Dumpling Madness

I made a batch of minced pork and prawns the other day and went mad with dumpling making...

My first dumpling batch was Japanese Gyoza... I wrapped the meat in Gyoza skins and pan fried them, they look similar to Chinese Sui Jiao. Mmmmm, so yummy! We ate them so fast that I forgot to take photos.

photo courtesy of www.cuisinejaponaise.be

The next batch of dumplings were the familiar Chinese Wantans...


One batch of them was pan fried and served crispy like this... dip in some mayonaise - oooohhhh... heavenly!


The rest of them I boiled like this...


And served them with mee suah...


I lurve dumplings... and I also lurve mee suah... mee suah is one of my favouritest comfort food... so my tummy feels quite satisfied tonight and I feel quite happy, thankyouverymuchie.

*breathing huge sigh of satisfaction*

*pat tummy*

*happy burp*

Easy version of pisang goreng

I had a craving for Pisang Goreng.

I didn't have the energy and resources to make the full version, so I made this alternative version using mashed banana.

Basically I mashed up some banana with flour and sugar, then fried dollops of it in about 1 cm of oil.

Turned out like this...


Quite nice actually. Not exactly the same as the original Pisang Goreng, but at least the taste is somewhat there.

Are you a Hoarder or a Spender?

Money, money, money
Must be funny
In the rich man's world
Money, money, money
Always sunny
In the rich man's world
Aha-ahaaa
All the things I could do
If I had a little money
It's a rich man's world

That was one of the popular ABBA songs my bros and I liked to sing when we were kids... not because we were obsessed with money... we were too young and innocent then to really know what the big deal about money was all about... we just found the tune really catchy!

But whenever the subject of money issues come up... I replay the song in my head, and sometimes it helps me to see how ridiculous a situation is whenever a money issue becomes too big a deal, either for myself or for other people around me I know.

Although it is sometimes amusing to see the kind of reactions and emotions money creates for some people... it cannot be denied that money is indeed a very real issue that we all have to deal with.

No matter who you are... whether how 'free' or 'bo chap' or 'unwordly' a person claims to be, no one is exempt, everyone is affected by money to some degree. And it's not something to be ashamed of, because money really makes the world go round. Money is essentially the substance of our time, blood, sweat, labour and toil.

I think the most terrible negative effect of money is to be the cause of family quarrels. It is an ugly and heartbreaking thing to see.

Obviously it is not money itself that is evil. It is essentially a heart issue... there are basically two types of money attitudes...

#1... The Hoarder

OR

#2... The Spender

The hoarder (which is not the same as a saver) basically hoards money out of insecurity. The spender on the other hand spends money for self pleasure alone. In both cases, it comes from a spirit of selfishness and not having true contentment.

I've met some families who are being torn apart by money issues. And my heart cringes at the sheer ugliness of it. This is something I never want to see happen in my own family and among my own future children.

One of the common issues is the whole 'inheritance' matter. I've seen how some people hang on to their own self-centered presumption of this so called 'right'. They simply wait around and get resentful of others, waiting for their big break to happen when they finally get a piece of the family pie. So they wait and wait, and they forget about what they can actually do in the now - today. They refuse to see the blessings they already have and how they can be good stewards of it to multiply what they have now for the future.

Hubby and I made a pact a long time ago that we will focus on the NOW. Whatever we have now, we will enjoy it, bless others with it and multiply it. Any inheritance is not a 'right', no one owes it to us - because it is a gift. After all if given a choice, I would rather have my parents around longer rather than get my inheritance earlier (if you know what I mean).

Phew! Long post... anyway, this is just some of my current thoughts... I've just heard about money issues happening with someone I know, which set me thinking about the whole thing in general.

Gossip cheers you up

Received a call last night from a dear sister in London... feel so important to receive a long distance call all the way from UK leh... aiseh!

As usual we talked about everything but nothing in particular. Mostly catching up on the usual gossssipssssss... I think a little bit of gossip - i.e. the good natured non-malicious sort where you take a real interest in life around you (that's the truth!) can really help to cheer one up.

We all need a good dose of 'kampung' news every now and then whenever we are far away from home.

So please feed me... I need a dose too!

Egg in a basket

On the menu for breakfast today: "egg in a basket"

Take a couple of bread slices and make a hole in a middle of each slice. Drop a few knobs of butter in a frying pan and place the bread in the pan. Crack an egg in the hole of each slice of bread, let it cook for a while before turning over.


Lovely...


Enjoy!

