Argus World

Dropping by, saying hi

2011-12-31T06:50:00.000-08:00

Thought I should slip in a post before 2011 whizzes by unrecorded as far as this semi-abandoned blog is concerned. Before the year goes to sleep and never gets up again.

December - We were in Bochum, Germany, to visit ma- and pa-in-law. We ate at the Bochum KFC before we swung into their street in time for a late tea. Hope we didn't reek of fried chicken as we never tell them we eat KFC, haha. It snowed on Dec 19 in Cham but the snow didn't stay for Christmas although the ground was still fluffy up on Zug mountain, which was where we went so the dog could enjoy running and hopping in the white stuff. I also made choco cake balls a la Bakerella.com and flourless Lebkuchen cookies for the first time.

November - The dog, dogpa and I came home from our caravan holiday in Spain and France, stopping for one night in Lausanne (CH), where we were delighted to find a place to plug into power for free. Made Fluffy Semolina Pudding for the first time and it was a keeper! So was Pear Touronde, something I found in a library cookbook.

October - In the second half of the month, we set off for France and Spain in a motorhome rented from Germany just across the border from Basel. Great! No need to do hotel-hopping, no need to pack and unpack half the time. Forgot to send labrador-shaped cookies to the guide dog school on Oct 2 to mark Umbria's birthday. Did it last year.

August - We went to Riquewihr in Alsace, France, before Aug 1 to escape the Swiss national day fireworks for doggie's sake. Came home in early August.

Dog finds a best friend in Enya, an Irish soft-coated wheaten terrier. They are so evenly matched and neither dominates the other. They love each other so much they lie down facing one another smiling and grinning and licking each other's faces.

Dog's other good friend is Tatcha, who also comes from the guide dog school. Tatcha is very small for a lab at 20kg (although she has put on 1kg and is now on a bit of a diet; her dogma says they walk and walk for hours and the pooch does not lose an ounce!). We once went on a walk at the foothill of Zugerberg with Tatcha and her two humans. She found a big stick and carried it doggedly for almost two hours - until our little picnic stop distracted her from her self-appointed duty.

Indra and Mumtaj visited us in August or September (yikes, my memory fails me). The former did not bring 'proper' shoes and walked around in her Hush Puppy ballerinas in cold, drizzly weather to the shock and horror of locals. The latter became good friends with Umbria and took dozens of pictures of the four-legged model. Oh, and we made a silly video with the dog a la Wegman's Weimaraners. Dogpa drove us to the Gotthard Pass and to the foothills of Mount Rigi and we took pictures up on a narrow rock which everyone climbed up including Umbria.

Dogpa and I went to Malaysia in April and a bit of May. Caught up with a few friends. We visited Pulau Sibu off Johore, Cherating (Impiana) and Laos. Luang Prabang was a lot of fun and relaxation; we took a lesson in Laotian cooking at Villa Lao in Vientiane.

Ann Marie visited us in March (if not February); she loved the huge strawberries; she and I went to Lucerne for the day with doggie.

February - We flew to Malaga (without dog), rented a car and drove to Cordoba, Sevilla, Granada and Priego de Cordoba. This was my birthday trip and enjoyed it immensely. The Spaniards are an amazing people. Just to stand in an ancient courtyard and think of how much history they have lived through almost blows one's mind.

Among the memorable books read: That Thing Around Your Neck - C Adichie, That Old Ace in the Hole - A Proulx, Big Little Life - Dean Koontz, Stroke of Insight, City of Falling Angels - J Berendt.

Will not try to over-stretch my memory and remember too much of this year. This is all for now.

Being and Doing - doo bee doo bee dooo...

2010-11-22T03:47:00.000-08:00

Much time has passed since my last post. But did much happen? Depends how you define 'much'. Sometimes being is doing, and doing is not necessarily being.

Philosophy and world views aside, here's something a little more concrete: The dog has grown up and passed her exam in October. Her trainer said Umbria did very well, scoring in the top category. Dogpa and I glowed with pride and happiness, the closest we'd ever come to parenthood. Or ever will, I'm guessing.

The Lab is staying with us for her final holidays before she begins work in January. Her trainer is on the lookout for a sight-impaired person who will suit her: affectionate, does not have too routine a life, likes the outdoors and long walks.

Today I received an email letter from someone at the British Council who told me one of my stories, "Grandma's Horny", has been included in the council's booklet 'City of Shared Stories - Kuala Lumpur'. It is not the most popular story I published on their website (that one was 'A Friend She Did Not Have to See') but guess it was chosen because it sounds real and is slightly humorous and heart-warming without being sentimental.

As for cooking and baking, I'm slowly increasing my repertoire, including (red) velvet cake, sticky toffee pudding (pictured at right), Spitzbuben (window jam cookies) and pork-n-apple pie. On a cold evening, seafood spaghetti is a favourite we keep coming back to every fortnight or so.

The next thing I'm going to try is onion pie. Mmm, looking forward to it this week.

One last thing: my reading diet. Since April last year, I have read at least ten books. The memorable ones are Master of St Petersburg by J.M. Coetzee, City of Falling Angels by John Berendt and The Turning by Tim Winton.

Funny coloured eggs + hot cross buns

2009-04-10T12:58:00.000-07:00

I've been totally out of blogging and blog-hopping lately. Kind of missed my regular cyber haunts but have also been busy doing other things. Guess this happens to almost everyone, huh?

Got a heat-activated, gel-type egg colouring kit from a supermarket and had a lot of fun 'marbling' eggs and trying not to make a mess on the table and work tops. Had so much fun that I even coloured the uncooked eggs - which meant when I used them, I had to be careful cracking them open. Making trouble for myself, eh?

A happy Easter to Christians and happy holidays to those who get four days off. :)
These Hot Cross Buns were made from this recipe.

Had no idea how they're supposed to taste but I liked them well enough eaten warm with butter (first bun pic). I subbed some of the orange juice in the frosting with lime juice to make it nice and tangy. This is an untraditional 'paste' for the crosses. Traditionally crosses are made of flour and sugar mixed with water or milk and can be quite stringy or tough.

The texture of the buns is quite light and fluffy. I put in dried cranberries and sultanas, and bits of sweetened orange rind on some of the crosses.

Rat-tailed Dog in the Year of the Ox + Spanish Omelette

2009-02-01T00:09:00.000-08:00

Phew, I'm like a new mum (at this advanced age!) -- exhausted from endless rounds of walks, run-arounds in the park and me putting on coat and shoes (I need Velcro sneakers! Can't tie shoelaces anymore for the umpteenth time!).

The pup has grown into a teenage mutant ninja Dogzilla. Just look at the contrasting pictures.

Where has the cute little pup gone?!

Like a typical rebellious teenager, she at times does not do what I ask her to and even 'talks' back by making funny noises or barking once loudly (that got put paid with 'correction' from the puppy expert who visits us once a month). The picture at right shows you the "don't tell me what to do" brooding face, with her left ear flipped up punk-rock-style. Nice, huh? Oh, and she steals my couch-blanket too when I leave her alone in the living-room. The cheek. Apparently I'm now her 'mum' as she isn't that crazy about her original dog-mother-smell-infused towel we brought her back with.

And she snores. (Isn't it enough that my other half snores? I must be paying back for some past-life karma.)

So who has the time to cook elaborate dishes? Not me. So here's a
Spanish Omelette,
adapted from recipes on the 'Net and what a Spanish friend taught me:

(serves 2)

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium potato, cut into small cubes
salt n pepper, to taste
1/2 onion, chopped (optional)
3 eggs
1 tomato, cubed
4 button mushrooms, sliced (optional)
2 tablespoons grated cheese (optional)
1 tablespoon chives or spring onions, snipped (optional)

Method:

1. Heat oil to medium hot in a small frying pan (the size you want for your omelette). Cook the potato cubes in it for 10 minutes, or until you can pierce a piece with a chopstick.
2. Grind salt and pepper to taste over the potato. Add mushrooms, onions (the Spaniards do NOT usually use onion or garlic for this but I like them) and whatever veggies you like. Add tomato last.
3. Beat eggs in a bowl and season with salt and pepper.
4. Pour into the veggies in pan. Sprinkle grated cheese over it if using.
5. Down heat to medium-low. Cover the pan if you like -- to help the top to gel faster.
6. Lift side of omelette to check done-ness. Be careful not to overcook. Carefully slide the omelette onto a plate bigger than your pan. Replace upside-down pan over it (put a silicone or heat-proof pad over pan bottom if it feels safer) and flip over. Remove plate and place pan back on stove.
7. Cook for 1 or 2 more minutes and invert or slide omelette onto serving plate. Eat it warm (before the dog needs to go out for yet another pee-poo).

A week of dogmumhood + Corn Veggie Fritters

2008-12-17T04:19:00.000-08:00

The day we brought home the pup, it was snowing flurries. This morning it has been dropping big globs of snow. The white stuff is coming down again willy-nilly and the balcony railing has collected 17cm of it. It looks iced and ready to be served like creme cake (snow always reminds me of ice-kacang, a colourful Malaysian shaved-ice dessert).

Umbria, our black Labrador ward, was happy to romp on the sidewalk, plowing the snow with her inquisitive nose. At least, she is not tempted by the discarded cigarette butts and other trash (Swiss residents can be so slack!) on a usually snowless kerb.

When I took the pup out at 7am, a janitor was already shovelling a path up the ramp to our apartment building. Later, another man beat down some snow caught up in a fir tree -- so as not to surprise (shock, likelier!) passers-by with a heavy shower of dislodged snow every so often. A motorised snow plough was driven up and down the main street, pushing the powder to the sides. Well, at least it was easy to pick up Umbria's solid production with a plastic-bagged hand. Voila! No traces. (Potential Seeing-Eye dogs are only allowed to do their business in the gutter between kerb and street and by isolated walls.)

If I sit on the floor, Umbria would climb into my lap. Here is her favourite 'manja' position -- between my knees.

Before coming back into the apartment house, I stomped away the snow covering my shoes and brushed off the snow from my beanie and shoulders. Inside the front door, we do a little dance on the big doormat to get rid of the remaining moisture.

It's good to counter such white weather with something hot and crisp. Let's find a gentle reminder of an equatorial childhood while nursing a cup of hot tea and looking out at the snowy scenes. How about some Corn Veggie Fritters eaten with homemade chilli sauce?

Corn Veggie Fritters

1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup rice flour
2 tbs chives, chopped
3 tbs spring onions, sliced
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp fine sugar
3/4 cup corn, drained of brine
2 tsp red chillies, deseeded and finely sliced (optional)
1/2 cup small shrimp, shelled (optional)
2 tbs cooking oil or butter

1. Mix the flours with the salt and sugar.
2. Mix the egg and the veggies (and shrimp, if using) into it.
3. Heat to medium-hot a bit of the oil or butter in a large frying pan.
4. Drop patties of the mixture and fry on both sides till gently browned.
5. Serve cold or warm with tomato ketchup or homemade chilli sauce (blend together 3 chopped/deseeded chillies, a tsp of sugar, 3 tsp lime juice, 2 tbs water and a clove of chopped garlic if you like).

Umbria Day and Orange Chiffon Cake

2008-12-11T06:59:00.000-08:00

Dec 10 from now on will be known to us as Umbria Day. That was the day my other half and I brought home Umbria, a black Labrador pup from the Guide Dog School of Switzerland at Allschwil, about 1.3 hours' drive from here. She will stay with us for 12 to 15 months and I will be her 'dogmum' or Puppy Walker.

As she has been only two days in our flat, she doesn't like being alone in the living-room. If she's snoozing (often against my foot) and I tiptoe away into the kitchen to make tea, soon enough she would pad quietly into the kitchen looking up 'smiling' at me with a few wags of her funny tapered tail. Taking her outside is no mean feat - putting on her collar and leash, making her stay seated while I put on my coat and shoes, pressing the lift buttons while carrying her in my arms (that prevents accidental peeing) and opening the heavy front door of the apartment building.

Juggling taking care of the pup's needs and my usual baking and cooking is dicey. Imagine my having to take her out to wee (she's sniffing around for a spot - red alert!) when a chiffon cake is about to be ready in the oven. Dicey doesn't even begin to describe the narrow juggling of time, activity and their coordination.

Baking and cooking will have to take a backseat for at least a couple of weeks.

Nevertheless, as Umbria is the runt of her litter, here's a mini-chiffon cake recipe which I've adjusted to suit my tastes. You can use a Gugglhupf pan or a detachable chiffon pan.

Orange Chiffon Cake

3 eggs, whites separated from yolks
1/3 tsp cream of tartar
1/4 cup mixture of vegetable oil and half-melted butter (more butter means more flavour while veg oil makes a lighter cake but has less flavour)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla essence or 1 tsp vanilla sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour, preferably sifted
1 tbs cornflour
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
small pat of softened butter, for painting cake pan with

grated rind (avoiding white pith) of 2 oranges
3 tbs half-fat yoghurt
80ml orange juice
bits of sugared orange rind (optional; storebought)

1. Heat oven to 175 degrees C. Whisk egg whites with cream of tartar till almost stiff.
2. Whisk oil/butter with sugar for 2 minutes at medium-high speed. Add yolks and vanilla and whisk for 1 minute.
3. Mix flours with baking soda, baking powder and salt.
4. Alternate adding the flour mix, the orange juice and yoghurt. Fold grated orange rind gently in till just combined.
5. Fold whisked egg whites into the mixture carefully. Pour batter into buttered cake form. Strew orange rind bits on top (if using).
6. Bake for 30-40 minutes. Insert a skewer or thin knife in the middle of dough to see if it comes out clean. Invert cake pan on a wire rack so cake retains maximum height. Carefully remove cake from pan only when cool.
(This cake gives 4 servings. Double the recipe if you're making a big cake and increase time in the oven to 40-50 minutes.)

Christmas market in Bremgarten and CKT-style stir-fried spaghetti

2008-12-08T03:16:00.000-08:00

It was two degrees Celsius on the half hour's drive to Bremgarten in Aargau. At the outskirts of the town, there were already signs to direct us to the 'park n ride'. It was very well organised - we parked for free in the huge lot and paid CHF4 each for a round trip by bus into the historical part of the town. The buses were very frequent indeed. Sitting in a bus holding hands to keep warm is quite romantic, I must admit.

On this outing, the 'official' photographer was the other half. My hands were kept deep in my coat pocket so as to keep warm; I hadn't bothered to bring my little snappy Nikon.

It was like a 'pasar malam' (night market) in Malaysia except that there were fewer varieties of food and a lot of cheese and Gluehwein (spiced sweetened red wine) in the tradition of Christmas here.

There were stalls hawking sweets and cookies (Lebkuchen) and others selling clothing, lamps, candles and costume jewellery. A 30m-high old-fashioned-style ferris wheel, boasting a substantial queue, soared above the crowds.

The market was situated next to a winding river, with a bridge and outdoor Christmas trees to colour the night scene. The buildings in this old part of town are well maintained and lovely indeed.

For this post, I would like to feature a 'char kway teow'-style stir-fried spaghetti for when I'm hankering for a taste of Malaysia on a cold winter's evening.

Malaysian-style Stir-fried Spaghetti

2 servings medium-soft boiled spaghetti, stirred with a bit of oil to prevent sticking
3 cloves garlic, chopped
2 shallots or 1 medium-size red onion, sliced thinly
1 tbs corn oil or sunflower seed oil
1/2 cup fennel or spring onions, sliced
1 tsp dark soy sauce
2 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp chicken or veggie stock powder
1 tsp red chillies, chopped (optional or sub with sambal oelek)
1/2 shelled prawns or clams or cockles (precooked or raw)
80g mung bean sprouts
1/4 cup chopped chives
1 egg
salt and ground white pepper to taste

1. Heat 1/2 tbs oil in a big frying pan or wok. Fry the onions and garlic on medium heat for a minute.
2. Add fennel or spring onions. Stir-fry for a minute.
3. Turn up heat and add cooked spaghetti. Stir-fry occasionally for 3 minutes.
4. Turn down heat to medium and add seasonings and chilli (if using).
5. Add bean sprouts and prawns/clams/cockles (add these in Step 4 if raw) and fry for 30 seconds.

6. Make a well in the centre. Add the remaining 1/2 tbs oil. Break egg into it and sprinkle it with pepper and salt. Scramble till almost gelled.
7. Stir noodles into the egg. Add chives. Raise heat and stir-fry for 30 seconds. Turn out of pan and serve immediately. Serves two.

This has been submitted to Presto Pasta Nights ( http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://www.prestopastanights.com ) and this week's host is Mary of Baking Delights http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://www.bakingdelights.com%2F

Heaven's fingers and my fourth Daring Bakers' challenge - caramel cake

2008-11-30T08:09:00.000-08:00

Someone's idea of a snowman with an identity crisis? This was taken earlier this week at the lake park in Cham.

Fingers of God or rays from heaven -- call them what you will, there's no denying that shafts of sunlight breaking through clouds and slipping between trees are one of Nature's quiet wonders.

Here are two pictures were taken by my other half on Zugerberg (Mount Zug), several kilometers from where we live, a couple of weeks ago. By now, there's some week-old snow on the ground in the lowlands but the mountains seen from afar seem to be freshly dusted with white every few days or so.

OK, who took a bite out of my cupcake?!

As for my fourth Daring Bakers' challenge, it was an exercise in reducing amounts of sugar. My other half does not like his cakes very sweet and frosting doesn't rock his boat. Me? I will tell you innocently I don't like very sweet things either, but then I happily finished the leftover browned butter frosting on crackers and such over the following couple of days.

