Nostalgia

It’s almost 4am now and I am still studying for the final next week. Studying the catering science. Found that a lil bit boring and I don’t really wanna continue to study anymore. I was trying so hard to score in every test and coursework in the beginning of the semester but my stamina will go down like a slope in the end of the semester, it is the same when I was studying in Inti. Hope will change it.

I was chit chat with my sister and my brother-in-law when I took a break just now. He told me that I could take a long break to travel around wherever I want and try the food wherever I go. He spoke what my plan and I have planned all the way start from long long time ago. Undoubtedly, I will do it for sure. Not much, not going to Oz nor Europe countries. My target is the whole Asia, except Korea and Japan due to the inadequate of budget, I guess. Hopefully Japan and Korea will include in my travel route. But still far to go to achieve from now.

Recall back, the times pass away very fast. I am still a bit blur and hesitate that what I have learned for this several weeks. Do I learn a lot? Or I just learn a lil bit? Or I do not learn anything at all? Confusing. Thank God, at least I am so lucky that I always got to know some reliable, truthful friends wherever I go. My Cameron gang friends, TAR College friends, Inti buddies, my Subang housemates nice colleague, and now, friendly classmates in Singapore. Really appreciate it!

I am wondering how is the life of my Inti buddies in US, my Cameron gang in Malaysia, Russia, Taiwan and Australia, and all my friends in all over the world. How are you guys? May the force always be with you all. Cheers. I left somebody else? Yes! I miss my family, my place, my food so much…..! Thanks for your support all the way. I would not let you all down. Okay. Going to off to bed. Ciaoz!

MISS YA.....

Coca-Cola ZERO

I went shopping at Takashimaya with my sister. We bought some baby necessity since there’s a baby fair. On the way back to Orchard MRT station, we saw a promotion from Coca-Cola new product, Coca-Cola ZERO, which means that the new Coke is zero percent of sugar, protein, fat, carbohydrate and calorie, but taste like the original Coke. It’s made from the artificial sweetener, so this Coke is even suitable for diabetes patients as well. The promotion was all the Cokes were free! Everyone could take as many as they can from the ice box. I saw a lady took around 8 bottles and put into her grocery bag, then a building worker use his safety helmet to carry 5 bottles and took 2 bottles on another hand at the same times. LOL. My sister and I took 4 bottles. We tried it. The taste was so light. But it’s quite refreshing. Good job, Coke!

I had appointment with Edwin to continue my “hunt for food” in Singapore in Bugis. He brought me to Sim Lim Square food centre for a local delights, popiah and laksa. Basically the popiah was almost the same with Malaysia popiah, it’s just slightly smaller in size. The vegetables were too soft that couldn’t eat the texture of it. The sauce included Hoisin sauce (sweet in taste), chili paste. It had the crispy thingy inside as well, but not too much. Overall was not bad. Katong Laska in Singapore basically is almost the same with the Currry Laksa in Malaysia. It’s just so-so. If you go, you can give the popiah a try. After that we went for Taiwanese beef noodles. We had beef noodles set, which included a bowl of beef noodles, a side dish and a cup of Taiwan milk bubble tea. Taiwanese beef noodles is different from Vietnam PHO. The soup is thick and used a lot of Chinese herbs and spices like star anise, five spices, whereas the soup of Vietnam PHO is clear soup like Consomme and served with some fresh herb like basil leaves, coriander and fresh bead sprouts. Both kind of soup are rich of beef flavor though. For noodles, I prefer the noodles that made from rice in Vietnam PHO; the texture is good and very smooth. Back to the topic, the thick soup was sweet and rich of beef flavor, the noodles was okay, the beef was not tender and juicy enough, I’m not a beef person and seldom eat the tendon and stomach part. But the tendon was so soft that just like jelly. I like it though. The chili paste was not bad too, you can eat with the noodles and the tendon part. Yummy! We had different side dish, flower squid and braise slice pork. The squid was poached and serve with tomato ketchup, sesame oil and some thinly sliced ginger, quite appetizer. The braise slice pork was just so-so, it didn’t taste like fried nor braised. The skin layer of pork was hard. The milk bubble tea was not too sweet, just nice. You can give it a try. I found out that there’s quite a lot of nice food around that area. Should find out more next time. I wanted to try the dessert that opposite the beef noodles restaurant. But Edwin’s stomach was not feeling well. I guess was cause of the clam from the Laksa we had. So should avoid the raw clam if you couldn’t take it. It’s my fault too to ask Edwin to finish the clam. LOL. And I’m looking forward the next “hunt for food”! Jumpa lagi!