Investment tip: Let someone else pay your mortgage

Do you recall that we recently bought our first Australian investment property

Anyway good news... we found a tenant!!! At least our agent found the tenant... anyway, we have a tenant!

Really praise God... and it happened so quickly with minimal fuss or delay. The agent advertised it on the net last week, we had one home viewing last Saturday... and immediately received 2 applications.

One was an elderly couple who just moved to Perth from Melbourne

The other was a bunch of 3 girls with a dog, a cat and a kitten

Obviously we would prefer the elderly couple, but at first they only wanted 6 months lease, we prefer 12 months. So we asked the agent to discuss with them again and get them to consider 12 months. So they agreed!!! And at the price we wanted too without having to negotiate at all.

That takes quite a load off our minds because these tenants will be helping us to pay a good part of our mortgage off each month.

Crazy woman's mood swings

Today I lost my temper at hubby... which was not very good...

You see he had uninstalled my Nokia PC Suite on the computer, so now I can't upload e-books to read on my mobile phone... soooo sian! I pinged him on MSN to tell him off, which was not very tactful or considerate of me.

I felt quite bad about it afterwards... hubby was very nice, he didn't mention it or act grumpy when he came home from work. I tried to make it up to him by making his favourite veggie dish - spinach fried with garlic (it turned out very nice!)

Later on in the car while we were on the way to YA Combined Cell, I meekly apologised for losing my temper. He was very sweet and didn't lecture (like he sometimes does).

I don't know what's happening with me these days... I seem to be losing my temper and getting mood-swingy so easily. Yesterday I lost my temper when we were discussing some accounting stuff for our cafe business in Singapore - he was so pedantic about it that I just lost it at one point. The day before I also lost my temper over some questions hubby was asking about some property investment.

These mood swings better not become a bad habit with me... don't want to end up like some crazy woman who drives her whole family crazy with erratic moods.

A little more effort for dinner today

Had the day off today, so decided to put a little more time and effort to conjure up something special and different for dinner.

On the menu today...

(1) Pork & fish patties

Mince and mix together pork mince, fish fillet, chopped onions, garlic, soy sauce, sesame oil, salt, pepper, and a bit of cornflour



Shallow fry dollops of the meat mixture in wok - flatten slightly as they cook so they cook evenly on both sides




(2) Fried beehoon

Chop some cabbage, onions, garlic... and prepare rice vermicelli noodles (a.k.a. beehoon) - the key to get the beehoon just right is to first soak it in normal tap water for 15 minutes, then blanche it quickly by pouring boiling water over the noodles... fry together and add oyster sauce, salt pepper, chilli etc.




Tadaa!!! Hubby is so lucky to have me!

Geram

"I hate deadlines"

Brief mental escape

Feeling complete stoned tonight... long day at work, not to mention long week as well... didn't get home until almost 8pm, so no time to cook dinner - we drove through Hungry Jacks to grab a couple of Bacon Deluxe burgers (I am such a bad wife!)

The whole trip home, my brain was in 'hibernate' mode... I was basically staring into open space in a blank the whole time.

Then for a brief moment, an image flicked across my mind - me on my red bicycle, brothers on theirs, cycling up and down the lorong outside our house... a couple of neighbourhood kids running up to join us... my little 'Snowball' at my heels happily sniffing around...

It was a clear mental snapshot - no idea why it suddenly appeared in my mind. Maybe for a moment I was feeling so miserable about all the endless responsibilities, workload, burdens (not that I'm doing that great in juggling them all) that I tried to escape just for a moment, if only my memories.

But less than a split second later, I was back where I was... with the numerous tasks and responsibilities crowding in once again...

No chance to say goodbye

Hubby just got off the phone with a friend who's cousin just passed away. We saw the announcement in the chuch bulletin. We didn't know this guy personally, but his cousin was hubby's coursemate at uni. So it was appropriate to give his coursemate a call to offer our condolences

It's another sad story of the sudden unexpected death of a very young person. He was only in his twenties. Apparently this young man met with a car accident, but he didn't have any major injuries. A few days later he had a very bad headache, so he took a couple of panadols and went to bed. The next morning, his mother went to his room to wake him up and found that he was no longer breathing.

Such a sad thing to happen. I think the saddest thing is to have a loved one taken away in such a sudden manner, without a chance for having any of those last lingering moments together.

Death is inevitable. But the most I would ask for if I had to lose a loved one is a chance to say goodbye. That would be what I would ask for.

Picnic

Farewell picnic for Keflin at Burswood...

