HEALTH FREAK MOMMY – Page 159 – The joys and throes of motherhood…

Steam Room Restaurant @ Viva Home Mall, Jalan Loke Yew, KL

My food critic cum food caterer hubs brought us to Steam Room Restaurant for dinner after having a satisfied lunch there with his friend a day earlier. He discovered Steam Room @ Viva Home Mall after providing catering service to his client whose shop is in Viva Mall.

Viva Home is an integrated one-stop centre where home enthusiasts can find all their home needs in one place. Whether you are decorating a new home, renovating an existing one or simply looking to fill it with fun and flair, Viva Home offers everything you need under one roof.

When the food came, my tummy was rumbling as everything looked so appetizing but my ravenous appetite was blown away when Baby puked half way through eating. This girl has a tendency of puking if she eats too full or if she is constipated. This time she puked because of the latter. She was constipated the whole day and was suffering from discomfort and bloatedness. My mistake of going out that night. It was really potong steam for me as I was enjoying my food when she spewed out her hot stinky lava all over herself and on the table. My helper and I had to bring her to the loo to have a big wash up. By the time we came out, the food was already cold and I had totally no more appetite to eat. Oh well, that’s motherhood.

Anyway, am not going to potong your steam. Do check out what we ordered:

Part of the dim sum that we ordered. Love the ma lai koa…

This kale is no run-of-the-mill kailan dish. It is kailan sushi. The blanched plain kale is served Japanese style with Japanese soy sauce and wasabi. Very refreshing. Perfect dish for weight watchers and the health-minded.

Steamed kampung chicken with Chinese wolferries…

Love this steamed egg with fish paste. Very suitable dish for kids. And I shall try cooking this dish for my kiddos very soon.

Ipoh style chicken noodles…

Beef noodles…

After an eventful dinner, we shopped at this Japanese RM4.99 concept shop that is akin to Daiso. But oops, I had forgotten the name of this shop as it is pretty new and unheard of. But many of their products are made in Japan. We spent quite a bit in this shop. I can never resist myself whenever I step foot into RM5 shops like Daiso or 100 Yen Shop. That’s one of my weaknesses!!

Apart from Steam Room, other F&B outlets are aplenty at Viva Home Mall. We shall definitely make another trip to Viva to try other eateries and to shop at the RM4.99 Japanese shop again.

Location:
Steam Room Restaurant (VIVA Home Mall)
Level 1, West Wing, Lot 1-12 & 1-13, VIVA HOME Mall,
No. 85, Jalan Loke Yew, 55200 Kuala Lumpur.
Phone: 03-9200 9906

No. of times viewed = 4329

Healthy Lunch – Fruits and Veggie Juice and Brocolli Potato Egg Salad

I prepared something really healthy for lunch for the kiddos a few days ago:

A salad of boiled brocolli, potatoes, hard boiled eggs, tuna, onions, mayo, cherry tomatoes and jullienned cucumbers…

I got the idea of potato – brocolli salad from the Japanese restaurant that we frequent to. This set of cup, bowl and tray were bought from Daiso @ Tokyo Street. All are made in Japan.

Sherilyn’s bento set, which she hearts
Her bento set consists of freshly made juice (carrot, celery, guava and green apple), half slice of toasted bread with homemade kaya and half slice of bread with herbs and cheese and a plate of brocolli salad.

Healthy mou? I’ll bet many kiddos will shun away from this bento set. Would your kids turn their thumbs down on this?

No. of times viewed = 405

I Told You Not To Put In Your Computer?

…. continuation from my post yesterday on My 3 Year Old Samseng dated 12 Sept 2011…

This morning, Baby saw her picture on the computer and she snapped at me…

Baby – I told you not to put in your FACEBOOK??

Me – I did not put in my Facebook. This is my blog!

Baby – I told you not to put in your COMPUTER?? Why put huh?

