Unlike previous year, this year kids started playing with their lantern one week before Mid Autumn Festival which falls on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month. I have not been buying lanterns for them for about 3 years now. The paper lanterns we had from previous year and the year before is still around. Every year, I have to rant the same thing. How come the rest of the kids all hiding in the house? How come I don’t bump into any kids carrying lantern in the neighborhood? So no fun at all.

My Sister & Nephew

Come to think of that, my own children especially the 8 y/o was not that keen to play with lantern this year. She have the guts to tell me this, “Mummy, I play for 5 minutes only, ok? Later I want to watch Teevee already.” There she goes, at least she fulfilled her culture needs as a Chinese. Can someone please invent a 2 in 1 lantern with a Teevee?

Kids have been playing with this Hello Kitty lantern for the past 3 years. This time, the evil Mummy purposely let the kids abuse the lantern so that they can have a new lantern next year. LOL!

Top left clockwise Bento belongs to Baby Princess, Eldest Princess, Daddy and Prince.

Food consist of Unagi & zucchini maki, edamame in skew and California strawberries which is 10x sweeter than Cameron Highlands strawberries. This, you have to agree with me, right?

Usually when I finished packing their lunch box in the morning, kids and Daddy will still be in bed by the time I left for work. I will layout all their bento boxes on the table. By now, kids are familiar with which-bento-belongs-to-who. I’m sure you are able to guess that too.

One of the weekend, I saw some fresh looking de-boned chicken drumstick from the wet market. I bought whatever he had on the counter and it cost me nearly RM60 as each drumstick cost about RM6 each and since the drumstick is all piled up, I underestimated the quantity. Why am I telling you all this? Nevermind.

Since I have so many de-boned chicken drumstick, I have to carefully plan and put them in individual container before freezing them. Remember that night when I cut the 1/4 of my finger nail? We had chicken chop for dinner. The rest of the drumstick I had them marinated in different ways. One of them is home skew chicken satay.

Recipe will come later when I blog about this one day. Please bear with me. *purposely make some people impatient*

I reserved two drumstick for adult (Hubby and Me la) bento as I planned to make something spicy.

Blend together chili + onions + garlic + thick coconut milk + salt + sugar. Everything goes into the freezer till I need to cook them.

Of course I have my faithful tupperware freezer-mate containers. *Any Tupperware enthusiastic fan? Please raise up your hand!* The night before, I will thaw them in the lower compartment in the fridge. Never thaw your poultry in room temperate to avoid food contamination.

To start off with the cooking, I have the marinated chicken grill in the oven for 30min at 200C. Discard drippings, flip chicken on the other side. If you have a bigger pan, place zucchini and onions on the side. If other wise, just dump everything on the chicken and all over it. Grill them furhter at 180C for 20mins.

I would prefer my chicken, onion and zucchini to burnt a little but I was running out of time. I had the base garnish with alfalfa. I have to remind Daddy to finished up all the alfalfa as they are such a healthy food ($$$). To Mummies out there who is still breastfeeding, eat lots of alfalfa to enhance milk production. I BF Baby Princess for 24 months. All thanks to alfalfa. If not because of my trip to States, I think I will still continue to BF her longer. OUT OF TOPIC ALREADY!!!

For dessert, we had a peach each.

I love the classic looks on this stainless steel Thermos bento box. The insulation bag is the one that attracts me the most and of course, it is a promotional products during July sales.

A friend from States, Phuong, whom I known thru my blog requested me to send some mooncake mould to her about 2 months ago. While buying stuff for her, I get some of the props for myself too. I bought 2 different design and shapes of mooncake mould and a packet of Red Man jelly powder.

This is my way of cooking without refering to the cookbook. The jelly mooncake turned out quite ok but still need some room of improvement.