Eating our food and enjoying a game of Cho Tai Ti



Actually to be honest, we were supposed to be having a picnic at the outdoor cinema. But when we arrived at the area, we found a picnic spot which gave us a good view of the huge movie screen. So we were able to enjoy a free peek some of the movie scenes. But most of the time, we were all yakking away... I think we were the noisiest group there.

Good fun!

After work drinks

On Friday after work, the whole team at my office headed down to Rigby's for farewell drinks for one of my colleagues who was leaving.

This is a quick peek at what the scene at our table was like...



Just your regular beer and some white wine. Overall the session wasn't really unpleasant... but all throughout the session my mind kept wandering off to other things I would rather be doing... like cooking a really nice dinner (the food at Rigby's was horrible), lazing in front of the TV, or spending time in the company of my own friends...

At one point I was starting to feel really sien because I thought much what was happening was really a waste of time... waiting for people to finish work and shut down computers, waiting to get a table, waiting for people to arrive, waiting for drinks, waiting for food, and the meaningless small talk on things that don't really matter to me.

I don't think my feeling of sien-ness showed very much... hubby says I am a champion at talking dead things to life... so I rambled on and joined in the nonsense at the table... but I distinctly felt that I was definitely losing my edge in this skill... I lose my talking stamina more quickly and struggle to think of things to talk about more often. Maybe it's the different cultural setting? After all there is only so much I can talk about cricket and it's definitely one of the top favourite topic among Aussies here (something to look into perhaps?)

I didn't want to be the first to leave, so I took the cue to leave about 20 minutes after one colleague headed off... and as I stood up to go, another colleague took my cue and took his leave together with me...

Maybe I'm not the only one who feels this way about office socials. Then why do we let ourselves go through this anyway?

P.S. Another thing that just popped to my head about why I don't like socialising in pubs or pubs... I just find it so exhausting to talk loudly over the din to make yourself heard. Aussie pubs are not so bad compared to the club scene which was a favourite after office social spot when I was working in Singapore... maybe I'm just one of those that simply "don't get it". I wouldn't call myself a homebody that never goes out... because I've been there and done all that already. So is this just considered "square" or just getting old?

Stir fry meal

Haven't cooked a proper home dinner in some time... that's what hubby said... actually his definition of a 'proper' dinner is anything with rice. So tonight I whipped up a mini culinary symphony of Chinese stir fry.



Stir fried cabbage with ikan bilis
Cabbage
Carrots
Ikan bilis
Oyster sauce

Tom yum prawns stir fry
Prawns
Capsicum
Tom yum paste
Soy sauce

This is me...

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Catering for a dozen

I was asked to prepare some food for 12 members of Team Extreme who were this Sunday's guest speakers at church.

So I made spaghetti bolognaise with my own homemade pasta sauce - grilled onion and garlic tomato sauce.

I pre-grilled red spanish onions, brown onions and garlic cloves in the oven with some olive oil, salt and pepper...

Grilling onions really brings out their full sweet flavour... I just love onions anyway! And the smell of grilled garlic cloves is a heavenly aroma...

Then when you blend them together with the tomatoes... ooooh, BEST!!!



Woke up a little earlier this morning to cook the spaghetti and pack the food into containers - with hubby's help of course.

Hope they like it!

Nice fruities

Nice to look at... Nice to eat!

Elusive happiness

[Yellow duckie calling red dog... do you read me... over...]

I am going through a very strange phase in my life right now. Sigh. Sometimes I feel so tired keeping on this facade of my seemingly being in control of everything. I'm just the same as you and everyone else in my pursuit of happyness. Can we ever really obtain happiness? Maybe this whole life is simply just that - the continuous pursuit of an elusive happiness.

I feel I have been slowly changing all this time. And at one point in my life, it seems I'm all set out to work in a typical professional role in a corporate world. But now things have been happening and thoughts have been coming into my head that are making me have second thoughts.

I think I don't know myself anymore. It's very frustrating. I feel like I'm trying to be someone I'm not. But at the same time I feel trapped.

So how? I also dunno...

Official homeowners!

The final settlement is complete.

Our property agent just popped by to drop of the keys to our new house

And he also left a little something else...



Woohoo! We can celebrate tonight!

New gadget

Have a look at my new Dyson DC08 Vacuum Cleaner

"What is a Dyson?" you may ask... in response to this, I will just let Wiki do the explaining here

Almost everyone we spoke to here raves about how great this marvelous piece of machinery is. I was dubious at first, but as soon as I felt the power of this cleaner in my hands while helping to clean up after the YA Christmas Chill last year, I knew I had to own one too. Plus I was also impressed with the fact that it didn't need any replacing of bags or filters at all.

