Christmas, The Good The Bad and The Ugly

The Good - dinners and lunches and exhibitions with BIKSS over the last couple of weeks - 

Lunch at a newly discovered French-style restaurant.

Cheese plate, smoked duck salad, mushroom and chestnut soup,

turkey breast, grilled (I forget what type of) fish.

Pre-Christmas dinner at a French restaurant before that, a place we have been wanting to try for a while now. So since it was OUR Christmas dinner we decided to go. It was a little underwhelming. A popular spot, it seemed like they were more concerned with just turning tables over as quickly as they could. Probably never again. 

Fish Quenelles, roasted squash w/risotto, b-sprouts and foie gras.

We also had some time to peruse the Banksy exhibition that was in town. Fascinating stuff. We both had a good time looking at the art. 

I really like the rat themed pieces.

The Bad - after church this morning after we had crossed the road, we saw an elderly couple fall while they were crossing. My caregiver went over to help, then turned back to look at me and made the symbol for "telephone". Uh - oh. 

Some other church goers stopped to assist too. But in the end we ascertained that the wife needed medical attention. Thankfully she wasn't the stubborn sort. I think I should go to the emergency room, she suggested, when I asked if she wanted to be taken to the clinic near our homes. As luck would have it, they live near me. A mere 5 minute walk from my flat. 

I called a ride-share and took them both to the hospital's emergency room. Along the way we managed to contact the wife's sister who said she would come straight away. The husband needed some convincing. He was insistent that if I didn't want to be reimbursed for transport, then he would owe me a favour. Right, you can do me the favour of giving me peace of mind by registering yourself at the emergency dept too, I said. Let them look you over cos even tho you don't seem to be bleeding anywhere, you took a fall too. Flat on the wife. Who thankfully just had flesh wounds. He agreed reluctantly. 

After a bit the sister arrived and we took off, but not before speaking to their daughter (who lives an hour away) and son in law. 

I took their numbers and they promised to update me. The daughter just texted to let me know that mum needed stitches on her forehead, she finally got to the hospital and is now with them. 

All good I suppose. I reassured them that they could call me anytime if they needed any help since the sister is 30 mins away and the daughter is far far far away (by our standards). I'm 5 minutes on foot. So yeah. It'll be a lot quicker for me or CG1 to get to them if they need anything. 

The Ugly - I had Christmas eve dinner at my place for my close friends. The people nearest and dearest to me. Betty's birthday is the 24th so I throw her a Christmas cum birthday party here every year. It's not happened in the last 2 years tho since mum wasn't in the best shape to tolerate a huge to-do here. But I resumed my annual tradition this year and Betty's girlfriend was in attendance. And I don't like her. 

Two friends from the freecycle / food rescue group I had gotten closer to were also in attendance. And while one of them is a lovely person, the other, I realised, tends to be the sort that just SAYS what she thinks she ought to to be thought of as a good person. She'll say this and that and then not follow thru. 

And BOTH of them share the same malady of being snobs. They're both very well to do, and I do NOT appreciate the way they speak to or think of or dismiss my caregiver, whom I treat as a sister, a companion and a true friend. They on the other hand think of her as merely THE HELP. But even then, you do NOT get to speak down to her, seeing as she's MY hired help, not YOURS. 

Too many details to get into, but suffice to say I'm done with these two. I'll be cordial, sure. But don't expect me to include them in my inner circle anytime soon (or ever!). 

------------

For now, Blessed Christmas everybody.

All the Food and Gifts from Portugal

Forgive me readers.. it has been 10 days since my last entry. 

Mostly I've been lazy. But also my brain is tired all the time from dealing with the incompetence of caregiver #2. We have been scrambling to find a replacement asap. I managed to get in touch with a friend's ex-caregiver who took care of her mum during the last 3 years of her life as she succumbed to dementia too. We're getting the paperwork started as soon as she clears her medical in her home country. 

Which, hopefully, will be TOMORROW! Fingers crossed that she's fit for overseas deployment. 

