Food for Urban Nomads brings you a simple breakfast, also one that I have been craving for few weeks already.
Ingredients:
1 large egg
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 - 2 tbsp sugar
butter
4 slices bread
peanut butter
1) Crack egg into a bowl, add in milk and sugar, and beat the egg
2) Spread peanut butter on bread and sandwich them together
3) Dip bread in egg. Becareful not to soak the bread in the egg mixture too long if not you will end up with a soggy bread.
4) Put bread into a buttered non-stick pan.
5) Pan fry for 2 minutes on medium high heat, or until surface turns brown.
6) Flip bread over and repeat step 5.
7) Serve and enjoy!
On a side note, Yuan and I have shifted to a new place, where we will live for 2 months until the end of our nomadic experiences! See you soon! :)
Urban nomads: A small but diverse section of society that lives and works in an urban area, yet does not rent, own or otherwise reside permanently in any one location. "Nomad" suggests a chosen lifestyle, as opposed to "refugee", and it also suggests that nomads feel they have a home, as opposed to the "homeless". -Urban Dictionary- That is the life that I am living at the moment. Since we landed in Sydney a week ago, Yuan and I have been staying in a temporary accommodation which we will move out this weekend into another place. I have not yet found a permanent place to live, so right now I consider myself a nomad. If you are curious how I identify myself as one, below is the checklist I came up with, according to my experience:
1) Luggage is your life: You tend to bring the minimum maximum with you which include the most important things.
2) A cupboard? What's that??: Because you basically live off your luggage. You tend to compartmentalise your luggage just like how you do with your cupboards, one part for shirts, one part for pants, one part for undies etc..... and you also store your clean and dirty clothes in them, and at the end of the day still able to identify which ones are clean and which are dirty. 3) Wearing the same clothes: Because you only have that much in your luggage
4) Buying the minimum: You tend to window shop more. I just went into Daiso yesterday (we all know that place is evil coz once you go in, you will definitely come out with many items coz they are so cheap and cute!) and there were so many things i want but I had to refrain myself from buying because I do not want to add on to the weight when I need to move again this weekend!
6) Occurring meals: pasta, pasta, pasta, pasta, pasta. Because its the easiest to cook!!! But we are pretty thankful that the place we are staying now has a well equipped kitchen where we can experiment with the limited cooking ingredients to make good edible food. They are not the best, but at least we are not having bread and tuna and pasta every single day. And I thought of sharing some of these ideas with you. So if you are 1)an urban nomad like me, 2)a architecture student who survives on instant noodles during submission period, 3)working person who is just so lazy to prepare you own meals, then this series is for you! So with the #FUN project, we aim to cook simple dishes, using the simplest ingredients, and EAT LIKE A PRO NOMAD because we I understand how hard it is to survive just with bread and tuna and pasta every day.....
This weekend was the start of Vivid Sydney that will run through till 9th of June (Sunday). It is an annual celebration with many different events revolving around light, music, technology and creativity.
Being so used to the Tasmanian laid back lifestyle, this event gave me a very vibrant and cheerful welcome; the highlight of my first week in Sydney!
It was really crowded all along Circular Quay, what more on a Saturday! But it was a really great opportunity to witness such large scale event with so many people.
Soooo many things to see! We walked sooooo much it really felt as if I could walk to North Pole.... but it was such an amazing experience, with so much things happening around you, you'd be carried away and forget how much you have walked until you reach home.
Light show projected on the custom house.
Amazing coordination of graphics and music, this was my favourite!
Not forgetting the Opera House. Since I recorded it from far, I decided to add in an audio track just to make it more glamorous, LOL.
So if you happen to be in Sydney during this time, remember to pay a visit to this event in the evening!
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And lastly, a little sneak peak to the next recipe..... :)
Hope you had a relaxing Sunday, and a good week ahead!
Firstly, I would like to apologise for the loooooooooong hiatus. Here's why: since the previous post in September, Yuan and I got into a huge black hole of stress preparing for our finals, because its the grand finale! Yes the last architecture studio crit of our Masters degree. We were really living like zombies until the end of October. And then there was graduation, visiting parents and time to vacate our beloved house.
So now, finally I have some time to continue (yyyaaaayy!!!) and I hope you will continue to stay with me as I share more recipes and more interesting things with you.
For your information, the both of us have left Tasmania, one of the most beautiful places in Australia, to Sydney. And with this, I hope to be able to bring you more interesting events!