Making the caramel itself was a scary thing. The sugar and water were heated till they turned amber (very hot!), and then cold water was added to stop the caramelization process. (That's when it spits and sputters.) So, following someone's tip, I placed a piece of foil with a hole in the centre over the caramel pot and poured in the cold water. That prevented me from jumping back.

CREDITS: This month’s challenge was courtesy of the author Shuna Fish Lydon’s recipe (http://blogs.kqed.org/bayareabites/2006 … he-recipe/)

Hosts this month are Dolores (http://culinarycuriosity.blogspot.com/), Alex (Brownie of the Blondie and Brownie duo: http://blondieandbrownie.blogspot.com/) and Jenny of Foray into Food (http://forayintofood.blogspot.com/). Thank you!

Cool days and hot saucy curry

2008-11-16T01:35:00.000-08:00

Foggy afternoon on Mount Zug makes a mysterious picture.

Going for walks between meadows and by the lake is a balm for the soul. As the seasons change, you note the greening or yellowing of leaves. Now, between autumn and winter, the trees are like bears - they're tired and want to go to sleep for a few months. The flowering plants have packed up their petals, seeds and buds like they've brought in their dried laundry and folded them away. At the lake, different birds come and go, and you watch the cheeping cygnets getting as big as their mute elders but they're still innocent enough to let you gently touch their downy heads as you feed them morsels of bread.

When the days are turning chilly, one thinks of something warm and spicy to tuck into in the evenings. I've recently experimented with salmon in a curry. The smooth, oily texture of salmon and its rich flavour are tastily balanced by the pungency of onions, chilli and ginger and the aromas of turmeric and cumin.

Salmon Curry

80g shallots or purple onion, chopped
1 red chilli, deseeded and chopped roughly
2 dried chillis, presoaked for 10 minutes in freshly boiled hot water and deseeded (sub with another fresh red chilli)
1.5cm ginger root, skinned and chopped
2 stalks lemongrass, thinly sliced cross-section

300g fresh salmon
2 tbs sunflower seed cooking oil (or other neutral-tasting vegetable oil)

1/4 tsp fenugreek seeds
3/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tsp powdered cumin
1/2 tsp powdered coriander (sub cumin and coriander with 2 tsp seafood curry powder, or add it if you like it very spicy)
3 star anise
4 cloves, or 1/4 tsp powdered clove
10 slices vegetable of your choice (fennel, okra or brinjal)
1 medium tomato, cut into chunks
100ml water
2 slices dried tamarind or sour fruit, soaked in hot water (sub with lime juice)
100ml coconut milk
Sea salt to taste

Pulse the shallots/onion, chillies, ginger and lemongrass in a blender or with a Stabmixer, adding a bit of the coconut milk to help the blades to move.
Panfry the fish in 1 tbs of the oil on a frying pan on medium-high heat for two minutes each side. Set aside.
In a medium pot, heat 1 tbs of oil and cook the spices on medium heat for a minute, taking care not to burn them.
Add the shallot mixture and stir for 6 minutes on medium-low heat.
Add tamarind and vegetables of your choice. Cook for 2 minutes. Add tomato, water and cook till hardest vegetable is almost tender.
Taste to see if tangy note is to your liking. Add some of the tamarind soaking water if necessary.
Add fish, rest of coconut milk and half teaspoon salt. Cook for five minutes.
Adjust taste with salt and thickness of sauce with water if necessary.
Serve hot with rice, roti canai or roti jala. Add a squeeze of lime at the table if you like it tangier. ;-P

Murukku made by madness

2008-11-05T02:46:00.000-08:00

Murukku cocka-doodle-do! That's almost the sound of my alarm clock in the morning (cellphone actually). Just before Deepavali recently, the Hindu festival of lights, I was inspired to make Murukku, a semi-spicy and savoury snack of Indian origin. During the festival period when I was living in Malaysia, Hindu colleagues and friends would ply me with the wonderfully aromatic snack. One can't eat enough of it!

Crazy enough to stink up the flat with deep-frying, I used a recipe from Kuali.com, pressing the dough out from a cookie pump (another round of eye-gouging cleaning, I tell you) directly into the hot oil. Dangerous work, this. However, I did not have bean flour at hand, so I used only rice flour added with a couple of tablespoons of wheat flour. It was pretty nice and crispy but oily.

A couple of days later (having recovered from an almost sore throat after eating too much deep-fried Murukku), I toyed with the idea of baking Murukku in the oven.

Here's the recipe I ended up with:

Oven-Baked Murukku

200g rice flour (sub with all-purpose flour)
2 tbs wheat flour (sub with cornflour)
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp aniseed
1 tsp powdered cumin
1/2 tsp powdered coriander or fennel
3/4 tsp chilli powder
1/4 tsp turmeric powder (optional)
4 tsp dried chopped curry leaf (optional)
1 tsp ground Himalaya or kosher salt
4 tbs gently melted butter
120ml coconut milk or half cream (more might be necessary depending on absorbency of flour)

Celtic Murukku, anyone?

Preheat oven to 160 degrees C.
In a medium bowl, mix rice and wheat flours, baking powder, spices, curry leaf and salt. Drizzle melted butter over the flour mixture. Slowly add coconut milk and stir with a fork. Add a bit more coconut if necessary to achieve a consistency that enables you to pipe the dough out of a cookie pump with a small serrated nozzle.
Line an oven tray with a baking sheet. Pipe coils or long strands as your fancy takes you. Bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes until the Murukku is lightly browned and crispy when cooled on a wire rack.

Rorscharch test Murukku - what does your Murukku pattern say about you? ;-)

Camouflaged Murukku - hiding from voracious snackers!

My 3rd Daring Bakers' challenge - procrastinating pizza!

2008-10-30T08:49:00.000-07:00

I've done it! I've done it! Well, try filming your own pizza-tossing video - I started 'fisting' one piece of the overnight-proofed dough (don't look at me like that; it's in the instructions to 'gently twirl it atop your floured fists', OK?).

Went out to turn on the video-mode on the camera on a Danish cookie tin on the dining table. Went back to the kitchen countertop to continue stretching the dough, which, by the way, was very soft and dangerously getting thinner and thinner. By the time I got in front of the camera, two holes had formed in the middle.

Hey! As it was the first piece of pizza dough I've ever made from scratch in my life, I didn't really care. (There are always the next two pieces to improve on.) Some flour got on the floor, I later discovered. Wipe, wipe, wipe!

Halloween pizza, it looks like. Double-yikes!

Then I ran out to buy some basil leaves to make my own pesto sauce, but the supermarket had run out of it, so I bought a small jar of Genovese pesto (cheating! I know). Also snatched up a pack of grated 'pizza cheese' (again it felt like cheating 'coz maybe I should artfully choose a nice chunk o' cheese and grate it myself? Sorry, it'd been snowing last night and today's been cold and lazy) and several white button mushrooms (at least this is fresh and I had to cut it myself).

Arrived home to further stretch the edges of the dangerously thin pizza dough. (The first mistake I had made yesterday was to put the three pieces of dough on semolina instead of on parchment in a pan which was covered in plastic and left overnight in the fridge.) It was dotted with semolina on one side, heh heh.

I strew semolina on an oven tray and placed the poor oval-shaped stretched dough on it. At least it wasn't amoeba shaped, all right? Then I painted some pesto on most of it. Since I didn't have tomato pizza sauce on hand, I squirted a wee bit of Heinz tomato ketchup on one corner (just to see what it'd taste like, ha ha, bad, I know). Arranged the sliced mushroom in such a way that it covered the smaller holes in the dough (more cheating!) and sprinkled some cheese where there were no holes. The centre is somewhat paper thin. I wondered how it'd work out in the hot, hot oven. Mmm...

Does anyone else see a face in the left mackerel pizza?

Popped the tray in the 220-degrees-C oven. After three minutes, I took the tray out and turned it around for even heating. Another three minutes and the centre was getting brown but the edges weren't coloured yet, so I added another two minutes but lowered the heat by 10 degrees. As a result the centre was brown, thin and crispy while the rest was almost brown, slightly chewy and quite thin. The ketchup-smeared bit tasted sweet - yikes! Enjoyed eating it very much - almost all gone. Will make the other two tonight for the poor unsuspecting other half. *cue: evil laughter*

How the pizza would have looked had it been a dog.

P.S. Do you think he'll want Heinz ketchup on his? *batting eyelashes innocently* (I mean the man, not the dog.)

In the end, he asked for Quattro Stagione (four seasons) and he got one with mackerel in tomato sauce and one with pesto, fresh button mushrooms, fresh sliced tomato, cheese and - you guessed it! - a small patch of Heinz tomato ketchup. (Oh, what? I don't take orders very well? Mmmff!) Silly me forgot to add some dried Italian herbs to Italianise it. But it must have tasted OK 'coz the man ate more than I thought humanly possible. (Myself, I'm all pizza-ed out for the next two months.)

Soul-scrubbing Swiss cleanliness + untraditional Zopf bread baking

2008-10-19T09:24:00.001-07:00

The Swiss are remarkable for their diligence. As they are descended from mountain folk who had to plan ahead to keep food on the table during the wintry months, hard work is a cultural trait. An off-shoot of this is their obsession with cleanliness and the cleaning task.

Someone is always cleaning something. Every couple of months, we are told to remove our car from the basement garage for a few hours so that cleaners can, well, clean it out. Never mind that it is still quite spotless.

Once every few weeks we need to clear the stuff away from our front door as cleaners come in to vacuum and wash the stairwell, landings and lift in our low-rise apartment building.

We came across this outdoor toilet in the forest next to a meadow. Notice the toilet brush next to it? No, we didn't lift the cover to see if it's like a regular WC with water in it.

One friend, when looking at a flat for rent, asked if the white-tiled floor was easy to clean. The answer was, "Yes, of course." She hadn't counted on how frequently she had to clean it as every single strand of hair that falls can clearly be seen on it.
If you want to make a coffee appointment with a Swiss woman, she probably can't make it this Thursday as she's cleaning her apartment. Friday? Oh, no, she's doing the laundry. If she likes you well enough, she might pencil you in three weeks from now.

Bovine Rambo? A cow with horn guards or growth guides on Zugerberg (mountain).

I, being totally, irrevocably, cleaning challenged, cannot hope to keep up, let alone compete, with these hyper-hygienic folk. So, to immerse myself more in the quaint and interesting Swiss culture, I opted to make Zopf, the braid bread.

Zopf (Braid Bread)

Ingredients:

500g Zopf or bread flour
1 tbs sugar
1 tsp sea salt
1 packet of dried yeast (7g)
300ml milk, lukewarm
50g softened butter
an eggyolk mixed with a tbs of water for brushing

Mix the yeast with the lukewarm milk in a big bowl. Mix flour with sugar and salt. When milk has bubbled up a bit, add the flour mixture and butter. Mix till you get a maleable lump. Knead for 10 minutes. Leave in the oiled bowl covered with plastic wrap for an hour in a warm place or till doubled in volume.
With floured hands, divide dough into two long ropes. Twist them together, then double up and twist again. Leave to rise again for about 30-40 minutes.
Preheat oven to 210 degrees C. Brush top of braid with egg-yolk mix. Bake on parchment for 30-40 minutes. Bottom should sound kind of hollow when knocked with a knuckle.

I forgot to mix the eggyolk with water, so the 'paint' looks a bit thick and unsightly. I also used a loaf pan to contain the braid, so I wouldn't get pointy ends or funny shaped slices. (Swiss grandpas wouldn't be pleased.)

Look, Ma, no eggs! Or scones won't break my bones

2008-10-11T10:04:00.000-07:00

A tree in Cham lake park provides a hiding place in summer and autumn but will be bare in winter and early spring.

Fall colours are mellow and warm.

He says scouns and I say skons. But then he's German - he might as well say skonnes. Eek.

Well, anyway, after a work trip to California and meeting a couple of friends in Seattle, he came home with a book about their special little hotel, a boutique hotel - a boutel, you might be tempted to say - which they gave him (the book, not the hotel).

(right) A leafy arbor above Lorzen river in Cham, Switzerland.

(above) The Millhouse near Carew Castle, Wales.

In it is an irresistible recipe by their chef in residence. Our not-so-recent trip to Cardiff to attend a friend's lovely wedding included a few forays into the Welsh countryside and sampling some afternoon milky tea with freshly baked scones. So it was partly nostalgia (and a nod to scones with my friend Xeus at The Teapot Cafe in SS2 Petaling Jaya, Malaysia) that made me bake those beckoning tea treats.

No-Egg Flaky Scones

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tbs sugar
5 tbs unsalted butter, cold, cut in chunks
1 cup whipping cream
1 cup currants or dried cranberries
whipping cream for brushing the scones and to serve

Method:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (195-200 degrees C).
Mix with a whisk in a big bowl the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar.
Cut in butter with a butter knife in each hand until mix looks like coarse crumbs.
Pour in cream and fold in everything until just incorporated. Do NOT overmix.
If mixture seems a little dry, add a little more cream.
Fold currants or cranberries into batter.
Press the dough in 3 or 4 batches on lightly floured board 1 1/4-inch (3cm) thick. Cut into triangles. All in all about 8-16 scones, depending on size (enough for 4 hungry mouths).
Place scones on ungreased cookie parchment. Brush tops with a bit of cream.
Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden brown. Let cool on a rack.
Serve while still warm with whipped cream, clotted cream or homemade marmalade - and you'll feel like you're floating on heaven's best cushion.

Nestled in the boutique hotel book is also a recipe for grapefruit and orange marmalade. Here's the recipe reproduced (in my own words) in honour of FatBoyBakes:

Grapefruit-Orange Marmalade

500-600g of oranges including one pink grapefruit
400-500g of sugar or raw sugar (depending on how sweet your tooth is)

Wash and dry the fruit with a clean towel. Cut the oranges into 8 wedges and cut 1mm slices from those. Cut the grapefruit into wedges and then into 8mm chunks.
The membranes and seeds (don't discard them when you cut the fruit) of the citrus fruit contain pectin, so you don't need anything other than sugar.
Then you boil the living daylights out of the mixture on low heat for about 2 hours or till it looks thick enough for your liking, giving it a stir once every 10 minutes or so. Then carefully ladle into clean dry jars with metal covers leaving 1cm headroom. Cover and leave to cool.
I feel better storing the jars in the fridge after that, but apparently you don't have to. Makes about 650ml of marmie (3 smallish jars).

If you don't like your marmie so bitter, first take off (and reserve) the peel with a potato peeler and then discard HALF of the white covering underneath. I suggest cutting the orange peel finer than the grapefruit peel 'coz the orange peel takes forever to get soft.

(left) Marmie with slices of bread
(above) Lavash done Alexa-style with herb leaves
(above right) Lavash done thick and muscly - for strong jaws. ^_^

Fussy Flo Heatherfuss gets flustered

2008-10-06T05:42:00.000-07:00

Flo Heatherfuss could not find her shoes. They were medium-heeled, strappy and red with little silver buckles on the front.

“Mother, have you seen my red shoes?”

“No, dear. Where did you last leave them?”

“In the closet by the front door. A few nights ago. They’re no longer there.”

“Mmm… I don’t know. Do you think Maddie could’ve borrowed them?”

“She wouldn’t dare.” Flo's nostril's flared.

“Well, ask her and see.”

“Okay. Is she here now?”

“No. She’ll be in tomorrow at ten. She’s scheduled to do the windows then.”

Clad in her favourite Italian-fan socks, Flo rummaged in her shoe cupboard and chose a pair of navy loafers to go with her slate-grey coat. Slamming the front door after her – still annoyed at not finding her silver buckled shoes – she left for the Hairy Bean pub three blocks away from her mother’s townhouse. At thirty-four years old, she was tall, lean and brunette with a no-nonsense demeanour. She had a purposeful stride although she had no real purpose going to the pub other than to sip a cool lager.

Who should be sitting at the far end of the bar but Reggie Wanderlust, someone she once dated briefly. Flo tried to pretend she didn’t see him and ordered a beer but Reggie came up to her stool and said, “Hullo, Flo. Didn’t expect to see you here.”

“Uh, hi, Reggie.” Flo kept her eyes on the shelves of bottles behind the bar but Reggie made to sit next to her. She coughed, held out a hand and said, “Hope you don’t mind but today I would like to be by myself.”

“Oh, I see. Very well.” Reggie moved four stools away and sat down with a glum expression. He ordered a slice of quark cake from the bar-owner Harry Bean.

A football match from the national league was showing quietly on the battered television set in a corner of the bar. Flo looked at the screen once in a while as she drank her cold beer. Then the door creaked open and someone shuffled in. Startled, Flo realised it was Heinrich Hundfutter, the man who worked three cubicles away from her desk at her office. He sported a shock of dark hair and his features were well balanced and pleasant. At first, he did not recognize her and then he did a doubletake.

“Oh, hi. You’re Flo, aren’t you, from the office?”

“Yes, I am. Hi, Heinrich. Are you a regular here?”

“Yes… no. Well, I come here once in a while, I guess. Hey, may I sit here?”

Flo avoided looking at Reggie, who was intently studying them while shovelling cake between his crackly lips, when she said, “Yes. Wouldn’t mind if you did.”

