Trip to Warehouse Club

Yesterday, I went to Warehouse Club by NTUC. My husband and I went there by bike, but you could get there easily by train too. Walkable distance from Joo Koon Mrt station.

I'm a natural born sucker for supermarkets. So you could imagine my enthusiasm when NTUC opened a warehouse concept for their goods. I was expecting a lot more from this place, but nonetheless, I came out quite satisfied.

At first, when I read that it was a members-only store, I thought they referred to NTUC members with the Plus card.

Nope.

In order to make purchases in this store, you have to be a member of the Warehouse Club. This is an entirely different card and I don't know where else I can use this card.

But oh well. $50/year for non-NTUC members and $35/year for NTUC members with the Plus card.

Pay upon membership, yah.

Here are some pictures I took.

This is the whole stretch at level 2.

My view from the travelator up to level 3.

My favourite part - vegetables! They don't sell individual vege, if you're wondering. Everything comes in a pack. And the fresh produce are fresh. I can't remember how much they were, but I remembered 5kg of onions was $4.50. APE LAGI? Buy lah.

Level 3 is where you can find all the food. Frozen food section in the picture above. They have cheesecakes for you to sample.

I didn't bother with the rest of the stuff because firstly, I wouldn't buy them. I'd recommend you to shop here if you're intending to open a shop, or cook for a crowd. Oh, quite a number of things are imported too. Some things you can't find in our regular NTUC. And Kinder Bueno/Ferrero Rocher come in BOXES.

Secondly, well there's no secondly.

Shop away people! The frozen food section is worth a look. Spices and all may even stock you for about 8 months.

If you ask me whether I'd take a trip down again? Maybe during Hari Raya when I need to cook for a crowd.

There you have it. I'll check this one off my list. 4 more warehouses to go!

Chilli crab

Leila cooks again! This was done a few days ago.
I'm not including an ingredients list, cos they're all in the pictures.

*I normally halve my crabs so it's easier to cook and eat. Oh, I bought flower crabs for this. Cheap cheap, surprisingly.

Heat oil in wok. Add whole garlic. (I should have used more oil here to cook the crabs better)

Add the crabs and fry/deep-fry them until they have changed colour. Or you could do this without the garlic. But....hantu garlic here!

Remove the crabs and with the same oil, saute chopped garlic. You may add sliced onions if you want.

Oyster sauce. I have never used specific measurements. Maybe about 3 tbsp here?

Add cili boh (Reduce dried chilli to a boil. Drain them. I normally deseed them during the draining process to reduce the heat. Finally, blend them and refrigerate to store). I added quite a large amount of this. Whatever is in the picture is not even half.

This is the part where you fry the whole thing until it is cooked. Masak sampai garing. This is an important process so that when you eat this dish, it won't burn your fingers. Plus, if it isn't cooked properly, you can taste it.

How to tell if it is cooked? Observe the separation between the oil and the mixture. The colour should darken too. And the aroma should fill your kitchen and stink your clothes.

Here, I added tamarind juice. Or air asam.

A bit of dark sauce. About 1 tbsp.

This is maple syrup, or commonly substituted with honey. You can skip this step if you want, then just taste with sugar.

Here is where you season with salt too.

Once done, add in the crabs and stir them until the crabs are covered. Right before putting in the crabs, I cracked 2 eggs and continued stirring it. The entire mixture ended up pretty thick. Maybe because the eggs were REALLY cooked. You could add them in much later. Like, immediately before putting the crabs in.

Here's the finished product.

My chilli crab this time was quite okay. Like I said, I could have added more oil in the beginning to deep-fry the crabs first. That way, the crabs are really cooked. I think it would work if you covered your wok too. I didn't  have a cover, so I just had to work with my limitations.

Try it out and let me know!

I'd give myself a B+ for this HAHA.

Cray(-cray)fish pasta

I'm going cray cray~

Hey ho hi-dy ho.

Yes I can't seem to sleep. And I'm still salivating over my crayfish pasta that I made for dinner just now.

If you guys want to try this, here's how I did it.