Ingredients:

• 1 packet of Red Man jelly powder (or any brand that you favour)
• approximately 200ml of coconut milk (I emptied a box of pre-packed coconut milk)
• 1 liter of water
• 180gm sugar
• colouring

For the filling:

Mung beans (pre-soaked for 6 hours. Sprinkle a teaspoon of sugar on it before steaming them for about 20minutes till done)

Red beans (pre-soaked for 6 hours before cooking under slow fire or crock pot with sugar for about 1.5 hours till done)

Method:

1. Mashed mung beans and red beans using a shieve. Discard any husk from the red beans that can’t be mash.
2. Boiled approximately (cos I just simple pour half of them in the pot) half of the 1liter water into a pot and half of the sugar into the pot. Emptied 1 packet of jelly powder into pot and stir them under medium fire till dissolved and boiled.
3. Scoop 1 ladle of mixture into the mung beans and 1 ladle of mixture into the red beans. Stir to mix mixture evenly. Now this is a quick multi-tasking.
4. Pour the remaining water and sugar into the pot again and cook till boiled. While waiting,
5. transfer the mung beans and red beans on a plate and cool them in the freezer to save time.
6. Back to the mixture, once boiled, emptied a box of coconut milk and stir. Switch fire to the lowest possible.
7. Separate mixture into 2 pot with 2 different colourings. I used natural food colouring for red. That is beetroot and since I have nothing for the orange, I used edible colouring. Discard beetroot once you get the colour you desire.

1. Pour mixture into your mooncake mould about 0.5cm height only. Cool them in the freezer to safe time.
2. Remove from freezer after about 5minutes. Transfer back to freezer if mixture is not harden yet.
3. Cut out filling according to your mould size as in the picture.
4. Place the paste on the centre. Arrow is indicating the base of the jelly. Remember to use a fork to make scarring on the surface of the jelly so that the first layer (base) and second layer will stick together. Remember your fire is still burning on low? Never let the jelly mixture cool down or else, they won’t stick to the first layer too. Now that you have finished with the paste and such, this is the time to switch off the fire. This is the full view of the mould.
5. Pour the remaining jelly mixture in the mould covering the paste.
6. Cool them in freezer to safe time. LOL. I am so impatient right?
7. Cut and serve.

This is the red square jelly mooncake using beetroot as colouring:

The cut out showing the red bean paste:

Towards the ending when I have not enough mixture for one mould, I just mix together what I had and came out with a multi coloured mooncake.

Even the paste is mixed:

Mission accomplished!

The adults love them but my two kids discard the bean paste and just eat the jelly. Actually I don’t like the paste too. haha! You should try making this jelly mooncake. Very easy only.

… of not so interesting kids bento. Muahahaha!

Bento # 35

No fancy looking cut out bread cos Mummy didn’t want to end up eating the leftover from the cutout. Bluek. Just a simple bread + butter + sugar in it. Yummy! I had this combination when I was young. Once I introduce them to the kids, they have been asking for more. I pack a piece of chocolate and a piece of mushroom cheese too.

Bento #36

At other days, I try to do something cutesy for the kids. Yes, and they get cut out breads. Instead of me, I will get no. 1 eat the left over from the cut out. Such a evil Mummy!

Bento #37

Many people was alarmed when they read the article on New Straits Times as they claimed cereal is not as healthy as they claimed. I already know that long time. Don’t you realized cereals like Kellog’s Frosties or even Honey Star contained lots of sugar? I still buy Honey Star for kids but never, NEVER buy Frosties cos the sugar coating on the cereal is very thick and way too sweet for my liking. I can tell you, there is nothing healthy to eat nowadays. Just strike a balance in their diet. There are so many cereals out there – cornflakes (more natural) Koko Crunch (more on fats), Quaker range (I love those). But hey, munching on cereal is better than munching on tidbits, right? At least we don’t consume that much MSG in tidbits.

Back to the bento, no. 1 insisted on buying this High School Music (HSM) bento box even though she already had a similar one. The only different is the prints on it which is a Disney Princess. I know she will be very sad if I don’t buy them for her cos she is totally nuts over HSM. Finally I gave in after trying my luck to coax her out of it just because iHSM too! But I told myself, if she is not using them, no.2 can always use them (without her notice la!) cos it is blue.

