INSOMNIA

I have been having extreme difficulties falling asleep lately. Last night was of no difference and I asked myself, what should I do to tire myself out and not to waste any time.

I decided to bake a cake, a choc moist cake as my contribution towards a birthday party at Cock & Bull tonight. It took me less than 20 mins before I popped the cake mixture into the oven. Whilst waiting for the cake to be ready, I put on a DVD to watch. That certainly got my attention for the next 30 to 40 mins. The cake was left to cool for a good 10 mins before I cover a generous dollop of chocolate over it.

My hands were shaking, so there goes writing the word Happy Birthday over it. I placed strawberries and a greeting stand on it instead.

The result of insomnia looks like this. What do you think?

INGREDIENTS :-

200 gms Choc Moist Mixture
200 gms melted butter
200 gms eggs
100 gms water

Put all ingredients in mixing bowl and beat using speed no 1 for 5 mins.  Followed by another 10 mins on speed no 2.  Bake in oven for 30 to 40 minutes at temperature of 180 deg C.

The mixture is enough to bake two 8" cakes.

STRICTLY HOME COOKED FOOD

It is back to my weekly cooking cum fellowship session with my group of buddies.  I took a break last week as I did not have enough quorum.  For last night's dinner, it was home cooked all the way.  One of the attendees, 'Panda' called in the evening and volunteered to 'tapau' additional food.  I replied 'strictly home cooked food only'. 

The menu consist of the 'must' soup which was chicken boiled with chinese herbs such as yuk chuk, kei chee (wolfberries), red dates, cordyceps (which has slight resemblance to maggots) and dried longans.  There was chicken stew with potatoes, onions and carrots.  The chinese cabbage was stir fried with anchovies and sabotaged by 2 mini chillies just enough to add some 'excitement' to the palate.  Another dish was attempted pan fried garlic prawns but I did not fancy the idea of pan fried after I did the pan frying.  So I decided to add some soy sauce to it.  It tasted good.  Ken made his famous fish curry and Reena made soft shell crabs.

Dinner was good.  Some were glued to the TV watching Sun Tzu, The Art of War.  One was sleeping after dinner due to happy hour sessions before dinner.  The night was complete with a game of mahjong which ended at 1am. 

All in, it was a mildly sedated evening without booze.  My objective was achieved.

MID YEAR RESOLUTION 2011

Here I go again!  Me and my resolutions.  I even came up with a title for it this time, mid year resolution, what's next right?

I have been very bad at writing lately.  Never seem to find the time or catch the mood to do so.  Hence the mid year resolution, to blog more and to cook more.

I am pushing myself to cook with feelings, a hobby which I hope will develop into a full blown passion.  I hang out with a bunch of friends daily and they have earned a nick name from  me, 'THE NEEDIES'.  They will kill me of course if they ever find out I call them that.  These are a bunch of my friends who are deprived of home cooked food and deprived of  places to hang out and chill.  As I love all  my friends, I took it upon myself that they should at least have a decent meal a week which must consist of soup.

We started this weekly routine about 4 weeks ago.  Last night was what I called the Teochew Porridge Nite.  There were only 5 persons last night but the table was laden with food enough for 10, as usual thanks to Dar Dar who is ever so afraid there is not enough food to go around or either that he thinks that I will poison the rest with my cooking one day.

So, there were dishes of minced pork meat and braised chicken purchased from Sam Moon Chuk in Uptown, I fried choy poh omelette and luncheon meat, black bean fish from the can, salted egg, salted veg, salted fish (hahaha... everything salted), fried fish topped with sliced salted veg and chillies cooked by Ken.  and my soup of the week, some herbal chicken soup for clearing the lungs (all of them are smokers!!)

I, of course had rice!