Suddenly she felt bashful and knew not what else to say. Luckily for her, Heinrich complimented her on her sky-coloured form-fitting dress with a V-neck. She said thanks and blushed visibly. All this was caught the attention of Reggie, who looked morose despite the deliciously moist cake which was fast disappearing from his plate.

Flo was feeling flushed and nervous; she wasn’t sure why. Heinrich kept the conversation going, talking about the latest news at their workplace. She was hardly following the conversation or holding up her end, merely giving nondescript ums and ahs to punctuate Heinrich’s chatter. After a while, he started giving his watch little sneaking glances which did not escape Flo’s notice.

“Are you waiting for someone?” she asked with a wrinkled brow, hoping the answer would be no, but - alas! - he said yes. Apologetically he added, “I’m supposed to meet a friend here, but she’s late.”

As the evening wore on, the television droned and Reggie, having now ordered a slice of Harry’s popular poppyseed cake, kept up his observation of Flo and Heinrich. Flo, in the meantime, focused her attention on the beautiful sunflower Harry had placed in a tube-like black vase.

The door of the pub swung open every so often and handsome Heinrich kept swiveling his head to see if his date had arrived. Flo started to feel disconcerted. She hoped that his date would never come, but then again he was already distracted, no longer the attentive man he was at the beginning of their chat. She noticed he wore the kind of cotton-knit sweater that she liked, with the collar tips of his shirt tucked under the high U-neck. He also wore a rather pleasant cologne which she could detect above and beyond the stale beer and faint rancid oil smells of the place.

The bar was filling up with half-smart-looking men and women in high heels. Finally, the door creaked open one more time. Both Henry and Flo turned their heads to look. Henry smiled and Flo frowned. The attractive woman breezed in and gave Henry a peck on the cheek. She noticed Flo and said hi coolly.

Flo could hardly say a civil hullo in return for she was looking at the young woman’s feet, the toenails of which were painted a brilliant red – to go with the silver-buckled strappy red sandals that Flo had been searching for earlier in the day. Heinrich’s date was Maddie Suess, the part-time househelp of Flo’s mum. Flustered and speechless, Flo left the pub. She passed a pond and felt like the weeds mired at its edge - the reflection was almost exactly like the real thing.

*

Fruit, florals and my 2nd Daring Bakers challenge

2008-09-27T03:43:00.000-07:00

You might have noticed I like to play around with the macro function of my snappy little camera and invade the privacy of flowers and fruits. Here are a couple of examples of the inner chambers of tulips.

To me, there's something fascinating about close-up peering at petals, stamens and the seedy centres of fruit. Here (below) are gooseberries and hydrangeas.

The gooseberry is quite sweet but kind of funny to eat. As the skin is hairy, I don't want to eat it, so I peel off a bit of skin and squeeze out the insides into my mouth. Mmm.

On to my next Daring Bakers challenge. It's lavash! Nice to have a savoury challenge. It's quite simple to make.

Allow me to quote the hosts, Natalie of Gluten A Go Go and Shel of Musings From The Fishbowl:

"The key to a crisp lavash is to roll out the dough paper-thin. The sheet can be cut into crackers in advance or snapped into shards after baking. The shards make a nice presentation when arranged in baskets."

Makes 1 sheet pan of crackers

* 1 1/2 cups (6.75 oz) unbleached bread flour or gluten free flour blend (If you use a blend without xanthan gum, add 1 tsp xanthan or guar gum to the recipe)
* 1/2 tsp (.13 oz) salt
* 1/2 tsp (.055 oz) instant yeast
* 1 Tb (.75 oz) agave syrup or sugar
* 1 Tb (.5 oz) vegetable oil
* 1/3 to 1/2 cup + 2 Tb (3 to 4 oz) water, at room temperature
* Poppy seeds, sesame seeds, paprika, cumin seeds, caraway seeds, or kosher salt for toppings

1. In a mixing bowl, stir together the flour, salt yeast, agave, oil, and just enough water to bring everything together into a ball. You may not need the full 1/2 cup + 2 Tb of water, but be prepared to use it all if needed.

2. Sprinkle some flour on the counter and transfer the dough to the counter. Knead for about 10 minutes, or until the ingredients are evenly distributed. The dough should pass the windowpane test (see http://www.wikihow.com/Determine-if-Bre … ong-Enough for a description of this) and register 77 degrees to 81 degrees Fahrenheit. The dough should be firmer than French bread dough, but not quite as firm as bagel dough (what I call medium-firm dough), satiny to the touch, not tacky, and supple enough to stretch when pulled. Lightly oil a bowl and transfer the dough to the bowl, rolling it around to coat it with oil. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap.

3. Ferment at room temperature for 90 minutes, or until the dough doubles in size. (You can also retard the dough overnight in the refrigerator immediately after kneading or mixing).

4. Mist the counter lightly with spray oil and transfer the dough to the counter. Press the dough into a square with your hand and dust the top of the dough lightly with flour. Roll it out with a rolling pin into a paper thin sheet about 15 inches by 12 inches. You may have to stop from time to time so that the gluten can relax. At these times, lift the dough from the counter and wave it a little, and then lay it back down. Cover it with a towel or plastic wrap while it relaxes. When it is the desired thinness, let the dough relax for 5 minutes. Line a sheet pan with baking parchment. Carefully lift the sheet of dough and lay it on the parchment. If it overlaps the edge of the pan, snip off the excess with scissors.

5. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit (180 C) with the oven rack on the middle shelf. Mist the top of the dough with water and sprinkle a covering of seeds or spices on the dough (such as alternating rows of poppy seeds, sesame seeds, paprika, cumin seeds, caraway seeds, kosher or pretzel salt, etc.) Be careful with spices and salt - a little goes a long way. If you want to precut the cracker, use a pizza cutter (rolling blade) and cut diamonds or rectangles in the dough. You do not need to separate the pieces, as they will snap apart after baking. If you want to make shards, bake the sheet of dough without cutting it first.

6. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the crackers begin to brown evenly across the top (the time will depend on how thinly and evenly you rolled the dough).

7. When the crackers are baked, remove the pan from the oven and let them cool in the pan for about 10 minutes. You can then snap them apart or snap off shards and serve.

I topped my lavash with swathes of powdered cumin, poppyseeds, sea salt and garlic. We were asked to make vegan dips, so I did mine with avocado and tomato mixed with cumin, salt, pepper, garlic and lime juice. I also had on hand homemade grapefruit-orange marmalade, which, surprisingly, went quite well with the non-salty bits of lavash.

A tasty introduction to Kuih Cara

2008-09-25T09:49:00.000-07:00

When I was recently back in Malaysia, an old school friend invited me to attend her Malaysian cooking class in Petaling Jaya (see sidebar at right). Aside from nasi lemak, prawn sambal and sago gula melaka, Kuih Cara was on the menu.

It was the first time I had heard of it. My friend, Ana, told us - a class of five 'students', three of whom were visitors to Kuala Lumpur, that Kuih Cara was usually sold at roadside stalls during Ramadan. It's a hearty minced meat appetiser with a base of coconut milk dough flavoured with pounded dried prawns. The minced beef topping is first saute'ed with some curry powder and sliced shallots or onions, while the 'pancake' base is coloured with a pinch of powdered turmeric.

Kuih Cara is cooked in a kuih bolu mould pan on a gas stove (or in muffin pans in a bottom-heated oven when I got back to Switzerland) and garnished with chopped red chillies and spring onion.

Have you ever had Kuih Cara?

Wonderful Wales + My first Daring Bakers' Challenge

2008-08-31T08:58:00.000-07:00

Some places just make your jaw drop and the corners of your lips curl up in wonderment. One such place that I visited in Wales is found along a river somewhere between Saundersfoot and St Gowan's Head. A field of grass sprouted huge bunches of bright yellow flowers. On top of it, the air was crisp and fresh from a downpour the day before.

In Bute Park in Cardiff, we came across evidence of a gardener's sense of humour: a plant, grass and wood formation of a hog's head complete with pointy ears. It did not fail to make onlookers smile and snap pictures.

Three weeks ago, I applied and got accepted as a member of Daring Bakers. This is a growing bunch of bloggers from all over the world who agree to take up a baking challenge proposed by a pair of members every month. There is a private members-only forum, but the earliest we can blog about the month's challenge is on the last day of the month.

My first challenge was Chocolate Eclairs. I had baked eclairs a few times before based on a simple cooks.com recipe and used a whipped cream and custard filling.

For the Daring Bakers challenge, we were required to follow the given many-step eclair recipe and use its chocolate pastry cream or a chocolate glaze recipe. I chose to switch the chocolate in the pastry cream recipe to white chocolate as my other half is not too enamoured of chocolate desserts. Then I simplified the glaze to microwave-melted dark chocolate mixed with powdered sugar and butter.

The recipe called for leaving the oven door a crack open for part of the baking time (likely the recipe writer Pierre Herme's way of flaying us wannabe bakers). I found that it made the puffs of the top tray in the oven not rise as much as the lower tray (see pic above left: right is the 'unpuff' and left is the 'puffed'). The pastry cream was wonderful-delicious and quite a lot was left over. So, a couple of days later, I made another (slap my 'dieting' wrist!) batch of puffs - this time without messing with the oven door. They puffed up fine. Also, I didn't bother with piping out the choux pastry (cleaning the pump is akin to gouging out my eye) so the puffs had spikes like punk eclairs. Needless to say, my other half and I were happily stuffing our faces with the yummy eclairs - mine with lots of choco glaze and his with just a bit, and both with as much white-choc pastry cream as the burdened puffs could carry.

If you want any of the recipes, please let me know.

Here's pouting at you, kid. (Doesn't it look like 'hair' and 'lips'?)

In the meantime, all over the world, a gazillion chocolate eclairs are exploding across kitchen counter tops and creaming the baking blogosphere as the hundreds of Daring Bakers post their respective blog-thingies.

Wailing at a Welsh graveyard + Perky Glass Noodle Salad

2008-08-15T06:41:00.000-07:00

There's no place as peaceful, quiet and mysterious as a cemetery. You wonder about the lives represented by every gravestone. You ruminate on the adventures and misadventures of those who died young. You think about the meaning of those lives that had gone on before you came traipsing about. So many of us -- how much meaning can we each create?

On a recent trip to Wales, my other half and I chanced upon the remains of a church with a graveyard around it. The church tower had ivy growing on two sides of its rough-hewn walls. It seemed to be in disuse; there was no signboard proffering its name.

Creeper plants partially shrouded the gravestones of Celtic design and leaves entombed some. The dead were safe from the worry and hassle of everyday life. They were no longer concerned by the whys and wherefores of the living. You wonder if they have indeed gone on to a better place.

You ponder on the possibility that life is a mere dream from which you awake when you pass on.

You wonder if death is only a gateway to an infinite cosmos.

After all that morbidity, how about some nudity? (Hah, awake now?!) Here's a pic of a furry friend I met at Bute Park in Cardiff. Squirrels are said to be only rats with couture and great public relations skills.

And now I tickle your tastebuds, dear reader, with a Perky Glass Noodle Salad recipe:

a handful of dried glass noodles, soaked 10 mins in freshly boiled water, then drained and rinsed with cold water
2/3 cup thinly julienned carrots
1/2 cup thinly julienned celery head (or cucumber or raw papaya)
2 spring onions, sliced thinly
1 red chilli, deseeded and sliced
a small handful of coriander leaves
1 cup of small or medium-sized shelled shrimp, salted lightly and panfried for 3-5 minutes in a bit of oil till just cooked
2 tsp lime juice (more if you like it tangier)
1 tsp castor sugar
1 tsp fish sauce
salt to taste

Mix it all together in a glass salad bowl. Adjust taste accordingly. Serves 2 right.

Discovering bodacious Croatia + stacked Blondies

2008-08-06T01:23:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures of Croatia, as promised. We visited it in July when the temperatures were high and the wind was dry. Needless to say, I spent most of the days in the shade where possible.

For a week, we rented a sailing boat with a couple of friends and their two teenagers. That was the first time I've 'sailed' in my life. Learnt the meaning of tacking - when the crew shifted the front sail (jib) to the left or right, and the boat would tip strongly to the left or right. It was always interesting to hear the crockery in the galley shifting audibly. Then I understood why the gas stove is on hinges - so it could remain horizontal, more or less. ^_^

(Above) Omis in the daytime and after sunset. That rocky mountain sure is imposing, huh?

Being a visitor in Croatia is kind of expensive. The hotels are about the same prices as those in Italy and Germany but their standards are not as high or consistent. It's a better bet to rent one of the many apartmani (apartments) offered along the coastal road. We often saw an oldish 'auntie' seated in a chair at the roadside in the sunshine offering brochures or information about some apartment-for-rent.

The Croatians, generally, are friendly, helpful and courteous. They speak pretty good English, at least those in the tourism and service industry. The young women are long-legged and gorgeous, togged in all kinds of fashionable clothing. The outdoor cafe culture there is great for people-watching. It is not an uncommon thing to see families with four or five young children.

Our recommendation would be to visit during the cooler months, say, in September or May.

Ice-cream is a must for those sultry hot days, strolling about the ancient parts of small or big towns. It's five kuna for a scoop of one flavour. (Seven kunas to a euro.)

The beaches are only so-so - gravel and pebble beaches mostly - but the seawater away from main harbours is clear and beautifully blue or aquamarine. Those of us who come from South-East Asia and Australia are spoiled by the soft sandy beaches. So if you intend to visit Croatian beaches, bring a pair of rubbery beach shoes - to protect your feet against sharp pebbles and especially sea urchins in the water.

As for Croatian cuisine, alas! I've no pics for you. The most outstanding was the octopus salad and the fresh-from-the-Adriatic-Sea array of seafood. Yum, yum, yum!

One last note: Parking in Croatia can be rather costly. Don't be surprised to find fee collectors at a small desk under a tree at some remote beachside parking lot or halfway up to an ancient, picturesque chapel.

The view from a hill of a cove we anchored in. Yep, that's our rented boat with its sails furled. (Above right) The boats all docked neatly at Rogoznica at dusk.

And, for those who asked, "Where's the food?", here's the pic I took of a stack of Blondies (use Mr Oliver's recipe; just sub the dark choc for white and lessen the butter) beribboned with a cut napkin strip:

Gallivanting around St Gallen and Mrs HBT's egg tarts

2008-07-20T10:14:00.000-07:00

In May, my elder sisters came from Malaysia to visit with us for a couple of weeks. One of the places we went to was St Gallen in the northerly part of Switzerland. It's famous for its pretty decorated window frames (designated a World Heritage feature) in its old town.

One thing that I've noticed all over the little towns in Switzerland and Germany is the old-fashioned wrought iron hanging signs for businesses. They are lovely and detailed, diligently kept new and shiny with coats of gold and black paint.

While I'm awaiting pictures of sailing off the coast of Croatia in the Adriatic Sea, I'll post the simple but tasty egg tart recipe I've adapted from Mrs HBT's 'Hip Food' blog (her link is in the column at right).

Easy Egg Tarts

2 eggs
200ml milk (low-fat or full cream)
1/4 cup fine-milled raw sugar (or castor sugar)
1/2 sachet vanilla sugar (or 1/2 tsp vanilla essence)
1 packet of frozen pie dough
20g butter, half melted

Preheat oven to 160 degrees C. Beat the first four ingredients together. Generously butter two six-cup muffin pans with a brush. Roll out the dough to 3mm thin (or just unroll a pre-rolled one). Cut rounds of dough to fit halfway up the muffin cups.
Through a strainer, pour the egg mixture into each dough-lined cup, leaving 4mm of rim. (You'd be in Sticky City if it overflows.) Bake for 15 minutes. Turn up heat to 175 degrees for the lower part of the oven. Bake for another 5 minutes. Remove muffin pans. Let cool for a few minutes before gently loosening tarts with a small blunt knife. Cool tarts on a wire rack.

These easy egg tarts go quicker than Michael Schumacher before he retired. I can eat four in a row - easy! Thank you, dear Mrs HBT.

Switzerland's Fickle Summer

2008-07-15T04:11:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was rainy and cool. Today's sunny and warm. Fickle, fickle summer here. So unlike the relentless dry hot winds of Croatia and the Adriatic Sea where my other half and I were for two weeks.

We drove home on Sunday under a deeply bruised sky that spelt the end of our vacation. How can one part of Europe be so different from another, just 800km away?

Today is a salad of catching up with email on a PC I'm not used to and a series of chores - to be dressed and blessed with a tea later in the company of two friends and their daughters. No access to photos that I can upload. Sigh.

Until my laptop is reconciled with the Internet...

Does Rhubarb Go With Football?

2008-06-03T11:51:00.001-07:00

Euro 2008 football tournament is starting this Saturday. I'm pretty excited as I'm torn over one of these nations lifting the cup: France, Germany, Spain and Croatia.

(Above) Italian national Luca Toni in a pictorial comparison with Renaissance art in the Sueddeutsche Zeitung magazine. A Bayern Munich player, he is said to bring Renaissance to the most exciting team of the German Bundesliga.

My heart is with Italy as a few of its players are my favourites (Luca Toni, Fabio Cannavaro who sadly is reported to have torn his ankle ligaments and won't be taking part, Pippo Inzaghi) but methinks Italy is not likely to be hungry enough to take the European Cup after winning the last World Cup two years ago.

Update: My story appeared in StarTwo on June 6 -- http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2008/6/6/lifefocus/21445912&sec=lifefocus

As for munchies, football season calls for snacks and 'portable' desserts you can take to the couch on a dish without making a mess.

