One pot wonder

Today I used my pressure cooker for the first time in my new home. I was hesitant because of the pressure steam which was volcanic when I first tried it out here. The first thing I made was lamb shank soup which was appropriate as it was winter. I realize the photo wasn't appetizing. I think I made green curry next and it was quite a flop - no photos.

Today I made the same soup and it looked so much better than the previous one. The secret ingredient is a good filter. 

~ Pause for effect ~

Ba ha ha ha ha! Ok la, I also have more confidence and experience cooking using a pressure cooker not to mention I jigged the recipe. Which reminds me - I better blog it up! My very own lamb shank soup recipe.

History showed I don't do well with western dishes and Bits was skeptical when I put this in front of him. You should see his face when he realize this is actually good stuff and he doesn't need to suck it up cause he needs to show support at my culinary skills.

Like durians HAHAHAHA....

The durian test

Bits failed. Can't really say I am disappointed. Let's be honest here - less for him means more for me.

He took one bite and I wish I had taken a video of his face - can't even describe it. He really tried very hard to accept it cause he know I love durian and it's a big thing in hometown. He even took another bite - in the end he spit it out. Feels like eating shit. Poor baby.

Strange thing is he can take the smell and even had durian ice cream before. But he can't take the real thing. Ok la no force. He doesn't like it means no durian trips. Actually it's a bit irony. I love durian but everytime I go back I am fearfull of eating it as it's heaty and when you are travelling, you don't drink enough water.

I usually ended up sick, so I try not to eat durian when I am back. sigh.

After 2 failed bites, Bit wanted to throw the durian seed away. Lucky I stopped him.

One man's meat is another man's poison.

Aesop

Ooh Aesop is doing it again. They hire artist/models to perform behind display windows. I guess they are trying to illustrate the effect of their products on skin. Some derma rumeration theme. 4 display windows, 4 actors pulling, mending and sewing a really long panty hose that I am sure represent the skin.

I appreciate and applaud Aesop's ingenuity. Very refreshing compare to just putting up bottles though I think they can achieve the same effect by having some people distribute free samples.

Bits said this concept is very adult theme. I told him only if they wear the apron and nothing else.

He quickly clarified that he meant the concept is too abstract for kids to understand and gave me a dirty look.

 I am the 'ham sup' girlfriend? 

OCD attack

Taking a walk with Bits when I suddenly halted and point to the ground.

Bits : What?

Me : Uneven width. Can't stand it.

Bits : OK, we don't take this shortcut anymore.

Someone must be drinking on the job. Apa ni? Where is the Aussie standard? If there's a bucket of yellow paint I will squat on the road and start touching it up.

Bits must have sense something. He quickly pulled me away to resume our after lunch walk.

When we reach his office, I spent a few futile minutes trying to capture twirling leaves. Unfortunately they all look dead here. Today's wind is super strong.

 That's mother nature running the vacuum. 

Unicorn or Rhino?

Me: OMG it is a unicorn! Horsey will love it.

Bits: ...or a rhinoceros.

Me: It is a unicorn! Look at that horn.

Bits: ... ok it's a unicorn with a big nose.

Me : Damn...it does looks like a rhino now.

Bits :... it's ok darling, it can be your unicorn.

Don't you just love it when your boyfriend try and save your face?

Dating at Ikea

In the end, I got the city La Belle Miette macarooms yesterday. Gave one box to my aunt and the other one to mama Bits.

Today Bits and I went to Ikea. In my opinion Ikea cafeteria has one of the most consistent franchise. The meat balls are consistently tasty unlike KFC. Only the nuggets taste the same, the rest sux. 

I got a free Princess cake from them for my birthday. OMG there is so much sugar. After eating it I went crazy and bought a couple of stuff from Ikea as usual.

It is too easy to buy things there like kena jampi. Bits have to remind me that we were actually there for Anaconda, a big sports retail outlet. I think Anaconda is a strange name for a sports retail outlet.

Bits wanted to see if the price on his targeted jacket is cheaper here or DFO. Turns out it is cheaper so it's a fruitful trip. Since we were there I also made him try on hiking pants. He got a shock at how light they are. He felt exposed and naked wearing them.

