RamblingMoo

This is Darrius’s Birthday Bento which is a week late but like the phase ‘it’s better late than never’ is always great to use!

Well, not sure if this is a tradition to most Chinese but on birthdays or any festive celebrations, having chicken dishes on the dining table is extremely important. I learned from my mom that in the olden days, most people in China are poor and they can only afford to have chicken for their meals during festive seasons.

Last time my mom used to prepare chicken drumstick on my birthdays… though not every year (since I was away for quite a while). Therefore, it only feels right if I try to carry on this little tradition. Since Darrius can eat almost anything now, I prepared a birthday Bento for him…

I made him his favorite pan-fried soy sauce chicken and I dyed the quail eggs red! Why quail eggs? Well, knowing Darrius can’t finish 2 chicken eggs I decided to give him quail eggs instead and like usual… quail eggs are so darn cute! Gave him an orange as a symbol of ‘gold’ so that he will grow up to be prosperous…  hehehee… am I that ‘lao-toh’???

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Clockwise from top left: steamed okra with cherry tomatoes on skewers, red quail eggs on a bed of steamed fish, pan-fried soy sauce chicken on a bed of rice with gravy and an orange

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This is the first time I serve okra (lady’s fingers) to Darrius where he eats himself. Normally I will cut until so minuet that he don’t even know they exists. And guess what? He told me “mommy, this lady’s fingers have so many seeds… I don’t want!’ Apart from that, he was a good boy clearing the entire bento.

Another thing which made we very happy is that I finally got my Zodiac skewers which I bought from here and arrived just in time for Darrius’s birthday! I used the Rooster, Moomoo Cow and Piggy ones and they are absolutely gorgeous!

Here is a pic of his happy face when I asked him to sing a Birthday song for himself!

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Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me…..

Oookay… mommy said I must say my thanks to all the people who has given me ‘ham-pau’ (eerr… I still can’t pronounce ‘ang’ like mommy taught me) and all the nice-nice pressies for my burp-day. All of you has made me the happiest 3 years old boy!

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oink-oink…. hiakz!

This year mommy let me open all the pressies all by myself… coz daddy is not around when mommy passed them to me or else he will open for me like last year!!!!! *hmmph!!*

Here goes the list…

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Was out the whole day (went to collect passport and shop for a new DVD player as ours broke down!) so don’t have the chance to catch up on posting… and I am so behind with my Bento posts!

Last week, I told PiggyBeng to get me some prawns so that I could do some fried rice. However, I have not been cooking that much last week so ended up I don’t have extra rice for the fried rice so I cook Asam Prawn instead since PiggyBeng and Darrius loves those. Happened that day I was out the whole day (brought Darrius to McD so he could get those Madagascar toys) and the easiest items to defrost are the prawns!

We had ours with the shells on but I decided to remove the shell from a few of them and put them on skewers just for Darrius as he loves the idea of eating ’satay’. On that day I also stir-fried some purple and green ‘yuen-choy’ or Chinese spinach which we had not had for a long time. Added some cherry tomatoes into the box since I don’t have any fruits available that day.

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Initially Darrius rejected the spinach as he said he ‘don’t want any vege’! Don’t know why he started to reject some of the vege I served him lately but I was lucky I could still coax him to eat. Sometimes he will just eat when I shoved them into his mouth but sometimes he will turn his head away!

And here is a very cute smug-faced photo of him with the ‘prawn satay’ or ‘prawn kebab’.

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.The corns were the leftovers from our McD meal so I dumped them into the box in the hope that Darrius can finish them up!

Thanksgiving is here and Christmas is just a month away. This is the season where we are sure to load a few more pounds on our already heavy body… so what can you do to make sure you get to enjoy all those yummy goodies and yet still have a slim and lean body for the new year? I am saying that no heavy duty exercise involved here…

Have you heard of Anoretix? Apparently it is one of this years hottest new weight loss supplements. It is said to contains nine patented and clinically tested weight loss ingredients which includes:

1. Super CitriMax ®,
2. Tonalin CLA ®,
3. Advantra Z ®
4. NeOpuntia ®
5. Phase 2 ®
6. ForsLean ®
7. 7-Keto ®
8. ChromeMate ®
9. Bioperine ®

I have read a few reviews and I thought of getting some to try since it sounded quite good. PiggyBeng has been complaining that I have too much fats on my tummy so I hope Anoretix could work for me and I don’t have to feel guilty at all chomping down all those cakes and cookies!

I have been trying to blog hop the whole morning today but still I can’t seem to complete! Everyone has been busy blogging so there are so much to read!

Anyhow, I have been catching up on my posts too (which never seems to complete… not even 30%!!) and I want to post up all the Bento I fixed last week… yeah… I am that slow now!

This is a snack Bento I did last Wednesday (I think) when I was half way doing my cupcakes. My FIL brought us some tasty ‘pandan egg tarts’ which Darrius has took a fancy on as they are really yummy! Then I cut some butterfly and flower shaped pear for his Vitamin C intake as he has not been taking that much fruit lately.