My two eldest sisters who recently visited me here liked the novelty and tanginess of rhubarb. The eldest took a stalk home and is planning to make a rib stew with it. Here, I present a recipe adapted from 'Die Zeit', a German newspaper online.

Rhubarb-Souffle Pie
By Karl-Josef Fuchs

Ingredients:

Pastry:
(1 part sugar + 2 parts butter + 3 parts flour) or store-bought pie dough

400g rhubarb, stripped of fibre and cut into 1cm slices
2 tbs sugar
80g butter, softened
80g ground almond, roasted for 5 minutes at 120 degrees C
75g raw sugar
2 eggs, beaten
1 tsp flour

The stripped rhubarb pieces (right) and peel (below) make interesting visuals.

Crumble topping:
60g sugar
55g flour (75g)
20g quark or yoghurt or cream cheese
25g butter, softened or melted

Method:

1. Toss rhubarb slices with 2 tbs sugar and heat in the oven at 120 degrees C for 7-10 minutes. Sieve away liquid if any.
2. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C. Roll out pastry to line a baking paper-lined pan (approx. 20cmx28cm).
3. Mix sugar with butter. Add eggs, flour and almond. Fold in rhubarb slices.
4. Fill pie with rhubarb mixture.
5. Combine topping ingredients with fingertips to make a crumble. Strew it over the pie.
6. Bake for 50 minutes. Let cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then transfer pie to a wire rack. Slice on a board. Serve with cream whipped with vanilla sugar if desired.

An Aromatic Discovery

2008-05-06T08:34:00.000-07:00

A couple of months ago, I was making green creamy vegetable soup with the health-giving likes of zucchini, fennel and spinach. While dreamily stirring the pureed soup, a picture of fragrant Rendang unexpectedly assailed my mind and the idea of "adding some hand-torn kaffirlime leaves during the final five minutes of simmering" floated into my head.

The result was pronounced 'fantastic' by both friends and Other Half.

You can vary the vegetables and proportions. Here I share a sample recipe with you:

Fragrant Green-Is-In Soup

2 tsp olive oil
half a medium onion, chopped
1 largish zucchini, sliced or roughly chopped
1 medium-size fennel, sliced
80g of frozen or fresh spinach
200ml chicken or vegetable stock
50ml cream or yoghurt, or 100ml milk (depending on how health-conscious you are)
2 kaffirlime leaves, hand torn many times to the spine
salt and pepper to taste

1. Preheat medium large pot to medium hot. Add olive oil.
2. Add chopped onion and stir-fry gently till translucent.
3. Add fennel, zucchini and spinach, with a minute in between additions.
4. Add stock. Lower heat. Adjust with water to just cover simmering vegetables.
5. When veggies are tender, take it off heat and let cool for 5 minutes. Puree.
6. Put puree back on low heat and add cream, yoghurt or milk. Adjust thickness with water to desired consistency. Add salt and pepper to taste.
7. Add torn kaffirlime leaves and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove leaves before serving.
8. Serve with potato croutons (panfried little cubes of potato) or chunks of sausage or cubes of bacon.

And now that the weather is getting warmer and sunnier every day, a lovely health-giving, nutrient-rich drink is simply to puree fresh or frozen (thawed) raspberries with buttermilk (add a teaspoon or two of powdered sugar, if you like).

French Kissing Tastes Better After Eating French Apple Pie

2008-04-10T03:36:00.000-07:00

Did that get your attention? Or did that get your attention? ^_^

Fatboybakes has inspired me to put up this recipe. I found it in an old little 'French Cooking' booklet I bought years ago in a warehouse booksale.
Since my Other Half wasn't too fond of pears, I switched the pear in Berry Rustic Pear Cake (see two posts below) to apple. That, in turn, nagged me to look for apple pie recipes in books and the 'Net.

Here it is, adjusted slightly to meet the Other Half's finicky tastes regarding crusts:

French Apple Pie

crust:
2 1/2 cups flour
110g butter
4 tbs cream

filling:
80g marzipan
1 egg
3 apples, peeled leaving bits of reddish skin for colour interest
3 tsp lemon juice
1 tbs sugar
2 tbs raisins or sultanas, presoaked for 10 mins in warm water and drained

glaze (optional):
3 tbs apricot or pineapple puree (e.g. baby food)

1. Cut butter into flour with butter knife or food processor. Pour cream over it and form into ball without kneading. Cover and put in fridge for 40 minutes.

2. Preheat oven to 210 degrees C. Roll pastry out on baking paper into a round for a 25-28cm round pie tin (nice if you have the lift off the bottom plate kind) or a square (25x25cm) or rectangle to fit whatever low-rise baking tin you have, making a low 1cm wall all round.

3. If you can succeed in mixing marzipan with egg into a smooth batter, bravo! (I couldn't, so I just snipped the marzipan into little pieces and mixed them with the egg), spread it over the pastry. Bake at 200 degrees C for 10 minutes.

4. Core apples and slice into half cm thickness. Sprinkle with lemon juice as you go along, so they don't oxidise and turn an unsightly brown. Besides, the tartness adds taste. Place slices, overlapping, in baked pastry. (This will test your aesthetic patience, I tell you.) Bring oven down to 190 degrees C.

5. Sprinkle sugar over the apple slices. Scatter the raisins.
Bake for another 15-20 minutes.

(6. When pie is out of oven, brush with puree. I only had some raspberry jam, so I used a bit to add a blush to my pie.)

Touching Clown Girl and Mashed Banana Fritters

2008-03-21T10:00:00.000-07:00

It all started with the film Fight Club, which is based on the book by Chuck Palahniuk. My good friends and I saw the film two or three times at the cinema and on video. I read the book and enjoyed it, too. Then the other books by Mr Palahniuk, an Oregonian former car mechanic, beckoned and I read and savoured all of them over a couple of years.

The author attended a writers' group when he was still a struggling writer. One of the writers was Monica Drake, someone he kindly wrote a very generous introduction for in her recent first novel, Clown Girl, after he became famous.

Ms Drake's book is published by Hawthorne Books, which produces large-format paperbacks with a difference -- they have fold-in covers that work as built-in bookmarks as well. (I would recommend looking for Clown Girl and other Hawthorne-published books online at The Book Depository as the company delivers without charging for postage and handling. You can find other titles published by Hawthorne at www.hawthornebooks.com.)

Clown Girl made me laugh and cry. It is about a young woman called Nita who has artistic clown ambitions. She rents a room with her boyfriend Rex, nude-model-cum-fellow-artist-clown, in her ex-boyfriend's house in a dodgy part of Baloneytown. Rex is away in a big city purportedly auditioning for clown college.

Nita hardly eats and suffers from some ailment. A nice police officer saves her during one of her fainting spells. While she has to collect enough of her urine output over 24 hours for a medical test, she needs to earn a living as a corporate clown. In the meantime, a bossy clown colleague tries to engage her in questionable one-on-one clown dates with men who have a fetish for clowns (coulrophiles, they're called). As if Nita doesn't have enough on her plate, her landlord's current girlfriend, who is a scary body builder, has it in for her.

The hilarious, yet in some ways sad, story involves a hot lawnmower, a urine collection funnel, a rubber chicken, a lost dog, clown sex, balloon sculptures and a cop who smells like baked cinnamon goodies. Are you intrigued yet?

Somehow cooking with bananas seems to go well with today's topic. Slipping on banana skin and fashioning banana-shaped balloons into religious icons and scenes are part of Nita's colourful life.

So here you go, a funny well-loved Malaysian snack:

Mashed Banana Fritters (Kuih Kodok in Malay)

2 big, ripe bananas (about 180g), mashed
3-4 tbs flour
1 tbs rice flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar (optional)
1 1/2 tbs oil (for frying)

1. Mix the flours, baking powder, soda, salt and sugar in a bowl. Stir it into the mashed banana with a fork. (Add the fourth tbs of flour if mixture is too soft.)
2. Heat a frying pan to medium-hot and add enough oil to coat the flat area. (Traditionally, this snack is deep-fried but I find it not all that necessary.) Spoon small mounds of the banana mixture onto the pan when the oil is heated (a soft sizzling sound when the batter touches it).
3. Fry one side till medium brown and flip over to fry the other side. Place cooked fritters on a few layers of kitchen paper. Best served warm.

Spring is in the air! Here are pictures of cut tulips I bought from the market and pink and yellow blossoms on trees in Zug.

For the Love of a Cosmic Travelling Dog + Berry Rustic Pear Cake

2008-03-05T13:32:00.000-08:00

This post is dedicated to our lovely, lovable and loving dog-ward of five weeks, Tigi. Her 'mum' and I met through the English Forum of Switzerland. She said she needed a dog-sitter for a few weeks and I offered a trial weekend with the dog.

Tigi giving the Argus look (above right).

She knows better than to pee on art (right).

All went well, and Tigi came to stay with us for five weeks. During the twice or thrice daily walks, we got to know some neighbourhood dogs, the most notable of which are a giant-sized Malamute, a black and white Great Dane (whom we dubbed 'Horse Dog'), and a neighbour's cocker spaniel, whose 'hairstyle' was messed up by Tigi's wagging tail.

The funniest thing is that I was quite convinced Tigi is a reincarnation of my late beloved dog, Argus. (See the very first post of this blog named after her.) Tigi's face and front paws look so much like Argus'. The expression on her mug is exactly the same, not so much her colouring and waviness of fur.

One day, I looked deeply into her warm brown eyes and said, "Argus? Is that really you in there somewhere, Argus?" Tigi merely gave me a look that almost said, "Are you mad? For gnawing's sake, whom are you talking to?"

So much for clairvoyance and astral travelling. Sigh.

Whatever the case, at least Tigi appreciated my boiling her meaty bones with rice, which supplemented her premium dry dogfood diet every evening.

The mute swans like to hiss loudly at her -- in case she wants to get too close.

And so it came to be that I buried my sorrows in a spate of cake baking. And eating, of course. Here's another recipe I adapted from Rohani Jelani's (she's a chef and cooking teacher in Kuala Lumpur):

Rustic Pear & Berry Cake

80g butter
5 or 6 tbs raw sugar (depending on how sweet your tooth is)
2 eggs
50ml buttermilk or yoghurt
150g flour
1 3/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
pinch of salt
one big ripe pear, sliced about 1.5x1cm and 3mm thick
1/2 cup thawed raspberries, blackberries, etc

Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius. Cream butter with sugar till fluffy. Add egg, mixing well before the next one. Add buttermilk or yoghurt and stir.

In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder and soda and salt. Mix this gently into the butter mixture. Add the fruit. Do not overmix.

Line a deep longish loaf pan with baking paper. Scoop in the cake batter. Smooth down the surface. Bake for around 35 minutes (till a small clean and dry knife inserted into the middle comes out 'clean'). Let cool in pan for 5 minutes before placing cake on wire rack.

Eating it while it's still warm is heavenly. The next day, cut a slice and heat on low in the microwave for 13 seconds.

Tubing on Mt Titlis + Quick Herring Spaghetti!

2008-02-17T04:04:00.000-08:00

If you live in Switzerland like I do, you need to take advantage of the numerous mountains with visitor-friendly facilities such as chair-lifts, cable gondolas and Rot-air bubble cars. Not to forget free 'tubing' runways.

On Mount Titlis at Engelberg, hundreds if not thousands of visitors swarm the place - tourists from China and Taiwan (even the cable guy has learnt some Mandarin greetings for the Chinese New Year) as well as locals and residents who want to ski and snowboard.

(above right) You feel like luggage being conveyed up a 'belt' with your tube before spinning down again.

In the snow cave somewhere on the top slopes, there's a display of buttons for you to press. One of the buttons plays 'Negaraku', the Malaysian national anthem. In the Rot-air gondola, there are greetings in myriad languages including Indonesian and Malay. The only difference between the two is how 'keretakabelgantung' is all one word in Indonesian. ^_^ Old women from China like to stick their faces in the 'face holes' of cut-out figures of extreme skiers and snowboarders -- to show their friends back home gleefully, perhaps. Not that it'd fool anyone.

If you don't ski or snowboard (those crazy gravity-loving sports!) like me, you'd appreciate tubing. You sit on an inner tube covered in canvas and push off a winding path. Soon it careens out of control and you're facing backwards and sideways. You learn to relax and enjoy the ride because it's all out of your control. At the most, you might spill over the snow bank and sprain a muscle or two. It's not likely you'd break your neck and die.

And then, when the skiing friends and family converge at the igloo bar outdoors, you can join them in the oh-so-strenuous apres-ski activity of eating and napping in the sun in a hammock or lying sprawled on the bean bags so considerately provided by the mountain ministers.

After you come down from the mountain and an hour's drive home, you'd want a quick hot meal, right? (I'm entering this in Presto Pasta Nights http://onceuponafeast.blogspot.com/.) Break out a can or two of herring or mackerel in tomato sauce, cut up some onions, boil a pot of spaghetti. Heat a bit of oil in a saucepan, cook the onions with some parsley or coriander, add a generous sprinkle of chilli powder (or sliced fresh chillies), salt and pepper, throw in the canned fish, break it up, and finally swoosh in the cooked spaghetti. Turn it a few times and voila! A hot, appetizing meal within minutes.

Interview with Bissme S

2008-02-13T02:49:00.000-08:00

Here is my email interview with Bissme S, one of the writers of 'Dark City 2', who contributed the story, 'Dad'. He is a journalist with The Sun in Malaysia.

1) What is the difference between writing fiction and journalistic writing (your day job)?

With journalistic writing, you deal with facts. You write what you see. You write what you hear. For example, when you are interviewing an actor and he talks to you about his life, about his career, about his love life and about his future projects. It is your job then to present these facts as interestingly as you can.
Fiction is an entirely a different story. You start everything from scratch. You create the characters. You create the mood. You create the beginning and the ending. Your imagination can go as wild as you want. The way I see it, with fiction, the ball is in your court and you can do whatever your heart desires.

2) Does one inform or enrich the other?

Sometimes they do. Sometimes they don't. Journalistic writing helps me to add realism to my work. Journalism is also about meeting deadlines. It builds the discipline in you to keep writing.

But there is also a drawback. As a journalist you spend eight hours chasing stories and typing them in front of the computer. So when you get home, the last thing you want to see is a computer and the last thing you want to do is to type another story. You literally have to drag yourself to the computer to write fiction.

3) Which authors' works do you read, including Malay ones if any? How do they help you in your writing?

I do not have one particular author that I adore. Instead I will pick some of my all-time favourite books.

a) 'Great Expectations' by Charles Dickens

This is my all-time favourite book. My favourite character is the spooky character Miss Havisham who got ditched on her wedding day. Since then she has not changed her wedding gown and has left her wedding cake to rot. Then, as part of her revenge, she adopts a child and trains her to break men's hearts.

b) 'Keluarga Gerilla' by Pramdoeya Ananta Toer

The story centres on a family during the fight for independence. My favourite character is the mother who went mad thinking of the sad fate of her favourite son who has joined the revolution to fight for freedom.

c) 'Flowers In The Attic' by VC Andrews

This was my favourite book when I was a teenager. Recently I had the opportunity to re-read this book and I do not feel the same passion for the book as I used to feel. Still, there are moments in the book which thrilled me. A mother who's willing to kill her four children just to gain wealth.

d) 'God Of Small Things' by Arundhati Roy

I wish I could be as talented as Arundhati. The way she uses words to describe situations and feelings is simply amazing.

e) 'Reading Lolita In Tehran' by Azar Nafisi

It takes place in the Islamic Republic Of Iran, where lecturer Azar Nafisi secretly gathers seven of her committed female sutdents to read the forbidden western classic. I love her usage of words. The book simply tells you that you can't take the simple things for granted.

f) 'Before Night Falls' by Reinaldo Arenas

It is the autobiography of the cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas who recounts his difficult childhood years and being oppressed under the regime of Fidel Castro. Another writer whose writing style I wish I could emulate.

g) 'Choke' by Chuck Palahniuk

His imagination is simply superb. The way he writes is never to impress.

4) What are your fiction-writing habits like? Do you only write when you're inspired or do you put in a number of words every day or week no matter what? What are your inspirations?

I would love to say that I write every day. But that is not case. I try to write as much as possible. As for inspiration , I just have to look around me. Finding inspiration is never a problem to me. But turning my inspiration into a full-fledged story is where the trouble is. I have so many ideas roaming in my head. But I never take the trouble to turn them into stories. I have to confess that I am a lazy writer. *hahaha*

In fact, late last year, I had a bad episode in which the computer caught a bad virus and wiped out my hard disk. This included all the short stories and poems I had written for years. This fact has demotivated me to write. I am slowly picking up the pieces and learning to write my stories again.

5) What are your ambitions as far as fiction-writing is concerned? Do you intend to submit more stories for 'Dark City 3'? Will you author your own novel or anthology?

I have submitted a story to 'Dark City 3'. Whether it will be accepted will depend on the editor/publisher. It is my dream to have an anthology of short stories published. When this dream will become a reality - that is something I can't say for sure.

6) Which is/are your favourite story/stories in 'Dark City 2'?
'The Neighbour' by Jennifer Tai. I must confess I loved the emotional impact the story had. It was written rather beautifully. Best of all, the story sounds real. It is as if the events really took place. I like fiction that sounds real... very real.

Happy Chinese New Year + Poppyseed Honey Cookies

2008-02-07T11:19:00.000-08:00

A very happy, healthy and prosperous Chinese year of the Rat to you and your family.