Meanwhile, the new washing machine is great. For some reason I can actually smell the soap on my clothes with this washer. I don't know if that's a good thing or not. But it smells good. At the end of the cycle everything is also drier than in the old machine. So it's cut my dryer time by 30 mins! 

I realise that since I've been so busy trying to get the Thailand fotos up on the blog, I've not posted any of the OTHER food pics from our date nights. So you're gonna get them all at one go. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

NUMBER 1 - We (well, I) apparently couldn't get enough of Thai cuisine following the recent holiday so we went and had MORE Thai food when we came back. 

Dinner at a place we've eaten at before, but this time we decided to try stuff we've never tried. 

Crab Tanghoon in claypot - crab good. tanghoon good. chinese parseley, not so much.

Sour spicy coconut milk and seafood soup. Interesting. Rich. Thick. I would eat this again.

Stir fried kangkong. Deceptively spicy. Didn't look it. Sure was tho.

NUMBER 2 - One hot clammy evening, BIKSS' car decided it didn't want to start. So it (and we) were stuck in the basement carpark of a nearby mall. Well, the car was. So that's where we went. He was on the fone with a million people trying to see to a tow truck etc... so I decided to hop into a Vietnamese place we were familiar with. 

It's kinda weird. Every time we eat there we agree it's really delicious. But we never actually REMEMBER to go back there when we have a craving. It's only ever by chance that we dine there again and we say to each other each time that it's a good place to go for Vietnamese food. It's as if our memories get wiped when we leave the restaurant LOL. These are their fried spring rolls. Veggie ones I think. I can't quite remember ... hur hur hur. 

Bun Thit Hue Nuong - Rice vermicelli, grilled pork, fried spring rolls with a very delicious sweet and sour sauce that we got an extra serving of and poured over the whole thing! It's basically Bun Cha without the meatballs.

Grilled something. Maybe more pork. 

Banh Flan - Vietnamese coffee and caramel flan

NUMBER 3 - This Russian restaurant run by Hainanese cooks (don't ask me... I have no clue how THAT came about) has been around for decades. It's pricey, but kind of  an "old school" restaurant. Dark, quiet, with a little murmuring of conversation that never quite goes above an acceptable "polite" volume. I loved it. The food, well.. it was interesting... I'll give them that. It was the first time there for both of us. I'm glad we got to try it together.

Borshch -

A hearty classic Russian broth with Angus beef brisket, slow cooked to perfection

Blinis Caviar -

Homemade Russian pancakes served with caviar and créme fraiche

SHASHLIK of BEEF - 

The menu states "Our Shashliks are traditionally served without sauce as the meats are specially marinated, please request for sauce if you need any."

So we ate ours with the pickles and veggies that came with it. I don't usually eat heavily seasoned food anyway, so this was exactly like eating at home! I've been known to eat unseasoned and unsauced food. 

Baked Alaska -

Wellington of ice cream, sponge cake and meringue, flambéed with dark rum

Here's a video - 

NUMBER 4 - Afternoon tea at a mid-range hotel coffeehouse with an Asian twist! Turned out their savouries were good. Their sweets, not so much. This was part of the afternoon we spent together before he left for his work trip to Portugal. And also the day I bought my new washing machine.

Laksa in a jar

Fried "carrot" cake aka radish cake aka chai tow kway. The reason some people call it carrot cake is because daikon or radish (which is the main ingredient in this savoury dish) is known in Chinese as 'white carrot'. Hence, fried carrot cake.

Not great mini burgers and not great 'pie tee' either.

An assortment of cakes and things. Top shelf, meh. Bottom shelf - quite delicious.

Satay in a jar

NUMBER 5 - After shopping for the washing machine we went to a pizza place by the marina. We'd never eaten there before so decided to try it. I ate half a pizza. And the meatballs. And the veggies. And I finished everything in no time at all! I must have been really hungry or really stressed. I have been known to get very very hungry and eat-y when I've been working my brain. And I had definitely been working my brain with the caregiver issues and the washing machine issues recently.