FISH FISH FISH

I was so excited when I knew that there’s a cooking competition. So lucky of us! My trainer, Ms Ong got the last seat of competition for me and my teammates, Shen Leng and Lee. The title was FISH. Ms Ong taught us her recipe that would suitable for most of the kind of fishes. So that we don’t have to worry whatever kind of fish we get. Then we started to think about the sauces and plating. We had just one day to prepare for the competition. Its sucks during the practice of the dish. Ingredients not prepared, the stove was not well organized, and knives were not sharp enough…. Freaking messy! The outcome was a disaster! After took the advices from Ms Ong, we had more familiar and more ideas with it.

Well, it was competition day. Most teams were formed from senior and we were the only freshman team and Wayne’s team as well. When the competition started, everyone was like had war, Lee filleted fish, Shen Leng cooked, and me in charged of garnish and sauces. The time was from 1:45pm to 6pm. But we had to complete our dish at 3:30pm. Means that we had only 1 hour and 45 minutes to do our dish. It’s freaking rush! Everyone was concentrating on their job and playing their roles perfectly. Cutting, washing, seasoning, cooking, garnishing and serving to the judges. All happened in a flash. We were so nervous when we served the dish to the judges, it was still fine eventually. There’s only one winner and the winner will represent our school for inter-college competition. Ironically, the winner was not from our culinary course, they were from pastry and baking course. What a shame! LOL. It’s undoubtedly that their plating was fantastic. But come to the taste wise, culinary teams were definitely much better than them. It’s just the main point of competition was all about the creativity and garnishing. I didn’t expect that we will win it since we just wanted to gain the experience. I was so grateful that I got the chance to compete with seniors. It’s definitely a fantastic experience for me. I saw a lot of wonderful garnished dishes from seniors. Splendid! I heard that there would be another cooking competition next month. I can’t wait for it and will go register it for sure. I’m coming! Cheers!

My team's product--> Confit Trout with seasonal vegetables and Gapazcho

wanna know the recipe?

Me and my teammates


My classmates, Wayne's team product


My team and Wayne's team


Other team's product, just some of it







<- winner's product


p/s

really thanks to Ms Ong to teach us recipe and gave us advices.

thanks for my teammates, Shen Leng and Lee for being my teammates and took part together.

thanks for my supportive classmates.

Changi Nasi Lemak and Nasi Ayam Penyet

Everyone will ask you “Have you ever try the famous Nasi Lemak in Changi?” There’s a famous and nice Nasi Lemak over there! HELL NO! I went there with my sister and brother-in-law for dinner today. There’s only a food centre in Changi and few food stalls were selling Nasi Lemak. BUT, only one food stall crowded by people and you would see a long queue in front of it. There you are! As a Malaysian, Nasi Lemak is just an ordinary food for me. I saw many people were queuing up for it, so I decided to give it a try too. My sister and I queued for 30 minutes, we bought two Nasi Lemak standard set which include fried chicken wing, egg, cucumber, dried anchovies, and chili paste. Cost $2.50 each. We brought it and sat in front of the Ayam Penyet stall. I was astonished and wondering why people queue up for more than 30 minutes for just an ordinary Nasi Lemak. It looked every Muslim in Malaysia could make it. And even some of the Nasi Lemak that sold in mamak might be taste better than it! Gosh! Nasi Lemak became very special when come to Singapore. And the Malay owners are making megabucks. Why people need to queue for so long? It’s not because it tasted good and special, it’s because they serve people in very slow motion. They did everything slow, packing Nasi Lemak slowly, collect money slowly, yet, they still chit-chat with each other while working, when they talked, they moved even slower.