With my brother and sisters in Malaysia and Australia, it is a quiet day indeed. Only on Saturday will we throw a party for a few friends who have volunteered to provide some CNY cuisine while I, as usual, make a fav curry of the moment, carrot-celery-head pickles and biryani rice.

There's no holiday here and the other half was out of town for work, so I went to visit a friend up in a village 10km away for lunch. The dog I'm dog-sitting was left at home to mind the floor. (Didn't think she'd appreciate the twisty bus ride up some mountain roads.)

Dog-ward for five weeks Tigi says: 'Call me Sister Tigi. I was self-ordained. Did you say Year of the Rat? Yikes, bats without hats! Now be a dear and pass me one of those fragrant cats.'

I have made two batches of cookies for fun. Here is the recipe which I adapted from a nice square book called 'Big, Soft, Chewy Cookies':

Poppyseed Honey Soft Cookies

4/5 cup honey (that's almost a cup!)
50g butter
1/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbs poppy seeds

Place honey and butter in a medium saucepan and boil for a minute. Remove from heat and stir baking soda into it. Set aside to cool.

Heat oven to 175 degrees Celsius (350 degrees F). Beat eggs in butter mix. Mix baking powder and salt with flour, adding salt and poppy seeds. Stir flour mix into butter mix till dough stiffens.

Line cookie tray with baking paper. Drop a tablespoon of dough for each cookie, leaving 5cm space in between. Bake cookies for about 10 minutes, or when they're firm to the touch. Be careful not to overbake. Use spatula to transfer cookies to wire rack for cooling.

This soft, tender cookie has the lovely subtle taste of honey and the light crunch of poppy seeds - perfect for teatime or coffee!

Tobogganing down Rigi + Ripping Rendang!

2008-01-25T06:23:00.000-08:00

Downhill skiing seems dangerous and too fast, and requires clunky equipment. Whereas snow-shoe walking would involve a lot of uphill trudging -- my heart will not go on and on (unlike Celine Dion's).

Now how about sledding? It looks relatively safe and fun. I had always thought tobogganing was a tame sport for lily-livered wussies like me.

How wrong I was.

The tobogganing path on Mount Rigi, near where I live in Switzerland, was twisty with requisite speed bumps, which meant bumping along at hair-raising speeds while my other half tried to steer us away from the steep precipice on the left of the lane. There was no railing, just an itty-bitty bit of a snow bank, between us and the blankety-blank yonder way below. 'Braking' meant putting your heels in, and 'steering' was merely putting down your right heel if you wanted to go right.

After one particularly vicious bump, both of us fell off and my right shoulder joint was dislocated (old tennis injury, happens once in a while). After it clicked back in, we rested at the side for a bit before we continued our slip-sliding journey down the mountain.

I'm amazed Swiss parents let their wee children go down on their own toboggans. No doubt their light weight meant less momentum (unlike the hefty combined weight of my other half and me, ahem! Maybe we shouldn't have shared a toboggan, but the rental ain't cheap) but the steep bank on the left is always threatening to swallow up a few delicious, winter-fattened mortals.

Here are lovely diamonds. Bet you didn't know they grew on twigs, huh? ;-)

Anyhow, after coming down a snowy mountain, what's a welcome sight and taste is Rip-roaring Rendang. I've adapted Rohani Jelani's recipe in her 'Homestyle Malay Cooking' booklet to what's available here:

Had no dried chillies, so this Rendang Veal looks less reddish-brown (aside from unsuitable kitchen lighting).

500g lamb, veal, duck or chicken, sliced into bite-size pieces (I found beef too tough or took too long to soften)
3 tbs dessicated coconut, dry-fried on medium-low heat till golden brown
3-8 shallots (depending how big they are; they're HUGE here!), sliced (substitute: 2 onions)
2cm ginger root, sliced
2 (or more if you like it hot!) big red chillies, seeded and sliced
4 dried chillies, softened in hot water for 10 minutes (substitute: 1 tsp chilli powder)
150ml coconut cream
1 tbs sunflower seed oil or corn oil
2/3 tsp turmeric powder
3 stalks lemongrass, the fat part sliced, the remaining stalk trimmed and smashed lightly
1 small fennel, sliced or julienned (this is untraditional - for added flavour, bulk and texture)
3 kaffir lime leaves, torn
1 tbs dark brown sugar
sea salt to taste (about 1 to 1 1/2 tsp)

1. Pulse the shallots, ginger, chillies and sliced lemongrass, adding enough of coconut cream to make a thick paste.
2. Heat oil in a thick-bottomed non-stick saucepan till medium hot. Stirfry the shallot paste for 2 minutes. Add turmeric and smashed lemongrass stalks. Cook for 2 minutes.
3. Add sliced meat. Stir-fry for 5 minutes. Add sliced fennel.
4. Add rest of coconut cream. Cook on medium-low heat till meat is done and quite tender, and curry sauce is very thick (you're lucky if the timing of both coincide!). If curry is getting dry before meat is tender, add a bit of water.
5. When curry is thick and almost dry, add fried dessicated coconut, brown sugar, salt and kaffir lime leaves. Cook for another 5 minutes.
Serve hot with plain white rice. Mmmm!

:)

A jolly good 2008 to you!

2008-01-07T05:23:00.001-08:00

Hope the new year has begun well for you. We were near Munich over the new year and went walking up Wallberg as the queue for the sleds and chairlifts was too long.

The collected snow between branches and twigs reminded me of the Malaysian ice-kacang, one of my favourite desserts.

The night before, we went with friends to the heart of Munich. I experienced for the first time the lighting of many, many fireworks by private individuals at Odeonplatz. It amazed me that people would spend so much on pyrotechnics. It was also a bit scary as 'rockets' whooshed past quite nearby, and there were lots of broken bottles in the
Marienplatz after the fireworks. 'Collective irresponsibility' I called it, as normally people would not break glass in the streets or leave so much litter for the street cleaners the next day.

Here's a toast to a year in which we achieve more than we felt we could. May your days be full of love, discernment and peace.

May everything you do and say be measured if not positively spontaneous. Be true to yourself!

P.S. There is still no snow on the ground in Cham, Switzerland, where we live. Is it going to snow in February or March?! It's six degrees Celsius today - so 'warm' for winter, no?

For lovers of Pannacotta, that smooth and creamy but not-so-calorie-laden Italian dessert, here's a recipe I adapted from German chef Schubeck:

400ml milk (can be low-fat)
4 leaves of gelatine
1 tsp of vanilla sugar with bits of real vanilla in it
4 tbs sugar
100ml cream

Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water. Gently heat the milk with the vanilla and sugar till simmering. Remove from heat. Stir in the softened gelatine leaves till dissolved. Leave to cool.

Whip the cream till thick but not too stiff. When milk-gelatine mixture is cool and starting to gel, stir the whipped cream into it. Scoop into 6 bowls. Place in refrigerator to cool and completely gel for an hour or more.

Note: You can increase the milk amount by 80ml without adding more gel leaves. Lessen the sugar if you prefer Pannacotta less sweet.

For topping, choose your fav: caramelised sugar syrup, poached peaches, rhubarb in sweet ginger sauce, thawed blueberries or raspberries.

You can also vary the flavour of the Pannacotta. I've substituted the vanilla flavour with ginger, stirring in a packet of ginger tea granules. Adding half a teaspoon of fresh ginger juice would strengthen the 'heat' deliciously. This reminded me of my late mum's steamed egg custard flavoured with ginger. Mmm...

:)

Mellow Days and Evenings

2007-12-17T13:54:00.000-08:00

The days are short - 7.50am till 4.40pm -- and the sun shines like a shy maiden (now you see her, now you don't). Daily temperatures tell us winter is here but there's no snow on the ground yet.

(Right) The bakery round the corner from the apartment building where I live.

Many bakeries in Switzerland like to decorate the store facade according to the seasons and festivities. They sometimes remind me of the edible house in the story 'Hansel and Gretel'.

(Above) The children's books in German I borrowed from the library and have read. I love the illustrations.

Learning German is hard-going if one does not use it every day. However, I enjoy choosing and reading children's books in the language. My other half helps me with the vocabulary and turns of phrases.

(Right) Where the lake in Cham pours into a river, there is a fishermen's boat-house with a backdrop of a church spire.

Other than writing and reading, I take walks in the lake park. When the day is sunny, despite the cold, lots of people stroll about - mothers with prams and children, people with their dogs, and a motley crew of other folk.

At the beginning of winter, a flock of greylag geese made a pit-stop at the Cham lake park. What's the marching soundtrack?!

For me, the best part of the lake park is the wildlife, the many swans, ducks, geese and water fowl that change their feathers with the seasons - just like fashion!

(Right) This could be Small Duck, actually a female Common Pochard (Tafelente in German), all grown up now and probably has a mate (the rusty-headed chap below). There are around 20 of her breed, both males and females, on the river and lake these days - Small Duck is no longer one of a kind.

Nearby is a yoga school, the building of which is fronted by a restaurant that was probably a milk-collection place - hence perhaps the cow statue?

Now that this is such a mish-mashy post, tell me which recipe you want and I will blog it:

Lemon iced cupcake

Naked coconut-milk cupcake

English scone (below right)

Or, lemon curdy pudding (below)?

Here's the recipe for Coconut-Milk Cupcake as requested by Cynthia:

80g butter
5 tbs sugar
7g packet of vanilla sugar or 1/2 tsp of vanilla essence
1 egg
4 tbs coconut cream or coconut milk
3 tbs plain yoghurt
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Cream sugar into butter. Add vanilla, egg, yoghurt and coconut cream. Mix gently. Mix baking powder and salt into the flour and mix the whole lot gently into the butter mixture. Spoon 3/4 full into paper cups in medium cupcake or muffin tray. Bake in a preheated oven at 175 degrees C for 22 minutes or until top is golden brown. Cool on wire rack. Makes 7 or 8 cupcakes.

Note: To make it extra special, top each cupcake with a few chunks of white chocolate before baking.

For Wonda, the Lemon Iced Cupcake:

For the cupcakes, use the cupcake recipe above, except that instead of the coconut cream, use 1 more egg, 4 tbs lemon juice and 1/2 cup of ground almond or hazelnut.

For the icing, use a handmixer to whip up:

100g butter
1 cup icing (powdered) sugar
3 tbs lemon juice
(add a drop of food colouring if you like)

Ice cupcakes when they've become cool.

:)

'Dark City 2' promises a disturbing read

2007-11-17T03:10:00.000-08:00

Dark City 2, published by Midnight Press of Venton Publishing, is a spicy anthology of short stories by writers ranging from well-known ones such as Xeus, Tunku Halim, Lydia Teh and John Ling to emerging ones such as Jennifer Wan, Chua Kok Yee and Bissme S.

You can buy the book from the MPH megastore at Mid-Valley, Kuala Lumpur, and Kinokuniya, according to bloggers residing in Kuala Lumpur.

My story in it is named "Till Death". It's about a couple who is harbouring thoughts of murdering each other, but just who kills whom in the end?

As advised by Xeus, I'm posting an SMS review sent to me by a newspaper editor:

"Just read 'Till Death' and wanted to say how much I enjoyed it. Ally McBeal meets Norman Bates. A true black comedy on one level; an exploration of parental poisoning; a look at how murderous fantasies are translated into reality."

I would like to thank Xeus and Venton Publishing for letting me edit DC2 for grammar, just as they had engaged me to edit the original Dark City, an anthology of stories all penned by Xeus.

A Farewell to Fall

2007-11-16T02:54:00.000-08:00

Good-bye, Autumn! You leave us golden, you made them fall;
you gave a melancholic feeling to us all.

You whispered through the shimmery leaves
of the wiry, pale-faced birch.
You gracefully bowed to winter
in a time-honoured search

(for where in the cosmos do you go in the meantime?)

And you tip-toed away in a veil of
delicate lace of leaves.

How you have gifted us with cool balls of fiery rustling!

Ahem.

Now that I've gotten that off my chest - waxing a tad lyrical on a cold afternoon at the onset of winter...

Here's a moist carrot cake recipe I've adapted from a Canadian one (you can replace carrot with zucchini for something different and green-flecked!):

1/2 cup sunflower oil or melted butter
2/3 cup sugar
3 eggs, lightly beaten

1 1/4 cup flour
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt

1 cup grated carrot (or zucchini)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 raisins (optional)
3 tbs dessicated grated coconut

Mix together the first 3 ingredients in a large bowl. Mix the dry ingredients together and add to the egg mixture. Finally add the last 4 ingredients. (Top with pieces of white chocolate if you want an extra treat for flavour!)
Scoop into a longish cake pan (approx. 4"x9", 3" high) lined with baking paper.
Pre-heat oven to 150 degrees C. Slow bake for 45-55 minutes for a moist cake.

For the truly sweet-toothed, make a cream cheese topping:
50g softened butter
120g cream cheese
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
vanilla flavouring

Whip it all together till smooth and well-blended. Spread on top of cooled cake.

Zucchini cake (above) naturally looks less orangey than carrot cake.

(Above) One of Small Duck's male relatives or mate (front). I found out they are Tafelente, or Table Ducks in German (!), Common Pochard in English. Behind him is a nasty-looking Eurasian Coot.

Greylag geese came again to the Cham lake park for a few days on their way south. Behind the two are lake gulls.

:

Shorter Days Call for Sweet and Sour Pickles

2007-11-06T03:40:00.000-08:00

Winter is upon us in Switzerland. The cloudy or rainy days are between 3 and 8 degrees Celsius here, whereas in the north-west of Italy by the Mediterranean, where I was for 3 days last weekend, it was sunny and warm (up to 22 degrees).

The water level at Zugerlake is noticeably lower now - compared to summer when it was flooded for a week (see pic below).

One tries not to let the cloudy days affect one's mood. It's not encouraging to see the sun set by five o'clock - when it had hardly made a showing during the short day. Sadly, Daylight Savings Time is a thing of the past.

If you are centred in yourself, and feel happy and content wherever you are in the world, you will not be affected so much by your surroundings.

I have at least one thing to look forward to: the book 'Dark City 2' is scheduled to be arriving in my letter box soon from Xeus. Yes, I have a story published in it - yay!

To tickle your tastebuds, here is a simple recipe for you to try:

Cucumber Carrot Pickle

1 medium-size cucumber
1 medium-size carrot
1 red chilli
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
3 tbs vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar)
4 tbs sugar

Wash and dry the cucumber and carrot. Remove the soft centre of the cucumber; slice the rest into 2mm-thin pieces. Slice the carrot thinly with a potato peeler. Deseed the chilli and slice it as small as possible. Put all ingredients into a clean, dry jar and mix with dry chopsticks. After several hours, mix again. Keep jar in refrigerator. The pickle is ready the next day.

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One of Bread's Best Playmates

2007-09-18T08:43:00.000-07:00

My best memory of kaya making is of my late mother. When I was a youngster, she would double-boil the kaya (Malaysian coconut cream & egg jam) for hours with a bunch of pandan leaves tied together (no instant essence in those days). After she decided to discard the leaves, I'd take them over and carefully lick them for the lovely kaya clinging to them.

Why 'kaya off the pandan leaves' tasted better than kaya from the jar is a question that beats me. ^_^

Other than butter, kaya is my favourite spread on bread. My previous post featured two bread recipes, and here's the simplest kaya recipe which I made recently:

Express Kaya

1 cup of egg (4 or 5, depending on the size)
1 cup of coconut cream
almost 1 cup of sugar
half teaspoon pandan essence

To get your cup of egg, break eggs into a cup till it fills up (tip - if you can put in only half an egg to fill up the last bit, choose the yolk rather than the white - for a lovely coloured kaya). Stir the first three ingredients in a heavy bottomed non-stick saucepan over low heat. Keep stirring for 18 minutes. Add pandan essence. Stir for another 5 minutes. If you like the texture of your kaya, take it off the heat -- it is ready.

(above) A sharper pic of the kaya nestling with a bit of better butter on homemade bread. The white cow is a milk dispenser I bought in Copenhagen many years ago. She spits milk into my coffee!

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Argus World: Bread Baking Made Easy#links

2007-09-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

Argus World: Bread Baking Made Easy#links

Don't like kneading bread dough? Jaden of Steamy Kitchen has a gorgeous and ultra-cute No-Knead Bread story:

http://steamykitchen.com/blog/2007/09/10/no-knead-bread-revisited/

Where Art Thou, Small Duck?

2007-08-13T03:34:00.000-07:00

About a month ago, my other half and I began noticing a extra-small duck -- probably a Common Pochard (Tafelente in German) -- in Zugerlakeside, Cham. The tail was curtailed, so to speak, and its neck very short and curved. Its bill though was longish and slightly upturned.

Being very energetic and resourceful -- to make up for its size perhaps -- Small Duck caught our attention and charmed us with the way it caught bread pieces and avoided Eurasian coots and mallards by diving under them or hopping over them.

We singled out Small Duck and a sole Carolina Wood duck (yes, that sweet timid fellow) to feed our few leftover bread pieces to. Some people came by with a biggish bag of bread and in the feeding frenzy, Small Duck seldom got a crumb because it was a bit wary of joining the quite violent fray among the swans, coots, mallards and lake gulls.

Small Duck would charm us by paddling furiously towards us whenever we stood by the shore to hurl bread chunks to it. With its relatively big webbed feet, it could manoeuvre its small body very artfully and make sudden turns to gain some space around it. Small Duck knew it needed that advantage to beat the coots and mallards to the bread.

