No yolking around

I have been self conscience about my weight this year and thought to myself: "NO MORE DISGUSTING EATING HABITS!"

So, I've been training myself to eat breakfast everyday now. Schedule consists of waking up at 7 in the morning, doing all of my personal hygiene routine, and making a light breakfast.

Today, well lets just say I tried to wake up at 7 but ended up waking a lot later than that and ended up being too lazy to attend my first class. So I had an hour to kill. I didn't want to eat left overs from yesterday's dinner which I did not have any, so I decided to make myself brunch.

I don't have anything in my fridge. Nothing, but have found some eggs, tomatoes, shallots, and some fresh herbs. Omelette it is. I used 3 eggs, but being health conscience, I used the egg whites instead, but left one yolk for flavouring. Extra virgin olive oil, shallots in the pan with some fresh thyme, tossed in the egg mixture, with fresh tomatoes and parmesan cheese, leaves you with this:



Okay, so it's not a perfect rounded omelette but it was tasty. Sooo sooo tasty.

Slurping is cultural...

I had a very lazy Wednesday afternoon, and wanted to go out for lunch. My friend suggested we go and be unhealthy and eat at the food court at Aberdeen Centre. For most of you who are not familiar with the Lower Mainland of Vancouver, AC is the ultimate Asian store. As I like to call it, the worst part of Richmond ever. (Some photos were from Google)


Seriously, if you want to get out of there alive, drive an SUV. Asian people are scared of big cars, especially in that ridiculous parkade. Anyways, we didn't exactly go to the food court as we planned, but instead went to the new place that's on the second level of AC, Chef Hung Taiwanese Beef Noodle. I was there the day of the grand opening, and it was packed. Literally. Line ups and at least an hour wait.


Like...holy crap. It's a good thing that I didn't want to venture during the first few days of the grand opening, so it was nice that my friend Suzi and I went on a slow day after lunch hours. I have to say that the decor of the place was lovely. Very mellow, modern, and yet has a flair of elegance. There is a VIP room, but there's a minimum cost for using it, at least $200 and a time limit of 1.5 hours. Not a choice of places to host a party, that's all I can say.


The service at the time we had wasn't that helpful. Usually you are served with tea when it comes to Chinese restaurants but we waited for about 10 minutes for tea and for a menu. When asked for a menu as she poured one cup of tea, she abandoned the other cup and left to get a menu. As she gave our menu, she completely forgot to pour the other cup with tea. Boo on you. As my friend Suzi and I looked at the menu, our mouths dropped. Food costs about $7 to $11 for an average sized bowl of noodles and soup, and the appetizers were small and ranged from $3 to $6. I'm that type of person who would pay good money for good food, but literally I can go to Tony's Beef Noodle House on Cambie and 41st and be satisfied.

Here at Chef Hung, the protocol is different. Each bowl of noodle is carefully analyzed before cooking. Chef Hung takes special care of the noodles before submerging it into the cooker. Noodles are fresh, and I can vouch for that because the first thing I smelled when walking pass the open kitchen was dough. All I could smell was dough, and it made me drool even more because I knew I was getting fresh noodles.

I ordered the Beef Brisket with THIN Noodle in Clear Soup


And Suzi ordered Sour Mustard Cabbage and Shredded Pork with THICK Noodle in Clear Soup.


I didn't have any of Suzi's, but with the faces she was making ( ^.^ ) ..I could tell it was good. I went to town on mine though. The soup was clean. No lies on what the menu was saying, and the noodles...OH DEAR GOD it was so yummy. Even the beef. So tender and it literally almost fell apart when I was picking it up with my chopsticks. The whole restaurant had the sound of slurping. Usually, the sound of slurping is a sign that the food is good, if it's silent, that means the food suck. I've always hated the sound of it, and didn't really believe in this whole myth of slurping if the food is good. I couldn't help myself, the food was that good.