Ingredients:
CRAYFISH, DUH
Pasta of choice (I wanted to use linguine but NTUC ran out of it so I used spaghetti)
Garlic
Red chilli
Yellow onions
Olive oil
Lingham Chilli Sauce (if you don't know what this is, please go and buy it now. NOW. Best chilli sauce ever)
Basil
Italian herbs
Black pepper
Tomato paste (I used Hosen brand)
Tomatoes
Sugar
Lime juice
Coke (yes, Coca Colaaaaaaa)



Crayfish prep:

1. Clean and halve the crayfish lengthwise. 

2. Boil it for about 2-3 mins (when water is already boiling) to make sure the insides are cooked.

Mix the following ingredients in a bowl:

- 3 tbsp of olive oil (it might taste better if you substitute this with butter)

- Chopped garlic

- Diced yellow onions

- 2 tbsp of Lingham chilli sauce 

- Basil (mine comes in a bottle)

- Black pepper

- Tabasco sauce

**Really, make this mixture your own. You can add in whatever it is that you want. Since my pasta is tomato-based, I wanted to go for something spicy and plus, I'm a garlic lover. So yeah.

3. Remove crayfish from boiling pot, spoon the mixture on top of the crayfish meat and pop them in the oven for about 10mins at 180degrees to let the mixture seep in.

IN THE MEANTIME...

Pasta:

1. Heat olive oil in pan.

2. Saute diced yellow onions, chopped garlic and chopped red chilli.

3. Wait until the aroma comes up (or how the Malays put it - tunggu bau naik), then add one dollop (or one HUGE tablespoon) of tomato paste.

4. Add 2-3 tbsp of Lingham chilli sauce.

5. Add 1/4 cup of water.

6. Add 3 tbsp of coke.

7. Add tomatoes (that has been cut in eights). Here, let the whole thing come to a boil to reduce the tomatoes. You can squish them to make the juices come out.

8. Add 2 tbsp of lime juice.
9. Adjust the taste with sugar. No need for salt because the tomato paste is already pretty salty.

10. Spam the Italian herbs.

11. Add spaghetti (that has already been boiled in salt water beforehand), stir and serve with crayfish at the side.

VOILA.

I honestly don't know what the coke does to enhance the taste of the dish, but trust me, the pasta wouldn't taste as good without it. I've seen tons of cooking shows that included wine/beer in their dishes. So I thought I'd use the most popular carbonated drink I had at home. Maybe if the dish required the use of white wine, I could substitute it with Sprite? Why don't you give it a go and let me know. Maybe when I've tried it, I'll let you know too.

Hmm, maybe I should also include a list of non-halal ingredients with halal alternatives. Probably those that I've tried.

Stay tuned for more recipes!

Bali, 2014

Let's begin with my 2nd trip overseas with the hubby. We went to Bali about 2 weeks ago and stayed there for 4 days and 3 nights. 

So awesome! I still get wide-smiled excited each time the plane takes off. Here are some pictures of the trip.

An "ulu" alley along the streets of Kuta.

Kuta beach.

Here's my beef lasagne at one of the restaurants I forgot where. It was so good.

Pandawa Beach. Beautiful waves, beautiful beach. Not commercialized yet, so no crowd here. Perfect.

The hubby was getting a massage beside me. And I was waiting for the lady to massage my skinny feet.

Garuda Wisnu Kencana, a cultural park that tells the tale of the Hindu history of Garuda, Wisnu (commonly known as Vishnu here), Kadru and a few others I can't remember already.

It's funny how I got the image of an eagle/bird upon the mention of Garuda (I play Summoner's War) and Garuda was, indeed, a bird-looking individual! Heh.

Dreamland. Yes, that's the name of this place. Generally dominated by Chinese tourists. I can see why.

Look at this place!

Ah yes, the Kopi Luwak plantation. Here they have a variety of tea and coffee that they planted here. We bought the mangosteen peel tea because it was that good. I liked the Rosella tea, too. Not a fan of the Kopi Luwak, but Hadi wanted it, so we got it too.

Kecak dance. Dancers are only accompanied by vocals from these men. It tells the story of Hinduism's version of Romeo and Juliet. Oh, and there was some fire element to it too.

Ah, here it is. The monkey-looking guy in the middle kicks the fire with his bare feet to put them out. I'm so glad I wasn't sitting right in front.