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To date my Bentos are not as creative as those Bento books I found or those Japanese mamas’ sites… I think I still have a loooooooooooooooong way to go. Though I have most of the gadgets but I find it tough to include them since I don’t pack for outdoor… so most of the stuff I have are sitting inside the box.

I am trying to find a few more Bento books from  Amazon books to add to my collection though I know I still can’t achieve that kind of results but it feels good to have a few reference books around!

I am so slow with my Bento posts though I have all the photos sorted out and uploaded. There are always something else I need to do that takes me away from blogging here. In fact I have loads of posts waiting at my cupcakes blog but I just can’t get around doing them. Not to mention the cob webs building up in my recipes blog!

Ok, here is another not so creative Bento I did last Tuesday. It was a quick one as I was running late. I wanted to do a sunny side up quail egg but while frying it I thought to myself I better make the yolk completely cook in case it has bacteria which will be harmful to Darrius hence the slightly brown ’sun’ face…

I steamed a slice of sea Barramundi fillet with some sliced mushrooms which I made it look like seagulls…

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Sunny side up quail egg, sliced mushroom as seagulls, sliced carrot, cherry tomatos, steamed Barramundi cubes with stir-fried Chinese cabbage with luncheon meat on a bed of white rice

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I don’t have time to cut the apple as Darrius was already making noise that he’s hungry so I have to serve him the rice and kept the apple till later for his snack.

Oh yeah, I must mention a little about the luncheon meat now that I remembered. The brand Maling was used to be quite good and a lot of people are eating this brand but I was very disappointed with my can of luncheon meat as it don’t only taste good but a little funny! Don’t know how to describe. I know it is unhealthy to serve Darrius these but I was glad he felt the taste was a little weird so he refused to eat them! *phew~*

Since it was quite pricey now, I felt bad to dump the whole can into the bin so I only dump the leftover. The other half I sliced them thinly and pan fried till crispy and I made some sandwiches with them. Tasted much better but imagine the fats I have loaded up!!!! I better go source for a good diet pill to wash away those fats! I went to read about some of the alli reviews and still thinking if I should get some to try.

We celebrated Darrius’s birthday a week early since his actual birthday falls on a Friday. It was my nephew’s birthday that day too and since we can’t be in KL, we decided to do it on the same day since everyone is free on that Sunday.

I was so silly to have forgotten to make the reservation for the event that I decided to call them up at  almost the night before 12am! Coincidentally they were having full house last Sunday so I have to beg and beg to get them to hold a table for me…. And the staff on the night shift was so kind to make my reservation for me so we can have the Sunday Buffet Brunch @ Coffee Garden, Equatorial Penang!

Since I was coughing and dealing with a few last minutes cupcakes orders that week, it left me with no time for Darrius’s cake… so I only started the project close to midnight the night before! I spent almost 6 hours (I stopped at 5am and woke up at 8am to continue!) and used a lot of short cuts!

And here is the cake (For those who is in my FB should have seen it) …

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Thank you so much for everyone’s birthday wishes for Darrius.

These few weeks has been a very hectic one for me as there was just too many last minutes cupcakes orders. As I am still coughing very badly, I have totally no mood to do any other thing. I have even neglected my blogs though I have so much to blog about but just don’t have the energy… that’s why I have not been blog hopping and leaving comment. Another thing is, I was so caught up watching Moonlight Resonance!!!! I completed the whole 40 episode within 6 nights!

I truly appreciate everyone’s kindness for still popping by to read this blog… though there’s nothing much to read. I have tonnes of back dated post still waiting (I have not even blog about my KL trip - all the makan posts!) I am so lazy to go sort the photos so I only managed to post a few up in my FB.

In fact I am looking really haggard now since I don’t get good sleep with the cough disturbing me at night. I am beginning to worry too as Darrius started to have husky voice since yesterday… a sign that he might have caught my cough!

All the late night spent on molding sugar paste figurines is taking a toll on my skin… my eczema is coming back and I can see more wrinkles on my eyes… *sob**sob* If things don’t better, I might need to help from Denver Plastic Surgery!

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Not sure how many of you have noticed that more and more of the big guys in the banking industry is starting their retrenchment exercise. It is disheartening to hear of such news. Just these two days I read about HSBC and Citi Group will be axing a huge number of their work force. It is really scary.

I cannot imagine how it going to be a few weeks down the road. According to PiggyBeng it is going to be worse than the last 2 recessions. In fact a lot of people will be badly affected since the banks are among the victims this time. A lot of people are going to suffer especially those who has high financial commitments.

PiggyBeng was telling me to be prepared as he might lose his job… it shuddering to even think about that possibility. I have asked him to start looking around though good jobs are hard to come by during this period but to have a job is better to have none at all. I even encouraged him to look beyond our shores and try other possible openings… for just in case. I even told him to consider some jobs in Dallas.