hello win

October 31st is celebrated by young and old all over the world - Halloween! In Malaysia, only the elite will go to the extend of decking their houses in the ghoulish mood. Also the children of the elite will dress up in all sorts of costumes from Spidey to Bart in effort to score some candies from their elite neighbours.

The not so elite individuals will check out the local joints to somehow get in the mood for a scary night out. So off we went to Tony Roma's at Cineleisure to check out the scene.

Strangely for a 'happening' night, the outlet was somewhat quiet with only a few tables occupied. The reception was complete with the cemetery scene and the hosts and hostesses were of course in the scary attire.

Our waiter for the night was this ugly looking chap whom we had problems try to decipher what he was saying under the mask. He was also cool about us taking pictures and started to pose. Thumbs up for that.

We were particularly curious about this other waiter and just had to ask him about his costume. He is a victim of a bad road accident and as for the sari he is in, he was on his way back from buying a sari for his girlfriend when the accident happened. Really ingenious and creative. Kudos to helmet guy.

Food wise it was same same but the effort they put in was great.

quest to success - the edamame way

I am perpetually on a diet. Well, all women are anyway. I have discovered the very simple truth about weight loss - have a daily deficit in one's calorie intake and lose weight; ingest more than you need will then result in a weight gain. Easy peasy.

So as of last week I have started to count my calories but firstly one must know what is ones daily calorie requirement.

Every morning I have a fruit or a yogurt because it is bad to start the day on an empty stomach. Then it lunch as usual minus the oily and fried stuff. Snacking is usually my biggest problem but ever since I have been transferred back to my original place, the snacks have reduced but still, I have on occasions succumbed.

Dinner is quite an episode. Having to prepare dinner for my husband would mean now being smart and cooking smaller portions. Since last week, my dinner has been either fruits or vegetables. No carbs or meat. And my latest craze and addiction are edamame beans. They are actually green soy beans still in their pods.

These yummy protein powerhouse usually served in Japanese restaurants can be found in the frozen food section. Dump them (frozen) in boiling water that is lightly salted for 1 minute and voila, goodness ready to eat!

Edamame , All the Way!

psychadelic

The look of the bottle and its unusual shape totally caught my eye during one recent grocery shopping trip. There were basically two variants to choose from - yogurt and sour. I decided to try the sour version and lo and behold, SOUR it was. The flavours were grape, green apple and lemon and very so strangely coloured that at some point I thought I was going to get colour poisoning (hey, manufactured in China lah... you know the bad press they have been getting!). Well, I didn't coz my neighbour at the office consumed most of it in one day, say like 20 pcs. By the way, he is still my neighbour if you were wondering.

Lesson of the day - Looks can be so deceiving. What you see may not be what you get.

So if you like the cute packaging and don't mind a little colour in your life that comes with a sour 'kick' that check them out at your local grocer.

simply

Today is one of those days that I feel that I am floating in mid air. No, I am not high, just drifting...

ho chak

My colleague recommended 'jing fan' aka steamed rice for lunch today after watching Ho Chak, the makan programme of 8tv last night. Well, we were not the only ones who had the same thought for lunch... (the amazing power of REACH of television).

We arrived at 12.45pm at the chinese styled coffee shop at Kelana Jaya (close to Giant Hypermarket) hoping to sample the talked about item but to our dismal, it was SOLD OUT!!! By the way the aunty was grinning when she said that. She did offer for us to try the soup with white rice in mushroom sauce. Sad. Never mind lor will conjure up the previous sensation when I sampled this amazing 'jing fan'. Anyways my colleague had the soup and rice combo and gave it two thumbs up.

***

This stall is not new to me as it is near where my parents live. We frequent this place quite often and is a favourite of my dad's. He always orders the ginger chicken variant. Always. There was also once when my cousin and I had lunch there at 2.30ish and was told that they had three portions left. We order two, one for each of us and was highlighted that there is only one more portion left and whether we would like to have that as well... (the owners are very friendly you see and that they know how devastated one can be when it runs out) My cousin, not having tasted it before politely said no and within seconds after taking his first mouthful stood up and walked over to the stall to place the order for the last portion. Too late! The last portion was already ordered buy someone else. Good things come to those who wait - NOT! Well not in this case anyway.

***

I had chicken varuval, beans and sambal potatoes with white rice from the indian stall. Chicken was great, beans were average and the sambal potatoes were burnt. My other colleagues order cantonese fry meehoon/kuey teow but portion was rather small so he had the appetite to consume half my other colleagues fried rice topped with a bull's eye. They said the fried rice was very great, full of lap cheong aka chinese sausage and other stuff. The other two had 'chap fan' aka economy rice and char siew wantan mee respectively. I wish I could have been more descriptive about the economy rice but he chomped/shoved it down before I could figure out the combo but the basic csw mee was given the two thumbs up.

The little corner coffee shop is choked with good food and great prices and that's one of the reasons why the place is always bursting with patrons. Hey, maybe I should consider highlighting this information when if I put my house up for sale...

hanging gems

It was a few years back when I acquired this piece of 'Art', if you wanted to call it that-- if permitted.

It is actually a poster I acquired to get it autographed by the visiting 'Stars' of Manchester United, namely Beckham, Giggs and Keane (only one remained at Man U). Soon, it may hang there no more.

You see, I am quite the budding entrepreneur. Having surveyed Ebay quite closely over the past couple of months, I discovered that there were some 'collectors' who would pay quite a fair bit for an autographed item by a sportsperson that they like, whats more, getting 3 for the price of 1.

I was contemplating on posting it on Ebay soon but perhaps I will wait till Giggsy retires from the team for it to fetch a higher price. What do you think?

ho ho ho weng kee

This makan place is famous for most KL and PJ folks. They first started their operations in Jalan Sultan, near the police station and the old post office which is now defunct. They moved over to SS2 for many years now and caters to the lunch crowd and basically everyone who wants great char siew wantan mee, ngau lam mee or the curry mee. My family used to dine quite frequently especially since my mum used to workout with the lady boss. That must have been about 20 years ago...

The thing about this legendary place is that the food still taste as good as before. The char siew is still tender, the curry is still thick and so fragrant and the hor fun, aka rice noodles, is still so smooth. Four of us went there for lunch today and all had the curry hor fun except for one who opted for the traditional char siew wantan mee. We also ordered the siu kau, aka dumpling.

The curry was scrumptious; thick and spicy yet not overly oily. The noodles were, once again I can't seem to stress this enough, so so smooth and there were also beansprouts, char siew and wantan. The wantan mee was nice too. Now the siu kau was kinda different from the ones that you may find at yong tau foo places complete with water chestnuts, etc... This version from HWK was simply filled with just PORK. There were moist and juicy nonetheless. Great when eaten with the pickled green chillies.

Good food, great taste at ho ho ho weng kee... Somethings just never change!