Saturday Outing

K and I were out for the whole day today! It was quite nice and refreshing to just go out on weekend, doing some fun stuff other than grocery and house chores. Even though it was on and off raining, we’ve been lucky enough that it wasn’t raining whenever we had to walk outdoor.

After my morning workout, I had a very odd combo of breakfast/post workout meal.

Loose leaf green tea (x5 I think?), steamed bok choy, almond muffins and a banana? LOL

The original plan for today was to go Ice skating using Groupon that I got a while back. It’s going to expire this coming Monday. And after we ran to the market and Costco to replenish our fridge, we decided to eat out for lunch before the ice skating.

I had to resist myself snacking on these Macadamia nuts that I ordered from Oh! Nuts using the promo code that I got from a giveaway a while back.

Roasted unsalted macadamia nuts. Among all of the nuts, macadamia has the lowest Omega 6, therefore it’s the most ideal nuts for Primal/Paleo. However, I wasn’t so lucky. I should’ve read the labels closely. Oh! Nuts roasted the macadamia nuts with cottonseed oil/canola oil….BUMMER! Now what should I do with these 2 bags??? Maybe I just slowly eat them and not overdo them too much? ARGH! I feel such a FAIL PRIMAL/FAILEO.

Lunch at Daphne’s Greek Cafe
Mine – I had the platter of gyro with 2 side dishes of fire roasted veggies and salad. I asked them not to include the pita bread and gave me extra salad instead, but they didn’t get it..*sigh* so K had all the pita bread

K had gyro pita sandwich with same 2 side dishes. Pretty much similar dish, but the gyros were wrapped in the pita bread. K was so nice enough to give me some of his gyro portion.

We went to the place for the ice skate, but totally disappointment. The description on the website was totally misleading! It was an outdoor ice skate rather than an indoor, and it was only a very small space of ice rink. Nobody was there and since it was raining earlier, we didn’t want to risk ourselves to fall on the icy rink. So in the end, we didn’t use the Groupon at all. Wasted $16 for nothing.

But we still went for ice skating though.

Paid $24 for two (including rentals) and skated as long as we want until we felt we had enough and it was getting crowded.

After skating, we went to the mall so I could shop for a dress for my brother-in-law’s upcoming wedding in early March (gasp! it’s getting closer and I have NO IDEA what to wear!) We literally walked the entire mall, though I didn’t enter every single shop there. I am not quite a shopper. I usually just go in to the shop, scan through the entire store to see if anything catches my eyes. If nothing, then I leave, not wasting more time trying to select some clothing. If there’s something then I’ll try it on. K is the most patient guy I’ve ever been. Unlike typical husband/boyfriend/man who usually just sits outside the store waiting for the wife/girlfriend/female companion finish with her shopping, K actually walked into the store with me and see what clothing that I picked.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get the dress, but I didn’t come home empty handed either!

Some undies from Victoria Secrets (I actually went here first because I knew I need more undies) and 3 color camis ($5 each).

Surprisingly, I was still full from lunch and decided to skip dinner altogether! And I finally made my first ghee!

Ok, I don’t think I did it right. After reading Kath’s post, I realized I need to cook the butter at least 1 hour! I think I only did it for 10 minutes? I thought after all the butter melted and I could skimmed off the white stuff, it was all done. I guess I’ll do better next time!

Are you a shopper?

Do you like ice skating?
I think I am ok, at least after “a little warm up”, I finally remembered how to glide on the ice. I am faaaaaaaaaaaar from being a pro. I wasn’t fast and only slide little by little. I could go a little faster but I would lose my balance an fall. This time I didn’t fall at all, which was good.

 

Too many things to do

Hello everyone! First of all I’d like to thank every single one of you of your complement and suggestions on my last post.

It is apparently hard to do the challenges but I’m determined to stick to it as much as I could. Of course I confess I am not 100% perfect, especially the not looking into the mirror to see how my muscles have developed…there were times I did take a peek but that only lasted for a second.

Anyway, I always think I could update my blog more often and could do at least a post on Saturdays and Sundays but that just not happening *sigh*

My weekdays are pretty much booked with full time job and there’s very little time to do after I got home. For weekends, I usually have too many ideas or recipes that just popped in my head uncontrollable and I just couldn’t stay away from my kitchen..HAHA.
That includes yesterday and today! Technically my inner OCD is not happy because I’ve been neglecting cleaning the house (wiping the furniture, windows etc..anything that look dusty to my eyes). And I still haven’t watched Inception….GRR…or re-read Harry Potter 7. Argh, why do I always have so many things to do???!

Anyway, I realize I’ve been always posting about recipes on each post, and it might get quite boring. I’ll save up those for next time. In the mean time, I’ll share you what I’ve been doing

Grocery

kabocha and another butter nut squash (last time I mistakenly labeled it as banana nut squash..)

fresh basil leaves

bunch of spices! I love collecting glass jars and they become handy when you need to store your spices, which aren't sold in a bottle.

cornish hen..this guy is super small!!