Now here's a cute recipe for you:
While I was back in Malaysia at the end of last year, I went to visit my grandmother in Terengganu (east coast of Malaysia peninsular). Knowing that grandma has many tasty recipes to share, I decided to show her my cooking videos. I felt embarrassed at first (it just feels so strange sharing your videos with your family members ><) but to my surprise she actually enjoyed watching them!
So today, I will be sharing my grandmother's cute recipe with you, Kuih Moho. To be honest, I have never came across this, neither have I heard of the name. To me, it is just a cupcake, and I really mean CUPcake. But it is special coz of the simple ingredients and baking method. Since grandma was eager to share this recipe with me, I took the opportunity and asked her permission for filming, and she said YES!
Very simple ingredients: (yields up to 50 cupcakes) Sweet potato mixture
4 sweet potatoes (approx. 15cm in length)
1 bowl water (2 cups)
Dough
1kg pau flour (or cake flour)
400g sugar
4tsp yeast with 1/4 bowl water (1/2 cup)
6 small eggs/4 large eggs
1 bowl water (2 cups)
Directions: Sweet potato mixture
1) wash and clean potato, and either steam or boil them till they are cooked. You can check by piercing a fork through the potato. If it is cooked, you should be able to pierce the fork through easily.
2) peel the potatoes and mash them in a bowl
3) add a bowl (2cups) of water and continue mashing/mixing
4) strain the mixture through a sieve to ensure you don't get chunks of unmashed potatoes
Dough
1) prepare yeast: instant yeast powder dissolved in 1/2 cup water
2) in a large mixing bowl, pour in flour, sweet potato mixture, sugar, eggs, yeast and water
3) keep mixing/kneading the flour until you get a sticky, elastic and moist texture
4) divide the whole mixture into 2 portions so that the dough can rise more effectively. Cover with a cloth or like my grandmother, she uses more bowls :) leave that for 30-40minutes.
5) while waiting for the dough, prepare a steamer and bring 1-1.5 litters of water to a boil
6) grandma uses small tea cups! wash them clean
7) after 40minutes, take a teacup and scoop a spoonfull of dough into the cup. place that in the steamer rack
8) steam for 10minutes
9) remove cupcakes into a plate filled with water (to halfway up the teacup). this is to cool down the insides of the cup so that it will be easier to remove from the mould
10) after 5 minutes, with a fork, gently push the sides of the cake and it shall pop out very easily.
11) serve and enjoy!
dough covered for 40minutes
little teacups! Grandma has heaps of these cuties and I am surprised you can actually use these cups to make cakes!
so tiny~
cupcakes!
these cakes are very soft and fluffy, and taste sooooo good!
here's the video recipe to it.
It was Yuan's birthday last week, we wanted to surprise her with not-another-cake, so we made her a giant fruit jelly cake for her and it was yummy and very wobbly~
I shall make a recipe video on this one day. It was really good!
Have you ever experienced awkward silence in a conversation? Wish that you could react fast enough to break the icy cold silence? Fear not, start memorising a few "Fill The Silence"-s from here, or if you think that the squiggly words are too challenging to read, try OMGfacts. You'll be surprise how the conversation can roll from there!
Thesilenttiger LOVES to read fun facts, and she always have a couple up in her sleeve during a conversation. Except, wrong timing, always. The conversations were rolling fine, but she have this randomness in her, and she couldn't stop herself from blurting them out, causing a short awkward silence with a burst of laughter after that. Well well, she's still our favourite joker. *smiles*
So, today we're gonna introduce this dish/ all time favourite/ snack/ gymfreakwillnotgetclose to you guys, steamed glutinous rice with chicken or best known as Lo Mai Gai (in Cantonese). This dish is usually served in chinese "high-tea" places, such as the coffee shops or dim sum places, where all yummy food secretly gather together to plan on conquering the world. The version we made was rather plain compared to the authentic ones, as we've removed the Chinese sausages and dried shrimps (thesilenttiger dislikes them).
Ingredients:
2 pcs chicken thighs
2 pcs shiitake mushrooms
1 cup glutinous rice
3 cloves garlic (minced)
3/4 cup water
Marinate (make double serves for both chicken and rice)
1/2 tsp oyster sauce
1/4 tsp light soy sauce
pepper
1/2 tsp chinese cooking wine
1/2 tsp five spice powder
1/4 tsp dark soy sauce
1. Soak to soften the chicken thighs and shiitake mushroomn and cut them to half.
2. Add in the marinates and mix well.
3. Cover with plastic wrap before putting into the refrigerator. The marination process have to be taken for at least two hours, but we recommend you to leave it overnight and cook it first thing in the morning.
