Kitchen Diary #1

I have been busy in the kitchen for the past half year or so, but most of these were very simple dishes that never really needed me to step out of my comfort zone.

These are stuff that I have cooked at least once before.

• Fried Noodles
  
• Fried Rice
  
• Fried Row Fish
• Cod with cabbage.
  
• Fried Chicken with cabbage.
• Pasta with all kinds of sauces. [latest one pic below]
  
• Cod Fish Soup. This was damn freaking good. And EXPENSIVE to make.
  
• Roti Prata wrapped with prawns, flaked fish. This was awesome, albeit salty.
  

So you see, I have never really tried anything especially difficult, maybe.. except for the roti prata wrap.

Today marks the day I tried making my first exotic dish with ingredients I had at hand.

Fish fillet.
Olive Oil.
Garlic.
Balsamic Vinegar.
Mint Flakes.
Kaffir Lime Leaves.
















I can finally declare I have leveled up to lvl 30. [ 1 being the average instant-noodles only guy, and 99 being a master chef. ]

What I have to try to cook/bake next :

Frying Salmon
Golden Fried Rice
Beef cubes in Wine
Drunken Prawns - you use hua diao jiu for the alcohol, RIGHT?
Nutella Cupcakes!

Using Herbs

I'm like freaking impressed watching Jamie Oliver cook. There's something seriously sexy about guys that can cook well, and I'm not even gay. He's my new idol now.

Here are 2 extremely useful herbs and how to use them. The man himself uses a lot of herbs in his cooking, and that no doubt makes his dishes OMGWTFBBQ-ly nice.

BASIL

• Famous in Italian Dishes
• Tear them with fingers, never chop. Optionally, pound them with olive oil.
  
• Never fully cook them as flavor diminishes with heat. Add at near end of cooking.
  
• Goes very well with Tomato dishes, cheeses, chicken, fish, pasta and salads.
• Complements the following herbs : Garlic, Parsley, Rosemary, Oregano

CORIANDER

• Used in Latin and Indian Dishes
  
• Mild, therefore use by the handful.
  
• Natural Emulsifier
  
• Like most herbs, flavor diminishes with heat. Add at near end of cooking.
  
• Spice onions, potatoes, sausages, clams, oysters. Grind up to flavor fish.

I need to get a conventional oven soon. I've been poisoned by this Nutella Cupcakes recipe.

冷静な話

I realized my previous entry sounded like as if I was on my way to get reincarnated.

In order to mask my inability to type properly in english after giving 2 years of my life away to NS doing sai kang, I decided that typing in Japanese would be better.

１級に挑戦するかどうかまだ分かんない。ありえない難しいつうーの！

頭が悪いじゃなく、今必要なのは時間です。はい。そうです、ただ時間の問題。

入学したら、奨学金を狙ってるために必死に勉強しなきゃ。俺なんか出来るか？！

いや。やって見なきゃ分かんないよ、こう言うこと。頑張り屋って言われた（赤の他人だけど）の俺なら行ける！盛り上がりますね　＾＾　これからも、本気モードで頑張りつつ、いい成績を目指そう！

On a side note, I realized my Japanese has far surpassed my Mandarin. No way would I have been able to blog in my mother tongue. So much for me being a RV student. =/

要領に得てる

Haven't blogged in a billion years. Not like it matters.

Short update on my life. Been running here and there teaching tuition, although I'm probably underpaid. But beggars cant be choosers. At least this chapter of my life will be coming to a close.

Nov - ORD. Started mugging for JLPT2.

Dec - Did nothing after pwning the JLPT2 paper.

Jan - Did nothing because I think I will be able to ace JLPT1.

Feb - So I was going to slack again for another month but then I realised.... I had to seriously mug for JLPT1. Because it's seriously KAAN PUAAAA difficult. Trust me. It makes JLPT2 look as easy as 1+1=2.

Mar - Started teaching tuition to 2 kids.

Apr - Had one more tuition kid, and flew to Japan on the 22nd.

May - Spent a bomb in Japan and came back on the 15th to see my USD/JPY position on the verge of self destruction.

Jun - Executed a self-margin-call, leaving me very little in my forex account. Fuck. I can't believe I repeated the same mistake that cost me my university fees. Fuck. Took me a very very long time to get over this. But then I realised money isn't really a big deal. I can always make that sum of money back in no time when I'm older. So there. =)

Jul - Meanwhile I formulated another get rich plan, but that would mean emptying another significant sum from my bank account to fund a TOS account. Things will work out. They always will. Life's starting to look up, with all the freshman and biz camp coming up. Seems like most of my friends couldnt attend their respective camps due to a lack of spaces. Good that SMU has a small cohort.

Peyling's and Hester's birthday is/was this week. We celebrated their birthdays over at their houses on Saturday and Sunday, and boy, was it grand. And they sure have chio female friends. =/ And the usual gorging myself at the buffet spread. Hester sent the Jurong peeps home, and damn - she actually drives well! Now I wish I had a driver's license. Eh no. Because when you're living in Singapore, NCNT. No Car No Talk.

Went for Matriculation. Bumped into Junior-turned-Senior xiaojun. She's really much prettier now. I really like SMU, its only the fees that are pissing me off. Why isn't the govt defraying the cost of education for local students by a larger amount!?! ... and instead giving the money to undeserving ah tiongs and ABNNs who dont even serve NS (and plan to zao from this country anyway?!?!) TMD.

Damn. I hate being older. Now I wish I was back in Secondary School days, when the only worry you have is whether you have enough time before tomorrow's morning assembly to copy homework.