We hadn't got a vacuum cleaner yet since we moved to Perth. So hubby agreed that we might as well spend a bit more to get a really good vacuum cleaner instead of just buying a cheap one only to have to buy a better one later.

So we made a few phonecalls to enquire after some prices and went out to get it.

Doesn't it look beautiful?

Moments that define our lives.

Life is a struggle;

We toil,

To make a living,

By the sweat of our brow.

Yes.

We labour and toil.

For moments,

That make life, life.

It's the moments that define our lives.

Family, values, parenting

Missing home. Maybe it's because I realise that Chinese New Year is finally over but there was just a little something missing which can never fully get except from HOME. Something about the atmosphere and people that is different.

During the course of a few conversations with various people yesterday, someone will always mention something about Malaysia and Singapore and compare those places with Perth... what's good... what's bad...

I love Perth.

And I am grateful that I have an opportunity to live life here. And occasionally I suck in my breath in relief when I come across news from back home like this...

Malaysian PM's new $50-mln jet order sparks row

Religious department defends khalwat raid on Americans

Students and academics forced to 'Aku Janji' document

But then again I realise, these are big issues that most times, don't affect the everyday living... people still carry on... life still goes on for the ordinary folk...

And quite a significant part of me wants to go back to my homeland. Because deep down inside, I treasure the experiences and values I am surrounded with growing up in Malaysia. And I realise that these would be things that my children will probably never get to experience here in Perth. They would grow up to be a different breed of kids altogether, and little corner of my heart my fears that I will not be able to relate to this part of them. Can I face that?

Yesterday one of our cell members was talking about how she was seriously contemplating going back to live in Singapore for a few years and bring up her kids the Singaporean way for the first part of their lives and come back to Perth again later.

And I recall another cell member who jokingly suggested that a few of us families should band together to form our own little home schooling centre and bring up our kids together. He seemed to be joking for the most part, but I think part of him was serious about it too.

So as I reflect, I think the main issue is not the controversial news from our homeland. Most of the time, I just find this kind of news just good entertainment.

But the core issue here is about family, and values, and parenting.

Or maybe I'm simply just being paranoid about the whole issue in its entirety.

Just a thought.

It's a holi-holi-day!

Public holiday today!!! It's Labour Day in WA.

Just woke up not long ago at 10am... to do laundry... haven't slept in this late in such a loooong time. But it's mainly because we really had a full on day yesterday, play play play the whole day.

Our church has crossed over into a new era. We have moved to a bigger hall that can seat double the capacity. And yesterday was Freshies Welcome which happens at the start of every semester. So hubby and I volunteered to help out in the ushering team as they were shorthanded. We were there since 8am helping out with the preparations and all.

By the time we finished cleaning up, packing up and everything, it was already 2.30pm and Happy Meals was closed. So we had lunch at Good One BBQ... I had chilli pepper pork and rice, not bad! And then we adjourned for ice cream at Baskin & Robbins. Sooooo sinful.

By the time we got home, it was already past 4pm. We barely had enough time to catch our breath, change before we were off to Ter's house for the Poker Champion Hunt!

Eu Lynn cooked SO MUCH FOOD!!! I tell you I was so full I was just too stoned to do anything else. But it was good... some people have such natural flair with cooking.

Hubby played a few rounds of poker, then we had to leave to go for supper with some of our cell members at Northbridge. So hubby just did an "all in" and pushed all his chips forward on the table so he can donate his chips to the next winner. Good thing he didn't win, otherwise he might be probably hooked and spend the whole night there with a beer in hand, flicking his chips. Anyway, the guys were quite terrible because they still wanted to force him to drink a spoon of si-yao as punishment for walking out of the game... hahaha, but it's alright lar...

Northbridge was pretty crowded that night. We ate at Hawker's Cuisine in Chinatown. I was sooo full I couldn't really eat anything, but I ordered this "Three Layer's Milk Tea with Gula Melaka"... rather disappointing, could hardly taste the gula melaka... oh well, but we had a good time talking all sorts of crap as usual...

After everything, I think we finally got home at 2pm... yaaaa, definitely tired... but it's a public holiday the next day anyway *grin*

Back to work again tomorrow, but let's not spoil the day with sad thoughts.

Tata... off to have some brekkie!

I have some pandan mantao....mmmmmm.... pandan is my favouritest mantao flavour!