And I made homemade taco seasonings (courtesy of Food Lover’s Primal Palate)

another good use of glass jar

Taco chicken with homemade taco seasonings. No sugar added btw

And I finally made Beef Rendang (Indonesian Beef Stew) Miho – I used orange juice as the marinade…turned out great!

And a traditional Beef Stew (again no sugar added, all sweetness comes from the carrots and jicama (I discarded the jicama)

beef stew with steamed spinach and saute shredded cabbage

I do miss these guys tho – fish sauce, oyster sauce, kecap manis (Indonesian sweet soy sauce) and Maggi seasoning soy sauce

Made this Basil Minced Chicken with those guys for bro’s dinner to go with my aunt’s homemade noodles.

Smell so good and taste good too..but I can’t eat those – aint I a good caring sister, cooking stuff for brother but she herself won’t be able to have it? (*narcissistic mode on*) – ok bad joke.

Courtesy of Chocolate Covered Katie, I made this salad dressing based on her agar base recipe!
Agar base:
1 1/3 cup coconut milk or other non dairy milk
3 tsp agar powder (preferred non sugar added) – mine had sugar added, urhg- no sugar challenge FAIL! But Only 3 tsp shouldn’t hurt, right???
Lemon juice (I used 2 lemons)

Directions:
Boil the coconut milk with agar until boiling, let cool and put in the fridge
Whipped them in food processor – resulting this creamy and ranch looking salad dressing with a mild sour taste from the lemon. Sweet and sour for mine (next time I really have to get the no sugar added agar powder!)

I’m loving my salad for my breakfast!

Plus loose leaf tea! The darker the better!

Finally I could add more variation to my non-grain/wheat/oats breakfast, so no need to always stick with this hardboiled eggs, spinach and avocado with lemon juice.

Do you like to collect glass jars? I LOVE COLLECTING THEM! From big to small ..haha..though I hate hoarding stuff, but glass jars are my weakness!

What’s your kitchen essential? Mine is the pressure cooker! I cooked beef stew under 1 hour and everything came out tender and tasty! Save my time, gas and electricity. Oh also my Cuisinart food processor!

Among all the food I posted today, which one interest you the most? If you have none, no worries just say it, I won’t bite!

What’s your typical weekends look like? Mine mainly cooking and cleaning! haha sounds boring huh?

Do you prefer loose leaf tea or tea bags? Loose leaf tea is my weekend treat and I’m always looking forward to it!

 

Dashing through the Rain, Kitchen Adventures, Simple Gift, and an Upcoming Facelift

It’s ALMOST Christmas and we’ve got LOTS OF RAIN here in Los Angeles!

Los Angeles sky has been like this since Friday!

Been raining NON STOP since Saturday! Weather forecast said it’ll be like this until this coming Wednesday.

I don’t mind rain, actually but just hate it when I have to go out and drive! I’ve seen accidents and road closures.

Parents just left last night (changed of plan from Thursday because my brother suddenly felt nausea (I called this Nausea Breakdown Syndrome).

He had been having nausea on and off before (digestion problem) and it might occur again because he’s been on a lot of TB meds for the past 6 months. Good news is the doctor finally reduced the meds from 4 to 2. 4 more months of treatment and hopefully he’ll be FULLY recovered.

I gave my parents a little Christmas gift: Wrote a Christmas card telling how I appreciated their help all this time here and also our differences in the beginning since I have been independent for the past 10 years. Plus a small Godiva Dark Chocolate truffles and our pictures with them while they were here.

Simple gift yet full of thoughts. I wrote a lot in the card. Hopefully they like it.

My co worker gave me and my fellow colleagues a box of cookies!

These are SINFULLY good! Not too sweet, yet crunchy and sort of melt in your mouth cookies! I only had ONE. These cookies are not from here btw. They travelled all the way from Hongkong homemade bakery according to her.

I’ve been a little adventurous in the kitchen lately.

Like this Cauliflower “Fried Rice”.

3 Ingredients:
1/2 of cauliflower (pick the most white and big looking one!)
3 garlic cloves – minced
3 stalks of green onions-chopped (separate the green and white part)
Salt, pepper, garlic powder to taste
1 Tbsp olive oil/butter/lard/coconut oil or whatever oil you like!
Optional: curry powder for a little kick, paprika etc the choice is ENDLESS!

Steps:
1. Chopped the cauliflower and ground them in your blender/food processor until they look like this

2. Minced the garlic and green onions (reserve the green parts for later use)

3. Heat up the non stick skillet with 1 Tbsp oil (I used olive oil)

4. Saute the garlic and the white part of the green onions until fragrant

5. Mix in the ground cauliflower

6. Seasoned with salt, pepper and garlic powder to taste

7. Mix in the green part of the green onions

8. Ready to devour!

Cauliflower Fried Rice!

It's healthy, grain free and nutritious!

