Food Poetry Nonsense from September to October 2012

On the first day of September my true love said to me;

go and eat prawn noodles

make yourself fishy

join you I will not

but beside you I will play computer games.

On the fifth day of September my true love said to me;

shall I make you a cereal drink?

It's good for health

You like it a lot

It'll perk up your mood all the time.

On the tenth day of September my true love said to me;

How nice this risotto is

It is all chicken and vegetables

no E colourings and preservatives

keep it up my love, you'll make me

healthy but with a belly.

On the fifteenth day of September my true love said to me;

Doesn't look very appetizing

yet once you try this onion soup

you'll be all charged and smelly

but who cares because I'm all oniony too!

 On the twentieth day of September my true love said to me;

I am going to bake

show you my love

my heart especially

when it's all given to you.

 On the twenty-fifth day of September my true love said to me;

I want to eat fast food

make myself a pork burger

much fresher than plasticky Macdonalds

much more oomph than your mouth can take in one bite.

On the thirtieth day of September my true love said to me;

If I knew what life was about

I wouldn't be swimming to search for answers

I would be cooking for passion and

swimming for fish to cook.

 On the first day of October my true love said to me;

I am going to make noodles

but of a special kind

they will be as delicious as

hawker food style in Malaysia

you'll want more and more.

On the fifth day of October my true love said to me;

Bread is the most basic of food

bake it I will

with bacon and cheese

hearty enough for dinner.

 On the tenth day of October my true love said to me;

Eat your apples; two a day

easy to cut with apple cutter

even if you're lazy

you can still do it

come on, you boleh!

On the fifteenth day of October my true love said to me;

Chicken drumsticks here I come

make something with soya sauce

let it be golden brown and with

vegetables to brighten up the day.

On the twentieth day of October my true love said to me;

Let's have Mexican

go for chips and chicken with guacamole sauce

sweet vegetables at the bottom

heat up in the oven.

 On the twentieth of October my true love said to me;

The Lorraine quiche looks good

for tea shall it be

dinner we can skip

for this enormous pie is shared only with the two of us.

Now you see this bowl of chilly chicken ramen from Wagamama's Restaurant in Amsterdam....

Now you don't! It's gone, thanks to me...

Hubby's 38th Birthday

 Hubby celebrated his 38th birthday on October 3rd which fell on a Wednesday. He was working from home on that day and I had lectures at university. I was out of the house from 11.00 am till 6.00 pm. It is a change for me as I am normally home on Wednesdays when he is home. University life means lots of travelling - technically classes start at 1.15 pm and end at 3.00 pm but I take up to four hours in travelling time. I was home at 6.00 pm because I went to buy hubby a birthday cake.

I got hubby a cream chocolate cake from the department store HEMA in the center of Alkmaar upon reaching the train station. Hubby was pleasantly surprised. He was still working at the computer and we had the cake as our tea. Hubby had to continue working still after that.

His mother had dropped by earlier in the afternoon to wish him happy birthday and to give him a present of a flower arrangement with decorative fans on it which were on closer view, banknotes folded creatively into fans.

She had also bought him half a birthday cake. So we had plenty of cake to eat. It was nice that both cakes were of different flavours - the cake that his mother bought was a pure chocolate cake.

We went out for dinner in the Thai restaurant in Alkmaar at 8.30 pm. We were fortunate that the rain had just stopped. We ordered Thai chicken curry in the war. It is a chicken dish with three different types of curry making the same dish. I thought that the curries will be served separately but I think three different curries were mixed all into one plate.

 Perhaps that's why they called it chicken in the war.

Our other dish was a pork curry dish served in a clay pot, while the last dish was a tauhu (bean curd) chilly salad dish. We had our meals with rice.

The chicken in the war was really spicy but I enjoyed it a lot. So was the salad dish.

In the middle of the night, I had a terrible tummy ache from all the chilly. Hubby's tummy was not feeling too great the next day either.

But we had a nice time together in the restaurant. Hubby was feeling more festive now. I had initially bought hubby a computer game "Mists of Pandaria" extension set for his World of Warcraft. I was surprised to know that he actually had this game already, so I had to change it at the shop the next day for a refund. Nevertheless hubby was happy that I thought of something that he liked. He knew that I feel that sometimes he plays too much games.

In the end, I got hubby some shower gel from Nivea as I ran out of ideas of what hubby might want. I was not sure what other computer games he might like for I hardly know any games unless he tells me about it.

We are going to England, in particular London to celebrate his birthday again in conjunction with his sister and nephew's birthday next Friday. We are looking forward to the trip and I plan to give hubby another nice dinner since we had tummy upsets from the Thai dinner.