4. As for the rice, the amount of marinates is the same, but also add in 3/4 cups of water.
5. Stir evenly and cover with plastic wrap, then into the fridge it goes.
Enjoy the steamed glutinous rice with a cup of coffee (click here for recipe!) and your Chinese life would be complete!
Fun Fact #1: Do you know that many airlines require the pilot and copilot eat different meals on flights to ensure the safety of at least one of them in the rare occurrence of a food related illness?
Typing this while waiting for the arrival of thesilenttiger. She left me alone at home while she travel lovingly with her other half in the city of civilization. *cue home alone movie soundtrack, or maybe sad violin song?*
Well, this post is loooooonnnnggg overdue, due to none other than.................procrastination. Hello? it's holiday yo, I have thousands of pla...........nah, I don't have any, except for eat, sleep and shit, and of course, making some delicious, yummy in my tummy food!
So today, we are going to introduce you guys inside out sushi roll!
and here's a video tutorial!
Ingredients:
1 cup rice
1 cup water
2 1/2 tbsp sushi vinegar
3/4 cup tuna
3 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp worcestershire sauce
1/2 cucumber
1/2 carrot
2 pcs nori sheet
sesame seeds (for sprinkle)
1. Add the rice into a bowl and add a cup of water into the bowl.
2. Shake to even out the water.
3. Place the rice into a steamer and cook for 20 minutes on medium heat.
4. While the rice is cooking, you can start preparing the filling. Place the mayonnaise into a bowl and add in the sugar, sesame oil, worcestershire sauce and stir well. You can also spice it up with some cyan pepper if you want.
5. Add in the tuna and mix well.
6. Leave this in the refrigerator and you can prepare the vegetables.
7. Cut up the cucumber half and then half, and slice them into 3 strips.
8. Slice the carrots using peeler for thinner slice, or you could use a grater instead.
9. Pour the prepared vinegar into steamed rice and mix well.
10. Wrap a layer of clinging wrap over the sushi mat (to prevent sushi rice from sticking onto the mat during the process of flipping over, yes, we are flipping over the rice) and bend over the sides of the clinging wrap.
11. Place a sheet of nori sheet on top and spread the rice evenly, make sure to fill the rice up till the edges of the sheet,
12. Sprinkle sesame seeds on top.
13. Gently lift up the sushi and flip it over.
14. Spread the tuna at one edge and add in vegetables.
15. Carefully roll the sushi and press firmly to secure the fillings.
16. Slice the sushi to about 3 cm thick with a wet knife, to prevent the rice sticking onto it.
The picture above is definitely not the egg sushi you normally buy out there/ see from the internet. We were just experimenting to see if we can successfully roll the egg in an egg pan, but we failed. The egg should be rolled the other way round, like this
image sourced from google.
Yeah, go ahead, laugh all you want. *Sulks*
On an unrelated note, have you ever had the thought that how nice it would be, if you wake up to a warm and nicely laid out breakfast, everyday? Bliss?
I must have done a lot of good deeds and collected karma points to receive this hospitality from thesilenttiger in this life. Now I shall keep collecting points so I get to upgrade to presidential-suite-butler-service from her in my next life.
Sometimes, she creates all these cute coffee art, and your morning grogginess get swept away in that very instance, and you will go "aaaaawwwwwwww.......!"
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The milk foam was so thick that I can actually touch its ears and it didn't even move a bit! So it stayed till the bottom of the cup, and looked up to me, like it was comfortably covered with a warm, fluffy, white blanket. *pokes pokes*
Now I should be expecting this for my breakfast tomorrow, shouldn't I?
Thesilenttiger was really excited in sharing this unique way of brewing coffee, so I just have to do a post the very minute she successfully uploaded on youtube, if not she'll haunt me in my dreams. This beverage is the all time favourite in traditional coffee shops that are extremely popular in Southeast Asia, and it is best served with toasted bread spread with kaya (coconut jam) or soft boiled eggs. Gorsh, typing this is making me hungry.
I wasn't a fan of coffee until I became thesilenttiger's house mate. She started introducing me all the different types of coffee (even though they still appears to me as the same ingredients) and ways to brew them. Eventually, she flew a few bags of this traditional roasted beans 80079087985 miles down south and they landed in front of me. Thus, I'm thiiiisssssss near to being a coffee addict now. Damn.
As usual, she who likes to experiment, tried making the coffee by adding milk into it, but they tasted so weird that we concluded it's still best to retain the original way of making kopi.
So, please click the video below to view the brewing process, whilst I make myself a midnight supper! Ta!
