Moonlight Cafe Review - 1 star out of 5.

I used to pass by this cafe whenever I visit the salon. Today, with my empty stomach, I decided to give this cafe a try. The ambience consider nice and the pastries look appetising.

After getting a good fengshui seat, I was handed over the menu. To my surprise, the price is pretty high for drinks.

"How does coffee vienna tastes like?"
"It's the mixture of coffee and cocoa, which tastes sweeter."  (I supposed she mean sweeter than other coffee)
"OK, I'd like to have one & pls give me this - Teriyaki beef spaghetti."

Well, the first sip is indeed --- bitter. (not sweet at all) I tried to stir and mix the whipped cream with the coffee (eventhough I know the cream is not sweet). Another sip, still bitter.  Hmm.....pretty disappointed. Not that I don't take bitter coffee but that type of bitter is "raw". Hmm....how should I put it. It's worse than a cup of Americano without sugar.

"Excuse me, I remembered you said that the coffee is sweeter but this is too bitter."
"Oh, well. Like I said, this drink is a mixture of coffee and cocoa. Perhaps it's due to the cocoa."
(err, what? what type of cocoa that you are using? cocoa is not bitter)

She offered, "I'll bring you some sugar." Then she walked away. (yup, this makes me feel better even her voice is monotone and there is, basically, a straight face)
After sometime, she came back with a pack of brown sugar.
It does not really help. I think it's the type of coffee that they use for the drink.

Before the food is served, she came back with a cup of water. Without saying a word, just put it in front of me. (a good act but carried out with a wrong gesture)

Here is the food.

the plate is way too big for the food and make me feel like the spaghetti is too little.

the teriyaki beed is in a chunk and the worst thing is -- the beef is overcook. Hard to chew!

The spaghetti and the sauce consider ok.

With this price charged, the food and service worth only ONE STAR.




My conclusion : no next visit.

This morning incident

I used to tell my kids not to open the gate to anyone who ring our doorbell. Not to tell anyone where you live or how many people in your house. Not to tell your family members routine to strangers. I even told them robbery cases that happened around us. I believe many parents out there doing the same.

This morning, the solar heater workers came to fix the heating element. And, they came very early in 9+am. I was in my room when they called up. They said they were at my guard post registering. Well, to test my kids whether they have the sense of danger, I decided stay put and observe.

They rang the door bell once only, but none of the kiddos alert me. I walked down in less than minutes and to my surprise, three men already standing inside my house!

This is a very fearful incident to me as I always think they know what to do when dealing with strangers. And I used to be there waiting (in my living room) whenever I'm expecting workers to come in. I used to be the one who open the gate for the workers. They definitely need some 'calibration' today.

Mushroom chicken stew

Mushroom chicken stew used to be my family's CNY signature dish. As what I can remember is the aroma of the dish and a thick layer of oil on the gravy. I don't really likes dried mushroom (I hardly eat dried mushroom as I found it chewy and have a feeling of difficult to digest)

Well, since I have a 'bird' from Sheng Siong and few packs of mushroom imported directly from TaoBao, I'm thinking to give it a try.

To my surprise, the mushroom that highly recommend by a friend is indeed superb.

After soaking for an hour, this is how the lil cuties look like. It smell like miushroom and looks like mushroom. I mean like the fresh one.

 then, time to clean up the chicken (oops, I should call it bird as it's just less than a kg)

this birdie is quite clean, even the internal organ is cleared. So, this cut down a lot of the preparation time.

Let the chicken has a hot water bath and standby for cooking.

put in mushroom, sliced ginger and bring water to boil. Chucked in the whole chicken when the water is boiling.

Turn to low flame once the soup is boiling. Simmer 1hr and leave it.

*Do not open the lid as it will continue to slow cook.

Added sea cucumber in the morning and simmer for 30mins.

*Do not cook for too long as it will spoil the texture of the sea cucumber.

The soup is perfect as a base for mee sua.

Most yummy mee sua soup that I have ever had.












* Learned from my aunty who always prepare this during CNY that to complete the dish, ones has to dilute some corn starch and boil it for few minutes. Then the soup base will turn thicker and that's why it is called a stew. (^.^)

mussles steamed egg

Many delicious dishes can be done with eggs. And, one of my simplest eggy dish is --> steamed egg with minced pork.