There are a few success attempt to sneak the box into No. 2’s bag. Hopefully Disney don’t come out with a new colour (i.e. PINK!) or else no.1 will bug me again. *URGH!*

This is my first time attending a Bento Party! Or was it the first bento party ever held in PJ/KL? I doubt so. We had a marvelous time on Saturday. All thanks to Patricia and Emily who take the effort to organize the party and they even took the trouble to held a little competition for us. All together, there is 21 participants + 2 organizers.

Yours Truly & Patricia

Patricia’s 16 y/o *ahem* Daughter & Emily

Patricia’s lovely Daughters aka Official Photographer *ahem*

I must say a big thank you to Sue and other contributors (sorry, don’t know who else contributed the item) as all attendees was given a goodies bag filled with stuff like Clinique samples, Kikkoman soy sauce, cookbook, popcorn, cookie & sausage cutter, bento box, cake-mix, etc.

Frankly speaking, I do not know who’s coming and who’s not. I was hoping I do not ended up staring at the ceiling and was hoping to meet someone familiar. I was glad Sue from Cooking Momster and Christene from All Things Purple sat right opposite me as co-incidentally they are the only two blogger that I know.

Sue, Christene & Yours Truly

The thing that excite me is the cupcake. They was bought/contributed by a food blogger from Ipoh. I need Pat to confirmed om this.

Look at all those cutesy sushi cupcake. So adorable can die!

Food from the buffet spread.

I hearts tempura prawn! Too bad everyone is only allowed to take one. The bento competition goes like this. Everyone put some food from the buffet spread on your plate, then goes back to your place and pack the food into a bento box that is provided to all. The best presented bento win a prize.

And the competition starts with everyone taking 4:3:2:1 – 4 portion of rice, 3 pcs of chicken, 3 pcs of maki, 2 tempuras and veges.

Contestants was seen busy with their masterpiece.

Terri

Forgot her name. *paiseh* & Christine

SueSue

Packed food was then photograph for judging later. We then ate what was packed in our bento box.

My Masterpiece

Christene and Terri waiting for their masterpiece to be photographs

While I was processing this picture, my daughter exclaimed loudly, “WAH!” She said that really loud!

I was jealous cos Daughter never Wah that loud at my bento! Fyi, this bento belongs to Christene. Nice right? Full of accessories like baran, sauces bottle and silicon cup.

There are lots more other bloggers sited on the next table. The place is a bit squeezy to move around so I better sit kwai-kwai plus I was kinda shy to go round snapping pictures plus, plus the place is too orangy! I really hate photographing under orange light.

lalala… I am so out of words today.

lalala… I think I shouldn’t continue writing rubbish.

lalala… Gave kids the cupcake instead. And guess what?

Biasalah tuuuuuu…. who can resist cutesy things?

Eight years ago before I had the so-called privileged of surfing net, I used to have lots of reading material with me – Reader’s Digest, Motherhood, Parenthood, various type of woman’s magazine, etc. To kill time, I love to cut up those little free sample coupon or discount coupon from the magazines and not forgetting, entering lots of contests.

One of the many contests that I was actively participate is the Parenthood magazine. Many a time, photographs of Eldest Princess was selected. The prizes I’ve won previously consist of the usual kids stuff for example Johnson & Johnson and Pigeon hamper. Somehow, the frenzy just stop at no. 1. I can’t recalled things that happened at those time. How weird.

Four years ago, I started surfing the internet and was hooked on it. When no. 3 came along, I was too busy surfing that I’ve almost drown aka addicted la. I don’t even bother to flip any magazines at all. I have WHOLE lot of interesting stuff to read on the internet.

