Happy Birthday Hubby!

Last week, I cook a rather a simple dish for Hubby for his birthday. I remember eating this when I was young where Mom will prepare this lovely and tantalizing dish for us. So, trying to recall on how to cook this lovely dish, here’s a version of Lam Mee from my own kitchen’s recipe.

Stock

1. 1 whole chicken carcass, pork ribs and scallop boil overnight. Reboil the soup again next day and add some salt to taste.

Ingredients

1. Breanspout fried with prawns and lotsa garlics. Fried the chopped garlics first before the prawns and beansprout.
2. 2 beaten egg and with a small “dot” of red colourings (edible colors). Fried the egg into an omellete. Sliced them into thinly slices.
3. Chicken meat shred them thinly. You can use drumstick and throw them in half an hour before the stock is ready.
4. “Yellow” mee.

Here’s a photo of my labour and I’m glad it turns out as good as I expected it to be :).

We clean the whole pot of soup and mee without leaving any leftover behind. What is missing here is SAMBAL BELACHAN. If this goes together with the belacan….oooo Heavenly!

It’s simple food, healthy and yummy. What’s more, I don’t have to spend hours in the kitchen preparing this dish.

Back in KL for CNY

Another year has gone by and another year Zach has celebrated his 2nd CNY in KL! Last year, during CNY we coincidently arrive on the day whereby his Godma invited the lion's troup together with Rinpoche to bless her office.

This year, we were there again and it was the last day before we return to Sg. I was curious to know if Zach will be scared of the lion dance with all the kling klang and drum noise. Surprisingly, he's not instead he use his hand to shoo away the lion mascot if it goes too near to him. He didn't cry or scream or try to run away. He was just there, curious looking at what's happening with all the noise and hoo ha about! Maybe he has a sound proof ear, eh. :)

Anyway, here are some photos to share.

Two lions playing and teasing around with each other.

Godma giving out ang pows and mandarin oranges Zach taking the oranges from the lion mascot.

Feeling down and under

Zach contracted some nasty virus that cause him so sick that he ran a fever as high as 40degree and was purging practically the whole Sat and Sun. The drama started off on Fri where as usual I will pick him up at nanny’s place after work.

After briefing by nanny on the day’s activities and happening, Zach had 3 times of diarrhea and a slight fever at 37.8degrees. We suppose to attend a CNY gathering by MH’s colleagues and we cancelled instead to bring Zach to the PD.

He was still his usual self and walking and playing on Fri night. PD said nothing to worry as he might has a mild gastric flu. And we collected his medication and we went back home to rest. The following day supposed to have another gathering at a friend’s place and we decide to cancel as gastric flu is contagious and we are visiting a friend who has just deliver a new born.

The following morning, Zach had a few bouts of diarrhea and by mid afternoon his temperature shoot up to 40degree. We gave him paracetamol every 4hourly and sponging him down. This brings his fever down to 38.5 and hovering around there. Still no good and we decide to bathe him in luke warm water. This helps to bring down his fever to 37.8degree.

Around evening, things remains status quo. We decide to bring him to KKH as my main worry is he may have some infection which is unknown to us and just to ensure he’s not dehydrated from all the purging. It was countless time we had to change his diaper. When we reached KKH, I saw 2 ambulance outside the emergency dept and I have a feeling is going to be packed with children. My instinct tells me right! It was super packed and we were assessed by a nurse where she took Zach’s temperature and asking a few questions to know if he needs immediate attention. However, we were asked to join the Q. Not long, an announcement is made and we were told there’s an emergency going on and the waiting time is about 2.5hours from now! This means, about 3am to see the Dr. So, we decide to cancel the registration and bring Zach to a 24hr clinic and Dr. gave him a suppository to bring the fever down.

We reached home around 2am and we had a good rest and we decide to bring Zach to KKH thou his fever has subsided but he has some blood streak in his purging. So, to ease our mind we need further advice from Dr. We packed and leave the house around 12pm to KKH. We reached KKH it was around 1pm and is packed again. We took our Q number and were told waiting time is around 2.5hrs. We decide to have our lunch in KK. We went to the 1st level Kopitiam food court and I discover there’s a 7-eleven, McDonalds, Delifrence, Mothercare, few more interesting shops situated in 1st level! Wow, suddenly I feel this is like a mini shopping complex in a hospital! Hahaha…considering coming from Msia hospital we do not have this extensive shops for us to shop. I do note that hospital in SG generally are getting more commercialized and I think is good in a sense of making the place more friendly, light up the environment and hip place! Not like those days when one always think of hospital is a place of sadness and gloomy place. Not anymore in Sg here.

Anyway, we seen the Dr. and he gave a few medication to Zach. After this, we went to my FIL place and I feed Zach his dinner and then his medication.

We were home early on Sun to let everyone rest. Zach still purge but his fever is going down and his energy level coming back in full force. I suspect the Pedialyte is the main culprit!

On Monday, when I went to pick him up after work I was greeted by Zach in his usual self and smiling happily at me! Aw….seeing my darling smiling and happy, makes up my day! What’s more, psst..hubby give me a bear and flower for Chap Goh Meh too (Chinese Valentine’s day) :)

Back to the good ol' days...