(Right) Small Duck (possibly a Ferruginous) surrounded by Eurasian coots.

In the past few days, after it rained a lot for almost the whole day and night, the lake overflowed at certain places and poured strongly into the river in our small town. We no longer saw Small Duck in the evenings when we took our walks there. This morning, neither did I see it on the lake. I'm worried Small Duck might have been swept upstream into the river.

(Right) The Carolina Wood Duck in spring. It has now a shorter, snazzier 'haircut'.

Wherever Small Duck is, I hope Mother Nature is looking out for it -- in that it is safe and healthy and has enough to eat. Small Duck has stolen our hearts and it is sad not to see him or her anymore.

Below are some portraits I took of my favourite teenage Mute swans. Swan yoga, anyone?

(Above) Can you see light passing through the 'nostrils'?

(Above) This teen pen (female swan) gives a comical front view of her mug -- does it somehow remind you of the front view of an aeroplane?
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Update (Aug 19, evening): We were throwing a few pieces of stale bread to the Carolina Wood Duck and the 'Dazy' swans (the three young pens often seem to be in a daze, or 'blur') when I spotted a familiar silhouette backlighted by the evening sun -- curved bill and small body with a short tail. Yes! Small Duck is back on the lake at Villette Park in Cham. Yahoo! She is safe and slightly bigger, at one point raising her small brown body and flapping her tiny wings. We are overjoyed to see her again.

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Switzerland's National Day, Gladioli and Pleasing Pancakes

2007-08-03T06:02:00.000-07:00

August First is Switzerland's National Day. You can Wiki it if you want to know its colourful history. One interesting point is that it was neutral during the world wars and spies criss-crossed it or were based there, slipping information across its borders with Germany and France. In Somerset Maugham's 'Collected Short Stories: Volume 3', I read of British secret agent Ashenden's adventures while he is stationed in Switzerland.

Maugham's eminently readable spy stories are essentially studies of character and portraiture in words. He is a master at describing and fleshing out grey characters with little judgment or proffering merely wry comment.

Thought I should include a picture of the little town I live in, Cham. Here you can see a golden crown (at left) hanging outside a restaurant, while a double-rainbow arches over a flag.

Also, on account of the national holiday, I would like to present close-ups of one of my favourite flowers grown in der Schweiz, gladioli. (Mrs HBT, here's a tribute to you and the lovely mothers we know.)

Also, as it's still summer, it's a good time to indulge in some pancakes which you can top with fresh red currants (Johannisbeeren) and slices of banana and nectarine or peach.

World-Is-Flat Pancake

3/4 cup flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/4 cup milk or buttermilk (buttermilk makes it fluffier)
1 egg
1 tbs powdered sugar
pinch of salt

Mix flour with baking powder, salt and sugar. Use a handmixer to combine flour mixture, milk and egg. Add 2 tbs water if you want a thinner pancake. Top with fruits of your choice directly after pouring enough dough into a heated and buttered pan to make a big round. Cook for a couple of minutes on medium-low heat. No need to turn over.

If the pancakes are made plain (flipped over once to lightly colour the other side), you can eat them dusted with powdered sugar and powdered cinnamon with applesauce (Apfelmus). Or with honey and a squeeze of lemon. Also tastes wonderful with some chopped mushrooms saute-ed in butter with onions, beef stock and a bit of milk.

Pancake dedicated to Lyrical Lemongrass: "Here's smilin' at you, kid!"

This one's with freckles and a hint of moustache (adolescent spent too much time in the sun?).
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A Tale of Spice and Intrigue

2007-07-17T06:06:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago, when I was working for a daily, I stumbled upon the most delicious and fresh-tasting chilli side dish - at the publication company's canteen, of all places. I asked tall, strapping Raju, the canteen operator, what the reddish concoction was made from and he told me: "Pounded fresh chillies and sliced onion cooked in salt."

It was that simple. But it was also simply appetizing. You could wolf down spoonfuls of rice with just this 'sambal'. However, after serving it a couple of times, Raju stopped making it - despite my begging him to do so. He never told me why he didn't dish it out anymore, even though I talked football with him every so often. Since then I've dreamt of eating this fabulous chilli thing, but somehow or other never attempted to make it myself.

The weather these few days in and around Zug, Switzerland, has been hot, hot, hot. As Mrs HBT has said, in summer, whip up some spicy dishes to stimulate your appetite - not that mine ever needs stimulating (as it is, I must eat once every three or four hours due to 'low blood sugar' or hypoglycaemia).

A blogger from Guyana, Cynthia of Tastes Like Home http://www.tasteslikehome.org/ , has inspired me with her mouth-watering salt fish recipes. Today, I decided to break open the last pack of dried salted fish I'd brought from Malaysia and combine her tomato & onion inspiration with Raju's dream sambal into something satisfying yet low-caloried. (Who would have thought Cynthia and Raju would 'meet' like this?)

Tomato, Onion & Salt Fish Argussimo

3 or 4 pieces (roughly 50g) of dried salted fish, soaked in water for 10 minutes
2 tomatoes, cubed hugely
half a big onion, sliced quite thinly
1 red chilli, seeded and sliced thinly
1 tsp chopped or dried parsley
pinch of salt
1 tsp sugar
1 tbs of sunflower seed oil

Heat oil in saucepan. Add onion and stir-fry on medium-high heat for 2 minutes. Squeeze water from the salt fish and tear into smaller pieces, add them to the pan. Fry for another 2 minutes. Add tomato and fry till the liquid is reduced by half. Add sugar, salt and parsley, and cook for another minute. Serve hot with white rice.

Bleeding Heart Muffins & Mauled Mallards

2007-07-10T10:33:00.000-07:00

Here's another post with a multiple personality disorder. Don't say I didn't warn ya.

Wok&Spoon inspired me to make muffins with those eminently delightful dried cranberries a couple of weeks ago. To add interest, I gave the muffins a 'bleeding heart', which is a small spoon of cherry jam right in the middle. Topped with chunks of almond white chocolate and roasted hazelnuts, the muffins were ready for the oven. I almost forgot the cranberries - they were outside the kitchen by the sofa. Cranberries are great to munch on while watching the news - so I was in danger of scarfing the lot in my quest for interesting muffins.

The muffins were still reasonably soft the next day. Heat one in the microwave on low power for 12 to 15 seconds for an aromatic boost. If you want the recipe, here it is (I developed it myself):

Cranberry Bleeding Heart Muffins

150g butter
7 tbs sugar
1 packet vanilla sugar (or 1/2 tsp vanilla essence)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/2 cups of flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
a small handful of hazelnuts (or your favourite nuts), medium roasted
a small handful of white choc chunks
a handful of cranberries
4 tsp of your fav berry jam

Cream by hand the sugars into the butter for 2 minutes in a big bowl. Add eggs and mix lightly. Mix the flour with baking powder and salt, and add to butter mixture. Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Butter 8 or 9 holes of medium muffin pan(s). Spoon a tablespoon of the batter into each hole. Add half a teaspoon of jam to the centre. Top with more batter till three-quarters full (a bit more if you like to bake dangerously!). Top with nuts, choc chunks and cranberries. Pop into the middle of the oven for 23-25 minutes. (Watch the 'rising show' through the glass front once every 5 minutes for added satisfaction.) Take out of oven and, after 2 minutes, remove muffins carefully with small fork and butter knife. Let cool on a wire rack. Eat two while still warm! (This recipe gives you 8 or 9 muffins.)

(Right) Isn't this the biggest cherry you've ever seen? It's labelled 'XL' in the supermarket here in Switzerland. Very juicy and sweet! Eating it is like a little spot of heaven on Earth.

The picture below is specially for Spiffy who wanted to see Scarface the duck. The Mallards seem to have lost some downy feathers from their heads. Next to these weather-worn wild ducks is a perfectly unmolested Eurasian coot, which is pretty hardy, cunning and quick.

Luckless in Lucerne

2007-07-04T11:38:00.000-07:00

(above) The curiously painted front of a restaurant in Lucerne Old Town.

THOUGHT I'd take a break from food and go traipsing again. It was last Saturday and I was foot-loose and almost fancy-free.

Lucerne is about half an hour's train ride from Cham, the tiny two-street town where I live. Unlike Cham, Lucerne is almost always bustling in the daytime with locals and tourists from all over the world.

It so happened the Old City festival was in full swing with all manner of bands playing here and there in the pedestrian area. For instance, one tent had two singers performing Abba songs while a couple of streets away, a bagpipe band was wailing heartily. The organisers had set up tables and benches for beer drinkers and the like. Seated revellers buzzed with chatting and laughter. It was like a mini Oktoberfest.

I had wanted to do some shopping and museum visiting but had forgotten that street shops closed at four p.m. on Saturdays (and the art museum near the train station closed at five). Only the shops in the train station shopping centre opened till seven or nine but those weren't very attractive.

So I skipped town around six. It was uncanny on the train ride home from Lucerne - I opened the book of Somerset Maugham's short stories I carried with me and the spy in the tale I had begun reading was also taking a train from Lucerne. The agent, Ashenden, however, was headed for glamorous Basel; while lil' ol' me was bound for lil' ol' Cham.

The water at Lake Lucerne (above) is crystal clear.
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What's delicious and red all over?

2007-07-01T07:48:00.000-07:00

Have you heard of the Japanese man who was convicted of eating his Caucasian dinner guest? Do you secretly admire Hannibal the Cannibal in Silence of the Lambs?

Wait, come back! Just kidding. The photo above is NOT human meat. It's not even meat. It's cut strips of beetroot. Rote Bete or Rande, German and Swiss-German for beetroot, is naturally very purplish red. It is sold shrink-wrapped in plastic in the cold veggie section of supermarkets here. I love it. You don't need to cook it or do anything with it -- but you can if you want -- it is naturally sweet and refreshing, but you need to slice off the skin or it might taste a tad earthy.

In a restaurant in Ticino, the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland, I once had a starter of cubed beetroot served in a wineglass with boiled shrimp and whipped cream. It was heavenly. No wonder it was used as an appetizer.

You can cut the beetroot into slices or strips or cubes, and dress it with lemon and sugar (or honey). Or savour it savoury with salt and a bit of raspberry vinegar or cider vinegar.

The first time I had boiled beetroot was many years ago in Montana, USA, in the food service hall of the University of Montana in Missoula. I was immediately taken by it.

The other red thing that I love so much is cherries. June/July is the season for cherries here. If you're pitting cherries with a little hand-held contraption, you need to be careful about white or pale clothing. It's alarming to get splashed with the concentrated red juice. But I love eating cherries au naturel (undressed cherries, that is, not me! Although eating cherries in the nude is not a bad idea, come to think of it, mmm; just take a shower after). Nothing like munching on a dozen of them after a savoury meal.

What are your favourite red things?

Should a craving for saucy chicken alarm swans?

2007-06-27T04:30:00.000-07:00

My Spanish classmate, Clara, came for lunch yesterday with three other guests and today she asked me for the recipe of the sauce that I made to go with the oven-roasted chicken drumsticks and wings. She said she enjoyed a tasty sauce as she usually found chicken too bland to eat on its own.

Has anyone eaten swan (right) before? Yikes, no, it's protected. Anyway, you don't want to tangle with this fella -- this young Mute Swan hisses. (How do I know it's male, or a cob? It has a larger knob growing above the bill, that's how.) 'Show me your knob and I'll show you mine!' this young cob looks like he's saying.

It was marinade left over from the chicken pieces. Thought I should make good use of it instead of draining it away.

In case anyone else would also like the recipe, here it is:

Marinade for 500g of chicken wings/drumsticks:

1 teaspoon salt
2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/4 tsp five-spice powder (if you have it)
2 or 3 tablespoon balsamico or cider vinegar (depending on how tangy you want it)
1 tbs honey
1 tbs fresh or dried parsley
2 tbs dark sweet soy sauce
1 tbs soy sauce

Marinate the chicken pieces in the mixture for at least 5 hours, better overnight. Preheat oven to 195 degrees C. Place chicken on baking paper or aluminium foil-lined oven tray. At 18 minutes, you can glaze the pieces with a bit of additional honey or sugar. Take out wings at 25 minutes. Continue roasting drumsticks for another 6 or 7 minutes.

To make the sauce:

Pour the remaining marinade into a small saucepan. Medium heat with half teaspoon of chicken stock. Mix well 1 1/2 tsp of flour with 6 tsp of water. Add to marinade. Stir constantly on low heat till it boils. Adjust taste by adding salt or water. Take off stove.

These are two of the three wild Greylag geese that have been visiting the Zuger Lake lately. They look singularly distinctive with their orange beaks and pink-orange feet. (No fear, I haven't cooked my goose!)

P.S. Come to think of it, I'm not sure if the Mute Swan in the first pic is male (cob) or female (pen). Both have the knob thing on their bills, but the male one is mentioned in Wikipedia to have a larger knob (but of course!). Guess I can't tell unless I put a cob and a pen of the same age next to each other and compared their knobby bills. Don't see that happenin' any time soon, guv'nor. What?! You want me to get all hitam lebam (blue-black) attacked by the territorial males?! Hissssssss...

If you click on the pic (above) you will see close-up what a scruffy teenage 'girl' this Mute Swan is. So cute though. She's not fully adult yet -- you can see some feathers are still brown-grey. I'm always fascinated by swans' dark grey rubberlike feet in and out of the water. They swim so effortlessly but are comically ungainly on land.

It has been raining off and on for three days. When I braved going to the lake this evening, the wild fowl were extra ravenous. When I threw in some small pieces of bread and accidentally par-burnt roti canai, the swans and ducks rushed for them, knocking into each other's bills and heads. No wonder there is more than one Scarface mallard!

The bully-boss cobs (male swans) were extra mean in chasing away the skinny female ones, trying to pinch them with their knobby bills. Am glad to report I managed to feed all three skinny-necked pens (female swans) while one cob was making funny throaty sounds on the water below my feet. (They were mistakenly named Mute Swans; they do make noises.)

P.P.S. Why do I seem to love these teenage swans so much? 'Coz I have witnessed them growing up from downy grey cygnets since last September.

P.P.P.S. In 'Feathered Friends Flock Together' somewhere below, I've corrected the name of what I wrongly thought was a Mandarin duck. It's a kind of Carolina Wood duck. Now I've got to speak to it in a North or South Carolina accent -- instead of saying 'ni hau?' ('how are you?' in Mandarin) like I used to. Mea culpa. ^_^

Loco for Coconut

2007-06-25T05:02:00.000-07:00

The other day, the other half was gently nagging me to use up the packs of dessicated coconut in the larder. "Ah," a light bulb switched on in my head yesterday, "I'll make some Coconut Barfi."

In secondary school, my fellow Rangers and I were taught by one Mrs Mona Toh how to make coconut candy with freshly grated coconut, sugar and condensed milk. We were told to watch out for the 'change of colour' towards the end of the endless stirring and turning over of the mixture. That's when the aromatic lump sticks together and the sugar content reaches crystallization point. Very dicey, this. If you cook it too long, you get dry crumbly candy. If you take it off the heat too soon, you'd end up with a soft, difficult-to-cut gooey mass.

I looked up my recipe file yesterday and decided to make Coconut Barfi, a Indian sweet similar to school-canteen-day coconut candy but mildly flavoured with cardamom.

Here are the ingredients:

1 1/2 tbs butter (or ghee)
1 cup dessicated or freshly grated coconut
2/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup milk
3 tbs sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp ground cardamom

Medium-heat a thick bottomed pan, preferably non-stick. Put in 1 tbs of the butter. Add coconut. Stir fry for a minute. Add sugar, milk and condensed milk. Quite constantly stir with a silicone or wooden spatula until mixture is thick. Add cardamom. Continue cooking until mixture sticks together (duration: about 12 minutes). Add remaining 1/2 tbs butter and cook for another minute. Turn out onto buttered small shallow pan (15cm diameter if round). Let cool for 25 minutes and cut into rectangles.

Caution: This sweet is very, very addictive!

Chan-mali-chan Roti Canai

2007-06-21T12:32:00.000-07:00

(right) Roti canai, lightly panfried for reheating the next morning.

Wokandspoon, who read about my craving for roti canai in Lee Ping's blog, told me about her 'third time successful' roti canai-making adventure and I was inspired to try her recipe:

http://wokandspoon.blogspot.com/2007/06/third-time-lucky-roti-canal.html

Since I didn't have margarine at hand, I used butter. These were what I found in my kitchen closest to Wokandspoon's recipe:

3 cups of flour
1 1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp ground raw sugar
2 tbs sweetened condensed milk (can be replaced with 1 3/4 tbs milk + 1 tsp sugar)
1 cup of water, or a bit less
2 1/2 tbs butter (or margarine)
1 1/2 tbs sunflower seed oil
extra oil for 'lubrication' and frying

Mix flour with salt and sugar in a big bowl. Add milk and stir with fork. Slowly add the water till you have 'slightly sticky' dough. Add butter and oil. Use hand to knead it into a quite smooth dough. Oil hand and divide dough into 7 or 8 balls. Oil them lightly and keep covered in the bowl. Let it rest for an hour.

Go read a book or something. Then you're ready for 'action':
Oil your hands and pat down a ball of dough on a clean oiled marble work top.
Press it as flat as possible. Then, using both hands, hold flattened dough with four fingers on top and thumb below, move your right hand up followed by left hand -- in a wavy 'S' motion.
The dough stretches. Move your hands to another part of the dough edge. Repeat S motion. Put the dough on the marble top and continue pulling and stretching it -- take care the edges are stretched thin too -- making it as big as possible. Fold the top halfway in, fold the bottom halfway up. Do the same for the sides.