So I slurped....and my stomach was full of noodle goodness.

3 AM and I'm feeling like eggs...

For some reason...Eggs have always been some sort of comfort food to me. Strange? To be honest...it's really good if you know how to make them the right way. I know, it's hard to eff up on making eggs but you'd be pretty surprised. For one thing, I can never make a perfect pair of sunny side up eggs. No joke. It's either the whites will run all over the place, forcing me to shove it back to a perfect shape, which causes the discolouration and rough look it gets. Another thing that I can never do perfectly is poach an egg for eggs benedict. Seriously. It's alot of work, and makes a huge mess. I applaud to those who can poach an egg for their first time and get it right, but I've been cooking for years and still can't get the hang of it.

But there is never one thing that you can mess up on when it comes to this fine yet disgusting ingredient, which is scrambled...and on top of that, an omelet. Omelets are simple. Take any ingredients you want in there, toss them in a pan with some extra virgin olive oil or butter, make the veggies or meats soft and pour in your beaten eggs. Open up "pockets" in the middle letting the liquid to run through and once you formed a solid bottom base you take the sides and fold them in. Oh!!! Don't forget the cheese. Always put the cheese in before folding the sides over, and you'll have yourself a nice healthy omelet.

I never knew how omelets could ever become an item for fine dining until recently. If you're a foodie lover, Food Network is like home base. We flip on that channel every single day and we can watch it for hours...(or at least me). I recently came across this new show called "Pitchin' In" whose host happens to be one of Canadian's finest chef, Lynn Crawford. As you might not know, Ms. Crawford has done exceptional work in both the Toronto and New York's Four Seasons as executive chef. I've been a fan of Ms. Crawford since watching my first episode of Restaurant Makeover. The way she moved around the kitchen and the way she emphasize on letting flavours come out of food in their own way was mesmerizing.

During her time in New York, she had a special item on her list that cost $1000. No. It's not $10 dollars and I forgot to put the decimal sign. It was literally one thousand dollar. And it was an omelet. A lobster with caviar omelet. I was baffled at the fact that she would charge that much for a small omelet with chopped up buttered lobster and a small tsp. of caviar, but at the same time, I was pretty damned impressed. I'm impressed at the fact that she can take a simple basic ingredient like eggs, and mix it with something luscious, making a simple dish to something exquisite. Would you ever thought of putting buttered lobster in your omelet for breakfast? I know I will next time, but then again, I'd probably just eat the whole lobster.

New Years, and nothing in the fridge...top ramen for lunch

Hello and welcome to my humble blog or as I like to a call it, a sanctuary for self-expressiveness. I've always had problems opening up to my thoughts and feelings, and thought that this blog can help. This blog is going to be about anything, whether to talk about my daily life, music that can change the world, fashion that can always be remembered and re-entered, and various things that strikes my interest. But one thing that I originally planned, was to make this blog a place where I can express my love for food, dining experience and cooking experience.

My love for food began at home. My family has owned 3 restaurants while growing up in a small town called Mount Vernon in the state of Washington. They owned a small breakfast/lunch diner, a Mexican restaurant, and of course a Chinese restaurant. Being a kid and getting to go eat whatever I can get my hands on was like being a kid at a candy store. Everyday after school since I can remember, I would arrive to the stinging feeling of onions being peeled and chopped, the heat of the wok, the sound of the deep fryer, and the smell of authentic Chinese food. The restaurant was literally my second home. I spent everyday and almost every weekend there, and learned to appreciate the industry and also learned to appreciate cooking.

My first experience cooking started at the age of 6, when I got invited to bake cookies at a friend's house. Her grandmother at that time was visiting and babysat while the parents went to work. I had the privilege of meeting this wonderful woman as she taught me a valuable lesson about baking and about life.

"Practice and a little bit a love will result in something wonderful."

To this day, I take that quote and apply it to everything that I do, school, work, relationships, and of course cooking.