I believe him cause at one point he forgot he only had his boxers on when he opened the changing room door when I knocked on it to pass him more pants to try. 

Luckily there was no one around to be flashed by him. I started getting him heavier pants to try and he like North Face hiking pants. It's about $130.00 so he is gonna scout it at DFO.

Tomorrow's forecast is rain. I hope the rain will be in the afternoon and I can still go 1000 steps in the morning. At the same time I also wish it will rain the whole day so I got a legitimate reason to skip training.

 I got lazy bug attack. 

Dumb-o-meter question

This has been circulating awhile in the internet......

Me: Hey ask you a trick question.

Bits: Aha...(his default answer)

Me: Ben is 4 and his brother is half his age. When Ben is 100, how old is the brother?

Bits: 50.

Me: Det...wrong

Bits: Ben is 4...mumble mumble...100/2 ...mumble mumble... 50.

Me: Det...try again.

Bits: Ben is 4, brother is half his age means 2...so 100-2..... 96.

Me: Det....wrong, how can 100-2 is 96?

Bits: Wait....... 98.

Me: Ding ding... correct. Took you that long?

Bits: Not that long.....

Me: This question has been circulating in fb - used to test how smart your partner is...

Bits: (-___-")

Ai Wei Wei exhibition

No ler,  not my cousin though they share similar name. I only know about Ai Wei Wei because of his problem with Lego. They denied his order because he is a China Activist and they don't want China to ban Lego - my take.

In the end Lego came to their senses and sold Mr Ai his legos. You don't argue with money and we get to see his lego masterpieces such as the below one. His exhibition is much talked about. It's not a solo exhibition. He is doing it together with Andy Warhol (pronounced as War Hole). I asked Bits, who is Andy What Hol?

I said I only know Andy Lau, of course he doesn't get the joke hahaha.... anyway this Andy is famous for making art with commercial logos and famous people. One of his favorite one is Campbell and Marilyn Monroe.

All works of art that you've probably seen many reproduction versions from China factories. Now you know it comes from Andy Warhol.

I don't really get Andy Warhol but I totally enjoyed Ai Wei Wei's creation. What is so great about blowing up multiple copies of Campbell logo? On the other hand, check out this bicycle monstrosity of Ai Wei Wei. In my opinion, this is art.

Anyway the highlight of the exhibition is these balloon corners. These are light balloons, buoyed by a fan blowing. It's an absolute favorite with kids and cough~ adults. It is interactive and you can gently lift the balloons. There is instruction on how to play so that you don't damage them. But guess what, there was a totally destructive kid about maybe 10 years old totally venting some form of aggression by hitting these gentle balloons as hard as he can, making smacking sounds. What's worst is the mum standing at the side not doing a single thing while his son was destroying everybody's fun. The guard warned the kid twice to no avail.

If I am the guard I will smack the kid for every smack he gave to the balloons. Told Bit that huffily. And Bits said that is why you are not the security guard. Maybe the kid was denied legos by his parents but take it home. Don't be an asshole in public.

Disgraceful. I was totally disgruntled. Luckily there are more than one interactive corner and we both thoroughly enjoy taking photos with these balloons at other corners. Bits loves east meets west themed dates. I think it's a reflective of our relationship and how we represent east and west cultures.

Friday with Bits

Finally Friday! 

I have a standing breakfast date with Bits on Fridays and I always look forward to it. No, not because Bits always shouts (belanja) my Friday breakfast (~shifty eyes)

As couples go, we are routine and boring. We always go to the same place and order long mac for him and ham and cheese toasties with croissant for myself. That's Bits in the background with his coffee

I think I am quite easily assisinated damn it. Note to self: Order the smoke salmon brioche next time.

On a totally unrelated note,Dayre added an About Me section. I wrote something there because my OCD don't like empty spaces.

Bits had a read and think it is very good. He also said I gave him a backhanded compliment by calling him overly indulgent. Then he proceed to trim all the excess cheese oozing out of my croissant. Is that revenge?