Heat thick-bottomed pan to 'medium hot' and put in 3/4 tbs of oil. When oil is heated, carefully put in the folded dough. Try not to pinch any part of the folded dough into a lump. After a minute or two when the bottom is 'spotted' medium brown, hold your pan handle and flip the roti over. After 30 seconds, swing the dough around on the pan to ensure the 'new' side soaks up a bit of the oil in the pan. Remove from pan when the other side is brown too.

Serve hot with a dhal, lentil, vegetable or tangy fish curry.

For roti pisang (below), add thin slices of ripe banana 3x3 on the stretched dough before folding.

To accompany the roti, I made a vegetable curry with lentils, zucchini, mushrooms, turnip, fennel and onion.

Thank goodness, no dough flew off and got stuck on walls and ceiling. Phew!

Feathered Friends Flock Together

2007-06-18T04:19:00.000-07:00

One of the best things about living in Switzerland is the many lakes dotted around the country between mountains and hills. On a calm day, the surrounding highlands, some snow-capped for most of the year, are reflected in the water, which can range from an aquamarine green to turquoise. On a windy day, the waves can make even a fish chuck up.

One of the best things about living near a lake is the presence of many water birds. My favourites are the ducks, swans and 'bonneted divers' Great Crested Grebe (these have long necks and a sort of bonnet structure around their heads; they dive expertly for fish). Lake gulls and Eurasian coots (black with white beaks) are more common and less enchanting to watch, unless they're accompanied by their young.

'Hi there. Any more bread in your pockets?' One of the cute, not yet all-white, teenage swans gives me its best hungry and enquiring look.

I mistook this Carolina duck for a Mandarin duck, so I said 'ni hau?' to him every time I saw him. His modus operandi is to take a small piece of bread from the grass and dive onto the lake to eat it. Timid, sweet, very low in the pecking order, gets chased by mallards and coots.

Meet Mr & Mrs Mallard. She's always ravenous (maybe because she lays the eggs) and her man often gives in to her as far as getting eats is concerned. In this picture, she's nearer my feet than Mr Mallard -- as usual.

Mr Duck strikes his handsomest pose (below).

In the last photo, a Eurasian Coot swims by an adult swan. The bossier swans often try to prevent the blur teenage swans from getting near me (i.e. the food) but I try my best to throw bread to the skinnier ones on the periphery. Gotta fight that 'survival of the fittest or most beautiful' thing.

Two of the oft-bullied teenage swans have very skinny necks, one of which has something like a tumour growing from one side (I hope it's NOT a tumour though). The one without the 'tumour' is very slow in catching bread -- even the ducks get the better of it, so your timing must be pretty good and your throwing skilful to feed this blur-as-sotong fellow.

Bread Baking Made Easy

2007-06-17T03:48:00.000-07:00

I had always thought making bread was too difficult, dicey and not worth the effort. How wrong I was. After making variations of 'peasant bread' based on recipes by Jamie Oliver and Rose Levy Beranbaum, here dare I present my simplified version:

Argus's Fool-Proof(ed) Bread

1 packet dry yeast (7g)
210ml tepid water (comfortably warm, NOT hot)
2 tsp honey OR sugar

2 cups bread flour
1 cup wholemeal flour
3/4 tsp salt

2 tsb extra bread flour for working & sprinkling
a handful of 2 or 3 of your favourite fillings (pumpkin seed, sunflower seed, deseeded olive green and/or black, fig, raisin, apricot, walnut, etc)

1. Mix the yeast and honey/sugar into half the tepid water. Mix the flours and salt in a big bowl or a clean marble countertop. Make a well in the centre of the flour mix. Pour in the yeast mixture. Using four fingers of one hand, gradually stir the flour into the liquid until thick. Add the rest of the tepid water and continue mixing till you get smooth & silky dough. Knead dough for 5 minutes. If dough sticks to fingers, just rub it off with a little extra flour.

2. Shape dough into a round and place it in a big oiled bowl or on floured baking paper. Slice the top twice 1cm deep with a sharp knife to aid the rising. Place in a warm, draught-free part of your kitchen for about 35 minutes for its first proofing. When it has risen about double in size, you're on the right track.

3. Place dough on floored worktop (I use a plastic chopping board), punch or press it down a bit for a minute. Spread the fillings over. Roll it up and shape it into a round or oval (or whatever you wish the final shape to be). Diagonally slice the top 1cm deep a few times. Leave it undisturbed on a floured or baking-paper-lined baking tray or loaf pan for about 40 minutes for its second proofing.

4. Pre-heat the oven to 205 degrees Celsius for at least 7 minutes. Peek at your dough. Has it risen double again? If you're happy with its size, place the baking tray or loaf pan gently in the oven and gently close the oven door. If it hasn't risen enough, wait patiently for another 5 to 15 minutes before baking it.

5. Bake your bread undisturbed for 25 minutes. Take it out and tap on the bottom of your loaf. It should sound 'hollow' -- then, voila! it's done! Let it cool on a wire rack for half an hour before slicing and sampling.

It's so delicious when eaten fresh baked with butter, etc -- that's one of the best reasons for baking your own bread from scratch.

P.S. If you scroll down to Bloomin' Brilliant Brownies, you can see the freshly minted pictures of brownies I baked with toppings of cookies and white choc chunks.

Bloomin' blooms bowl me over

2007-06-14T04:56:00.001-07:00

The little pot of chives (Schnittlauch) on the balcony surprisingly, charmingly, burst into bloom (above) a few weeks ago. Never knew chives sprouted flowers, did you?

Can anyone help me identify these flowers (above) I saw outside the Notre Dame in Paris? Yes, I know I need "Horticulture for Dummies".

The picture below was taken in the back garden of a bed & breakfast my friends and I stayed at in L'Hayes des Roses, at the edge of Paris. It was such a charming little place. The landlady, a young one named Sophie, made her own orange marmalade and it was so delicious we ate great lengths of the baguette just so we could eat more of the jam.

When I'm 'retired' I'd like to own and run a nice B&B somewhere by the sea. Where do you think I should have it? East coast of the Malaysian peninsula (I wouldn't paint it pink like the one in the photo though. ^_^ ) or some island off Thailand?

Notre Dame -- Our Lady in Paris

2007-06-11T04:36:00.000-07:00

The ceiling of the Notre Dame (right).

If you stay quiet and look closely, you might see some 'ghosts'. Yikes.

Two arches inside the cathedral. Despite the numerous tourists, the atmosphere is one of calm and peace.

Broad on bread

2007-06-09T06:11:00.000-07:00

Here's a couple of pictures of the bread I baked from scratch. Thanks to Mrs Rose Levy Beranbaum and Jamie Oliver, I've learnt a few things about baking bread:

1. Keep your yeast alive! I sweated over the temperature of the water to mix the dry yeast in with the honey or sugar. I've figured out 'tepid water' means water that you can stick a clean finger into and it should neither feel cold nor hot, justly slightly warm. If it's too hot, the yeast will 'die' and your dough will not rise much.

2. Kneading is fun and therapeutic. It's not hard work at all. Just five minutes of folding, pushing and prodding the dough before the first proofing.

3. Add your fav ingredients (olives, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, chopped apricots, walnuts, etc) before the second proofing and shape dough into the final form you want. Slash the top half an inch deep two or three times with a sharp knife so the dough relaxes and rises nicely again. Place it onto a generously floured baking tray or loaf pan if you want it to be a more upright bread shape.

(At top is a 'window pane' montage of the wharf at Ascona, Ticino, in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland.)

Blown over by Bloomin' Brilliant Brownies

2007-06-07T06:28:00.000-07:00

Jamie Oliver's website has a wonderful rich chocolate brownie recipe that has been a big hit with my German language classmates, Austrian teacher, and my partner. I made a batch for an in-school birthday party for our Russian classmate. It was also to celebrate our Italian classmate's going-away-to-have-a-baby.

I've adapted it to make it less fattening. Here it is:

JO's Brilliant Brownies

200g butter
200g dark chocolate (make it white choc for a 'blondie' variation!)
1/2 cup roughly chopped walnuts or whatever nuts you fancy
1/2 cup your fav dried fruit, chopped (dried cherries, apricot, figs, etc)

3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 cup cocoa powder
3/4 cup sugar
4 eggs, beaten

Melt butter with broken up chocolate in a big saucepan over low heat. Add nuts/fruit. Sift and mix together flour, baking powder and cocoa powder, mix the sugar into it, and add the dry mixture to the melted choc mixture. Add eggs and stir lightly until incorporated.

Preheat oven to 180 degrees C or 350 degrees F. Line 12"x12" pan with baking paper and pour in mixture. Bake for 25-27 minutes. Take out of oven and let it cool in the pan. Cut into squares/rectangles. Texture is moist and slightly gooey.

(Brownies can taste loads better than they look. Mr Oliver suggests serving them with creme fraiche whipped with a bit of orange zest. I had some maple walnut ice-cream in the freezer -- it was bee's knees served with microwave-warmed brownies. Come to think of it, it was the whole hive's knees all put together -- so good it tasted. Heh.)

Think of France

2007-06-03T07:38:00.000-07:00

A couple more pics to 'entertain' you with.
The ceiling of Napoleon's apartment (right) -- elaborately beautiful: Josephine could have just lain back and thought of France.

What do you think the second photo is?

Scroll down for the answer.

Hee hee.

In the Louvre, touching sculptures is forbidden. I saw a Chinese-looking visitor leaning against the pedestal of a sculpture for his picture to be taken. Out of nowhere a museum officer came to tell him off.

Ha ha.

(Here's the answer: the view from right below a huge-ass chandelier in The Louvre.)

Gay Paree, May Paree!

2007-05-23T08:56:00.000-07:00

Recently, went to Paris to meet two smiley ex-colleagues, one of whom was on assignment there. Together we did the touristy thing and visited the Louvre -- did you know Monna Lisa is spelt this way?! -- the Eiffel, Champs-Elysee and Montmart, the vibrant artistic part of the city near the Sacred Heart church where they filmed 'Amelie'.

Here are a few pictures:

(top left) Joan of Arc in the Louvre: 'Ah kin hear Ya but will I listen? Ya know what I mean?'
(lower right) A (peeping Tom's!) view of the bed & breakfast where we stayed at the edge of Paris.
(above right) Eiffel invaded by gigantic roses.

Bread! Food of gods, goddesses and other critters

2007-05-22T00:38:00.000-07:00

The other day, I made from scratch and baked my first loaf of bread -- dotted lightly with chopped walnuts, green olives (the taste of olives tickles the palate!), cereal, poppy seeds and pumpkin seeds. Yay.

At first, I was kind of uncertain, looking at the many kinds of flour and a few kinds of yeast at the supermarket. There were a few types of pre-mixed bread flour which I snubbed after considering it for a few seconds, and instead chose organic unbleached bread flour and a pack-of-three dry yeast.

An ex-colleague had given me this huge and heavy 'Bread Bible' book but I was too lazy to lug it around, so I dug into my favourite spiral-bound 'Open House' book of recipes and stories of volunteers who help feed the homeless (it's inspiring, and bought cheaply at some book fair). I found Cinnamon Cranberry Bread and modified the recipe to suit my five-hundred ingredients.

Very scary -- coz when I sprinkled the yeast into a cup of warm water (maybe it was too hot?), it didn't bubble up much after 10 minutes. Anyway I mixed it with the flour and the rest of the ingredients and halved the recipe for one loaf. I put the lump of dough in an oiled bowl and covered it with cling film to 'prove'. Put it somewhere warm, the recipe said. Geez, it was a rainy cool day so it was hard to find a warm place. After half an hour, it had only increased a bit in volume, so how to 'punch' it down?

For the second period of proving, I heated the oven to 50 degrees, switched it off, and put the bowl in it. Again, the dough only increased slightly in volume. What the hex, I thought. I preheated the oven to 180 degrees C, reshaped the dough a bit and placed it in an oiled loaf pan, and popped the whole production into the oven.

After 32 minutes, I took it out as the top was getting brown. I forgot to knock on the bottom of the pan to hear if it sounded hollow (that's to indicate readiness).

It tasted lovely though; the texture was quite dense (luckily, my partner likes bread dense and not fluffy) and had a bit too much sugar, I thought. Went well with butter and smoked raw ham and even jam.

Now my partner is converted -- last time he thought bread is not worth the trouble making. Now he thinks it is, since we're not in Germany and he can't get his "chicken food" (I call it) dark brown bread here. He even went as far as to suggest getting a bread-making machine, but I pooh-poohed it, saying, "No challenge in that!"

So the second time, I used a Jamie Oliver recipe and ... all is right with the world again. The dough rose like nobody's business. Jamie's the man!

P.S. If you're wondering why the accompanying picture is of dog-bathing and not bread-making, well, I don't want to steal any pics off the 'Net -- and, anyway, the activities are quite similar. You get a nice-smelling fresh dog at the end, too.

Take This Poll!

2007-05-10T05:39:00.000-07:00

Der Spargel*

2007-05-10T03:17:00.000-07:00

From Chuck Palahniuk (author of 'Fight Club', 'Survivor', etc) I learnt about Amy Hempel, an American short story writer. Her 'Tumbleweed', 'Dog of the Marriage' and 'Reasons to Live' led me to 'Unleashed: Poems by Writers' Dogs' which Hempel co-edited with Jim Shepard.

I being a dog floating in the cosmos, of course, quickly dug into the canine poems. Woof! Amused and delighted by the slim tome, I present to you some lines from it:

Could you take your foot off my head? Anything to eat in those pockets? Off! I'm not a horsey. -- Daisy, five, Speaks to Sophia, Two (Ralph Lombreglia)

Last night I urped a knot of tennis net; Picky bastard won't ever get the ball. I'm keeping the next duck too. -- Jessie's 'Lab Lines' (Robert Benson)

The poems are grouped under categories such as Belles Lettres, The Good Life and Canine Nervosa. In the last one, Arthur Miller gives us "Lola's Lament", a sensitive exposition on a dog's preoccupation and obsession with security for its human companions.

Lovely.

*P.S. Der Spargel (the asparagus) is a play on Der Spiegel (the mirror), an established German periodical. The allusion to asparagus is an oblique nod to Astral-travelling Argus.

Inspiring journalists

2007-05-01T04:07:00.000-07:00

I remember reading Adibah Amin's Sri Delima column when I was a kid and thinking: "It's so nice to reach out to so many people through a newspaper." She was one of those who inspired me to put words down on paper. Another is Pak Sako of Utusan Pelajar. He was good-naturedly encouraging and kept on publishing my silly essays and poems. A few times, he awarded me RM10 to RM30 for my efforts.

There was also a column in The Malay Mail which catered for youngsters' prose and poetry. Eagerly I would scan the page every week to see if mine was published. If I remember correctly, the daily also gave away little cash prizes, which was so gratifying to an impecunious child. It was solid proof that one had achieved something, no matter how small.

And then there were Fats, a pseudonym used by Thor Kah Hoong for his hilarious and rambunctious 'makan' reviews, and Rehman Rashid's witty and incisive Scorpion Tales.

Who were the columnists and journalists you read and remember? Who gave you that shiver of delight over shared thoughts and illumination on an unfamiliar subject? And who simply entertained you with their writing?

What marks your book spot?

2007-04-25T05:19:00.001-07:00

What are your current favourite bookmarks? My partner takes pride in his nicely crafted slim metal ones. Me? Any old library slip or corner of a paper napkin will do.

Once I stuck an elbow in a book while answering the phone and writing a few notes. Another time, at my sister's house, her big lazy dog was snoozing as usual, so I used one of his black floppy ears as a bookmark for a few minutes while I got some snacks from the kitchen. Of course, when I came back with the food, the dog with the hyper-sensitive nose sniffed the titbits, opened his eyes and -- "No! No! BoBo, don't get up!" -- lifted his gigantic head and of course his ear slid out of the book. Hmmf.

Yeah, I've bird-brained ideas like that.

If overcharged, what would you do?

2007-04-21T09:10:00.000-07:00

If you feel an injustice had been committed, what would you do?
Would you barge into a shop and ask for your money back? Or politely talk to the manager and make him see your point of view and how important it is to keep your custom?

"Let it go," my partner said when I told him I had been overcharged for a cut and colour at a hair salon. "Just don't go to them again."

It's very hard for me to let go of such things. For days I struggle with myself. To me, if I don't try to right things, I feel I'm encouraging such people in their less-than-honest ways. If I at least give them a "bit of trouble", they'd think twice before perpetrating the same thing on other unsuspecting clients. Which means my trouble or effort won't get me any future benefit but it might benefit other people.

What is your take, please?

Not-again scenes

2007-04-18T12:53:00.000-07:00

Which kind of movie scene are you sick of watching?

For me, it's the taking of pictures in a photo booth -- whether it's two lovers or two or three friends. It's been done to death in both Western and Eastern films.

Silly Word Game

2007-04-05T03:34:00.000-07:00

Seeing the title of John Ling's "Zero Sum" (which is making it into 'Dark City 2', I hear, congrats!) made me think of Sum Tin Har, the matronly and buxom HK actress. Now, inexplicably, Sum Tin Har, being dishy in her unique way, associated my twisted mind with 'har lock', a kind of Chinese prawn dish. And, of course, 'har lock' made me think of the saying "lock, stock and barrel".