I took this video during my trip in Hangzhou. We were visiting the Longjin tea village and happen to see a group of woman washing clothes using the traditional way. I have never seen once (yea, pretty sua ku) and I thought it's interesting to video it.

I guess the harder you hit the clothes with the bat/stick, the cleaner your clothes will be. Agree? Anyone care to share your view if you had tried before washing this way.

Suzhou Day 6

We decided to spend 1 night in Suzhou and 1 thing I regretted of not staying longer is the hotel in Suzhou room is super big! We book Holiday Inn, Jasmine Suzhou and we didn’t expect the room is so big. Zach had a good time exploring and moving around the room. After refreshing, we headed out for lunch. It was about 2pm and we found this all you can eat BBQ restaurant behind our hotel. We paid RMB15 per pax (abt SGD4/pax). So cheap! Anyway, the spread is nothing to shout about. I guess we are tired of walking around and due to the super cold weather (5-7 degree) we are almost numb.

The table was designated for you to BBQ your food and the waiter set up the fire rather quickly.Within minutes we start BBQing our food – squids, fish, chicken wings, corns, marinated pork and chicken strips, hot dogs…and list goes on. After filling our stomach, we decided to visit the Humble Administrator's Garden. It's one of the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage and guess it's worth a visit. We took a cab there and whn we reached it was about 4pm. Sadly this place close at 5pm and we decided to come back the following day. The day is shorter coming to winter time so, it will be dark half way through the garden. So, we headed to a night market. This place is full of locals and small quaint shops. I bought a leggings which I thought it would be good to help me keep warm. The weather is extremely cold and I believe is about 2 degree and thankfully, we brought the carrier along and Zach snuggle in there sleeping soundly. At least with our constantly walking, it able to generates body warm to both of us.

Following day, we woke up early to visit the Humble Administrator's Garden. It's beautiful this place and i reckon during summer or spring it will be gorgeous as you will see a full blown of colorful flowers growing the garden. Infact, the entrance fee for winter/autumm is different in summer/spring. Here are some photos to enjoy.

See Zach in Mummy's arm. Well bundle up. Looks like a nice day to stroll but it is not as you think. It was freezing cold! It was about 1-2degree. Thanks to our layers and layers of clothing we wear and glad we had good thermal wear to keep us warm.

Rows and rows of bamboo trees...

Oops, MH face too dark! Too concentrate in taking the scenery :p

After touring around the garden, we decide to go back hotel to rest and to keep us warm. It's too cold to walk around and we just feel like hiding in the hotel!

So dinner, we decided to have in the hotel restaurant called Song Helou. It's a well known restaurant in Suzhou with 200 years old history and is the most famous old trademark of Suzhou cuisine. This restaurant was created in 1737 during the Qing Dynasty.

We ordered the roast goose. Very well marinated and the skin is crispy. Sinful! Sinful!

We also ordered a bowl of bamboo shoot soup. It's sweet and refreshing. Just look at the clear soup makes me yearning for it again!

We ordered the recommended "Si Che Tou" The dragon head. Very yummy I must say.

We had a very fulfilling dinner and we took a walk later at night to the old street in Suzhou. Following day, we took the train back to Shanghai again.

Zach's 1st Birthday!

It was a coincidence trip that we had planned to spend our vacation in Shanghai last year that it coincides with Zach’s 1st birthday (3rd Dec 08).

It was the day we got back from Hangzhou and I remember it was freezing cold as the temperature dips suddenly with cold wind and crisp air. However, it does not dampen our mood to celebrate for Zach and the whole jing gang walk to the nearest cake shop to buy a cake for Zach. It was about 8pm and most of the cakes are sold and I spotted this nice and yummy looking ice cream cake for sale.

Yea, it was super duper cold but we went ahead to buy the ice cream cake.

Here’s Zach looking so happy! I’m so glad that he has grow up to be such a happy boy and I hope the years to come I wish for more happiness and to be healthy always.

Zach with Daddy laughing away when we were sing the Happy Birthday song.

Making a wish and blowing off the candle.

Lunch @ Hangzhou

Before we took the train back to Shanghai, we had our lunch in Hangzhou. I decided to try the restaurant somewhere near behind our hotel as the night before when we were out exploring the city we saw many people lining up for dinner. We thought it must be a good place to try as the locals are flocking to this place.

And so, here we are arriving the place a little early as we need to catch the 2:45pm train back to Shanghai.

We ordered this, lotus roots stuff with sweetend glutinuos rice as a starter. I don't quite like this commbination as the glutious rice is very sweet and the lotus roots is cold.

And here's our main order to go with plain rice. Their specialty claypot toufoo.

Crispy chicken with salted egg yolk
Beggar's chicken
We also ordered a pot of soup which I forgot to took a picture of it.

Overall the lunch is quite satisfying minus Zach's crankiness. I guess he was tired and miss his morning nap so he was at the verge of tearing the whole place down. We had to keep distracting him with Gerber stars and also the waitress do try to entertain him once in a while.

I forgot how much we had paid for this lunch but I believe it was not expensive considering the portion and quality of the food. I would rate it as 3.5 star out of 5.