Finally, after reading so many raw/vegan cookies on the blogsphere, I decided to try making them my own:

Raw Almond Cookies!
(vegan and gluten free)

Ingredients (I didn’t measure everything exactly)
1/4 cup raw almonds
1/4 cup raw walnuts
1/2 cup golden roasted flaxseeds
1/2 cup raw sunflower seeds
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
2 cups of raw almond butter (I used my homemade almond butter- super easy!)
2 pitted medjool dates

Directions:
1. Lightly toast the almonds and walnuts in your oven for about 4 minutes

2. Put all ingredients in your blender/food processor and grind until the nuts are coarse (not too much or it’ll become nut butter)

coarsely grounded

3, Mixed the grounded ingredients with the almond butter

4. Shape into whatever you like! I didn’t have any cookie cutters so I just shaped them into flat cookie.

5. Chill them in the fridge so they’ll harden a bit

Optional: Bake the cookies for 15 minutes (I might want to give this a try)

These cookies are VERY RICH, so be mindful of the portion size.

Oh not to forget I also made Vegan Tofu Eggplant Stir Fry.

In the mix: tofu, eggplant, bell peppers and button mushrooms

Super easy and healthy! You can always customize this and turn it into a different kind of stir fry! I LOVE STIR FRY!

On another note, I have a BIG plan for this blog and it might take me quite sometime to actually put together. A little hint, I might merge my other blog content into this one. We’ll see how things go.

Last but not least, I really want to win this iHerb Giveaway!

Have a wonderful Christmas everyone!! Be safe and be merry!

Question:
What’s your latest cooking adventure?

 

Asian style Thanksgiving

Knock, knock, knock,  anyone here?

I know it’s been a week since Thanksgiving and I haven’t had a chance to post about my Thanksgiving *boo*
We were totally having an Asian style Thanksgiving – no stuffing, no bread, no sweet desserts, no mashed potatoes.

Anyway I’ll just use pics to tell the stories.

Thanksgiving lunch with my family

Overall view of the lunch

Vegan mixed stir fry veggies - ear mushrooms, carrots, celery and tofu...yummm!

Vegetarian stir fry noodles (my aunt's homemade noodles from scratch) stir fried with some of the vegan stir fry veggies

Minced green beans with scrambled eggs...I LOVE this thing!

This dish was actually for the dinner gathering at my aunt’s place. It’s called “tekwan” (pronounced: ték-wun), an Indonesian dish from a small town called Palembang (pronounced: puh-lam-bung”). Basically it’s a shrimp, fishballs and shredded jicama soup. It’s a simple dish but lots of work. Maybe in the future I might post the recipe here

Tekwan (pronounced tek-wun) - an Indonesian dish that my mom made...pretty much shrimp soup with fishballs

The soup

Fishballs made from fishcake (ground fish)

chili sauce to go with it

I ordered a Chinese style turkey from 99 Ranch market which had to be ordered 1-2 weeks before. It tasted pretty good, just a little bit on the salty side. Totally different from American style turkey. Just imagine those Chinese roasted duck and you’ll get the idea how Chinese turkey taste like

Cut it into pieces and brought some to my in-laws for dinner

Thanksgiving dinner with my in-laws.
Can’t you believe my father-in-law cooked all of these? He’s amazing.

Only got one overall shot because we were late and I didn't want to make everyone waiting for me taking individual picture of each dish

Sticky rice dish

Went home with these organic fruits!

Persimmons! Fresh from K

Lemons! From my K's brother's fiance's parents' backyard

BLACK FRIDAY – I had to go to work but K had a day off. So he gave me a ride to work and later we had lunch together at Furaibo.

Miso soup and salad - part of the lunch specials.

My fun way eating the cold salad - mixed them into the warm miso soup..Yumm!

My dish - Originally I asked for New York steak dish but they ran out..BOO! So I asked for the broiled fish instead with more salad to sub the rice

K's dish - Korean BBQ dish

While I was working, K went to his parents’ place to chill. Better than walking around in a crowded stores or circling around the parking lot.

On our way back home, we stopped by Albertson’s to pick up some stuff. Gotta use that gift card

I ran out of Almond milk and too lazy to make them and wanna try Greek yogurt for the first time and I LOVE IT!

My mom got a chiffon cake recipe from my aunt when they were having Thanksgiving gathering so we made Chocolate Mocha Chiffon Cake during the weekend. I’ll do a separate post for this since this one has gotten quite long. But for now just enjoy the pic

Chocolate Moccha Chiffon Cake

Questions:
What’s your favorite holiday foods?
I don’t have any particular favorite food because I am not a picky eater (as long it’s not overly salty/sweet/greasy). But for sure I like the stir fry veggies that I made on T-day.

What type of persimmons do you like? Do you like persimmons?
There are 2 types of persimmons: Fuyu (the ones that I have in the pic) and Hachiya (more oval shape).