A half and half pizza, grilled veggies, and (below) meatballs in gravy.

NUMBER 6 - The post-worktrip dinner. We went to a mall that houses a few Thai restaurants and a Thai supermarket, cos I wanted to have a look at the offerings. We didn't make it to the supermarket... so I think we'll go tomorrow instead. 

Stir fried veggies - GOOD

Grilled pork skewers - also GOOD

Seafood curry fry up. I enjoyed this one tremendously. 

BIKSS looked at the all-orange mass on the plate and announced "that's not going to photo well". 

I agreed. This was the best I could do. 

.... and now.... PRESENT TIME!

BIKSS was in Portugal for a work thing. And since I couldn't come with, I did the next best thing. I googled "Best souvenirs from Lisbon" and gave him a shopping list - The Rooster of Barcelos was one of the items on that list.

From the www :

In Portugal, the rooster is a symbol of faith, good luck and justice based on the legend of the "Old Cock of Barcelos". The legend tells a story about a pilgrim traveling through Spain who is accused of stealing silver from a landowner, and is sentenced to death by hanging.

To plead his innocence, he begs the judge to reverse his sentence. The judge was about to tuck into a roasted cockerel, when the pilgrim vowed that as proof of his innocence the cockerel will stand up on his plate and crow.

The judge pushed aside his meal and laughed. As the pilgrim was about to be hung, the cockerel miraculously stood up and crowed. Leaving the judge in disbelief, he then hurried to the gallows to free the innocent man.

Many years later, the pilgrim returned to Barcelos to carve a statue of the cockerel, where the legend and symbolism lives on til this day.

Also, a dozen Portuguese egg tarts. These were HIS suggestion, not an item on my list. They're a LOT sweeter than the ones that are sold in where-I-live, and a fair bit "stickier" too. Still, it's good eating. He asked if I wanted 6 or 12. Of course I said 12. 

I collect magnets. So I had it on my list. Along with a picture of a clay magnet with the Lisbon tram on it so he would know exactly what to look for. He couldn't find any clay ones, but he did get these. I have taken possession of the one on the right. I am still waiting for the one on the left. 

And on top of all that, a surprise - we got in the car and he gave me a present, wrapped in red paper with a bow and everything. (The shop wrapped it for him, he said.) 

It was an Azulejo bracelet - absolutely beautiful, but impossible for me to put on or take off on my own. This requires a second person to work the adjustable bands hahahah. 

And wait, the CHEESES! 

Cured (aged) sheep milk cheese on the left, made in Portugal, and a Very Delicious Camembert - subtle and pungent at the same time. I don't know how else to describe it. I wondered why he would get FRENCH cheese from Portugal, instead of just more Portuegese cheese - turns out it's a lot cheaper there. Less than 2 Euro, he tells me. It'll be about 10 to 12 Euro here for that same size wheel. Cheese is generally expensive in Asia which is why I don't buy a lot of good (or ANY) cheese. But I DO love me my cheeses. And I think I tolerate the 'smelly' cheeses better than most of the people I know. Got that from my Mamma. 

Quick aside - I recently picked up some natural goat cheese at the store cos it was on clearance. (How else am I going to afford it!?!) When I got home I offered some to the caregivers to try - cos they'd never tried it before. BOTH of them immediately made a face and went looking for a beverage to kill the taste. Then popped some candy to try and recover from the "stink" of the cheese. I then turned to mum and popped a little bit from my finger into her mouth. Her eyes widened, she looked at me, and when I offered her more she readily accepted. She had three fingertip-fuls in all. The caregivers looked on in disbelief. 

I am my mother's daughter, I announced.  

I haven't got into the sheep milk cheese yet but I hear it's less pungent than goat cheese. (Also isn't it strange that one is sheep MILK cheese and the other is just GOAT cheese?) I do still have a bunch of other cheese to get through first before I open that one up. 

Right. And now I have to go to bed. It's been a long day and this has been a long post. 

