Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 29, 2015

i am home again!

We celebrated my nephew's first birthday last weekend back in my hometown! Always feels so good to be back home, it is always fun to get together, lots of laughs and good food.

My 'smiles-all-the-time' super duper adorable little nephew has turned 1 year old last Saturday, we got him his first car! Hehe, the kids ride-on BMW and 2 pairs of cute baby sneakers and socks as he begin to learn to walk now! 

Let me share with you all the love i have got from home.

 Look at this handsome boy on his first-ever bmw, how cool!

I love love love this beautiful photo! (em, please ignore my mom behind trying to hang all our freshly washed laundry)
His smile and facial expression, and also every of his cute gestures just melted my heart.
He's really a little angel, keep the happy spirit floating around our house always!

 I made some of "my signature" (food to be proud of) osmanthus jellies and took home for mom, grandma and my partner's parents. They loved it.

Granny's homegrown jackfruit! There was a big jackfruit tree just outside my granny's house.
I remember when we were just a child, my uncle would ask one of us to climb the tree (not very high) and pick some of those large jackfruits. 
I miss my childhood very much, nothing beats childhood memories.

Jackfruit is very sweet, delicious also rich in fiber & minerals; but its difficult to cut open and to eat it.
Jackfruit is very resinous, and the sticky latex/substance is very hard to remove.
Guess I'm just a glutton for food. I managed to cut, trimmed and removed those sticky fibrous strands and finally retrieve all the yummy fruit pods with my bare hands very patiently. Yohoo!


  We happened to pass by Ipoh (capital city of Perak state) to buy some nice foods home!
How can we miss the best chicken rice in town? (Lou Wong Bean Sprouts Chicken)
A must try chicken rice and the best blanched bean sprouts drizzle with the combination of soy sauce, sesame oil, & shallot oil. oh mama mia!

There are many many old bakeries in old town of Ipoh. We went to an old bakery (not so commercialized, not much reno & decor) for these freshly baked egg tarts with piping hot wobbly custard! Oh~ these are really good!

Kompyang is a biscuit popular in my hometown, its like our comfort food! Its made with lard, onions, salt and flour, some with meats, some sweet & soft inside! Best eaten while still hot, but we usually buy more and reheat them with oven.
 

Mom gave me 2 pineapple crowns, they can be placed directly into the ground and yes! i can actually start growing my own pineapple!
From the info, pineapples don’t really have usable seeds, so pineapple plants start from the pineapple itself, it usually propagate from the crown.


Beside food shots, I love taking pictures of plants too! Here are some veggies & edible plants that my parents are growing.

top left - winter melon
top right - calamansi 
bottom left - curious cat that hovering around daily
bottom right - daun kaduk / wild betel leaf / piper sarmentosum 
*(they are widely used throughout SE Asia as a herb in Asian cooking or eaten raw)

My mom usually used them to make otak-otak (fish custard/ dumplings wrapped in banana leaves), or nyonya perut ikan (fermented fish stomach with herbs & vegetable curry). Original recipe are using fermented fish stomach, but my mom substitute it with small prawns and blood cockles.
I know 'fermented fish stomach' sounds a bit weird or scary for you, but trust me~ they taste really good in this nyonya recipe. ^_^


Monday, April 6, 2015

back to my hometown

Went back to my hometown last weekend for tomb sweeping day or ching ming jie (just in case some of you might not know, its a traditional chinese festival where people visit the grave sites to remember and to pray to their ancestors). Great opportunity to back home, gather and play with my adorable little nephew! Here are some random shots I really like.

 
There's a beautiful butterfly that visited our garden last saturday morning, we had good mood that day!


Collecting and storing my cotton bolls & seeds! Hopefully i can save enough cotton to make a pillow one day. How cool if i can make a pillow with my homegrown cotton plant, yohoo! Okie, maybe a mini pillow? ^_^


The cutest & sweetest little angel in our house!
Look at that little face, and the little sunflower print top. SO CUTE!
How can you not love him?
Little Edward, my nephew! He's 11 months old now,  and going to turn 1 year old in 3 weeks time! 
Couldn't wait to be back home again to celebrate and capture hundreds of photo with him. 

*Can you see the wooden book shelf at the back, those are all my mom's recipe books! hehe!


Dad walked 'Kimura' & 'Brownie' in the evening, and he asked me if i know that dogs eat grass?
I'm not so sure about it! And dad says yes! dogs does eat grass, but they doesn't eat all type of grass, instead they will pick, the reasons are to improving digestion, treating intestinal worms, or fulfill some other nutritional need. Now i know it!

Kimura is a jack russell terrier, 6 years old. Our first doggy. She's a small but energetic breed!


 Dad bathe our 2nd security guard at home - brownie! She bark at strangers and kept our house safe, specially at night.

Have a great start to the week!