I personally like Fuyu ones because they don’t get mushy when ripe (unless overripe). Hachiya ones on the other hand have to be really ripe to consume, otherwise you’ll get this nasty chalky taste in your mouth (I had that before..eww). I don’t like mushy fruits so Fuyu persimmons for me.

How different are you with your significant other?
K and I have lots of similarities in terms of food and lifestyle but we still have differences on some other parts.

Fashion: Believe it or not K has twice or three times more clothing than I do. LOL, very rare I know. It’s usually the other way around. He even occupies my walk in closet and another closet and still has some boxes of clothes in the garage. Heck, I’m even wearing one of his sweater because it’s a little too small for him. Seriously I need to shop more clothing.

Books/Stories: K likes the Twilight Sagas while I don’t even bother. On the other hand, K doesn’t get Harry Potter as I do as well.

Are you a Black Friday shopper?
Since I started working at my current place, I can’t take a day off on Black Friday because that’s our busiest time (retail business). The only time I lined up early morning for Black Friday was 4-5 years ago in front of Best Buy. However, now I don’t even bother to go shop during the Thanksgiving weekend. It was waaay too crowded and I hate being in a crowd. It gives me headache. And I don’t have the patience to search for that particular clothing and go back and forth the fitting room to try it on. That explains why I don’t have much clothing..LOL.

 

Everyone’s out watching Harry Potter The Deathly Hallows!

Hi Friends, how are you doing? It’s Friday again and next week will be Thanksgiving week – meaning a short week!! But for me I won’t be having a long Thanksgiving weekend because I have to work on Friday after the Thanksgiving (known as Black Friday). I am working in a retail industry thus it’s the busiest time for us.

Anyway, I am not complaining. Besides, the traffic will be much better

Last Saturday I had to go to a dentist for my yearly teeth cleaning.

to be honest, I dislike going to a dentist..urgh!

Afterward Met up with my friend, her hubby and her kid for a lunch at this Japanese restaurant.

so empty and it was lunch time! woohoo!

According to my friend, this place is crowded during dinner time - mostly young people who enjoy drinking

lunch menu was pretty cheap. all of us picked #7

free refill of miso soup

The lunch set - K and I asked more salads for twice..hehe..I didn't finish the rice

couldn't remember the last time I had BBQ meat - I'm not much a meat eater.

On our way to my in-law’s place for dinner, we stopped by at this newly opened Chinese market and it was super crowded! Just because you’ll get some gift by spending a certain amount. The cashier lines were full! We had to wait at least 30 minutes!

it's like a zoo. Why there were so many people?? It's not like the market was giving away the stuff for free..haha

our grocery loot

the gift - but I gave it away....it was way too sweet for me to drink

Got this cute earrings from my sister-in-law to be

i love dangling earrings!

Questions for today:
1. Anyone out there going to watch Harry Potter this weekend?
I am not going to. In fact I’m going to wait at least a month later to watch it in the theater, when the crowd has died down. I don’t like to be in a crowded place as much. I know it’ll be fun seeing other fans, but crowded and noisy thing are just not for me.

2. Do you dislike going to a dentist/doctor?
Not so much for a doctor visit, but dentist, yeah. I used to have braces on when I was little and had it for a loong time. Just remembering those dentist visits already makes me cringe. Also 2 weeks later I have to go back to the dentist so he can take out my permanent retainer and order a new one for me. URGH!

3. Can you wear fake jewelries?
I can’t. I have to wear gold or I’ll get itchy. The earrings that I got weren’t gold but I think I could wear them for a short of time. But today I felt a bit itchy. Kinda bummer because there are so many cute jewelries that are not gold. And gold are expensive!!
Have a good weekend!

 

Friday I’m in Love!!

“I don’t care if Monday’s blue”
“Tuesday’s gray and Wednesday’s doom”
“Thursday I don’t care about you”
“It’s Friday I’m in love”

How’s your week been going so far? Mine is okay and for sure this week I am exercising almost ( I took Monday as my rest day) daily with today as my rest day. It makes me feel good even though it’s only a short exercise, as long I push to my maximum effort, I still get the endorphin I am not a big fan of long exercise per say so that’s why I’ve been following this gorgeous girl’s workout video.

“Monday you could fall apart”
“Tuesday Wednesday break my heart”
“Oh Thursday doesn’t even start”
“It’s Friday I’m in love”

Another good news is my brother is getting much better day to day. His temperature has been pretty stable for the past 3 weeks. The only thing that was still bugging my parents were his high heart rate. It’s true it’s been slowly going down but recently he redid heart echo reading and there was something different there (too much complicated medical term and I won’t bother trying to post it here). So long story short after we got referred by one of my cousin’s friend recommendation, we drove all the way down to UCLA Medical Center to see a Cardiologist.

The commute took us about an hour one way (yay to the traffic on 405, 10 and 105)
And as I drove down to this area, I was thinking of these ladies. (maybe next time I come up here we could do a little blogger meet up? )

Boy! This doesn’t look like a hospital/health center at all! The bright and modern interior reminds me a lot of an ad agency!