Here's the bag of sotong flavour crackers I've been snacking on while putting this post up.

Oat to Joy and other Food Pics

I told the doctor boss about my 1 oat cookie encounter. He has advised trying to desensitise my gut. So I've been eating 1/4 of a cookie daily. He's quite adamant about the daily intake thing... that's the only way to give my gut  the "poison" regularly so that I build up a tolerance again. 

The first 3 days it did still cause some discomfort. But by yesterday it was more tolerable. After a week, and ONLY if it doesn't give me any reaction, I can up the 'dose' to 1/2 a cookie. I'm glad that we have some sort of a plan at solving this problem. 

Of course he did say that if it IS a missing enzyme issue caused by AGEING (yuck) and not just an immune reaction, then I may not ever be able to reverse it. But we'll see. 

This week's pics have been taken with an iphone XR and a hot sauce packet beside the plates for size. Here's a bunch of satay, grilled squid rings with chilli, and some brinjal from a used-to-be-popular-especially-for-tourists food court near one of our biggest gardens (also very touristy!). 

grilled chicken skewers served with a savoury-sweet peanut dipping sauce

grilled squid with chilli sambal sauce - this one was meant to be shared... so definitely enough for 2

I think it was a stirfry - brinjal with minced pork in a soy based sauce

And yesterday I asked BIKSS what he fancied for dinner, he said, how about a street side stall (we call them hawker stalls or coffee shops - not to be confused with the Starbucks type of coffee shop) run by ex-restaurant chefs? 

Apparently there have been tons of those in the last 5 years or so. With many restaurants closing down during Covid, a lot of the chefs have struck out on their own and started up tiny stalls in hawker centres and coffee shops, bringing with them "restaurant level food at hawker prices"... whole write-ups have been published in local newspapers and online news sites about this phenomenon. 

So I went hunting and found one relatively nearby. 

It wasn't as cheap as regular hawker food, but given the same thing would have cost us double in a restaurant, I thought it was well worth it. Besides, I had $15 on my rebate app that I used to offset the $60 bill. 

Left - pork ribeye with pineapple (I thought it was strange but tasted alright actually!) and Right - single portion beef wellington. It was a first time trying this for both of us. I had no complaints. The beef was very tender! 

And yes, I just discovered that pork ribeye is a thing! I never knew it existed. 

What is a pork ribeye?

The ribeye chop not only looks like a ribeye steak, but it is also juicy like it's bovine counterpart. This chop comes from the rib end of the pork loin which is smaller in size and is an ideal single portion size.

So now we know. BIKSS didn't know it was a thing either. LOL. Guess it's just not too popular in where-I-live.

The beef was tender and juicy and the chef advised us to cut it immediately if we wanted it medium rare, or else to just let it cook a little longer in the pastry case if we preferred our beef done well. We cut it immediately. I was not disappointed. Also, I'm a huge pastry fan and this one didn't disappoint.

And then we went grocery shopping to use up a voucher that BIKSS got from some other purchase which he kindly donated towards feeding my hungry clan (the new caregiver eats a LOT), and I ended up getting myself a couple of bags of truffle chips along with the other stuff. Because, CHIPS!

(not this brand tho....)

Don't Take Your Gut for Granted

Some time back I had a bowl of oats for lunch. Then I felt sick. And constipated. Oats are a soluble fiber. I shouldn't be constipated. Right?

A few days later I had a bowl of oats for dinner. Thinking the fiber would be good if I was constipated. I had the worst gut cramps since cold shrimp. (FYI - Cold shrimp, prawns, any shellfish give me the horriblest of tummy aches.) 

A week later I had my usual oatmilk mocha at a Starbucks. 3 hours later my tummy was churning. 

My boss thinks either 1) Oats are now triggering my IBS-C hence the constipation (I've linked it cos I don't want to discuss irritable bowel syndrome here), or 2) I've developed a sensitivity to the oat protein avenalin - because as we age we sometimes lose the enzymes that are needed to break down certain foods. 

