Tuesday, January 20, 2009

[recipe] Green beans + Sliced Almonds

- Melt a tiny bit of butter
- Toast 1/4 cup sliced almonds at medium heat for a few minutes. One cannot have too much toasted sliced almonds though. Salt and pepper the almonds.
- When it smells really good, remove and set aside.

- With some olive oil + butter -- Stir fry green beans. Salt and pepper. This will take a few minutes.

- Turn off heat and stir in almonds.

Green beans = by-the-book healthy. Toasted almonds = by-the-book addictive.

[recipe] Sesame Seared Tuna

- Pat dry tuna steaks, rub a bit of sesame oil, and cover in sesame seeds
- Seared on high heat with a little olive oil, a couple of minutes per side

- Sauce: Can buy Ponzu sauce, or, take 2 part low-sodium soy sauce, then 1 part sweet (honey / brown sugar) and then 1 part sour (rice wine vinegar / lemon), plus dash of sesame oil. Sliced green onion or cilantro will make it look pretty, if not just throw some sesame seeds in there.

- To serve: Slice tuna, dip in sauce, enjoy.

Impressive looking, delicious, and ridiculously easy.

[recipe] Smoked Salmon Bites

1. Smoked salmon (that we got from Seattle)
2. Whipped cream cheese
3. Low-fat wheat thins

- Cream cheese on wheat thins
- Flake off smoked salmon and pile on top of cream cheese
- Add secrete ingredient (or not), I tried and liked: Fresh black pepper, lemon, honey. Guessing sundried tomatoes, roasted red bell pepper, capers, would work well too.

Colorful and fast appetizer perfect for 2 or 20.

Monday, January 05, 2009

[trip] Shanghai

Where: Shanghai - Pudong
When: 2008.12.21 - 2008.12.28
Pudong Champs Elysse Condominium Complex, next to Tong Mao Hotel

- Going to bed in my coat, jeans, and socks. Yes, it was that cold.
- Walking to buy breakfast with Uncle Peter every morning at 8am
- Bowl of 30 mini wontons for 75 cents. OMG.
- Trying the thousand layer pancake from all three vendors
- The cops that busted breakfast vendors at 8:30am
- Dad raving about the KC Worm that lives forever
- Um, you may want to read dosage instruction before downing that glass of Reversitall ...
- Mom going home with tons of sunflower seeds and Lindor chocolate balls
- Pick your own live chicken / duck / pigeon and ready to take home in 5 min
- Enjoying a sparkling pool heated to a perfect 28C -- All by myself
- Striking up a conversation with the pool lifeguard about life and economics
- Dad making Pierre do his secret exercise trick -- c'mon dad, you mean, the basic horse stance?
- Yes, that chinese sign really says "Massage by the Blind", in 200 point font
- Number 5 and number 6 please
- 1 hour full body massage. $8.
- Nothing like a glass of cold beer after a nice swim
- Checking out Uncle Richard and Auntie Tina's Rock Sculpture collection
- Discovering a Brazilian restaurant in the underground shopping plaza -- along with cheap beer, fee pool tables, and clean bathroom -- what a haven
- Pulling out enough white hair to make a beard for a very small santa
- OMG internet connection totally doens't work on my laptop (for three days!)
- "The Day The Earth Stood Still" -- with really strange English subtitles - an secrete unreleased screenplay?
- An amazing meal at the Marriot, with our private room, with two dedicated servers, for 8 people -- for $130. Seriously?
- Highly addictive pineapple pancake and paper thin fried beef fillet
- Who knew beer ice slush can taste so good!
- Taking a million pictures of Pudong from the Bund - And that Blimp!
- How many of these D&G shirts do you have? I'll take them all.
- Good cop bad cop bargaining for four pairs for tennis shoes
- How about 350 for this 8GB SD card? How about 300? 250? 200? What price do you want?
- Having lunch at Pierre's great great grand aunt's house. The best and warmest lunch of all!
- Oh no, I lost my right glove! Haha, you lost your right glove too!
- All the fancy games on PSP - and we played original Road Rash for 3 hours instead
- The dude who bought a bottle of Johnny Walker Black from the in-flight duty free cart, and drank half of it, while telling us about Milk Thistle