Cardiologist said we don’t have to worry about the heart condition at all. My brother is totally fine. That put my parents into an ease. For sure they finally can go back home in December without much worries anymore.

 

“Saturdaaaay, wait”
“Sunday always comes too late”
“But Friday never hesitates”

Next day I had to replenish my car’s gas tank in the freezing morning temperature on my way to work

That morning I made steamed sweet potatoes for my b-fast. Left them too long and got mushy! Ugh!!!

I took one, and I think my family finished the other one. It was meant for K to bring, but by the time he was about to leave, they weren’t done yet! FAIL. It took me a whole morning to finish those. They were filling!

And I made Chicken with Portabello Mushrooms. Was okay, family didn’t enjoy it as much (tasteless – haha I have a very light taste buds so didn’t put much salt and seasonings – maybe next time)

First time cooking using Portabello mushrooms..they are good!

 

Something to talk about:
1. I am still pretty new in blogging world and I realize the way I interact in blogging community doesn’t differ much from how I interact in real life. For example, no matter what I still need to reach out to other people’s blog if I want to have more readerships. Same thing in real life too, right? I have to start go out and meet more people if I want to increase my community circle. Unfortunately, I am not that type of person. I interact better in smaller community. When I first started this blog, I felt like I had to keep searching for new blog and put comments on every single blog so I’ll get more readers come to my blog. After a while, it just wore me up. I can’t do it. But I don’t care anymore how many readers I have here. This is my blog and who cares if there’re anyone reading, commenting or not. I will comment and read other blogs ONLY IF I have the time to do it. I don’t have to make it as my daily duties. I’m sure every bloggers have this kind of issue someway in their blogging path. But I won’t lie that I DO ENVY those popular bloggers who always have LOTS of comments on his/her blog. So I’d LOOOOVE to hear your thoughts on this matter.

2. I know there were some posts that I was venting off so much and full of negative thoughts and would like to thank those who’ve been encouraging and understanding my situation. I don’t do this enough but I thank EVERYONE for sticking around with me going thru the tough time. Now the situation keeps getting better

3. What’s everyone’s plan this coming weekend? I have a dentist appointment tomorrow and meet up with one of my friend afterward since she lives around that area.

“Monday you could hold your hands”
“Tuesday Wednesday stay in bed”
“Thursday watch the walls instead”
“It’s Friday I’m in love”

Have a good weekend, everyone!

 

From Summer November to Insomnia

Hey everyone, how are you?? Did you enjoy your extra hour of sleep (for those in the US). As for me, I did but for some reason I couldn’t sleep now thus I decided to update this blog! I know it’s Sunday night and I even planned to get up early tomorrow and work out but don’t think it’ll happen.

Sometimes I do have this insomnia when I can’t just fall asleep because of my snoring hubby. Anyway let’s recap a bit, shall we?

candies from Halloween - untouched! No trick or treaters came by to our house

So we had all these candies lying around since nobody came on Halloween day. I didn’t have any of these, but my hubby, mom and brother been nibbling on those a lot. Good thing I didn’t have much sweet tooth.

 

Unless it involves Loacker Dark Chocolate! I can hardly resist these!

I admit that I ate majority of this dark chocolate covered wafers!

And I finally tried to strain my yogurt like Tra did so it became creamier! No more watery yogurt for me!
Thanks Tra for the tip!

strain strain- getting rid of the excess water

mixed in some Kashi cereal..hmm hmm hmm....creamy and crunchy!

I don’t have Tofu Press as many other bloggers who like the tofu to be nice and firm. Heck, just prepared a big dish and put something extra heavy on top of the tofu, you get your DIY Tofu Press!

filled in a pyrex container with water and put extra other stuff on top of it. See the water from the tofu?? It got the job done!

Why spend extra $$ just to strain your tofu? In fact the DIY one can do more than 1 tofu! This is the second pressing. The first one had lots more water which I had to throw away or it'd spill out

For a little change of my usual toasted wheat bread with PB, oats or cereal, I ate purple yam for b-fast instead.

one for me, one for hubby. Who says a man/woman only can live with bread/cereal/oats for b-fast?

I don’t usually spend $$ for b-fast but I’ve been having this Subway coupon for a while and it’s getting closer to the expiration date. I got the Egg white Wheat muffin breakfast sandwich.

$1.49 for breakfast sandwich. After tax it was $1.62. Not bad. Usually it costs around $2.00.

The combo was only some steak meat and lettuce. No mayo or cheese as I dislike them all. No tomatoes b/c I don't like to be messy eating at my work desk.

My impression? I’m glad I always make my own b-fast The sandwich just tasted meh for me. It was pretty bland without the addition of mayo or cheese. The steak meat was kinda salty and so did the egg white. The wheat muffin was a bit chewy prolly because I ate it 20 mins later after I got to the office.

