Well fried

It was the Sunday before Chinese New Year. Rained that morning but hubby and I had to go to the wet market to buy some meats and grocery for the CNY. 

As expected, the market was packed with people. We quickly did our shopping and then headed back to our area. However before we went home, we made a stop at this coffee shop. Somehow, this place has become our favourite breakfast place as it was newer, cleaner and the food was nice. 

This round, hubby tried the chu char stall that I ordered before. I enjoyed its fried food. I tried its fried mee hoon and tomato crispy noodle in the past. Both were good. 

Initially hubby wanted Foochow fried noodle with a fried egg on top but somehow the order didn't turned out what he wanted. But surprisingly, hubby enjoyed and liked this plate of noodle very much. Enough 'wok hei', he commented. Now, there is a new dish on the menu!! Lol. 

As for me, I stayed loyal to my tomato gravy noodle but this round, I had kway teow instead. The gravy was sour yet sweet and appetizing at the same time. The kway teow was well fried to perfection as I could detect the 'wok hei' taste.

Both of us enjoyed our Sunday breakfast, without the kids around. Now my kids hardly want to go out if they could. I don't mind a little peace and quiet so I could enjoy my breakfast with my other half. ^^

Our CNY 2020

We are on the 3rd day of Chinese New Year today. Hope everyone had a great and joyful CNY holiday with family and friends over the weekend. 

For reunion dinner, we went to my in-laws' house as my BIL cooked the dinner. Sorry, I did not take photos of all the food on the table. We stayed for a while before headed home and waited for midnight. 

We stayed pretty late to lit up the firecrackers at 12midnight. We were joined by hubby's young cousin and Jan's cousin to witness the firecrackers and fireworks display. 

So, we slept and woke up late the next morning. By the time we reached my in-laws' house it was after 9am. 

Mother-in-laws cooked chicken mee suah and we had that for breakfast on the first day of CNY. 

Then we went to my parents' house for lunch. My mum's Hakka specialties that day. How I missed my mum's cooking!! 

Chicken Kacangma

Bamboo shoot soup

Pak lo duck (braised duck) 

On the 2nd day, we visited 2 houses of relatives. In the evening, we invited hubby's side of family and relatives for a steamboat dinner. 

BIL cooked and brought some wild boar meat over. A true Sarawak's exotic dish!! 

The house was very noisy and merry. So many young kids, so that was expected. Lol. 

On the 3rd day (today), we stay at home, welcoming anyone who cares to visit us. Not many guests; my half sisters, half-brother and bil came over. We had few good hours of chatting and drinking. 

Some goodies waiting for guests. Some we bought locally, some were gifts and some were goodies we bought from China. 

These packed goodies were from China. Dried crunchy red dates, tasty sunflower seeds, black sesame cookies and others. I liked that they were individually packed, easy to store and eat. 

These cookies were from a friend. Tom yum goong cookies and Kopi Boy cookies from Breadsman. Not the usual cookies I would buy or taste. 

Hubby is going to work tomorrow. He only took few days leave before CNY. All my kids will enjoy extra few days of holiday before schools reopen on Thursday. 

Couple of days

The Year of Rat is coming in a couple of days, so are you ready for it??

I did not visit the shopping malls much since the school started. Most of my CNY shopping was done last year. This month, I am busy with chauffeuring my kids around and spring cleaning the house. 

The only shopping mall I frequently visit is Aeon Mall. Not too far from my house and I like to walk and shop there. 

The CNY decoration in Aeon Mall this year is festive and nice. Many good and instagrammable spots for photo-taking too. 

Wishing all my blogger friends and readers, Happy Chinese New Year!! Hope your new year is filled with immerse joy and prosperity!  Gong Xi Fatt Chai!! 

January report

How's your January? So far, it has been a busy month for me.

It has been nothing but raining on New Year day. Rainy and wet days when schools reopened as well. Rain continued for days and into weeks.

Both boys are in primary school now so after drop them off in the morning, I have some breather before preparing lunch and sending my girl to her school in the afternoon.

Life is pretty routine on weekdays, me being mostly on the roads, chauffeuring my kids around. As on weekends, I would prefer to stay at home and relax.

Jamie was down with flu and cough after a week in school. Then I caught the virus last week and wasn't 100% well.

