Sunday: Lazy Breakfast + Unwrapping Parcels

It was a Sunday and I was feeling, well, lazy. Hence I decided to put together a simple breakfast that required little to no effort on my part. Just lay down the ham, crack an egg, and sprinkle some black pepper, mixed herbs and garlic powder. 15 minutes in the oven at 160 degrees and it was ready.

Easy. I wouldn't say it tastes fantastic but it's definitely edible.

Time to unwrap my two new pots that got delivered yesterday!

Totally in love with the colours and can't wait to use them!

White Pepper Live Alaskan King Crab @ Long Beach Seafood Restaurant

Prior to dinner at Long Beach last week, my impression of the restaurant was mediocre at best. A household name that's been in existence since I was a kid, yes; but somehow we were never enticed to dine there.

A meal there last week turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Every dish was very much to our liking.

The star of the show was the Classic White Pepper Live Alaskan King Crab. 

It came with a hefty price tag but it was worth every penny. The crab was incredibly fresh. In fact, we were told that the crab arrived in Singapore only a few hours before our meal. Sauce was perfect and all flavours were in perfect harmony. There was just enough white pepper, which did not overpower the sweetness of the crab.

A must try!

Now, time to attempt to replicate the sauce at home. 😜

Greenery at Home

Headed over to Sinflora over the weekend and bought some plants for the home.

Snake plant aka mother-in-law's tongue

Nerve plant aka Fittonia

 Please don't die on us! 🤣

Review | KiKi Young Vinegar Noodles 小醋面

If you haven't heard by now, KiKi is the latest brand of instant noodles to sell out in Asian cities like Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. When it first launched in Singapore, the entire batch of 2,000 packets was sold out within 6 days despite costing twice or even thrice the price of Korean instant noodles. 

Lately I had the opportunity to try the Young Vinegar flavour, thanks to a friend who kindly shared her stash of noodles with us.

Verdict: I liked it, in particular the texture of the noodles. It was soft and springy - similar to la mian - and was markedly different from your usual Maggis. It definitely looked and tasted more expensive than the regular ramen noodles. The portion - nett weight of 90g according to the packaging - was decent for a small eater like me. The vinegar wasn't overpowering and flavour was light on the whole, which was the way I liked it. I imagine that it'll pair very well with some minced meat or roast pork!

4 out of 5 stars from me!

Guo Da Li ceremony: 12 版帖

His aunt bought the item below for our Guo Da Li ceremony and it immediately caught our attention, mainly due to its size.

Both of us have never heard of this before and we had to google to find out its use. Turns out that it's called the十二版帖 (there are 12 sections, hence the name). In the olden days, the groom would present it to the bride's parents to invite them to attend the wedding banquet. It comes with certain standard phrases and all one has to do is to fill in details such as the names of the groom's and bride's parents, banquet venue and date and so on. An invitation like this besides the regular invites given out to friends is needed as the usual invites already contain the parents' names - the logic is that parents therefore can't 'invite themselves' to the wedding based on those.

I believe this custom of handing out the 十二版帖 is becoming uncommon these days as couples choose to simplify their wedding and traditions get lost with the passage of time. We, however, are glad that we've had the opportunity to be exposed to such an interesting tradition.

I followed this link to fill in the details - I hope I did it correctly! 😉😃

Upcycling | DIY Plastic Bag Holder

Lately I've been trying to cut down waste in my life. I'm normally not into crafts but I thought this is an opportune time for me to do some simple DIY stuff since I'm moving into our home these few months and there are plenty of stuff that we need to buy.

Plastic bags. 

We bring recyclable bags to the stores as much as we can but sometimes we forget. And the amount of plastic bags in the house can sometimes go out of control. *Hangs head in shame.* 

My mum has been using the IKEA Variera plastic bag dispenser for years and it's been doing its job. Now that I'm shifting, I could of course take the easy way out and get another one, but I decided to recycle materials that are lurking in my parents' place instead. Saves me some pennies and the earth.

I started with this can of Lay's chips.

Cleaned the inside of the can and decorated it. Now you can use wrapping paper but I decided to make it cuter, and used some scrap paper lying around that would otherwise never have seen the light of day.

Finally, I used an exacto knife to cut an opening where the mouth is.

How cute is this?!! Major love. 😍

Kimdo BBQ, City Square

If you are on a day trip to JB and just want to stay around the checkpoint, be sure to check out this stall selling grilled food at City Square. Flanked by various stalls selling a variety of snacks ranging to local kuehs to crepes, this stall can be easily missed amidst the busy action along the narrow stretch leading into the main shopping area. In fact, we only started patronising this stall recently despite having been to City Square on countless occasions.

We loved their chicken wing, smoked duck, lady's finger and homemade chilli sauce. The chilli sauce was wickedly spicy, but we couldn't stop ourselves from dipping into it anyway as its sour tinge really whetted our appetite and went perfectly with the BBQ meat.

Our only grouse was the tight eat-in area, but the food, in our opinion, is definitely worth a try. 

Our meal of 7 skewers and a drink came up to RM 26.

And if BBQ skewers are not your thing, you can consider having some roast duck nearby too!