… errrrr and I was tongue tied, struggling to find an appropriate answer for her O_o!!! This girl can really out-talk me at times!

No. of times viewed = 295

My 3YO Samseng

Funny conversations with Cassandra:

I like to carry Baby, though she is already 3years 5 months. As I lifted her and carried her on my hip yesterday…..

Me – baby, I love to carry you. You are so skinny and I can still carry you like a little puppy. Next year when you are 4 years old and heavier, I will not be able to carry you anymore…. to which she would always tell me this:

Baby – I thought you have backache and neck pain? Why still carry me? (so thoughtful of this girl!)

Me – because I love you.

Baby – I love you too (and then kissed me)

Me – you will be my last baby. Next time, I will carry your baby ok?

Baby – I will get married with my boyfriend and have babies. Then you carry my babies ok?

And then we laughed together. Where did she get the idea that she has to get married with her boyfriend in order to have babies? I can’t remember telling this to her LOL!

My samseng is still very much a samseng up until today. She still flat lines my heart beat all the time with her acrobat stunts everyday.

Just a moment ago, I saw her performing this stunt and quickly grabbed my camera to snap… and got this reply from her “DON’T put in your Facebook ok?” MUAHAHAHAHAHAH!!

No. of times viewed = 192

Restaurant Pin Xiang Seafood, Chicken Rice & Noodle House @ Aman Suria

Last Saturday, my good blogger pals, their families and my family had dinner at my good friend, Alan Yun’s restaurant at Aman Suria. Alan Yun is a local celebrity. He started off as a humble model, and is now an actor, restaurateur and entrepreneur. And he still is humble and a very nice guy!

We had a fabulous time chatting and digging into the food, which was really a LOT! All in, there were 10 mouth-watering dishes.

The facade of Pin Xiang Restaurant @ Aman Suria…

Yam ring with sweet and sour pork…

Pin Xiang deep fried Talapia with lots of garlic, yums!

Kai Lan cooked with yam, a dish that’s pretty unique…

Mongolian pork knuckles…

Yin Yang prawns. The creamy orangy prawns on the left cooked with mayonaise and tomato sauce was concocted by Alan Yun himself and was everyone’s favorite too. It was lip-smacking and very tasty.

Spare ribs with champagne sauce and fresh watermelon balls…

Another unique dish – bitter gourd stir fried with pickled lettuce, iLike!

Assam petai aka stinky beans. Can’t really comment on this as I did not taste it, though I like petai very much. Just can’t stomach the after-taste and the morning after, eewwwwww! But I think this dish was pretty good, otherwise my fussy food critic hubs and Barb’s hubs would not have polished off the dish.

House signature tofu…

Sweet and sour crabs. There was also a plate of fried mantou to eat with the sweet and sour crab sauce. Love this crab dish. Actually there was another salted eggs crab dish but we had to ask Alan to cancel this dish as we were all stuffed to the brim of our tummies.

The next time I go there, I must try this Teochew crab porridge.

While we adults yakked non stop, the 3 girls were busy reading books. I bought Alycia 3 new Geronimo Stilton books that same day and she had a book marathon, with her eyes glued to the books non-stop and finished reading the 3 books in 1.5 days!

And the boys (Annie Kiu’s twin boys) were glued to their iPads, hehehe…. Alycia enjoyed herself playing with Fearles and Cruz. This girl enjoys playing boy games with her boy classmates *slap forehead*

Us with Alan Yun (in green)…

Wait….after a satisfying dinner, there was homework! Alan Yun was giving us dictation here LOL!

The price of all the dishes are pretty reasonable and I must thank Alan Yun for giving us a treat to this sumptuous dinner.

If you are thinking of making a trip there over the weekends, be sure to call to make a booking or go there early as this restaurant is normally full to the brim on weekends.

Restaurant Pin Xiang Seafood, Chicken Rice & Noodle House
H-18-G, Jalan PJU 1/45,
Aman Suria, Damansara,
Selangor Darul Ehsan.
Tel: 016 276 1438

No. of times viewed = 403

You Burp Like A Pig!