Chinese New Year is this weekend!! Are you ready for it? Some red packets I got this year. Pretty designs for most of them.

I like this red packet from AIA.

But I liked these the best because I bought them. Lol. No, it was the personalised designs that caught my attention. No dad and mum red packets so I guess the paternal and maternal grandparents red packets look good and realistic as well.

Bet my kids would be excited to receive our ang pow this year!!

A friend gave us a basket of goodies and a box of this premium graded cherries. Oh my, I love cherries!!

Sweet and fresh. I love and eat the most.

We are going to be simple and frugal this year. CNY for us is gathering with family members, a once a year thing. The family re-connection.

I am looking forward to the CNY break. A long 1-week school holidays. :) 

Monthly affair

We are making it a monthly affair to have dim sum breakfast in Boulevard Restaurant. So last month was no exception, we went on the last Sunday of the month.

The place was already packed with customers when we arrived slightly after 9am. We found a table, wrote down our order and passed the order chit to one of the waitresses.

Maybe because it was still school holiday so many family with young children that morning. And it took quite sometime for our drink and dim sum to arrive.

The first few dim sum to be served on our table are these plates. Deep fried yam puff, deeo fried pumpkin balls and egg tarts. 

Almost everytime we were here, we ordered new dish. This round, we ordered this pumpkin ball. It was good. Big, crispy pumpkin balls with salted egg custard in it. 

Another new dim sum we haven't try in the past was this deep fried spring roll.

The filling was nice and tasty, I enjoyed it. Except that the rolls were oily. 

Somehow we had more deep fried dim sum than steamed ones that morning. Like this deep fried sweet yam. Pretty good. 

We always enjoyed its fish beancurd cake in the past. So we never missed out on it.

Our non deep fried dim sum was har kaw as well... 

.. as this sweet and sour pork rolls.

Hubby and I shared this bbq sauce chicken feet. It was rather spicy that day. 

Our breakfast on the last Sunday of 2019!!!

Nasi kukus

It was the Sunday before Christmas. A cold day as it rained almost the whole day.

After church, we went to Vivacity to catch Star Wars movie. It was 245pm slot so we had time for lunch beforehand.

We went to this place that we have never been to before. Opened 3 months ago, Nasi Kukus Place, opposite to Pho Master (Vietnamese cuisine) was packed when we passed it. Thought it must be good to have so many customers.

Nasi kukus, literally means steamed rice in English. One table was vacant, lucky us so we took it and ordered our lunch.

We didn't wait long for our food to come. Hubby's salted fish fried rice came first. Smell was good, hubby also commented it was nice. 

Salted fish fried rice RM7.90

Yours truly was attracted by the tilapia name on the menu. Sounds irresistible so I ended up with Nasi Kukus tilapia. Luckily it didn't disappoint me. 

Nasi kukus ikan tilapia RM11.90

The chicken curry was good as well. Not too spicy but ut has the Malay curry fragrant. Hubby and I enjoyed it. 

Curry chicken RM7.50

Jan went for the nasi kukus butter chicken. I tasted one cube and it was alright. Not too buttery, just nice to my liking. 

NK Butter chicken RM8.90

We also had this lovely plate of stir fried cangkuk manis with egg. Quite a portion for RM6. 

Cangkuk manis telur RM6

Lastly we also had a plate of sotong sambal. I didn't manage to take photo of the whole plate. It was spicy but the sotong was nicely cooked. 

Sotong sambal RM13.90

Jay had fried yellow noodle for RM7.20 but I didn't take the photo. Overall our lunch was RM89 plus drinks. 

Nice lunch, the staff was friendly and quick. We would not mind to come back for more nasi kukus. 

Miscellaneous Picture #93 : holiday misc

There were few places that I didn't post as a  whole post since there wasn't much to mention but for the sake of my China holiday, here was the compilation of places that we visited but I didn't write.

Wuxi Studios

Story Share, a beer museum in Wuxi Studios

One of their own brewed beers

HuanHuaWan township, Wuxi

Along the road to tea village

The tea house, Hangzhou

Teresa Teng concert in Hangzhou

Teresa Teng hologram was performing

I liked the canned peach drink

That concluded my China travelogue. Thank you so much for reading and commenting, and hope everyone enjoy the posts and photographs.