Here is the latest version of steamed egg.

Ingredients:
1x salted egg
2x eggs
150g of minced pork
a handful of wolfberries
a handful of mussles (can be replaced by crabmeat)
some pepper powder
1 tsp of salt
1 tsp of Maggi light soy sauce
and a cup of water

1. smudge the salted egg by using fork and spoon.
2. Add in minced pork, and mixed well with salted egg.
3. beat in 2 eggs and add in seasonings.
4. lastly, pour in a cup of water, stir well and steam in boiling water.
5. after 20mins, put in the mussles one by one and steam for another 15mins.

Voila. Another version of steamed egg.

Another HappyCall.

Having great time shopping at Sg yesterday & bought so many things. I teased my friend that "we must be out of our mind to shop at Sg for food stuff when the exchange rate is so high now" Anyhow, we had great time shopping and dining. The favorite food that I always hunting for is beef noodles.

Without further hesitation, I bought myself another HappyCall grill pan. It's only $89 (from Metro) Well, I should have said a substitute, not another, since the previous one already has a spot on its surface. I think it's time to change to a new, and of course a bigger one.

Well, just a reminder : kitchen ware is subjected to 30% tax (30% of the purchase price). I had a nasty surprise when the custom officer told me about the above tax rate when she found the pan on the backseat. However, she let me off.

 Tadaa..... Can't wait to launch my new pan.

It comes with a spare 'packing' (the rubber around the pan) and a safety instructions handbook.

The first project is spaghetti with tomato sauce, cooked with fresh shitakae mushroom, cucumber, fresh mussles and Taiwan sausages.

 Taiwan sausages 20 for $3.00. Yummy......

 It's so simple and dinner is ready in half an hour time.

Grilling steak/pork chop should be the next assignment.

making delicious cupcakes by using blender

I bought this blender from Total Image roadshow 5 years ago but hardly use it. I remembered back then, I used it only for making fruit juice and the marinade sauce for chicken rice.

I always wanted to try making cupcakes with this blender after watching the Magic Bullet video clip. Always, but no action taken since then. (shy ^_^)

Last Sat night, it just crossed my mind on having it a try. I cut the ingredient into a small portion which fits in well to the tall cup.

Ingredient: (making 8 cupcakes)
100g butter
100g self-raising flour
60g castor sugar
2 eggs
few drops of vanilla essence
raisins or anything to your liking

Steps :
1. Heat up oven at 175°C.
2. Melt butter and blend it together with sugar.
3. Then add in eggs. Press and hold for 3 seconds
4. Fold in flour by using a plastic paddle. Press 3 times  (one second each)
5. Lastly, add in raisin or anything that you like. Mixed well with the plastic paddle.
6. Pour in the batter into cupcake liners and bake for 18mins.

*remember, do not blend the butter for too long as it will make your cupcakes shrink. Like my choc sun-dried tomato cupcakes.

Below website is just for your viewing pleasure. Looking at the way they compressed the usage of the blender into few minustes of video clips is just like watching magic show!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtpKjgwi4Sc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=plbRSugctAA

for the next experiment, I'd like to try on pasta sauce. I'll definitely share it out once I successfully make my homemade pumpkin and tomato pasta sauce.

easiest way ever to clean your microwave

Believe it or not, many of our household has this. Be it as simple as for heating up to the high capacity type which has the function like convection oven, we are not going to live without one. 

However, cleaning it would be a disaster if you use yours for cooking, grilling as well as heating up food. Food which contains oil will definitely make the cleaning a nightmare. 

Some time ago, I came across an article about cleaning microwave by heating up a cup of water then clean it up with wet clothes and dish wash. I decided to give this a try. 

Instead of heating up a cup of water, I directly pour water on the glass tray with few drops of dish drops. At first, set the timer to 1 minute. After sometime, set the timer to 1 min again. Total 2 minutes can perfectly clean up the oil stain in your microwave. 

Put a cleaning towel on the glass tray to absorb extra water and bring out to wash under the running tap. Then, wipe off the stain inside and voila, your microwave is shining and smell good, like new one. I wish I learnt this 10 yrs ago. LOL