Another post to pen down in this eJournal for my girls.

Last night after a dinner of pork chops, I let out a satisfied burp and had forgotten to say “excuse me”. After the burp, I knew I was in for trouble. I knew that criticisms will be flying from all directions of the dining table from my 3 sarcastic rascals. My girls are always very quick to lambast if I had forgotten to say “excuse me” or “sorry”. And Baby my 3YO was quick to snap at me with “mummy, you burp like a PIG!” … to which I had to control hard from bursting out laughing out loud. 10 minutes later, I was still chortling softly to myself at the dining table as I found the remark from Baby too hilarious. Alycia saw me and asked me why I was laughing. I told her about it and together we all laughed heartily.

No. of times viewed = 290

Homemade Golden Fried Drummets

My girls love fried drummets, nuggets and fried chicken. While shopping for groceries at Bangsar Village, I saw some raw chicken drummets at the frozen meat section. I hardly see raw chicken drummets at the frozen meat section at the supermarkets that I normally frequent, so I was really excited and got 2 packs. But I had a problem. I did not know how to fry them. So after google searching for fried drummets recipe, I modified the recipe a little and the end result was very successful. The fried chicken drummets turned out to be golden brown, crispy and very, very delish! My girls love them to bits. The fussiest of the lot – Alycia even asked to bring some to school the next morning.

I replaced the plain flour with rye flour (50%) and corn flour (50%) and used olive oil.

I marinated the chicken with turmeric powder, pepper and sea salt. Before frying the drummets, I dipped the drummets in a bowl of beaten eggs, then dipped them in a bowl of the flour mixture, then dipped into the egg mixture again. Next shallow fried the drummets until they turned golden brown.

The delicious crispy fried dummets, free from MSG, low in sodium and no other food additives. Tasted as good as restaurant ones, yums!!!

Want to taste some?

No. of times viewed = 165

More Angry Birds Loot

One reason why I don’t like to go to the Pasar Malam with my hubs or to any shopping mall for that matter is because the 2 older girls will take advantage of their daddy’s softie heart. They would surely ask him to buy them stuff – just about any stuff and the ever yes-man daddy will oblige. The girls don’t even have to pester him, unlike getting things from their mummy. Whenever we are out at the Pasar Malam or shopping mall, none of the girls want to follow me as they know they will not get anything from me. All 3 will stick to their daddy like a leech, sucking him dry!

While I was busy buying fruits at the Pasar Malam 2 Fridays ago, the 3 girls were leeched on to their daddy and this is what they had sucked out from him:

The only thing that I was willing to buy was the Angry Birds shoes for Alycia, which only cost RM12 a pair! What a price to pay for! And because the price is too good to say no to, my girls each have more than 3 pairs of these Crocs look-alike shoes, each with different Disney characters on them.

No. of times viewed = 362

Tokyo Street @ Pavillion, KL

We spent the day at Pavillion KL yesterday. After lunch at Duck King Pavillion (I find the food there very pricey, albeit tasty), we spent a couple of hours shopping at Daiso and buying Japanese snacks like Japanese Nama Roll (owned by The Loaf) and Kindori Japanese ice cream.

My 3 angels – look lovely don’t they? But they can drive you bonkers everyday.

My 2 vain pots shopping for girlish stuff. Too bad, my pretty Alycia is only interested in boys’ toys and games, sigh
Instead of getting pink, cute and girlish stuff, she pestered her daddy to buy her some Japanese toys for boys called Bey Blade, which she learned to play from her male classmates, double sigh!!