Anyway...this is further proof of me thinking with my tummy. Today is quite stressful for a Friday. Wanted to go to KFC to get the charcoal burger and then think about work on the way and ended up in Macca.

 When I am stressed I eat. 

Valentine 2016

On Valentine's day Bits gave me this e-valentine. He said it will be something that I would like. He is right. No surprises we celebrated Valentine this year. I won't argue with food hahaha. We went back to the same place and when I look back at 2015 photos, we even order the same food!

Well it doesn't matter as long as food is good eh? This year's roses is white with red blush. It also had an odd number of 10. I asked Bits got meaning with the 10 roses? He wasn't even aware of it ~ sweat.

These roses were also bigger than last year's one. Unfortunately they don't dry well so I threw them out once they wilted. I still keep my first Valentine roses though. They are are looking good on my Kallax shelf.

How time flies, our relationship is already two years old.

Auto correct blooper

Sometimes I think my phone is out to sabo me. Seriously! Auto correct should be called over correct. Anyway if you think mine is worst, you should check these out. Some are 18SX so don't get offended. IT.IS.HILLARIOUS. You have been warn.

By the way this is not the first time I kena from auto correct and both times also with Bits. What does that say? Maybe need to tone down the pillow talk? Mua ha ha ha ......

Yes, I still get a kick of turning Pu Er into various meme. OMG his expression is priceless ha ha ha.....

If this keeps up I will need to create a new folder to store my Pu Er meme collection.

Throwback: Christmas Dinner

This year's Christmas dinner was interesting. It's the first Christmas dinner I had at Auntie's house as a guest. Naturally as a guest, Nite is not invited anymore. Aunt also didn't invite Bits. Not surprised as Aunt is very particular with relations and social status. Bits, although is my significant other, is a male that has no connection with Aunt - hence not invited. I explained to Bits and he doesn't seem perturbed. Hopefully he doesn't feel slighted. This year, Cousin Sis and her boyfriend came back to celebrate with the family. Auntie was over the moon. However I didn't expect the awkward conversation that follows with Cousin Sis's boyfriend (BF)

BF : Hey where is him?

Me: Who him? (~ pretending I don't know what he is talking about)

BF : Bits. Why didn't he come?

Me: Ah..... (keep eating~)

Aunt: I didn't invite him. I will invite him when he is married to Piggy.

Talk about minefield, guess Cousin Sis's boyfriend never expect to step on that one haha....

Anyway I already knew Aunt would not invite Bits anyway so I planned a mini Christmas celebration with him - not that he celebrates it.

As there is just 2 of us, the menu is really simple

Cheese board with Olives and some semi dried tomatoes to tease the palate

Main course of stuffed turkey breast wrapped in bacon with brown rice salad (pine nuts, with currants boil in red vine vinegar) and roasted potatoes

Dessert of panna cotta

Tasty? Bits really loved it. Although I cooked everything single handedly, there some facts that needs to be shared for transparency...heh heh

1. The turkey was bought from Aldi, marinated and stuffed.
2. The panna cotta failled during Christmas, the one in the photo was a second successful try. 
3. Roast potato is Jamie Oliver's recipe. It was a total failure. This is my second failed attempt at roasting potatoes. How hard can it be to roast potatoes? 
4. It is taking awfully long to finish the cheese. There are still some left in my fridge.

Ok moving on.... Despite point 1,2, 3, I rate it a successful first try :) Maybe next year I can spread my wings even more and invite a bigger crowd.

We shall see..

Low Cholesterol but Fatter Part 3

Dating time......

Bits: So darling, how's your blood test?

Me: My cholestrol is perfect.

Bits: That is good news!

Me: Yeah, but I am 5kg heavier. I am now 72kg!

Bits: Oh..... ok that is not good for health.

Me: Tell me about it, I have to eat grass like you now.

Bits: I did not eat grass dear.....anyway you are perfect. Weight is just a number.

Me: I thought it will be in your best interest to ensure my weight is manageable, after all you have to carry me.

Bits: Eeeek..... in that case.....erm... 60kg is a nice target to achieve.