Food may come and food may go, but birthdays with hubby must be perfect in my opinion. Hubby is fond of Asian food and I am pleased. I am fond of Dutch / Western food now and hubby is neither pleased or angry. He says "just be yourself and that is the best of all." How sweet.

Although it is already two weeks since his birthday, I wish hubby the greatest birthday yet and may all his dreams come true! Your wife will see to it...

Chef Jonker's Philadelphia Pork

From a commercial on tv and from my initial interest in the dish but lack of commitment to actually make it, hubby took over the reins from me. He made Philadelphia pork which is basically an oven pork dish coated in a type of herb butter from the Philadelphia brand which is famous in Holland. He slices the pork fillet into half, marinates it overnight  and on the next day spreads the butter inside the pork just like one would do a sandwich. He then cuts bell peppers and adds them inside the tin foil together with the pork. Then it goes into the oven for forty five minutes at 180'C.

The dish is delicious and I feel like I'm having a meal in a Michelin starred restaurant. The sauce from the marinade is delicious and the pork is all buttery with a distinct herb taste.

It is a joy to be eating this meal. I didn't think that from butter you could get a delicious dish. Of course it's fattening but I will overlook this for now. Good things come with a cost; hence the saying "you can never have too much of a good thing", if this interpretation is right. You must strive for less and in moderation. Thus eating = living.

Or maybe it means the other way round - you can never have too much of something good because it is always getting better and better. It means that you can have more of it and appreciate what you have! Thus living = eating. Not bad at all I would say and definitely easier to follow.

Korma Curry Pork with the Couch Potato Chef

Feeling re-energized on a dreary-weather Friday evening, I decided to cook a proper meal with TLC (tender loving care) for hubby and myself for dinner. For two weeks, I had not cooked a proper meal - by proper meal, I define it as something which is not oven-baked, instant or tapaod (take-away Malaysian style). I was down with an inflammation of the tail bone; in simple words just lower back swelling. I was unable to bend down and could walk only very slowly. Hubby took one day leave from work to see to my needs. I felt very immobile. I could not walk without pain then. It saw me lagging behind housework, cooking, studies, my favourite morning sessions at the gym, piano playing in Almere and my new found interest in ballet. So happened I had exams too last week, and I was at an all point low. So when I found out that I didn't do too bad after all in the exams, my spirits were lifted. For all that two weeks of almost no-physical action, I was feeling sluggish and unintellectual given that I was brooding more than studying and lamenting the fact that my brain didn't seem to work like it did ten years ago at university. Oh, am I that old already?

I decided to make korma curry pork to celebrate my coming out of back pain, my exam results and for thanking hubby for taking extra care of me. For the past two weeks, our meals have been out of the box and didn't feel like mama's recipes; you know that feeling of sentimentality you taste when you're eating home cooked food even if you're faraway.
I cut mushrooms, tomatoes and pork fillet into cubes. Then begins the meat stir-frying part. My style is to toss and play with them as if they were dice in a roulette game. Makes it more interesting with an oomph factor in the frying, making me pay more attention to whether or not the meat is cooked.

I add in the Dutch button mushrooms (they are a bit flatter and whiter than Chinese ones) after the pork has cooked for a bit, but not completely. The reason is I always don't trust mushrooms - yes, that's right. I somehow feel that if I don't cook mushrooms long enough, I'll be poisoned by them. So I treat them like meat.

The mushrooms on their own are tasteless. So if I run out of ideas of ingredients which complement or match the food, I use mushrooms as an all-rounder food. Great tip, no?

 Then I add in the Korma sauce. It comes in a small bottle. I pour all of it inside. I wait for the curry to bubble for a bit, starting at the sides of the pan. Then I know it is really starting to cook and sizzle.

When the curry is all bubbly, it kind of reminds me of a hot swamp in those Piranha type movies where some giant crocodile or monster fish lurks beneath the murky waters ready to pounce as the bubbles get bigger and higher. So when the bubbles are big enough and spread towards the center of the pan, I know it's time to pounce - I do so by adding the tomatoes!

Tomatoes are my last ingredient in any dish because I like it when the tomatoes are still juicy instead of all wrinkly when the dish is ready. Some dishes I see here people cook tomatoes until there is nothing left of them. All you see is a strand of skin of what once was, instead of the juicy red flesh.

I stir the whole mixture thoroughly and with TLC. I felt it all coming towards me now after all the moodiness and back pain is gone. Last unseen ingredient - TLC!

