We have finally cook all our frozen food stock in the freezer, only left some fish and prawn which my BIL has re-stocked it for us when we were in Kuantan last month end. I feel so terrible for not cooking proper chinese meal for hubby for a long time. Yes I have been feeding him and my niece with noodles, porridge, fried rice and noodles, noodles and noodles.

Its time to cook something good. BIL bought really huge prawns and its so fresh, I decided to steam it instead.

Here’s how I prep the prawns. First  must clean the prawns. Use scissors to trim the feelers and the legs.

Then use the scissors to cut the top part of the prawn. Start at the end of the head until almost to the end of the tail.  Eww eww.. look at the green vein. yuck!! Nasty nasty nasty duck shit green colour wan!!!!!  Remove the vein and wash the prawn again.

Then slice some ginger and place it on the plate. This one is Old Ginger.. ‘Lou giung’. I dont care about peeling the skin off

Stuff the prawn with finely chopped garlic and chilli padi, add some Xiao Shing Rice Wine, a pinch of salt, a teaspoon of premium soy sauce, a teaspoon of sesame oil.

Put in steamer with boiling water and steam for 5 -7  minutes depending on the size of the prawn.

Voila!!! Serve hot!

(photo: Very delicious prawn, that looks great after it is cooked, vibrant red colour)

Sorry la, photo missing, I describe my prawn can already. Only realize did not take a photo, only left with prawn shells   Sudah makan luuuuuuuuu

I need some decadent sweet fix in my diet. Too much brain drain thinking of my 9Dao and I have come to my new terms only for that day : Idontcareabout myweight. So I decided to make Tiramisu which I have been putting off making one since last year. Since my niece Jessminn is here, it had been fun making one together.

Its our first time making a tiramisu. We did not follow exactly the recipe we found online. Just pick it up here and there and try our luck.

We use 5 eggs grade C. Can’t even get a grade A eggs from Tesco when we were there doing our monthly shopping . 

Separate the egg yolk and white.  Jessminn did a great job on that! Thumbs up

Add in about 1 cup of superfine sugar and beat separated egg yolks and sugar until well mix. The outcome looks like thickened pale egg mixture.

Add Mascarpone Cheese about 250gm. Beat again until creamy and well blended.

Wash the mixer very clean and pat dry. Beat the egg whites in a separate pot/bowl like you’re doing a meringue, without sugar.

Test the stiff egg whites if its ready by turning over the pot above your head. Its not falling down at all!!

Back to the mascarpone cheese mixture, add a teaspoon of dissolve gelatin and mix evenly.

Then fold in the egg whites and fold in gently.

We forgot about the cream, so just add some here. Wrong method, should add before the egg whites. wahahahha

Whipping the thickened cream and spill the coffee. What a mess!!!

This is the packet of ladyfingers I bought a couple of months back, err maybe last year. .. I can’t remember

Dip the ladyfingers quickly into the coffee in split-second (fast fast) and arrange it on the rectangular dish and fill up the gap if there’s any.

Pour half a portion of the marcarpone cheese mixture on top of the ladyfingers until fully covered.

Another ingredient to show off.  Unsweetened cocoa powder, Kahlua on the background.

I use my superclean fingers, sprinkle the cocoa powder on top of the mascarpone cheese mixture.

Line a second layer of the dipped ladyfingers.

 You can see some of the lady’s finger are quite dry right? Coz coffee not enough but that’s okay. At this point, I add Kahlua on top of the ladyfingers. (Actually its not strong enough, next time I use Cointreau better)

Pour the remaining mascarpone cheese mixture and smoothen the edges until covered evenly.

Sprinkle cocoa powder on it generously.

 Keep in fridge overnight.

Tadaa!!!! The outcome!!!

THE MESS!!!

But its worth it.

Absolutely Delicious Tiramisu.

 Special Thanks to Jessminn for the help and the fun.

  I need a break. I really do. A spa treatment would be really nice!!

Over the past weekends like I said, I’ve been talking to contractors and going to the our new house – lets call it my 9Dao for now. This is not the first house I bought, but its the first one we have major renovation to do.  I’ll give my house a new name once we have renovated it to our likings.

Last weekend we did the same thing, going to our 9Dao several times and this time we getting some input from Hubby’s friend, one of them is an ID guy and another one a civil engineer who has renovated 2 house of his own and learnt a great deal from the renovation experiences. The more we talk to people the more ideas we got and now they even asking us whether we ever thought or utilising the high ceiling of the airwell space and make it like a Loft.

Hubby wasn’t so interested in the idea, but having a space like that will add value to the home we bought. Our 9Dao will be able to fetch higher asking price compare to our neighbours if one day we decide to sell it and move to bigger homes.

How long do you intend to stay in the house you bought? 5 years or 10 years?  Right now I am just looking at 5 – 10 years if that’s possible.

Is that too short?

Maybe??

But I’ll  like to stick to my little thoughts here, to DREAM BIG!!

Its never easy to have a dream house when you have unlimited ideas but working on very limited budget. To decide on a house to buy is never easy, but renovating a house is even harder. It involves a lot of cash and one wrong decision can set us back  thousands of Ringgit which we cannot afford to make.

What we want in our mind does not mean what the contractor understand. I’ve been so stressed out lately that I felt like my blood pressure has shoot up. Talking to the contractor for the 2nd time today to change the renovation layout after cracking my heads for many nights. When the contractor telling me my bathroom cannot be bigger than what I wanted, I was about to faint. No.. I have not engaged him yet, he is a very detailed contractor and I am not complaining. It hurts when there are so many limitations due to the house main structure. 

There are still many things to consider, especially renovation based on feng shui principles.  I can’t say I am a feng shui narcissist but I do pay 800MYR  and booked the Feng Shui master 2 months in advance . What I need from the master was to guide us on what directions we should avoid and which direction Hubby and I should sleep or where to place the stove, the door etc.

That’s my  intention. Really!!

However everything has changed since the consultation. I believe its for the better and the layout of the house will be improved tremendously. It means - giving me more ideas to work on  especially when there’s a chance we will be extending the Master bedroom to be even larger than its already are. A study room, or a powder room, or even larger closet???? I can’t think straight now.

I need a scrap book to put the ideas down and do my space planning. My minds gone wild!

P/S: Should I put a mini fridge under the staircase? How about custom made wine shelf?

 I love chopping block like this. Have been searching for one for quite a long time, didn’t get those sold at Ikea as the price is really expensive and the quality is just not as good as I would have preferred.

Saw this at ‘I forgot the Kitchen shop name’ and its sold for RM75!!  Its expensive but compare to the one sold at Ikea RM95 this one was way better. Didn’t hesitate to buy this at all and went home happily.

So happy with the purchase and pass the bill to hubby, implied “you want your wife to cook? buy her nice chopping block”