Our SoCal weather has been really weird! I call it Summer in November. It was 80-90°F in November and this is in the US!

bright, hot, sunny and very dry! Much like summer! Weird weather. Is 2012 movie coming true?

But I will miss this daylight home commute after the time change though.

sunsets over the hills.

While shopping our grocery this weekend, I saw this lopsided apple and thought it was cute.

I know we just got 4 kitchen rugs last week, but after seeing these we couldn’t resist to get it. It’s more durable, bigger and not to mention it’s easier to clean! Just wipe with damp cloth and be done with it! Dirts won’t stuck on it as much and it’s made of rubber/PVC.

color matches better with the dark wood floor. They're $20 each.so total we spent $60 by getting 3 of these. Oh well.

It was my mom’s birthday today (technically it should be on the 8 but it’s already Nov 8 in Asia. Since she was born in Asia, we use Asian time) so I decided to take her out for a little shoe shopping. But instead getting the shoes, she found some winter clothing. There weren’t much shoes that she liked.

Got all of these at Ross. I offered to pay for all of these and said they'll be for her b'day gift. I know it wasn't much, but at least they'll be useful for her. My mom is afraid of cold weather a lot so she needs more warm clothing

Got this Chocolate cake. 7 candles - Happy birthday MOM!

perfect cake. Everyone got 1 slice and 1 slice left for whoever wants to eat it for b-fast tomorrow morning. this cake taste really light and not sweet at all. Kudos to Asian Bakery!

And while driving earlier, I notice the weather might be cooler again. I heard rain is coming.

Questions of the day:
1. What do you do when you can’t sleep?
You know what I do..haha!

2. Does your significant other or whoever share the same room with you snore? What do you do?
Mine does! Usually the remedy is I go to sleep first. There are times when I’m tired enough I still be able to go to sleep even though he’s kinda snoring.

 

One week update, hospital facts, some fun traditional remedies

I’m still alive and kickin’ here, in case you are wondering
Thanks for the encouraging comments on the last post. They meant a lot to me . So my typical days recently are get up in the morning, workout (if I have time), go to work, come back home, have a quick dinner, then drive my parents to the hospital to see my bro, hanging out there until we all got kicked out by the security guard because we usually stay beyond visiting hours, come back home, shower, sleep – rinse and repeat. That’s weekdays.

Weekends are pretty similar but add the hospital trips during daytime as well.

My hubby and I had the luxury (pun intended) to have lunch at the hospital's cafeteria because we had to drive my parents there earlier than lunch time and we weren't hungry when we left. Then it was too much hassle go back and forward, might as well stayed there for lunch

Not bad actually and I finished this whole bowl by myself - hubby took a little taste

My hubby had the wraps, which in my opinion wasn’t that great. The wrap was a bit salty for my taste.

Another thing that I had to come up in order to squeeze in as many chores as possible is to prepare a ready to mix bread mixture. Yup, I had to pre-measure all the dry ingredients and put them in the zip lock and set them aside. So everytime I want to make a bread, all I need to do is pour that whole dry ingredients into the bread machine, add the wet ingredients (water, oil and almond meals), press the button and walk away until the mixing and rising is done.

bread dry ingredients in the zip locks & almond meals (almond waste from almond milk) in plastic wrap. All measured up. Sadly those are still sitting on the counter because apparently I STILL DO NOT have time to mix these ingredients in the bread machine and press the button...SIGH.

fresh fruits are always the best meal for me!

Oh and did I tell you that I had the honor to have another meal at the hospital cafeteria for Monday night dinner?

None of the dressings they offered appealed me, so I grabbed the packaged lemon juice and mustard

A closer look of the inside - I had to pick the shredded cheese before eating this. Such a pain

So it’s been one week and you guess they found out what kind of infection my bro is having? WRONG.

They HAVEN’T FOUND anything concrete regarding his illness. Lots of tests, biopsies, cultures and other medical gibberish I don’t understand and they still can’t pin point what kind of infection he’s having. He’s still under TB meds and had lots of antibiotic IVs infused into his body and yet his fever is still hovering between 99-100s°F. His heart rate is insanely high (120bpm-150bpm) for someone who’s only lying down on bed whole day. That’s crazy! Normal people only get that high heart rate when they jog or run! Like me this morning.

Btw, the hospital workers are TERRIBLE! My bro told me yesterday that he was in pain for 15 minutes in the afternoon because some stupid nurse combined his potassium IV together with the antibiotic. A little bit of medical stuff here: potassium IV flow is much SLOWER than antibiotic. Why? Because you could DIE from potassium overdose in a short time! Even with a very slow flow, it still hurts (like a burning sensation on your hand according to my bro).