I cannot help but add some Vietnamese chilly sauce inside for more fiery passion in the dish. The label on the Dutch korma curry says that it is only mildly spicy; and for Malaysian standards, this means that it is nil as the level of tolerance for Dutch taste-buds are generally low.

The chilly sauce is actually the one which is officially used by Vietnamese loempia (popiah) sellers here. Hubby and I always squeeze a long line along our popiahs when we buy them at the market to eat immediately. At 1.20 Euros per popiah, they really are doing good business cos when we walk together, we never fail to get one.

Finally the dish is all ready to eat. It tastes good and hubby likes it a lot. The next day, he made fried rice with it with the leftovers as I cooked quite a bit. I'm glad that this dish is the start of a more energetic me.

I hope that I would be able to cook proper meals at least three times a week. Nothing beats the creamy flavours of a home cooked meal. Now I follow hubby's style and try to make my dishes as creamy as possible. Maybe this is part from hubby's liking for cheesy meals. So I try to re-create it in Asian meals as well by means of adding santan (coconut milk). However for this dish, there was no need to as it was already creamy enough as the sauce is quite thick.

Pizza Oven Timing for Dummies

I was in Almere today and I went full-fledged Malaysian food. I ordered off menu, asking for char kuey tiaw (fried flat noodles). The food was delicious. The chef's wife gave me three types of sauce to go with it - sambal, atjar and "ma lai can" - that's what the chef called the last sauce. It was pork fillet with chilli sauce. I figured that that I had one too many sauces already so I took just the "ma lai can" and returned the sambal and atjar, not before offering the customer beside me the sambal. He said he had enough sambal too.

I feel that it is not good to waste, so I gave the little bowl of sambal and the plastic bag of atjar (yes, it was tied up in a plastic bag for me for some strange reason) back to the chef's wife, who is also the waitress. I said that one sauce was enough for me, and pst...pst...the sambal and atjar actually gives me a tummy ache. The food itself is good but not its' sauces.

For dinner, we had quick oven food. We had pizza, chicken nuggets, curly fries and potato pieces. I was silly enough to burn the pizza because I miscalculated the temperature required. The instruction on the box said that it must be at 225'C for 12 minutes. Our new oven could not be set to 225'C. It could only go to either 220'C or the alternative and highest temperature was 240'C.

I did a fast calculation and set it at 220'C for 15 minutes, and the top of the pizza was burnt black. I had to use a pair of scissors to cut off the top layer of the pizza so that it was still edible. My deduction was that a longer time was needed to bake the pizza since the temperature was lower, and I thought a mere three minutes would be fine. After all, what could three minutes do?

Boy, I was so wrong. After my shower, I checked the oven and found a black pizza. At least I was quick enough to shower within 15 minutes and check the oven in time. There was already a burning smell.

I told hubby about my wrong calculation. He said there was a way of calculating. I said we should eat first while the food was still piping hot. Yet somehow we got into a Mathematical mood, and I took out a pen and paper and did the following and the pizza was really cold by the time we ate it :-

The instructions were                            225'C for 12 minutes
So how many minutes would it take 220'C?  
This would  mean                                  220'C       X    12 minutes
                                                          --------                              
                                                            225'C

                                                            = 11.7 minutes

At first glance, the answer of 11.7 minutes seem good. No question about miscalculation. However what I failed to see initially was pointed out by hubby. It does not make sense if a lower temperature would require a shorter time in the oven. Duh...It struck me too that there was something wrong with this calculation.

Nevertheless, not about to concede defeat in producing the right answer, I tried another way.

             If                           225'C takes 12 minutes
             Then for                1'C, how many minutes would it take?
                                          12
                                         -------       =  0.053 minutes (see how minuscule a second it is)
                                           225          
   
             Thus                    1'C                 takes  0.053 minutes
             Then                    220'C             means  220 X 0.053 minutes
                                                               = 11.7 minutes  

Yet, still I got the same answer for this different method of calculation. How could this be? Common sense would tell you that the lower the temperature, the longer the pizza has to be in the oven. But why with sound mathematical calculations, the answer is not reached? Or maybe the law of pizza in the oven timing does not use mathematical calculations?

Hmm, I still did not get it, and have not got it till today. By the way, this meal we had was over a month ago and I did not finish the post until today. Any ideas, anyone?
                     
