Where'd The Inner Chef Go?

"Do you cook a lot?" Gloria asked me this morning during one of our monthly Skype sessions (she's in Australia).

I rolled that question over my mind for a few seconds before answering, "Not as often as I used to."

When I lived on campus, I used to cook real food like pasta, fried rice, Japanese curry with potato cubes and sliced carrots, fancy ramen (fried ramen coupled with vegetables, eggs and meat), bacon spaghetti, chicken curry, and more. I never ventured out to cook authentic cultural dishes like nasi lemak, chow kuey teow, pan mee and other stuff that I missed from home, but I was able to fill my tummy each night with the simple things.

The fact that I had roommates actually motivated me to cook almost every day. Sometimes I'd cook for them too. When I went to live with Rob and Dina over the weekend, I'd cook for them and Rob used to joke about how he hated the preparation process, of having to dice carrots and marinate the meat and all that. You prepare for an hour, and you finish the meal in 10 minutes. I told him I didn't mind preparing or cooking, and I really didn't, because it was worth it when people were around to appreciate my food.

Living alone in NYC has changed a lot of things. Because I don't have anyone to cook for apart from myself, I don't feel the urge to make a nice meal. I can settle for the easy stuff. Cooking feels like a chore. I don't know where my inner chef disappeared to. It all started when I did my first fashion internship a few months ago. I would get home around 7.30 PM, exhausted from a long day at work (and the hour-long commute contributed to my laziness too) and the last thing I wanted to do was cook. So I'd reach for the quickest thing that would fill me up: a bowl of cereal or ramen. 

I know that fringes on a very unhealthy lifestyle, so I'm trying to cut down on ramen and cereals for dinner. I thought I'd give salads a shot, despite my lack of enthusiasm for raw lettuces. During my last grocery trip, I bought fresh vegetables, honey roasted almonds, croutons and some tuna. Still not a huge fan of salads... but they're way healthier than ramen.

Every now and then, I pick up the spatula and produce a simple dish that isn't ramen. Just before I sat down to blog about this, I made spaghetti with garlic, eggs and leftover vodka sauce. It was surprisingly good. It won't earn a Michelin star, but it's good enough.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I used to enjoy cooking. Not anymore. Maybe things will change. Maybe one day I'll find my inner chef again.

Relax, Take It Easy

I'm not a big Mika fan but that song is stuck in my head. It rained all day so I stayed in and edited photos from yesterday's photoshoot.

We found a row of abandoned chairs lined against a spray-painted wall and decided it'd be cool to shoot there. While photographing, an old Chinese woman came over and started asking a bunch of questions in Cantonese. Neither Stephen or Melwin could understand her, so I tried conversing with her for a little while despite my terrible Cantonese. I thought she owned the place, so I asked for her permission to photograph in that area. She didn't seem to understand me (and I didn't seem to really understand her either) because after several minutes of talking, I gathered that: 1) she didn't own the place, she was just a curious passer-by and 2) she thought I was asking to photograph her.

Okay, so Cantonese isn't my strongest language. Lol.

Minutes after she left, a random dude popped up and asked if he could join us for some photos. Talk about a very happening photoshoot! Definitely a photoshoot to remember.

For dinner, we dined at A Casa Fox. It was my first time sampling Latin American food, and I fell in love. The tapas were delicious. I'll have to write about this in my food blog... which needs serious updating. It's not dead, people. It's coming back to life in a few days. I promise.

Anyway, ever since Melwin and Stephen told me about The Doughnut Plant, I'd been obsessed. The donuts aren't ordinary donuts. They come in a variety of crazy flavors: creme brulee, vanilla bean, peanut butter & jelly, oatmeal, pistachio, you name it. The closest shop was closing at 8, and we left A Casa Fox at 7.36PM. I remember this because I glanced at the clock as we were racing out of the restaurant to get to the shop. We literally ran there and arrived just 6 minutes before it closed, and then sat outside and shared the donuts.

It was a nice end to my weekend. :)

Blessed

Last weekend, I headed up to the mountains of Poconos with a group of friends from Times Square Church to celebrate Mae's birthday. Mae organized the trip. It was a refreshing retreat away from the hustle and bustle of New York City, and into the peaceful realm of nature. The rental house that we stayed at was situated among the trees and beside a large lake.

We arrived at the rental house slightly after 10PM. The sky was illuminated by the silvery glow of the moon and a rich sprinkling of stars. As the chilly night breeze enveloped us, we sat around the bonfire that the guys had successfully created from the chunks of wood and branches on the ground. And for the first time in my life, I roasted marshmallows. It was so much fun! I kept thinking, "Oh, so this is what I've been missing." Glad I was finally able to put an end to that. 

One of my friends brought glow sticks! We had a miniature "rave" party around the fire.

SunYoung, Mae, Chloe, Adam, me, Joy, Sean, Helena and Kay

Sean and Kay brought out the guitar and we all started worshiping. There we were, in the middle of the woods, just singing praises to Him and thanking Him for His blessings. The best worship stems from the heart, out of earnest desire for His grace.

Jon's artwork was achieved by decreasing my camera's shutter speed.

When we returned to the house, we sang Mae "Happy Birthday" and brought out cake! But since it was way past midnight, no one was really in the mood for sugar so we packed the cake back into the refrigerator after the birthday song. Lol.

The next morning, we gathered around the balcony for breakfast and a nice time of fellowship. 

Adam, Jon and Kay

Despite the afternoon rain, we couldn't resist a good game of badminton.

Chloe's game face

Kay and Sean, the wonderful couple

Half of them were Koreans, so I actually got to learn a bit of Korean over the weekend :) My goal is to converse fluently in Korean at the end of the year. We'll see about that!

For lunch, my friends cooked up a feast! While Jon cooked curry in the kitchen, Joy and May roasted pork and shrimps on the grill.

And the rest of us busied ourselves with the preparations. My task was peeling potatoes and de-skinning shrimps. Lol.

While waiting for lunch to be ready, I snacked on some crackers and tortilla chips. I mean, they were right there and I was hungry. Haha. 

Finally, lunch was ready. We sat around the table in the balcony and enjoyed a delicious meal of rice and curry, roast pork, salad, hot dogs and spicy shrimps on sticks. My friends could really cook! 

The hearty lunch left us with swollen bellies. So we hopped on a boat and explored a bit of the lake.

Such a beautiful weekend with an awesome bunch of people. Celebrated Mae's birthday, took a boat ride on the lake, roasted marshmallows and captured a plethora of precious moments. Truly a blessing!