So guess what? He was in an extremely burning pain on his right arm and been calling up the nurse for help BUT NOBODY CAME!!!! FUCKING RETARDS! I was so mad last night when I heard him telling me that and had to restrain myself to storm up to the front desk and yelling at the staff. But I know better. Do not make enemies at the place where they can create some kind of medical errors to harm the patient. So I stayed quiet. But I did bring this matter a little bit to the night shift nurse, not sure if he got what I meant. My bro said the daytime nurses are the WORST! Gosh, I hope I don’t have to be hospitalized like him. I don’t trust my health to strangers. Sadly none of our family member can always stay by his side to help him get stuff. Just like my friend said, you always need a family member around the patient to get his/her needs. Can’t trust those hospital nurses.

Ok moving on.

I had some fun traditional remedies that I just learned recently. Ever since my brother’s been sick, one of my relative who’s an expert in traditional Chinese herbs been advising my parents with lots of traditional remedies.
Remedy #1:

Dried red chilies

(source)
Place a handful of dried red chilies in a sandwich size ziplock bags and hold them in your hands and put some on your body as well (packaged in a zip lock bag). According to them, it’ll help drive out the fever from your body. Believe it or not.

Remedy #2

Rice vinegar

(Source)
According to my other aunt, soaking your feet into rice vinegar will make you feel less tired after a long walk or something like that. Interesting!

So any other traditional remedies that you’d like to share?

 

Stiff neck, Averie’s GF crackers experiment

First of all thank you for all your comments and support on my last post. Definitely motivate me working towards to my goal.
How’s everyone’s Saturday so far? My left neck was really stiff since yesterday evening. Not sure what happened, I was TOTALLY fine yesterday until the time I got off from work. I couldn’t even turn my head to look left. Just imagine how painful when I was driving home and had to change to the left lane. Had to turn my entire body to do that..UGH!

But today after my morning jog, my neck was loosen up a bit but not quite yet. And I’ve been feeling quite tired this whole day. Prolly my beach morning jog was a bit too intense? It was quite windy on one way and I had to really push myself. I felt the faster I jog, the harder the wind blew on me. I couldn’t even hear my music from my BB speakerphone.

click for larger view. My max heart rate was 204 bpm?? What that even real? Though my average was only 147 bpm

After the jog, we had to go for some grocery shopping on the way back. I snacked on Boomi Bar Perfect Pumpkin to refuel my energy.


Unlike other Boomi Bars I tried before this one was ok. It was very sweet and don’t think I like the texture as much. There were generous amount of pumpkin seeds though. Heck I was starving so I still finished it.

Breakfast was the same as yesterday, oatmeal with raw homemade almond milk with non fat plain yogurt topped with jumbo raisins. Unlike this pic which I took yesterday, this morning version was super watery as I ran out of oats and a bit too much almond milk.

So earlier this week I was already planning to do some cooking/baking project for this long weekend. But because of my stiff neck, that plan had to be postponed a bit. But that didn’t stop me to try to make Averie’s Vegan GF Crackers! My husband was out for the whole day to help his brother with his new house so might as well I kept myself busy. Better than napping the whole day, right? The weather was very sunny with cool breeze in So Cal today, perfect for sleep in. But I chose not to.

I made myself a quick lunch, big ass plate of spring mix salad with baby carrots, topped with nutritional yeast dissolved with some water, nuked 4 egg whites topped with ketchup, “curly fish ball thingy” and a handful of raw almonds and Carr’s Water Crackers on the side.

I didn't finish the almonds for lunch but I ate it later on for snack

After lunch, I made a quick run to TJ to get the ingredients for the crackers: Golden flaxseeds and sunflower seeds. They didn’t have chia seeds so I substitute that with white sesame seeds.

I wanted to make more savory crackers rather than sweet ones, so I altered Averie’s recipe a bit.
1/3 cup sesame seeds
1/3 cup flax seeds
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
a pinch of salt
1-2 Tbsp honey
2 tsp garlic powder
2-6 Tbsp water

Directions:
1. Blend the seeds in the blender- be careful not to do it too long- still need to leave some chunks

2. I didn’t pour the wet ingredients in the blender cause I didn’t want it to stick at the bottom of the blender. Instead I pour out the coarsely chopped seeds into a bowl and mix in the sald, honey, garlic powder, salt and water. I used my own judgment not to make it too watery or too dry.

3. Line everything on the cookie sheet. I used aluminum foil. Spread it evenly.

4. Bake in the oven 300 F for about 20 minutes or something. I kept changing the oven temperature and kept an eye on it. I changed the temperature to 250F towards the end. Also I flipped them over so the other side will get dried as well.

finished product. I broke the cracker sheet when I flipped it earlier.

Immediately I cut them into pieces before it cooled down.

some part are not as crunchy as I expected but still good..pretty nutty and I could taste the sesame seeds

not as pretty as Averie's, but it's still edible..haha

I also roasted 2 eggplants, thinking to make baba ganoush but because of my stiff neck, I scrapped that plan. Instead I made this Korean style eggplant side dish. Pretty easy, just peeled off the skin, squeezed out the water out, mixed in with Korean hot pepper paste (gochujang), a bit of salt and some nori furikake, you’re done! Doesn’t look that pretty but it’s good!

