Japanese Cucumber Salad (Chinese Style)

Here is the recipe (trial and error based) -

1 Japanese cucumber (chilled and cut)

2 tsp of soy sauce

1 tsp of apple cider

About 3-5 drops of Lea and Perrins sauce

About 2 drops of sesame oil

Method:

Combined all the sauces and pour the mixture onto the cut cucumber. 

You may add or sprinkle some garlic oil on top. 

These are the brands I used.

Winter solstice

Today Chinese celebrate the Winter Soltisce. Here is a small but useful tip to make the balls soft and tender even if they are kept in the refrigerator.

ADD a little SUGAR to the flour when making the dough! 

Happy Winter Soltisce Festival folks !! 

My kids helping me to make the glutinous  rice balls.

They tried to be creative.

Loafing

 Loafing usually carries a bad connotation. However taking our family out to somewhere and doing nothing in particular can make the bond stronger and relax our minds. 

When we were back to our home town, we took our kids to one of the nearest recreational park, Ceruk Tokun. We saw many people went there for hiking, cycling and picnic. We also saw many monkeys there. 

My kids were so excited to see the wild monkeys. They even fed the monkeys with their biscuits. When we started doing that, many monkeys rushed down from the hill. We  ran away to escape from them.

 Kids with our maid looking at the trees and river at the foot of the hill.

The view from the ground.

The monkeys

Swimming for the kids

I have recently sent my son for swimming lesson. It was hard initially for him as he was afraid of water. However, he managed to take this up and was able to swim correctly on the 4th lesson. By the sixth lesson, he was able to swim for a distance of 50m, non-stop. 

I would like to thank his swimming instructor, Ah Seng for pushing him so that he can expand his capability. I find that sometimes, making our kids doing things beyond their own expectation is good. Our kids would never know what are they capable of if they never try. 

Anyway, my son was so thrilled that he can now swim, and compete with me.

Girl Or Boy

After a long break from blogging, I have finally come back. Now I no longer have two sons,but three! Many people have been asking me if I should give it another try to get a baby girl. Some even told me off that I should try for a girl so that there will be someone taking care of me when I am old. I feel all those remarks,though thoughtful, are unfair for me and my kids.

Firstly, God has His divine purpose in giving me three boys. My children are indeed God's blessings, not only for now but also in years to come. They are in fact born smart, handsome and unique. They are very close to my hubby and I. My boys have brought us so much joy! So people that are saying that only having boys is not sufficient are implying that God has got it wrong *grin

Secondly, saying that we must at least have a daughter in order to have someone taking care of us is saying that boys will not take care of their parents. This sounds very unfair for the boys. My boys have never said that they won't. So making such assumption is off-tangent.

So I hope that people out there, if we were to say that we must have a daughter in order to have someone taking care of us, are we trying to imply that daughters are to take care of their own parents and sons have no ability or responsible in doing their jobs in taking care of own parents? Such unfair and without basis statements should never be uttered!

Besides being a parent, we are also someone else's sons, daughters, son-in-laws, daughter-in-laws, and etc. I strongly believe that we have the responsibility to take care of our elderly people. Don't expect only the daughters to to the job. Let's help one another. Well, at least that's what I think.

Just in case you get me wrong, I am not saying that having a girl is not good. I am just saying that whatever that God has entrusted to us is always the best for us.

Soft bread W/O Bread Improver

Had always been enjoying soft bread. My friend who likes baking gave me a bread recipe. It was good but the usage of bread softener bothers me. However I just discovered a recipe to make soft bread without bread improver. If soft bread is what you are looking for, this is the recipe. I got this from the net too.

3 1/2 Cup Bread Flour
2 Teaspoon Yeast
4 Tablespoon Sugar
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
1 Egg
1/2 Cup Milk
3 Tablespoon Butter
1/2 Cup Tang Zhong (Refer recipe below)

Method:
1. Put in all the wet ingredients (egg, milk,butter, tang zhong) in a mixing bowl.
2. Then put in the other dry ingredients except yeast on top of the wet stuffs.
3. Make a well in the flour.
4. Pour yeast into the well and cover it with the flour.
5. Start kneading it into dough (I use my hand to do it).
6. Prove it (about an hour, depending on the weather).
7. Cut the inflated dough into 16 sections and make them into balls.
8. Take a ball of dough and flatten it with a rolling pin.
9. Fold in both ends and flatten it for the 2nd time.
10. Roll the flat dough into a 'bolster' shape.
11. Put it in a tray.
12. Repeat the rest.
13. Prove it for the 2nd time.
14. Preheat the oven (I'm using a round silver traditional oven, so can't really commend on the temperature).
15. Bake your bread. 

Optional:
1. You can sprinkle some sesame seeds or any other grains of you liking on top of it after a layer of honey.
2. Alternatively you can also put some fillings such as sausages, raisins, cocao powder, bananas ect before you roll the dough into the bolster shape.

Tang Zhong Recipe:
1. 1 Cup Water
2. 1/3 Cup Bread Flour

Method:
1. Put these two ingredients in a sauce pan and whisk it over slow fire until it becomes a lump.
2.Cool it before use.

Funny

This photo got my attention as I was browsing though the files in my computer. Remember that I was attending a course in KL last year, and we had to do lots of presentations, this is one of the funny yet creative presentations done by the two gentlemen. Very sporting guy putting his face like this. Am sure his pupils enjoy his lesson in class.