You get my drift.

Now, let's play a word game using only well-known maxims and titles of books, songs, TV series and movies.

I begin with Garrison Keillor's "Lake Wobegon Days". Days something, anyone?

Exciting plans a-foot!

2007-04-01T12:08:00.000-07:00

Please check out Tunku Halim's blogsite, Write Lah! Writing for Malaysians.

http://tunkuhalim.wordpress.com/

Happy days are here again, as they say.

Get published -- and get paid in cash and kind!

2006-10-11T08:14:00.000-07:00

Dark City 2

For the Dark City sequel, which is scheduled to be published in April 2007, author Xeus is calling for short story submissions. Dark City 2 will be an anthology of dark and twisted Malaysian tales much in the tone of the first book.

The submission criteria are:
1) Each short story should contain around 3000-8,000 words. Please use double spacing and Microsoft Word.
2) Each plot must be in the same vein as Dark City 1, which are stories about the darker side of Malaysian life. The short story genres can be contemporary, horror, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, romance, Roald Dahl-style ironic etc.
3) The stories must meet the English and storytelling standards of the first book. (In other words, the editor will select only what is publishable)
4) Each short story must contain a twist which hopefully no reader will see coming
5) This is open to published and unpublished writers of all ages. For unpublished writers, this allows you an opportunity to be published and to use this in your literary resume. You will then be able to sell your work more easily to a future publisher.

Your story will be selected on the strength of its plot, your ability to beguile the reader, and the shock impact of your twist. Your story must be concise, gripping and satisfying! Selected contributors will be paid RM 150 and 4 free books for each story. You can submit as many stories as you like.

The editor reserves the right to conceptually edit selected stories in the purpose of making them more appealing and ask you for a rewrite.

Closing date is Feb 28th, 2007. Good and publishable stories will be selected on a first come, first serve basis. So if you’re interested, get cracking now!

Stories are to be submitted to dark.city.xeus@gmail.com

For more information about Dark City, log on to www.darkcity-xeus@blogspot.com/

Sad Day -- Oct 6, 2006, Friday

2006-10-06T08:16:00.000-07:00

Today, Nico the dog (a nod to Chuck Palahniuk, but named by the shelter folk) had to go back to the Tierheim (animal shelter) because we did not think putting him in a crate most of the time is the way to house-train a dog (as suggested by the shelter people).

Nico is a wind dog, a Podenco mischling (mix); his ancestors hunted rabbits and hares with Spaniards. We wish for him a wonderful family with a big yard or a meadow to gallop and romp around in, chasing leaves and sniffing scents. We loved you, Nico. We love you still and miss you so.

characterization

2006-09-07T06:56:00.000-07:00

Oberon's mum The piece below is part of a novel I'm working on. I'm trying to characterise the protagonist's mother-in-law. Any feedback would be much appreciated.
--------------

Zephaniah
By Lou 2005 (c)

Kirin's mother-in-law drives a minibus. It's not that she's a bus driver, oh no. Her personal vehicle of choice is a second-hand bus she bought for a song five years ago. Having begun volunteering at an orphanage and old folk's home, she wanted the Mercedes bus for ferrying the children and senior citizens on excursions and such. The eighteen-seater works for her – big enough to carry a boisterous party, small enough to manoeuvre around corners and into parking spots. She had the old double seats ripped out and put in firmly cushioned double and single seats. She got it repainted in lime green too. When she's not driving anyone anywhere, she'd put her favourite potted plant of the day in the foot well of the front passenger seat.

Sometimes her muscular short-legged dog of indeterminate breed goes along for a spin – riding shotgun securely strapped into the front seat like a psychotic patient who has just morphed into a wolf.

Zephaniah Rada is the name in the birth certificate of Kirin's mum-in-law. Her ancestry – traceable ones are Irish, Ceylonese and Chinese – is almost as mixed as her dog's. Zeph, as she likes people to call her, named her son Oberon. When Obie was twenty-five years old, he was dating three young women. A year later, he was married to Kirin, the one Zeph had least liked. His mother's complaint was that Kirin was too ordinary – the beautiful young woman, in the eyes of the older one, did not possess quirks, idiosyncrasies or eccentricities.

Right or wrong, Zeph concluded that Oberon, for reasons he didn't disclose and she hadn't asked about, had deliberately not chosen a woman like his mother.

inane chat between Cockney guys

2006-09-03T10:12:00.000-07:00

Slovenian or Alien? “I tell yer me trouble and strife is an alien.”
“Sure. Sluvnia isn’t exactly this neck of us woods.”
“No, I mean Zianna is from outer space.”
“Yer mean another planet?”
“Yes.”
“Cop out of 'ere!”
“Hear me out first.”
“Okay. Wot did she do?”
“For one, she arranges effryfink in rectangles and squares. She even cuts an apple till the core is a rectangle.”
“That o'course immediately makes 'er a Martian.”
“If yer’re gonna be like that, I’m gonna change the bloomin' subject. Obviously, right, yer don’t take me straight up.”
“Straight up? I’m sposed ter believe that yor luvly trouble and strife is an E.T.?”
“It sounds crazy. Listen. There’s this uvver fin'.”
“Wot?”
“She sleeps wiv 'er feet next ter my loaf of bread and 'er loaf of bread next ter my feet.”
“And if yer turn 'round?”
“She goes the chuffin' other way.”
“Yer’re nuts.”
“I’m nuts, is it? I tell yer Zianna is an alien.”
“I won’t ask yer 'ow yer make luv ter her. I refuse ter go there. So wot other evidence will yer put forff?”
“Her eatin' 'abits.”
“Yeah, eh? Wot about them?”
“She eats only food of certain colours, say, corn, peas, tomatoes, right, pumpkin. If a food is of an indistinguishable colour, she won’t touch it.”
“Neever would I but I’m still an Earfflin'.”
“Yer don’t believe me at all.”
“I believe yer, but the bleedin' finks yer mentioned don’t make Zianna an extraterrestrial. She’s just eccentric.”
“Right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then 'ow do yer account for 'er gahn missin' for two days effry time the moon is full?”

--- --- ---

The following is the original dialogue:

“I tell you my wife is an alien.”
“Sure. Slovenia isn’t exactly this neck of our woods.”
“No, I mean Zianna is from outer space.”
“You mean another planet?”
“Yes.”
“Get out of here!”
“Hear me out first.”
“Okay. What did she do?”
“For one, she arranges everything in rectangles and squares. She even cuts an apple till the core is a rectangle.”
“That of course immediately makes her a Martian.”
“If you’re going to be like that, I’m going to change the subject. Obviously, you don’t take me seriously.”
“Seriously? I’m supposed to believe that your lovely wife is an E.T.?”
“It sounds crazy. Listen. There’s this other thing.”
“What?”
“She sleeps with her feet next to my head and her head next to my feet.”
“And if you turn around?”
“She goes the other way.”
“You’re nuts.”
“I’m nuts? I tell you Zianna is an alien.”
“I won’t ask you how you make love to her. I refuse to go there. So what other evidence will you put forth?”
“Her eating habits.”
“Yeah? What about them?”
“She eats only food of certain colours, say, corn, peas, tomatoes, pumpkin. If a food is of an indistinguishable colour, she won’t touch it.”
“Neither would I but I’m still an Earthling.”
“You don’t believe me at all.”
“I believe you, but the things you mentioned don’t make Zianna an extraterrestrial. She’s just eccentric.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Then how do you account for her going missing for two days every time the moon is full?” (522 words all in)The above was in response to this writing exercise: Create a scene, of 600 words or less, where two (or more) characters have a conversation. Choose one of your characters to “dialectize.” Now go to this site: http://www.freelang.net/references.html and about halfway down you’ll see The Dialectizer. Convert your chosen character’s dialogue using the dialectizer. Try it; it's fun!

Metal sculptures

2006-08-31T01:49:00.000-07:00

A good camouflage place for going incognito.

(Taken near Brisbane, April 2004.)

Retired service dog in Japan living in a home for aged canines

2006-08-31T01:01:00.000-07:00

exercise for fingers

2006-08-30T09:44:00.000-07:00

Medium Rare

The room was dark and musty. Also, I could smell something like incense. Three mediums were seated at the round table –- as far as I could make out. They reminded me of the three monkeys: see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. The mustiness was getting to me. Call me irreverent but the next thing that came to mind was: see no weevil.
Two of the mediums were quietly chanting a phrase. Over and over and over again.

I came here –- to this dilapidated cottage in the grounds of a Taoist temple –- not of my own volition. My aunt, who was pushing my elbow indicating I should sit at the table, settled into a creaky chair. Perhaps she needed to lose some weight. Perhaps she needed to get a life. But what she wanted most at this point was to make contact with her dead husband.

Of course I did not believe in all this mumbo-jumbo. Why should I, a woman of science with a Master’s degree in biotechnology? But what to do? I was my aunt’s only relative living near enough to her to drag along for this venture of folly.

I felt a nudge at my ribs. Apparently I was off day-dreaming again, and now I was supposed to link hands with Auntie May-Ta and one of the mediums, whose hand I doubted was freshly washed.

Goose pimples raised their tingling little heads on my forearms when I heard the middle medium chant, “Chen Cheng Kim, Chen Cheng Kim, Chen Cheng Kim!”

For heaven’s sakes, that’s not my aunt’s husband’s name, I thought. “Hey, guys,” I piped up. “His name was Chen Cheng Kee.” My deliberate, rather too loud enunciation reverberated in the room. Auntie May-Ta glared at me.

“Chen Cheng Kee, Chen Cheng Kee, Chen Cheng Kee…” the medium adjusted his chanting obediently. “Come to us, speak to us… Your wife is desirous of your presence.”

Oh, what hogwash! I was whinging and complaining in my head when, unexpectedly, my goose-pimply feeling turned into a top-to-toe sensation – which really got my attention. One by one, the mediums fell over out of their chairs. The hand of the one next to me slipped out of mine like a slimy squid.

Then I felt my jaw opening against my will, my throat tingling and my tongue moving.

A baritone voice came through my lips: “May-Ta, let me be in the cosmos... it is peaceful… aaaahhh… It has an end with these practitioners and 'solletica' of the 'boneses' contentment of the ways.” With a distinctive ‘ping!’ deep inside my head, I snapped back to my normal self.

“What the hell did I just say?” I asked no one in particular but turned to look at Auntie. She startled me: Her eyes were shining with tears. And her expression of near-ecstasy? It was a tad worrying. “Solletica was the brandname of the ointment I rubbed on your uncle’s limbs when they hurt,” she said, smiling. Was that supposed to explain everything? Never mind, at least she got what she wanted; she’s happy.

Meanwhile, the trio of mediums were getting off the floor and groaning – in pain or out of dismay over potential loss of income, I couldn’t be bothered to find out. Surely they don’t expect any money in a red packet after their fiasco? Auntie May-Ta made to pay them but I pressed it back into her purse. I took her elbow and guided her out into the sunshine.

After all, as a dutiful niece, I did all the hard work, didn’t I?

(597 words)
By Argus Lou (2006)

The above was an exercise to write around a phrase translated many times into other languages and finally back into English.

Original English Text:
There is a point to this exercise and it is tickling my funny bone.

Translated back to English:
It has an end with these practitioners and solletica the boneses
contentments of the ways.

short story

2006-08-23T09:03:00.000-07:00

Last SupperBy Argus Lou

The first sign of trouble came when father dropped a platter of starters. Mother had asked him to help her bring the dishes out of the van to the picnic rug. He had been reluctant but she insisted that men should at least help with the serving if they didn’t do the cooking, packing, unpacking and cleaning.

My jaw dropped a split second after the pewter platter fell, spring rolls and roast pork ‘coins’ going hither and century eggs and water-chestnut ‘pouches’ going thither. All my favourite appetizers – gone! I wished I were a dog; I’d be on my hands and knees on the grass lapping up the spilled goodies and wolfing it down in no time. Which Ding-ding, Uncle Jeh’s Shih Tzu began doing, before my Bruno, a huge black canine of indeterminate ancestry, loped up, nudged Ding-ding aside, and finished the job. The little fellow yelped and nipped Bruno in protest but was no match for the bulldozer of a dog.

“Lucky fella!” squeaked Grandfather, rubbing his rotund tummy exposed by his rolled-up red T-shirt. “Year of the Dog indeed! Ha ha ha.”

“Sorry, everyone. See?” Father turned to Mother. “No good can come from enlisting manly labour for such feminine tasks.”

“Pah! If you helped out often enough at home, like Jeh, you’d be less awkward doing it – less chance of dropping the whole production, no?”

Father was quick to change the subject. “Sit down, sit down, everyone! Ah, Jeh, stop fussing about already. Everything looks perfect; we’re only going to mess up your presentation when we dig in.”

Every other year, we have the unique tradition of eating our Chinese New Year’s Eve reunion dinner in a different place. This year’s picnic in the Lake Gardens on the edge of town was Uncle Jeh’s suggestion, of which father hardly approved. Heh, heh, a dim view of dim sum in the park, I reckoned. My middle sibling, Sher-Win, and I loved the idea though. So did Grandpa, who was prancing about with the dogs – probably tempting fate to give him a heart attack.

Two years ago, my mother suggested camping in the jungle, which we foolishly agreed to. It turned out to be a disaster because it rained and then the leeches came out to eat us. We ate our new year’s eve dinner hurriedly and came out of the rainforest looking like the war wounded, what with patches of blood on our jeans.

“Grandpa, grandma, Pa, Ma, Uncle Jeh, eat rice!” Sher-Win and I chimed the pleasantries expected of ‘well brought up’ Chinese teenagers. As for Sher-Dai, our tomboy of an eldest sister, she mumbled the meal salutations self-consciously, not looking at any elder in the eye. Is that what it’s going to be like when I turn 21? Hope not!

“Good children!” Grandma briefly flashed her over-white fake front teeth. “Everyone, eat, eat!” You could see she wasn’t comfortable sitting on the ground but she didn’t complain.

“This fish is perfectly steamed, Dil. Succulent and firm. Bravo!” Grandpa congratulated my mum on her impeccable culinary skills. Dil is short for daughter-in-law, his prized private joke. Ma opened another outsized vacuum flask and we had Peking duck with crispy skin to complement the cabbage with abalone and dried oysters.

The sun was setting quickly as it is wont to do in the tropics. Harmless little flying bugs buzzed about in the golden air while nasty mosquitoes, like enemy helicopters, waited to swoop down for their crimson evening meal. We habitually brushed our elbows, feet and ears every few seconds – just in case a mozzie had alighted silently.

“Jeh, when you going to bring home a girl, so we get another daughter-in-law?” Grandpa unexpectedly asked. Only Pa, Ma, and we children knew Jeh’s predilection for pretty men. Pa, Ma and Sher-Dai studied the stripes of the picnic rug while my brother and I looked expectantly at our dear uncle.

Even more unexpectedly my father spoke up: “Pa, your neck is going to lengthen if you’re still waiting for Jeh to bring home a bride.”

“Why?”

“Once and for all, accept the fact that your younger son does not like girls.” I thought Pa’s deliberate enunciation of the last few words was unnecessary and jarring.

Grandpa’s spluttering and coughing got us all alarmed. “Look what you did!” Ma scolded Pa, tapping his wrist with the back of her chopsticks. Sher-Win got up to whack Grandpa on the back, expelling a grain of rice from the old man’s bulbous ‘prosperity’ nose.

“He gotta know sometime. What’s the point of us pretending Jeh’s normal?”

“I’m not abnormal!” uncle protested. “Gayness is part of nature. Why can’t you just accept that?”

Mother tried to soothe Jeh. “Yes, yes, we know. It’s all good.” She rubbed her temple; I knew she was getting one of her frequent headaches again.

Grandma finally piped up: “You mean, you mean to say Jeh is really a homosexual? Tay,” she addressed Grandpa, “I knew it all along. But you refused to believe me.”

“Aaargghh!” Grandpa finally found his voice. “Why did you all not let me go to my grave with just a bit of doubt as to whether my younger son is gay? Why did y’all have to confirm it? Hai-yah!”

Sher-Dai, probably desperate to change the subject, blurted: “I’m joining the Army. And don’t any of you try to stop me!”

“What!” Pa exclaimed. “The Malays will eat you up alive. Don’t you know there are only three percent Chinese in the Army?”

“She’s strong; she can take care of herself,” Ma said quietly. I knew she didn’t approve of Sher-Dai’s decision but she always let us be who we were.

That was the last time we had a reunion in an unusual locale. Ma died of brain cancer before the two years were up and Pa did not have the heart to continue our little tradition. After the first year of mourning and non-celebration, it was just sedate reunion dinners at home from thereon. Sher-Dai carved an illustrious career in the Army; she reached the rank of colonel and she never got married. Uncle Jeh, on the other hand, ‘married’ his French boyfriend the year after Grandpa passed on.(1,034 words)

In memoriam -- Argus 1992-2004

2006-08-17T03:11:00.000-07:00

She was one swell dog.

Which vowels do you favour?
	A, because I'm a Type A personality and such achieve the most.
	E, it's the most used vowel. Hey, I'm an egalitarian, for-the-masses kind of person.
	I, i is for I, me and id. The world revolves around moi; heck, no, the universe revolves around me.
	O, because I'm sexy to the hilt. Yeah, the Story of O, all right!
	U, coz I care about you and you and you. Me, goodie two shoes and all that.

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