Only part of our loot, hehehe…

Felt so happy after buying new mugs and Japanese lacquered bowls and trays for my girls and other household stuff. Also spent over a hundred bucks on pants at Bossini for Alycia. But spent nilch on myself. Never mind, I shall splurge on some cheap and trendy ladies new arrivals for myself from my own online store

No. of times viewed = 484

Environmentally Conscious 3YO Girl

My 3YO daughter who makes me proud. She never fails to leave empty milk boxes, Vitagen bottles, plastic punnet after finishing her cherry tomatoes and empty shampoo bottles into the bag for recycling empty bottles in the wet kitchen. And I better not let her see me throw papers away with a clean reverse side, lest she will lament that I am wasting papers and not recycle them o_O…

And she would remind her sisters and we adults too whenever we conveniently dump empty bottles into the bin. She will make a good class monitor in future, I am pretty certain Who knows, my baby will pursue a course in organizational management in future or run recycling educational leadership programs!

She does not even wear her top at home as she does not want to waste water and detergent to wash her clothes… so she’s back to basics at home LOL! Just kidding. That’s actually my idea muahahahahahah!!

No. of times viewed = 411

Bestest Che Che in the WWW

When I saw that Baby had dozed off on her favorite che che’s lap one night, I just had to snap a pic to capture the moment. It was such a heart-warming sight. I pray that my 3 girls will be the bestest of friends forever.

No prize for guessing whose lazy leg was on top of the couch eh? Kekekekeke……

Is everyone back from their holidays yet? Time to have a holiday after a holiday before a new week begins. I don’t know about you but I feel really tired and need a day to rest, clean up the house, unpack and to settle down after a holiday LOL!

No. of times viewed = 188

Our Sunday – 28 August 2011

The roads in KL and PJ were pretty smooth today as many KL folks had already left this crazily busy and hectic city for their hometowns for the long Raya holidays. We too will be saying good bye to KL tomorrow and heading back to Ipoh to my parents. It’s been over 9 months since our last trip back and I miss good old Ipoh, the place where I was born and bred… the place where fair and pretty Ipoh Mali girls are made *ahem*

After church today, we had lunch at Xenri Japanese restaurant with the girls’ visiting little uncle from London (hub’s cousin)

Back home, the girls had a Skype video call with granny and koong koong…

Granny and koong koong showed us the homemade pandan lotus paste that they were making for the mooncakes that they are about to bake for us! And my 3 Angry Birds craze girls were delighted when granny showed them the new Angry Birds loot that she had bought for them! Yeah, yet again this indulgent granny has bought them Angry Birds merchandise – bed sheet, watches, torch lights, etc. Alycia has been telling me non-stop that she can’t wait to be back in Ipoh to lay her hands on the Angry Birds loot!

The 3 Angry Birds craze girls “WOW”ing over the Angry Birds loot that granny is showing them thru Skype LOL!!

To all my Muslim friends and readers, Selamat Hari Raya and to all non-Muslim, HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

No. of times viewed = 601

Purple sweet potatoes for dinner

I had forgotten that there was still a bag of purple sweet potatoes that I had bought from the night market. When my maid reminded me about it about a month later, I told her that we had to finish off the sweet potatoes that night itself, lest they rot in no time. So that night, everyone ate purple sweet potatoes in replacement of rice. Nevertheless, there was still some rice, specially cooked for my ‘fan thoong’ aka rice addict. Can you guess who the fan thoong is among my 3 girls?

What’s on the dining table? Steamed pork ribs with fermented bean paste, pickled plums, tomatoes and garlic. Stir fried leafy green veggie which is a must-have everyday, some vegetarian dishes bought in the morning, steamed purple sweet potatoes and steamed multi-grain rice. Healthy stuff eh?

Baby’s plate of dinner…

No. of times viewed = 228

Learning To Write From The iPad2

I used to spend a fortune on those alphabet and numbers tracing books for my girls. Baby has been learning how to write lately and has keen interest too. But this stingy mum does not want to spend so much money on those tracing books as sometimes she will get bored with the books and dump them in one corner. So I did a search on my iPad2 and found several awesome apps for kids to do alphabet and numbers tracing, yiiiiihaaaaa!! And they are so attractive, enticing, so colorful and comes with an iTeacher too, who will ‘talk’ to my baby girl and guide her! Not bad not bad, no regrets buying this gadget!