Me: LOL...aha that means it is in your interest to make sure I exercise regularly..

Bits: Ok if you put it that way......

Me: We gotta continue the 30 day plank!

Maslenitsa in Melbourne

Early in our relationship, I always bug Bits to share a bit more on his culture. Yes, I can google as much as I want but it is more fun learning it from him and get his perspective.

In February, he told me there will be an important Slavic festival called Maslenitsa. It has close relationship to his culture but his family does not celebrate it. In fact his family does not celebrate much of anything, very cost saving. So without further ado, we make it a date.

This is a significant figure in the festival. It is the Lady Maslenistsa. I am quite glad I took a photo for at the end of the festival she was gone! There was also some performance in the hall when we arrive. It was interesting enough to distract me from the food.

They perform a few traditional dances and sang in Russian of course. Though I had no idea what they were singing but I enjoyed it. We stayed a bit but stomach calls. So of we went for food.

During the festival, if one observed it strictly, you are to abstained from all manner of meat. However, I doubt a festival without meat will be a success hahaha. Anyway no complains from me as you can see from my plate. Nothing smells tastier than sausage grilling on a spring day.

If I have any complains, it is that they do not provide any table and chairs to eat comfortably. As you can see this is no finger food nor easily eaten while walking or standing up.

Will I go to this festival again.....um.... not really. But if you want the cultural experience, I recommend it.

Melbourne Open Day 2015 Part 2

The second building and we barely (we were in the last group) made it is the Council House. The attraction is the green concept. It's more expensive to build, yes, but it's eco friendly. If only all entrepreneurs take in consideration of the environment all the time. It is a building that harness the elements around it for cooling and to a certain extent heating. Imagine a building with no air conditioning and just uses the difference between temperatures to cool down the building and retain the coolness. The head architecture said the temperature is always maintained at 23 degrees.

Hot air will get churned out by this big turbines. The whole thing kinda reminds me of Casa Mila in Barcelona.

The turbine area has been made into an open garden/canteen. It would be lovely to have lunch here in spring and autumn. Not summer unless you like big ugly flies.

These are heater coils that take heat generated from the building and out. The cement ceiling traps cold air for summer. In winter, these coils will warm up the building as well.

This is the view from the roof garden where the wind turbines are. Beautiful yeah?

We spend a total of 30 minutes here before we left. Would love to stay longer but the crowd is just massive!

Melbourne Open Day 2015 Part 1

I think every city should do this. Kudos to the Melbourne government for arranging it. Over this weekend, several buildings around Melbourne will be open for visitation and not because there was some celebration like Raya. This is merely to introduce Melbourne I guess. We are talking about buildings that don't usually open to the public - so it is pretty awesome. Thanks to Nite for suggesting this as a good date outing. It was!

I suggested to Bits and he put together a list of nine buildings. Of course that is impossible. So we shortlisted to 4. Even then we only manage to see 2.5. Main reason was we only start our visitation at 1.00pm. There were queues on the good ones. The cream of the crop like Flinders Station or Melbourne Central, you can only go in with reservation which Nite told me was full within the first hour of registeration. I sure hope next year I can go see it. Anyway we end up visiting :-

• The Limelight Studio and Salvation Army Heritage Center
• Council House - CH2
• Townhall - actually I won't even consider this a tour. We spend a total of 15 minutes in it only

The one we missed was the Russell Sub station. Nite queued for ages to get it. I bet it's really cool. We also ended up queuing almost an hour to see the Limelight Studio. It's very interesting to note the first motion picture was produced here (not sure if I got my facts correct) and it was a religious movie. A shame it was also lost and never found.

These people recognize really early that picture and sound is a far more interesting way to spread the gospel rather than just preaching. And back in the days, they use colour plates + dialogue. All the plates were hand colored. Look how intricate it is. This photo is obviously enlarged. The actual size is just about the size of a coaster.

I think the overall tour was just about 1/2 hour. No luxury of leisure browsing as there are just too many people, not to mention we need to rush to the next location which was the sub station that we eventually had to miss.

To be continued....