Besides, we also tried the Nasi Ayam Penyet which was quite famous too. I was so lucky that I need not to queue up for it. And it tasted much much better than the goddamn Nasi Lemak. The specialty of Ayam Penyet is its extremely hot chili paste. It’s made from the dried chili instead of fresh capsicum. And the hot was irresistible. The chili paste has a strong pungent smell. Should give it a try though if you would like to challenge with hot! Well, I think I should quit studying of culinary and start my own business to sell Nasi Lemak in Singapore. LOL… Yet, don’t ever trust or think that the food is nice when you saw there’s a long queue of people. It’s a scam!

<- it tasted same with the nasi lemak in mamak Malaysia, nothing special !

Hunt for food

I had a nice sleep for me since it was raining heavily in the morning. What a good day! After had my typical Chinese breakfast (porridge and “you cha kuai”), I went to hunt for food with my friends today. Basically was my friends brought me for some nice typical Singapore food. Our destination was a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown.

Before that, I went to Tiong Bharu alone to looks for some nice food as well. However, this was my first time been to Tiong Bharu, and I didn’t know where to go without map. So I just gave a try at a Chinese Ramen restaurant. I had a family recipe curry chicken LaMian, ShangHai pork dumpling, and Chinese tea (PuEr). The handmade noodles were not bad, but not al dente enough. I like the curry taste due to the absent of the coconut milk in curry. It was Indian style; the herbs taste was strong and hot enough. It’s taste odd when you eat LaMian with curry. The pork dumpling was a disaster, the outer layer was hard, the texture and flavor of the stuffing were lost, couldn’t get the tenderness of pork as well. No wonder the price was a big different if compare with Din Tai Feng restaurant. Overall was just so-so.

I was wandering around since I reached early. I bought a Germany hotdog, which was homemade and sold by a German. The meat taste strongly and the texture was good. Ate with mustard sauce, simply the best!

Actually I was stuffed, but I still wanna go for some food, I went to a dessert shop which was famous and historical in Chinatown. I had a recommended dessert, mango with pomelo and sago. Nobody knows that my favorite fruit is mango. So no matter where I go, the mango flavor dessert will be my first choice. Back to the topic, the mango was sweet enough, the sweetness of the mango and a slightly bitterness of pomelo, it’s just nice. Should give it a try!

It’s time to meet up with my friends in the MRT station. We went to the Chinese restaurant but it closed due to the holiday of the restaurant staffs. What a pity! We went for Thai food which was just beside the Chinese restaurant. We had mango salad, green curry chicken, Tom Yam seafood, omelette with minced pork, and a KaiLan with oyster sauce. The mango salad was an antipasto; it stimulated appetite due to the sourness and greaseless, the mango and papaya were crunchy also. The green curry chicken was too sweet, and the taste of baby eggplant was too strong, I don’t like it though. The Tom Yam seafood was just so-so. I still prefer the clear soup. The omelette with minced pork and the KaiLan with oyster sauce were just like normal homecook dish. Last but not least, we had a mango and sticky rice with coconut milk as dessert. An authentically Thai dessert, the sticky rice was good, but the quality of mango needs to be improved.

After that we went to my friend’s cousin’s pub had some beers and chew the fat. We were stuffed, especially me. It wasn’t a good makan-makan trip due to the unsatisfactory of food. Well, it was a good start though. I hope my next makan-makan trip will be more interesting and get the highlight of foods. See ya!

The Leap Year

So called Leap Year, means that there was 29 days in February which was once in 4 years. And I had my practical test for canapés and salad sandwich. I had much confident for myself in this test. We had to make 4 kinds of canapés included salad and sandwich which were called Ceviche of Scallop, Pantanella al Pomodoro (Italian tomatoes and brad salad), Lamb open face sandwich, and smoked salmon with caviar. Everything was going smoothly during the test until the end. After the presentation of dishes, the comment I got was the cutting for salad and sandwich too big. Then I passed the scallop and smoked salmon canapés. Quite disappointed that I did a mistake in my salad and sandwich. And now I knew that what should I cut during making salad. Just wanna write something for the Leap Year since it was only once in every 4 years. Ands here were my opus. Well... Will update more soon about my makan-makan trip in Singapore. Looking forward to it…. Ciaoz!

<- lamb sandwich

<- Italian tomatoes and bread salad

<- smoked salmon with caviar canapes and cevhice of scallop (spoon)