So sorry for the long winded post. I am trying to get to the point as soon as possible. Still working my way there. LOL. Now let’s talk about my next-door-sister. While she is expecting her first child, I pass over the old copies of Parenthood magazines to her. And thereafter, she has been buying the new edition every month. One day…. no. 3 came to me with a copy of the September edition. It takes a while for me to realized she is trying to get my attention on the magazine. She kept on pointing to a picture printed on the magazine but was wordless as how to relate it to me. She is still babbling while point to the picture! So I took a closer look at it and to my surprises……

(I am finally done with the bushes. phew)

I still couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw her pic on the magazine!

Oh, it was nothing *blushing*

My Sis send in her photograph for a contest without my knowledge and she won a Fiffy hamper too.

It then reminds me eight years ago….. (scroll up and repeat reading the first paragraph)

I have been getting this “Error 99” not long after I purchased my Canon 400D. Thinking it was only a small problem, I just brush them at a side. Fyi, “Error 99” is a general error. Whenever “Error 99” shown on the LCD screen, all I need to do is switch the power off and on again or removed the battery and slot them back again. While I was holidaying in Port Dickson, the error was so dramatic. I have to repeatedly switch them off and on for the fifth time before they could function again! A bit worrying, I asked my sifu about “Error 99”. Looks like all along, I was so wrong to take the problem lightly. He had this same problem before and had his camera repair for RM400! I cringe when someone talking about money. As my camera is still under warranty, I decided to send them back to Canon.

Now, these people in Canon sure knows how to boiled my fire (foh kwan – cantonese).

First Visit

When I bring in my Canon 400D, I checked with them if they want me to leave the 50mm lens with them cos the problem might be coming from the body or the lens. They say no need. Just the body will do. In the afternoon, they called me to send in my lens as the computer can’t find any fault in the body. They suspected the error could come from the lens. Of course I have to raise my voice, “TADI KATA TAK PAYAH LENS. SEKARANG MAU LENS. BERAPA KALI KENA JALAN NIIIIII!”

Second Visit

I bring in the lens. And this time I ask them if they want my kit lens. Adding that I rarely use my kit lens at all and the error usually occurred when I used the 50mm lens. After the Babe heard it, conveniently she said no need. So I left the Service Center with my kit lens leaving the 50mm there.

Two days later, I called them to check on the status of my lens. They said they still can’t find the fault in the body and 50mm lens. Now they suspect it could come from the kit lens. But, but, I RARELY USED MY KIT LENS AT ALL! Lazy to argue with them, I delivered my kit lens the next day. I already can’t eat and sleep without my camera so I beg Hubby to be a bit more efficient. Next day must send in!

Third Visit

Since the body and 50mm has no problem, they are ready to discharge from the ‘hospital’. And now, my kit lens that is rarely used was hospitalised. They suspect it could be the culprit. They will change the optical bla bla in it.

But HARLOW!!!!! I have never used that kit lens and the error came out only when I used the 50mm lens. How come Kit lens need to do a operation instead of the 50mm lens or the body? You get what I mean or not? Very not logic right?!

Then hor, story haven’t finish yet. I ask them now how since the error keep on coming out and they all can’t find the problem. What if (IF only! Touch wood!) after warranty period the camera decided to die on me. She say, “oh no worries” as they usually will give one week extended warranty after the service. But then, I have another 4 more months before my expiry date. What is the point you give me one week only! Get what I mean? Huh! Huh!  One week has passed and I still can’t figure out all this thing.

SO NOT LOGIC leh!

Left to right: Baked beans, homemade fishballs (it was given to me by a relative), tomatoes, chicken ham and potatoes with a squirt of Kewpie mayonnaise. aitelyu, once you have tried Japanese mayonnaise you will never go back to other imported brands!

Bought this new Bento box from Tupperware during their July promotion.

What I love most is the saucer container that came with a lid to avoid spillage during transporting.

And another thing, it is microwaveable. Good for Daddy as he preferred his food to be hot. That way, he can just pop the lunch box into the microwave at his work place.

For the kiddos, I packed them ham sandwiches instead of rice and had the potatoes mashed finely to go with the bake beans.

p/s to Daddy only: Picture number 1 is the proof that you’ve lost the food separator. I don’t care. You lost it, you pay!