Gong-gong's 70th Birthday

We celebrated Gong-gong's 70th Birthday in Nyonya and Baba Peranakan Restaurant. I know my dad especially likes to eat spicy food, so I decided to take him there on his birthday. I bought the vouchers from Groupon. The food was delicious but the family time was even more precious! :) I really appreciate my dad and mom because they really love us a lot and especially my children. I am able to go to work every day without worrying because I know that they would definitely take good care of my children! :)

The folks really enjoying themselves! :) Everyone tucked in!! :)

Everyone was eating, except the 2 kiddos who were engrossed in self entertainment :)

The deco was beautiful, with strong Peranakan influence :)

The food, though a little expensive, was delicious - Gnoh Hiang and Sweet Babi Stew. The folks had lots of praises for the Curry Fish Head. It was the best dish of all :)

Lime juice goes best with spicy food!! :) We'll always order the Chup Chai and the Crayfish was fresh and juicy!

The A Cha was crunchy and we love the Hee Piao Soup. The Curry Chicken was soft and tender...

I'm so glad they had enjoyed eating the food! It was money well-spent! :) Yippee :) Happy 70th Birthday Gong-gong! I pray that you'll have great health and that your golden years will be spent with the people whom you love dearly! :)

September Holidays

September holidays may be short but for last and this year, we manage to go on 2 trips without the children. Last year we went to San Francisco for 9 days and this year, we went to Bangkok for 4 days 3 nights. It's like a couple retreat for us, with no children, friends or families. I think sometimes we're just so consumed by the children that we may neglect each other. Hence short retreat like this is really good for the both of us. I hope that we can make this into a yearly event :)

Cathay flight to BKK / First meal in MBK-BKK : Tom Yam soup with Pineapple rice, Phat Thai, sweet & sour fish, and fried spring roll

Pathuwan Princess Hotel. It was luxurious and convenient

Breakfast in Pathuwan Princess Hotel before taking the skyrail to Chatuchak Weekend Market / Rail ticket : 39 Baht = S$1.50


Many many many stalls in Chatuchak Weekend Market, we spent the whole day there!

Time for lunch. We settled it in Chatuchak Market. Fried rice and Phat Thai.

We eat donuts everyday! In total, I ate 7 donuts in 4 days. We love this Meiji Yoghurt drink!
We also went to Platinum Fashion Mall and Prathunam Market. We did Thai massage and had pedicure. It was a tiring trip but we did find time to pamper ourselves.

Some of the stuff we bought : Snowman Christmas lights and coin purses for Children's Day presents for my school kids and Phoebe and Reuben's Birthday goodie bags

After so much shopping, time to go home... tired feet.

Chinese or Hokkien Song?

Everyday at 7 p.m., gong gong and mama will watch the long running Taiwanese drama "Ai". I thought it was a boring drama but they had nothing much to do and there was nothing much to watch anyway. The drama has been running for months and whenever Reuben sees that the show is starting, he would announce it to his gong gong and prepare his seat for him, with extra cushions. And within the next 5 seconds, if gong gong did not appear, Reuben would look for him in the house and hold his hand to lead him to his seat, right in front of the TV. He is such a sweet boy. So even though he is often very naughty, gong gong loves Reuben a lot and so do we! :)

Anyway, Reuben has been hearing the opening song of "Ai" for so many months that he has started to pick up bits and pieces of the lyrics. But when we hear him sing, we couldn't decide if he was singing a Chinese or Hokkien song!! Haha. It was hilarious! :) He's indeed a funny boy. You hear it for yourself and let me know :)



I thought it sounded like,

wo men ting, wo men ting,
wo men lai, zai deng ni,
ah, zai na li...

What do you think? :)

Making Mooncakes

My mother has been making mooncake for 20 over years. She is very experienced and her mooncakes are delish! I've never shown interest in commercially made mooncakes because I've always felt that they're overpriced and my mom's ones taste much better! Since young, I have been seeing her making boxes and boxes of mooncakes to fulfill the orders of clients, mainly bank executives. I have never really thought of learning it until these recent years, when my mom was ill, I suddenly realised that if she's gone, I would not be able to taste her baking and cooking again. The wonderful skills and taste would be lost forever. That was when I became a little more serious in learning from her. Pb was interested in having fun and she was not really afraid of "dirtying" her hands. Hence, one afternoon, I decided to learn how to make the snowskin mooncake from my mother. Pb wanted to learn too. And we all had fun! :) I finally learnt the skills of making snowskin mooncakes! :)




After learning the skills, I decided to teach parents and children how to make snowskin mooncakes as well. You can find our more about my workshops in 'Aunty Annie's Sweets' in Facebook page :)