Some stuff I had today for snacks while waiting for the crackers to be done:

Some of yesterday food:

Ok I had to cut this post short. My neck is killing me now and I think it’s better I stay away from computer for the rest of the day.

Happy 4th of July for those who live in the US. Be safe and have fun!

Question: What do you do when you have a stiff neck?
I think I just want to sit down and do nothing. Lie down on the bed and watch stuff……

 

More recipes!

House chores done for the day, even though not completely. I was a little overwhelmed trying to finish lots of stuff in little time. Anyway, after my semi-negative post this morning, I decided to make Tofu Burger one more time! Unlike last time, I didn’t put all the ingredients in the blender, rather I just mashed them with potato masher.
Tofu Burger
Ingredients:
About 8.5 oz firm tofu, drained (I used House Tofu)
1 canned black beans, drained and rinse
2 Tbsp flaxseed meal mixed with 6 Tbsp water (or you can use 2 egg whites)
2 Tbsp dark soy sauce
3 Tbsp whole wheat flour
3 tsp vital wheat gluten flour (I used Bob’s Red Mill)
1/4 white onion, chopped – you can use more if you love onions
1 tsp garlic powder
Some organic ketchup (it wasn’t really necessary, just put a little bit)
Some salt – I think I used 1/2 tsp
1 tsp brown sugar
A dash of black pepper

Directions:
1. Mashed tofu and drained black beans with potato masher.

2. Mix in the flaxseed mixture, whole wheat flour, soy sauce, salt, pepper, vital heat gluten flour, onions, brown sugar and garlic powder until even.

3. Mix in the ketchup.

4. Taste the mixture to get the desired taste. Since there’s no raw meat in this mixture, no need to worry about tasting it, right?

Ready to be cooked!

5. Preheat the cooking pan with 1 Tbsp cooking oil in high heat. Shape the tofu burger mixture with hand to form “burger patty shape”. Reduce the heat to medium. The goal here is to make the tofu patty as dry as possible so it won’t crumble when you flip them over.

Don't they look like beef patties? My hubby said they looked like chocolate chip cookies..LOL

6. After about 5 minutes, flip them over. Cook for another 5-7 minutes.

As you can see I over crowded the pan with the patties so I had hard time flipping them over.

7. Remove from pan and serve! Have this with ketchup, surely look a lot like the real hamburger

What did I do for the rest of the tofu? I made this tofu veggie medley! I cut the tofu into cubes, grilled them on the pan (with almost no oil, just to brown the sides).

Chopped celeries, cucumber (seeded), tomatoes, 1 potato, and carrots. A dash of salt, black pepper, and dried parsley and it’s done!

We had these for lunch along with other veggie dishes. I think our lunch today was almost vegan, with the exception of McDonald’s Chicken nuggets my brother bought the night before. My hubby and I didn’t even touch those. I hate McD, they’re just full of gross stuff! I couldn’t even remember when was the last time I had them.

My hubby loves the tofu burger that I made. He had at least 2 or 3 pieces! I packed 3 pieces for my lunch tomorrow, along with the green beans and veggies. I have to remind myself to bring the ketchup as well.

After lunch, we had to shop some stuff at Costco. Pretty much basic stuff like shampoo and toothpaste. I also bought a big bag of baking soda for cleaning. I love using baking soda mixture to clean my kitchen. Mix it with a bit of vinegar, it’s a total deodorizer and the best part of it, it’s NON TOXIC! I hate using those kitchen cleaners that claimed to be “anti bacterial”. I hate the smell of ammonia and I don’t want any toxic chemical on my kitchen counter. Hot vinegar, baking soda and dish washing liquid soap are my only cleaner ingredients for cleaning my kitchen counter top.
In addition to those, I saw this 4lb package of strawberries for $4.99! Heck I grabbed that! I’ve been craving for strawberries for a while and this time I won’t let it slip from my hands again. Besides for this price, I got these nice and ripe strawberries.

Whipped them into my non fat plain yogurt and some canned pineapple slices, it made my wonderful afternoon snack.

That yogurt hold my hunger way too perfectly that I didn’t even have dinner until 7:30 pm. The good thing was, I didn’t have to rush preparing dinner, because even my hubby said he wasn’t hungry either. So I took my time and pan grilled 3 salmon steak pieces I got yesterday. I separated the salmon pieces into 2 plates.

One topped with mango salsa.

The other ones topped with sweet and sour sauce.
Sauce ingredients:
lemon juice, soy sauce, dried basil, brown sugar, a dash of salt, chopped celery, chopped 1 carrot, some garlic, ginger, garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste.

Serve those with boiled broccoli and nuked potatoes. Did I mention I wasn’t hungry? Well after I took a bite of mango salsa salmon piece, before I realized it, I had at least half of the salmon along with boiled broccoli.

What do you usually use to clean your kitchen counter top?