Lucky me. NOT. 

In order to be very sure, the boss says, go eat some oats. 

I did. An oat cookie. This afternoon. It was so good.

And now I'm farty, bloated and my gut is protesting. 

This is NOT good news. 

And so, whatever I CAN still eat without my gut complaining, I shall eat with gratitude. After all, the day might come when a thing I love may not be a thing my intestines love no more. 

Last week we went to a touristy spot that offered some highly acclaimed local "signature" dishes. We had 3 BBQ wings : these are roasted over a charcoal grill on long skewers - 

Foto from www.pinkypiggu.com

They're called BBQ wings not bcause there's any BBQ sauce on them. But because of how they're cooked. You dip them into a spicy, sour chilli sauce.

A pretty decent portion of grilled stingray with a spicy chilli paste slathered over top, and served on a banana leaf.

And finally some good ol Sambal Kangkong.

Hermione mentioned that my portions looked pretty big. That surprised me some, cos by friend standards we actually eat very little. 

For the record, this plate of veggies is probably equivalent to 1 cup. (As in a measuring cup that you might use for flour or sugar.)

It's a sharing portion so this dish is meant for 2-3 people when eaten alongside some steamed rice. But since we don't eat rice, we just have our veggies and proteins as-is.

I'll see if I can take pics with something beside the plates for size. Meanwhile - pumpkin chips are still chips right? 

Enjoy!

Conveyor Belt HotPot and Hidden Japanese Gem

This chain has just opened a 4th restaurant and not only do they have individual hotpots (which is what the other 3 restaurants have), there's a little bbq hotplate thing too for you to grill your meats should you so choose. 

We tried their mutton shabu shabu (thinly sliced meat) - it was better on the grill than in the soup! Not bad overall.  

We've also recently been having dinner at not-the-usual times cos BIKSS has a shitty work arrangement at the moment. The hunt for a new job is still ongoing. Meanwhile, we've had to look for places that don't close too early cos he only gets done at 8-ish on some days.  Here's a Jap place near my house that came highly recommended. I understand why my friends are raving about it. It's a real hole in the wall kinda joint, a shophouse on the ground floor of a residential block. But totally worth the trip!

Mushroom truffle soup. BIKSS isn't a fan of truffle anything. And he's a huge fan of soup. He likes his soups a certain way. So for him to give this a thumbs up says something!

Sashimi salad with wafu dressing. Fresh veggies, fresh juicy sashimi slices, and they were generous with the dressing. I hate it when there's not enough dressing to go over all the greens!

The most delicious thing on our table. He like a good wok-hey in his fry ups. And this buttered mushroom stir fry had really good wok-hey! (Or wok-hei - I shared a video about this distinct wok aroma in THIS POST)

And finally, bacon-wrapped asparagus, chicken meatballs in tare (teriyaki sauce this one was), chicken breast with cheese, and bacon-wrapped tamago (egg omelette). I think in future I'm just gonna steer clear of the bacon-wrapped anythings. It's just way too salty for me. 

I think overall that was an A plus dinner! I definitely wanna go back again to try some of their other yakitori!

Enjoy today's chip pic! 

I'm Broke. Caregiver Updates. Calamity Bikss. More Food Pics.

Basically I have not a lot of cushioning in my bank account at the moment cos I've just spent a ton of money getting the replacement caregiver. And so I've been trying to buy groceries for cheap. Mainly whatever's on sale. I'm picking cheaper food options - Potatoes. Spaghetti. Sardines. And also whatever frozen veggies, fruit and cheap meat/fish that's on special! 

Not too bad, I must say. I'm going to have to steer clear of the fresh cheeses, artichoke dips and truffle mushroom spreads for a while. While I'm not a huge fan of frozen mixed veggies (carrots, corn and peas)  I'll eat it if I have to LOL. Beggars can't be choosers. A $5 pack will last us 4 meals. In comparison, getting fresh veggies comes up to something like $3 a meal. Frozen catfish is $8 for 3 meals. Other fish portions cost about $6 a meal. And there was a 2-for-1 on whole chickens so that was fortuitous. 