Artisan Gelato

Cost a bomb for ice cream but oh so yummmmmy! This little place is in Emporium right near the food court.

Quite unassuming and with limited flavors but every flavor is spot on. Try it if you don't believe me. You can ask the lady for a sample. My favorite by far is the salted caramel. Bits always shout me this when I give him my puppy dog eyes hahahaha. You can either have it in a cone or a container - no difference in price but I might be wrong as I never pay for it hahaha....

Maybe we should be renamed to Indulgent Boyfriend and Glutton Girlfriend. Do stop by for a bite! Even Bits who doesn't like sweet stuff thinks it's good!

Coffee to Sooth

When we are in our early dating days, Bits never lets me know when he is stressed. He will say he is fine and curi-curi go drink solo coffee. When I know about this I always feel a bit sad that he did not want to share it with me or that could be male ego. I don't know.

So after much encouragement and telling how I think a relationship should work, he promise me he will not hide things from me and he never did. So now when he is having a bad day he will tell me so and I will ask him from a scale of 1 to 10 how bad cause I like things to be measurable not to mention I suck at reading body language. So if it hits 7 and above I will offer him company and a cup of coffee. 

I realize we often go Sensory Lab behind David Jones - maybe cause it's on the way. They also have a small selection of cakes that I like. The other day I wanted to have the flourless cake but Bits stubornly want this poppy seed cake. Since he is having a bad day, he gets it. Later I knew poppy seed is a common ingredient in his culture. SO this must be comfort food.

This man.....must peel him back like an onion and always pusing pusing. Looking at the miserable slice, mana cukup both of us, so I ordered a green tea something with lemon curb.

Hot chocolate for me.....

And coffee for Bits.

It's good to let him release tension and I can tell he feels so much more relaxed after he barfed it all out. At the same time I get to eat. I also realize I used to do this alot with Nite back in the days. Now I don't spend as much time with her anymore (~guilty).

How do one balance both worlds?

Not Just Me

To prove I am not the only one that cop if from auto correct.

Recently he upgrade his phone to Nokia Lumia and is having the best of time using it. He is particularly attached to the new swipe text function much to my amusement. I also quite like this snail sticker, it is really cute.

At first I pooh at his phone as I don't like Windows OS on phone. However I have to admit the camera function is superior to mine. Hence I have been playing with his camera phone more than my own. He is also pretty happy that I am impressed with the camera phone. Currently we are learning how to take wefie with it.

Wefie is the new internet lingo as oppose to selfie. I am pretty sure one day it will make its way into Oxford dictionary. I am also suppose to work today but for some reason I can't login to the VPN. I also no mood after 1 week of non stop OT so I didn't look too closely at why it failed. Just take the excuse. (yes, God, I got the hint). Gonna just rest and blog.

Long live the internet.

The Perfect Armchair

Whatever marketing mumbo jumbo that Ikea employs from the artistic suggestive furniture display to the deceptively cheap meatballs, it works on me. In fact Ikea store is like walking into a catalog. I love it. I even dragged Bits dating with me there a few times. He suck it up manfully and even helped testing the furniture.

First let's pay homage to the meatballs. Not the famous beef one but the unknown brother - CHICKEN MEATBALLS! They have chicken meatballs here which is awesome. Finally I get to taste the Swedish meatballs.

As mentioned earlier I wanted a few moving pieces of furniture that I can play around - a 2 seater sofa, an armchair and an ottoman or several poofs (haven't decided yet). After sitting on a number of arm chairs, this is an all time favorite for me and Bits - the STRANDMON series. From neck support to arm rest, it is perfect! However the price is also a shocking $399.00. The footstool - $149.00. Combined, it cost almost 2 Klippan Sofa.

There is a cheaper option in the below one. We tried it but it just feels different. No neck support and the seat area is a bit small for my and Bit's bum. We both have fleshy bums.

There is also the cheapest version which is the POANG series. It is comfortable has a good neck support just not aligned with my neck though it aligns with Bits. The arm rest is ok so it's a good contender with the favorite armchair.

So hard to justify investing so much in an armchair but I really like it! ARGH!