                                                               
             
           

Summer Highlights in Alkmaar

It is autumn now. You see it in the trees and the chill in the air. Yet I am quite nostalgic about summer. It seemed like ages ago that the trees were still green. Late summer is the most beautiful when everything is in full bloom. These photos were taken during at the Oosterhout park in Alkmaar while I was jogging back from the gym in the morning two months ago. This summer I am fascinated with all things tiny like insects on flowers. I know now how to distinguish between a wasp, a common bee and a bumble-bee. This is thanks to hubby for telling me, and thanks to me being stung by a wasp. Don't worry though, it was not painful (ok, maybe the wasp just settled on me and did its booty dance or maybe I have skin as thick as an elephant!).

According to hubby, a wasp is like the one you see in the photos here. The bumble-bee is smaller, yellower and brighter. It makes the most buzzing sound, and it is quite loud actually. The common bee is somewhere in between the wasp and the bumble-bee in terms of size and colour.

So what I have learnt especially from this summer are :-
(a) bee differentiation - a skill not very useful in my law studies perhaps, but useful enough to have that rare conversation with nature enthusiasts. Not that I've met any though...

(b) making sure that once I look up, I have to look down too - this golden rule came rather too late for me as I had stepped on a pile of goose/duck poo (I can't tell which is which) in my excitement of photographing these wasps on the flowers. The flowers were by the banks of the lake, and so happened it was a hot day which made the ducks/goose more prone to nature activities I guess.

Had I not scented something "fishy" below me, I would not have known...cos the yellow flowers were bright, the sun was shining and I was with my camera. Well, no pain, no gain, and no immersion in the scents of nature, good or bad!

By the way, the flowers actually have no scent at all, which was quite disappointing. I wonder what the bees see in them as they really love this flower a lot compared to others. Maybe like me, they're rather blind and go for the first flower that catches their attention.

(c) Ducks/Goose and all creatures which fly like me less during summer - try feeding a duck bread during summer and it scorns you as if quacking to say "Hey, don't insult me. I can find my own food." They don't rush out at you and can't be bothered for your bread, however fresh it is. Well, only the laziest ducks will come and appreciate your bread.

Try feeding them during winter when it's all icy and snowy. The response is, "Quack! Quack! You saved my life!" All ducks/goose and flying creatures including the fierce seagulls which can bite though garbage bags (nowadays a nuisance in Alkmaar but that's another story) zoom towards you like crazy. They squabble among themselves just for a piece of bread. They like humans more during these times and I must say, I like them more too during winter when they appreciate me walking in the park just to feed them bread. It makes my day and the sense of knowing that although I am not feeding people in starving countries, I am feeding starving animals instead. Let's hope that during summer, they remember me.

(d) Sunny days are rare, sunless days are aplenty - this summer didn't really feel like a "good" summer which Dutch people define. The temperature at its highest was around 30'C and it lasted for 2 days. There was a good whole two weeks (though not consecutive) of sunshine. The rest of summer was damp, rainy, cloudy and sunless.

No wonder people told me back in 2010 when we got married that it was a "good" summer. I didn't see the difference then because it was my first summer in the Netherlands. Then we had sunny days for months on end. This year mother nature rushed into spring with too much warmth and then for summer, it ran out of steam. Maybe that's why my crocuses (spring flowers) at the balcony did not grow, and the poor photographer in me was taking photographs of it everyday for a month to make a video of its growth...you know the type which slowly shows the blossoming from bud to flower. Here the bulbs grew, but no buds, no flowers. Then half way I stopped my amateur "science" project. Ah, what to do...

(e) Carry your own weather with you - this quote was not invented up by me, but by a book which I read. I now make this my personal motto. I try to make the weather in my heart sunny and comfortable enough for me all the time. Spiritually speaking, it's about creating peace in your heart. Outside conditions are immaterial to happiness. That way, whatever the weather is outside; how the wind may be blowing my hair silly and freezing my fingers stiff will not bother me apart from spending more money to buy a conditioner and gloves.

Summer came and left, just like all seasons, and all of time in general. What I regretted this summer was that hubby and I did not have the time to go camping at the dunes. Somehow we were occupied. We had a busy summer. Every other weekend, there was some party, family gathering or our own trips to Germany to the Black Forest for my birthday and our anniversary in Sauerland. Oh yes, I have to add we enjoy Germany's nature a lot - with its rugged mountains, waterfalls and diversity. Holland is so tame in comparison. We learnt more about the German landscape, I can say.

The best part of this years summer in Alkmaar were my jogging escapades around the park/road on the way home from the gym. It feels so close to home in Malaysia (literally and spiritually) minus the cheeky hoots from the trishaw rider who yells at me in his very honest way "makin lari, makin gemuk!" (the more you run, the fatter you get!) Needless to say, I can live without that!