There are arrows guiding Baby the order of the strokes too!

No. of times viewed = 280

Angry Bird Craze Girls

No thanks to the popular Angry Birds online game, my 3 girls are loyal fan-see of the ugly birds with heavy frown. Almost every kid I see on the streets are crazy over ABs. The other day, while I was paying for ABs lanterns, I saw a little boy about 2-3YO, wearing ABs clothes. He saw the ABs lanterns that I was holding and kept saying “Angry Bird daddy”.

My girls, especially Alycia is besotted with ABs. She draws ABs whenever she has free time. She bugs me to bring her to the toy and sticker stall at the pasar malam every Friday and would behave herself very well, just to earn her ABs rewards from me.

If there is no ABs reward for her good behaviour, this girl will be one Angry Girl, I kid you not.

Even I love those Angry Birds tees, which my mum bought for her 3 grand daughters.

Part of my girls’ ABs collection…..colorful pens and stationery sets….

Glue, pens, mechanical pencils, sticker books, jig saw puzzle (for Baby, the jig saw puzzle buff) …

And oh yea, I also bought them each a cute Angry Birds lantern from a nearby mini market last week, to add to their collection of Angry Birds Shall take pix of them later.

No. of times viewed = 4734

Dad’s Birthday Dinner At Unique Seafood Restaurant

My parents and brother and SIL from Singapore were in KL over the weekends to celebrate my dad’s birthday. This year, we celebrated his birthday at Unique Seafood Restaurant in PJ again and we were allocated the same room again as last year! Our group photo was taken on the same couch with the exact same wall mural painting as last year. We joked that we have to come here again next year and every year to celebrate dad’s birthday. My mum has been assigned the job to upload all the pix in her Facebook page and show us the year by year pix of dad’s birthday celebration taken in the same venue. We even planned to request for the same room every year. My mum is the most active senior citizen Facebook user I have met thus far LOL!

Here are the sumptuous dishes that we had last night. Superb food aside, there was also a karaoke session, which everyone enjoyed. My hubs ordered one of the tastiest chocolate cake ever for my dad, who is a chocolate cake lover. The cake is no run-of-the-mill chocolate cake. Is was made from special ingredients by an artisan pastry chef and ordered from Les Deux Garcons Patisserie.

The first dish and my all-time favorite restaurant dish. This Four-Season dish cost a whopping RM180. Everyone enjoyed this dish, which was specially crafted and cooked to perfection. Not a single morsel was left unattacked on the plate.

Deep fried prawn, combined with yam, pine nuts and an assortment of diced veggie. On the shells are baked scallop with cheese.

The usual Longevity Noodles…

Soon Hock fish, also a very sought after fish in Unique….

Geo Duck… which can be eaten raw ala Sashimi style or cooked in hot pot.

Ham Tarn Hai (crab baked with salted eggs).

Pak Cheok Har (blanched prawns), Chang Loong Choy (a long, green, leafy veggie resembling and tastes like a combination of spring onion and leek. This is also another popular Chinese restaurant veggie dish). On the left is cockles cooked Thai style, something which I, the health freak did not touch, though I’d love to.

Dad’s custom-made birthday cake, looked pretty simple but tasted top notch and given a 5-star rating by everyone. This cake had the WOW factor which made everyone craving for more! Weighed less than 1kg and cost RM165! Tasted like Kit Kat in a cake. We all loved this cake to bits and finished every single crumb left on the cake board. Though very costly, we are now planning to get another one for mum’s birthday next month.

And finally…… the bill for the dinner plus the cake was close to RM1,500! But it’s A-OK daddy! After all, your birthday only comes once a year.

No. of times viewed = 729