As for the new caregiver, when she said she could only speak a little English, she really meant a little English. That was all the English she knew. "Simple, a bit a bit" was what she said. And really that's all she says. So we're currently on a quest to get her comfortable with English words. Youtube pre-school phonics and simple vocabulary for tiny tots to the rescue! We've put together a playlist and she's watching that daily. When she can she'll follow along and mimic the sounds, but if not, at least it's just playing in the background and she can listen to the words being said. We're talking "C, A, T, cat, F, A, T, fat" level. 

And the previous caregiver? Her mum passed away on Monday. She texted to let me know. I felt bad for her, but it's a good thing she managed to go home to see her before she passed, I thought. I told the rest of my household about it, and that's when all the stories started flying fast and furious. Turns out she wasn't very conscientious about her work while she was here. We also have reason to believe she stole some money from my tenant. Basically my first / primary caregiver was picking up all her slack. She didn't tell me sooner because she didn't want me to question her thereby making things awkward between them. Le Sigh. Anyway, I'm feeling cheated, if you know what I mean - like I was taken advantage of. So I'm glad she was only here for a year. I hope this new one, no-speaking-the-English as she is, will be a more sincere / genuine carer to mum. According to caregiver number 1 so far she seems to be a "better" worker and a "nicer" person.

Recently BIKSS has had a bunch of bad luck with health related things. He had a cavity that needed seeing to. And then he caught a bug so he took a few days off work to recover. When he was getting over that his tooth began to hurt (he had trouble with our dumpling dinner - see pics below) and the dentist told him there was a chip on his molar. And, get this, neither he nor his dentist knows if the bit that chipped off was part of the tooth, or a previous filling. He also went to see the ortho guy yesterday for his meniscus tear. Turns out it's past the window for any surgery at this point or something like that. And so he's just going to have to live with a bum knee. 

In a bid to spend less on dinners (due to my broke-ness), we went in search of near-residential-areas food centre fare! Here's the dumpling dinner that was giving BIKSS grief in the tooth - steamed chilli oil dumplings  and fried potstickers from two different stalls at an old food centre near Chinatown. The one on the right was featured in the 2016 Michelin guide.

We preferred the NOT Michelin version. Each plate costs about $5, which is dirt cheap really. Most places sell these for about $8-10. Some places even go as high as $12. We think we should sample some of the other offerings in this food centre. A good rule of thumb is that if ONE stall sells their stuff cheap, most of the others will do the same. 

We also managed a whole afternoon together yesterday after BIKSS' ortho appointment. We went to the indoor food court at a downtown mall, hoping (fine, I was hoping, but I think BIKSS was skeptical) for a cheap-ish lunch. I was wrong. The mixed croquettes and skewered meats and a bowl of vegetable soup cost us a grand total of $32.

Yikes. Ah well. Food is expensive. After that we went to a newly re-opened cultural museum for a quick walkabout and then had dinner at a cafe near my place. I thought this Star Wars plate was a hoot!

Japan, Saga prefecture, Arita 2017

Brussels Bacon - Those mini cabbage heads were cooked in bacon fat. OH SO GOOD!

Cauliflower Salad - Grilled cauliflower with baby spinach, quinoa, pine nuts, almonds, grilled halloumi and pomegranate which I could have done without, but still... mostly all of my favourite things!

And instead of chips, today I shall leave you with this :

Pine nuts and almonds on grilled cauliflower

Quinoa, tomatoes for heart boosting power

Throw in some citrus for flavour and zing

These are a few of my favorite things 

Brussel sprouts fried in some fat bacon drippings

Water is best for some thirst-quenching sipping

Spare me the carbs and the sugars they bring

These are a few of my favorite things

When im hungry, tummy’s rumbly,

When food must be had

I simply will order my favourite things

and then I dont feeeeeel so baaaad.