What's a trip without some arty-farty shot? This is my feeble attempt at bokeh. HAH.

Manhattan Fish Market, by the way.

Some chicken noodle on our last day. Pretty good. And that is a plate of Bali's version of siew mai in peanut sauce.

Airport food. Yes, I had to.

I ate A LOT during this trip. Contented and very happy.

I'm so happy that my husband dragged me out to see a part of the world.

I was looking at Cambodia/Phnom Penh/Vietnam/Bangkok/Manila/Laos for the next trip.

Let's start small. :)

Looking forward to more trips with you!

Oh my goodness

For so long, I had totally forgotten about this space. It wasn't until recently when I was cooking that I told myself I'd want to document my recipes and what-not. Failures and successes.  Then I thought - why not blog about it?

Then today when I looked back at this blog, I realized there were so many things that changed since 2010.

Looking back at 4 years was....... amazing.

Empowering.
Enlightening.
Funny.

I had to say, my dreams came true.

Now I'm happily married to the man of my dreams. It's been over a year now!
I've got 6 adorable and beautiful kitties at home - Mika, Loki, Bruno, Snow, Scooby and our latest addition, Anna.
I'm on the right track of (slowly) building up my career as an educator.
We're moving to our new BTO house next year. Can't wait!

So there.
Super quick updates on 2013-2014.

I'm gonna change some pictures and layout here. Some things have gotta go.


Till next time! Real soon :)

125 days

I'm so mad. So so so so so mad. You're in Europe right now and it was supposed to be our first experience together. But now you've "tarnished" that whole Europe experience with some not-so-good ones, I don't want to go there anymore. Let's just not have a getaway anywhere anytime anywhen. HMPH.

I refuse refuse refuse refuse to go anywhere already. Unless you plan on convincing me or dragging my ass to some beautiful country and make it the best experience any girl can ever get, don't even think about going anywhere anymore.
HMPH.

And no, material things do not make me happy for long.
HMPH.


I want surprises :'(

**********

On a side note, I used to do the usual 'keeping count' of the time we'd spent together, but this time it's different. I'm actually counting down to the days that we'd officially be together.
I can't wait for all these to end; the waiting, the seeing-me-off-to-the-staircase moments, the goodbye hugs and kisses.. 

Countless of times where I've been so mad that we're not married yet cos I can't cuddle you close in my arms and smell the lingering scent of cologne on your neck. Though I'm pretty sure there's tons of things I'm gonna miss when we get married too, I seriously can't wait for our big day to come. 

Preparations are going a little slower than expected, but I'm not complaining. Things are pretty okay I guess? I do foresee July and August to be hectic cos we need to prepare for many things. Then comes the headache.

Whatever it is, I'm so glad we're doing this together.

I'm back!

Wow. Happy New Year to all! It's been about 5 months I suppose? Many things have happened so far. Okay I'm going straight in on this. Haha! Looks like I've got tons to update on.

I just made chilli crab, for one, and dare I say, it's quite good. Haha! Well Hadi ain't complaining, so why should I?

Over the past few months, it was quite a rollercoaster for me. I shan't mention the unfortunate incidents, but let's just say it's gonna be over in a few months :) Also, I've finalized on a few of the wedding stuffs! I'm super stoked and I can't wait to get more things done! Most of all, I can't wait to get married.
A brand new year, a brand new name for myself. CHEY!

I still have to keep a lookout for great deals for my honeymoon in December too. I really have no idea how to go about doing this. I mean, I've never really been out of the country. Let alone been on a flight, and I'm so nervous just thinking about it.

Anyway, on top of all these, I've yet to start on my second semester in school. I'm rather nervous to start because of the long holidays that I'm having now. I just fear for my momentum when I'm back in school. Like, how long am I gonna take to leave the holiday mood behind? I wouldn't know now, would I?

Somehow I foresee a stressful few months ahead prior to the wedding. Wait, what am I talking about? It IS gonna be a stressful time! Getting married in October is no joke. My exams would be around the corner, if I'm not mistaken.

For now, let's just enjoy the relaxed time I have on my hands and get a headstart on a few things. My list, for example. My list of things that has to be done for the wedding. Oh boy.

Here we go.
Wish me luck :)