We Are Loved

DH and my dear K went to Malaysia to process K's ID and visited my mother-in-law the day before yesterday and returned with tons of stuff. Supplying us with plenty of food that is enough to feed the whole neighborhood for months has been the habit of my dear M-I-L. She lives in Malaysia therefore we don't see her often, that has not stopped her from passing things for us and despite our efforts to reason with her that we would not be able to consume all those things that she gives us, she keeps on pouring us with lots and lots of food nearly every few months. By food, it included all sort of fruits, vegetables, dry food and frozen food as well. Occasioanlly we get fish, chicken and pork too.

In the past, it has been our practice to curb what she gave us, but that only worked a little bit, we eventually gave up and let her do what she loves to do. We do not want to hurt feelings, in case our request is misunderstood. We are aware that she does it out of love and she only has good intentions towards us.



My mother in law is really a wonderful lady with a gigantic generous heart. She loves DH dearly, and she loves DH's family so much as well, although we hardly communicate with her due to language barrier. Motherly or grandmotherly loves obviously are unspoken but real. And yesterday, we were loaded with all sort of tropical fruits like including rambutans and mangosteen and .... well, many others. From her garden, she gave us cassava too.



So here are the mangosteens. They are not too attractive looking from the outside but the inside is so gorgeously white. The rind is thick and deep reddish purple, when ripe, the edible white part is delicate and tastes sweet. My K fell in love with them. They are luscious!

For Love

Under normal circumstances and if I were single, I would never cook something like that - in the picture - Indonesian style Fried Noodles. First of all, I dislike big noodles, I don't take spaghetti or any big size noodles especially if they are round instead of flat. They kind of remind me of worms (sorry!). Second, I am not into any dark color noodles, widely sold in this island. I was disappointed by them many times before, because I constantly expected such color would represent rich taste and I found them to be bland and rather tasteless.

Just last week, I discovered that my two teenage daughters love this Indonesian style fried noodles. The school canteen, apparently, has been offering this dish. And because I love my family, I cooked this.

Unlike the fried noodles that I stumbled into here by some unfortunate events, Indonesian fried noodles are really rich in taste. Sweet soy sauce and fish sauce contribute to the both sweet and saltiness of the dish. Sauteed crushed garlic, onion, tomatoes and chili prior to mixing the noodles. Eggs, sliced chicken and fish cake as well as chopped green vegetables complete the beautiful taste of this dish. For final touch, some drops of lime juice will even perfect it further.

Es ist köstlich. It is delicious - in German. Random!

Marble Memory

When I was small, my mom used to make marble cake. In fact, if my memory serves me right, she only only baked marble cake and Ontbijtkoek, a Dutch Spice Cake, no other type of cake. My mom was Dutch educated, she conversed in Dutch with some of her friends, she sang some Dutch songs and she had some Dutch admirers too before she married my dad. She had many Dutch stories to tell too, many of which are no longer in my memory, I was way too young to remember.

We didn't use any electric mixer, we didn't have one back then, 3oo years ago. I remember the big glass bowl that we used and how we took turn beating the eggs and sugar. Occasionally the cake ended up being stuck badly on the pan, but we enjoyed the moment and ate with our little hands straight from the pan. It was fun, it was a wonderful memory.



I am glad that marble cake is our family favorite now. I don't use the same recipe my mom used in the past. My sort-of-pound-cake recipe is much simpler and has a better success rate and everyone likes it better. And last night, we baked another marble cake. Happy memory!

Tower

We spent a couple of hours at the Universal Studios, Orlando before we headed out and had lunch at Bubba Gump at the Universal City Walk. We had this tower of onion rings as appetizer. We thought they were presented interestingly, don't you think so too?

Hungry Koi?

Koi fish are lovely looking. This picture was shot in Orlando, in one of the Chinese restaurants we visited when we were there. The ponds that they had were not big, but filled with tons of koi fish and they looked aggressively hungry. I could be wrong, I do not know much about fish. We used to have koi ponds here in the complex where we live, but they are all gone. A while back we received a letter from the management requesting people to stop feeding them with their food, as the fish became sick. I, guess, rescue effort has failed, now the ponds are completely drained. I am looking forward to seeing they will do with them.

Kisses Up There

Even the lamp-posts are shaped like Hershey kisses in Hershey.

Her Shadow

When we were heading to Providence to pick up our dear Miss L from Brown University and stopped by at Yale for a quick look around the campus and its neighborhood. I found these pictures when I went through my Yale folder today.

Clue: she likes sushi, she likes Italian food and cheese, she likes taking pictures of her two fingers, flowers and bees. And I apparently, she loves taking pictures of her shadow too! At least she didn't bug me when she was bored that day in Yale.

Heavy Decision...

I had been wanting to have two of those three books for months. I was in many bookstores in many states in the USA when I traveled last month and kept on wanting to buy these books but was not sure if I should get them since they are quite heavy. (We tried to travel light and completely failed!! ) It came across my mind to order from Amazon and had them delivered to one of the hotels we were staying at towards the end of the trip, so we did not have to carry them around. (Delivering them to this country is pricier!)

After almost continuously delaying it, with DH as my cheerleader, I finally ordered those three books and a silpat and had them delivered to Providence. Delivery charge was free because they were qualified for that, Amazon has this arrangement all the time, I believe. It was a good bargain, I love good bargains! Who doesn't???

Those books are now nicely stored on the shelf, waiting patiently for their new owner to flip through and start baking!!!

Crush

For a change, let's listen to a rising 17-year young star with beautiful voice, an American Idol alumni from Utah, Mr. David Archuleta. Click here to listen to his new debut single titled "Crush". The song was played at Z100 on Friday. Reviews have been favorable so far. The song is available on You Tube as well. His first album will be out in the coming weeks.

Are we crushed yet?

Wonderworks

This upside down building is another tourist attraction in Orlando, located at International Drive. Wonderworks is some sort of amusement park with more than 100 interactive exhibits. My two private investigators did a little research on the venue after we arrived and concluded that it was not the type of place that we would like to go to. Some reviews on the internet don't seem favorable as well. Well, taking pictures of it is harmless, it is interesting building irregardless. We used up our time visiting other amusement parks and other attractions.