto Malai Langkawi.  Hubby used to hang around here during his bachelor days and short stint in Langkawi. 

Mine

His

Pleasant place for a stroll and dinner

On our last day, we strolled along the Cenang beach again where hubby caught a baby crab ( because of my sharp eyes, hehe ) then we checked out and drove to the Crocodile farm (but didn't enter) and went hotel hopping.  We checked out Four Points by Sheraton and then lazed around in The Andaman before moving on briefly to The Datai and then down to town again to return the car.

Honest to the bone, we were both missing our kids even at the end of Day 1.  We called them a few times, and they were happy and didn't sound like they missed us.  Before leaving, William asked hubby if we didn't bring them along was because we didn't love them... awwww... that really broke our heart but it was good he asked and not assumed.

Well, the next two holidays will be as a family... and I'm looking forward!!

Happy Birthday Mi

To the most influential, outstanding and wonderful woman in my life... my mom.

We celebrated my mom's 66th birthday a few days earlier to coincide with the school holidays and also our short break in Seremban before returning to PJ.

Yi Yi made a room booking at Silver Dragon Restaurant where she is one of their regular customers due to business entertainments, if I may say... so altogether Popo Gong Gong, Yi Yi, myself and hubby, plus two maids and 5 boisterous, active grandkids (actually Sharon is too small to be labelled as boisterous, but since she has the same DNA it is safe to say that she will eventually be like her super active brother Andrew, or sporting talkative sister Grace, or even like her cousins Victoria the Tai Ka Cheh and William). 

Dinner started at around 730pm with a round of peanuts and ordering of foods.  After and during dinner, we had voluntary karaoke singing kicked off by William, Grace, Andrew and Victoria with Psy's Oppa Gangnam Style.  Thereafter, Gong Gong took over with serenading us with oldies.

We also finished off a bottle of year 2012 Merlot red wine by Queen Aberdeen.  Two bottles would have been more satisfying... : )  With our wine glasses, we each made a toast to our dear Mi and Popo.

Here's to long life, good health and multiple joys, ending love and warm friendships, above all God's blessings upon your life, Mi...

"You have always been my role model, ever more so now that I am a mom myself.  Sporadic and random times I find myself "in your shoes" and then I felt like I understood you even more.  

I remembered how you toiled in the kitchen to ensure we have home cooked meals and not catered nor tapau-ed food, a soup was almost a must.  

I remembered how you lovingly woke up early just to prepare my breakfast and then to wake me up without the slightest grump or whine.  I remembered how you were always there to pick me up, most of the times earlier than when my school dismissal time.  

I remembered more, how you'd sponge me when I was younger so that the fever subsides, how you'd ensure the floors were clean, the beds were made, the laundry washed and folded, and never once did you demand that we helped you.  

These, are just but a few of the many miracles I remembered.   

You to me, is my superwoman.  At this time, I feel I am less than half of what you are, and even a week without domestic help I am burned out with fatigue, two weeks and I'm almost a wreck and anything exceeding that, I am at risk of breaking down or two months - a walking time bomb.  

How can I even compare myself to you?  But yes, I know I am special because I am my mother's girl.  You are not only sacrificial, but you show never ceasing love.  A dedicated grandmother.  I pray God's blessing will continue to shower upon your life. "

Beancurd with minced pork

Pumpkin fried with salted egg.  It was supposed to be crunchy but this was soft and wet - still nice.  I kinda thing anything taste nice with salted egg

Prawnnnssss... my fav!  These were fresh and of reasonable size.  I told the Captain to pick those as big as possible. 

Steamed cod fish with soy sauce

Status quo... or default... or standard... the Yuin Choy

4 Sky King Belacan Style

Eating cake.

Vic enjoys cutting the cake and serving them

Sharing a moment with Kakak