You know you've settled down in a place....

...when you start feeling comfortable cooking there.


I am very fussy about cooking.

I don't like to cook in a strange kitchen where I don't know how things work and where everything is.

I don't like to cook when I don't have all the ingredients and the tools that I need (or ones that I'm familiar with).

I would rather eat peanut butter and jelly sandwich everyday rather than cook in an unfamiliar kitchen that does not have my full set of items there.

(That's why I was so obsessed with making my kitchen as complete as possible when I first move in into my house previously. Even forgoing the need for a bed, hehe..)

So after a month of collecting bits and pieces, here and there, I am finally at home in my kitchen here. I have all the things that I need now.

I have my own set of Tefal cookware now - a small saucepan with lid, an omelette pan and a mini wok, courtesy of my recent trip to Glasgow. I am soo loving them right now. Makes my cooking so much easier.

I'm also loving my mini rice cooker, which I am also cooking pasta inside it and steaming broccolis.

I have a mini roasting tin for me to bake potatoes and grill salmons.

Everything is so mini, easy to handle and to wash, yet big enough to cook for one or two people.

All of these items will fit nicely in my own kitchen back home.

For now though, I am at home in my kitchen here. :)


ps: I sounded more and more like a housewife now, don't I? :p

My very own cuisine

Walla!! My first Salmon cuisine. My own recipe hokay...:) Well, I modified 2-3 recipes that I found on the net coz it was too complicated, and made it mine. And it tasted really, really good.

Ingredients :

One salmon fillet
Salt and pepper
1/4 Lemon (for the juice and grated zest)
Olive oil
mixed herbs
spaghetti
1/2 green pepper (cut in slices)
1 tomato (cut halved)
1/2 garlic (chopped fine)


Direction :

1. Marinade the salmon with olive oil, salt, pepper, lemon juice, lemon zest and mixed herbs.
2. Pre-heat the oven and the roasting tin at 250degrees
3. Heat some olive oil in the tin
4. Put in the garlic
5. At the same time, boil the pasta until el dente i.e. ready-to-eat state.
5. Once garlic is browning, put in the marinated salmon with all the juice into the tin. Cook until salmon is medium well, about 15mins in the oven
6. Put in the green pepper and tomatoes. Then put in grill for about 5 mins.
7. Put the pasta in the plate, then put the salmon, green pepper and tomatoes on top. And the dish is ready to be served.

An early winter

The weather here has dropped to 0 degrees now, and it's not even November! In fact, some parts of England are already covered in snow! Winter arrived quite early this year. Well, it does goes well with my mood right now.

2 more days, and we're in November. It's now been a month here. I've got 11 more months to go.

Jacket Potato

I made jacket potato today, woohoo...:)

It is my goal that while I'm here, I'm going to not only "brush up" my cooking skills, but also to learn more on western cooking. My short term goals are jacket potato, pastas (trying to learn more than just bolognaise, heh), salads and also salmon dishes. Salmon is quite cheap here and I'm going to eat lots and lots of it. I have one salmon fillet in the fridge right now which I'm still deciding on how to cook it. Looking forward to that.

Anyway, the jacket potato today is a fusion dish..coz the topping is actually - inti karipap, hahaha... I still have some leftovers inti karipap from the weekend do which I'm trying to finish, so what better way than to eat it with the potatoes. :)

It is really good by the way. Top choice for jacket potato topping, hehe..

Feeling worst than ever..

I made a mistake of taking the flu medicine last night...woke up today with my flu much, much worse than before. sigghh....

You see, I've learnt that if I have both runny nose and cough, it is better that I don't take any medicine, and just let the phlegm goes its way through the nose. Once I stopped the runny nose with the medicine, my cough will get worst coz now the phlegm has no where to go, and my lungs have to work extra hard to get rid of it. So, its better to just let it run its course. But of course I'll take the supplements like multivitamins, vitamin c and lots of warm water.

Also had some nose bleed this morning. I wonder if that's normal. It's only one side of the nose though....

A PMS entry

I think I'm having a bad case of PMS. Coupled with a flu, it sure ain't pretty. I just feel like hibernating (which I already am!) and I get riled up easily. Especially with those ppl who just have to share their opinions in class and asking long-winded question. For God's sake, if you have to ask a question, can you at least keep it as concise as possible? And while sharing your opinion do add richness to the lecture, keep it as short as possible as well. Don't start talking non-stop for 10 minutes! We paid highly to come here to listen to the qualified lecturer, not to you!

Friendship Hole

One thing that I really missed in being here is the feeling of togetherness with another person. At different periods in my life, I had always been blessed in having someone close with me, whom I had fun with, laugh with and cried with. Even as a child. My childhood was filled with memories of the times with Yaya, my childhood friend whom I practically grew up with. I think from the time that I became aware of myself, she had already been there with me. We went through the learning process together, from riding a bike, to playing badminton, as well as testing our limits and our rules together. We learnt which rules to break and which rules that can be bend. And which that can really get us into trouble. :) We were the best of friends, yet we were also the best of enemies, always in competition with one another.

We grew apart though when I moved to KL.

In primary 6, I had Dilla as my best friend and in secondary I had Azlin.

The only time that I did not have one was when I was in Perlis. Maybe that's why I wasn't very happy living there, heh.

UTP was just blissed cause we were basically close with almost everyone. And we had fun all the way. But I've learnt that I'm the type that likes to have a deeper and personal relationship with a person. A person that you can share your life with at that particular time. And I had that with Nadia as well as with Didie then.

And later, with Ayu, Nurli, Eta and Elya as well.

I think I am missing that right now. Maybe it's just too early for it, well I have not even been here for more than a month! But that is the hole that I felt in my life right now.

Unfortunately, letting someone in your life is not as easy as it was before.