Nutella 5kg

I was at Costco earlier to pick up some items that my mom asked me to buy for her when I stumbled upon this!



5 kilograms!! Isang balde!



I didn't even know they sold something this big at all! N-year supply of Nutella!

The Book Thief

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

Great book. It is fascinating because whenever we hear about World War II, the story would usually revolve around how evil the Germans were (mainly because of Hitler) and how the bad the Jews had it. This book though, was the first book that I read about the life of the Germans during the war, and how, not all of them agreed to the war and that there were those who showed sympathy for the Jews.

The book centers around the life of the book thief - Liesel Meminger, a young German girl, who lived with foster parents the Hubbermans. It tells of her life during the war, and how she made her life wonderful because of her thirst for reading.

I find that the book was quite confusing for me at first, and it started a little slow. However, it eventually picked up along the way and I found myself not wanting to put it down. I didn't shed some tears unlike when I was reading Silver Linings Playbook, but it touched my heart a whole lot, especially with the character of Hans Hubberman. He wasn't the great dashing war hero that one would usually see in movies or other books, but he was simply, a kind man.

I read this book knowing that it will be created as a movie soon, but all the while I thought it would be for next year. But imagine my surprise when after doing a simple google, I found out that it's actually going to be showing this November and has a trailer already!

And what can I say, oh wow. Something definitely to look forward to. I don't think it'll be a commercial success, but I think for those who like the drama, and perhaps for those who loved the book, may just enjoy this touching story showing in the big screen.

Watch the trailer here.

Can't wait!

Yahoo Changes

We all remember back in the days when Yahoo! was the tech giant and most people that I know had yahoo mail. But as Google slowly made it's way to the consumers, and yahoo slowly deteriorated, a lot started moving to Google's services, in particular - gmail. I was one of those. I signed up for a new personal gmail account and although I still have my decades old yahoo mail account, I decided that I will use gmail as my primary account, and ymail as my, secondary email account.

Over the years, while Google, Facebook, Apple thrived, Yahoo declined. According to this source, its share prices went as high as 118.75 back in 2000. And went down to as low as 8.11. Now it's hovering around 30, which is already a big improvement from two years ago before Marissa Mayer stepped in.

I've been fascinated by Yahoo recently because we've been seeing a lot of changes. Just earlier I saw the gui for their ymail changed again! And if you haven't noticed, they did change their logo recently as well. Another recent headliner was when CEO Marissa Mayer banned work from home for its employees! So that got me wondering who is this CEO?

And here I found a wonderful article about: Marissa Mayer

I have to admit, she's now one of my most admired women.

Rainy Saturday Treats and Eats

My rainy Saturday ended up being a day of eating.

Around 6 AM, I woke up to a hungry stomach so I prepared my sunny side up + almond chocolate drink.

I was feeling a bit restless at home so even though it was raining outside, I decided to go out for a walk straight to this small cafe around 1.5 kilometers away from my place. This was probably around 10 AM and I ended up trying out the hot chocolate plus a nice cinnamon roll. Yummy.

I went back home for lunch and then went out to the grocery to buy a few missing ingredients that I needed for my weekend project – Super Moist Carrot Cake! I ended up getting a whole lot more than what I needed for my baking though. I ended up getting ruffles! Talk about junk! Just tastes sooo yummy. I’ve been eating a ton of veggies lately, then I guess I’m entitled to have a splurge on junk every now and then?

Anyway…

Carrot Cake

For this weekend’s baking creation, I decided to try out the Super Moist Carrot Cake recipe from Sally’s Baking Addiction.

This is my first attempt. When I eat baked goods, especially cakes, I want it to be very moist, but not to the point of being a little too oily. Thus, just based on this recipe I picked, it sounds like I’ll be getting what I am hoping for, plus the fact that it is quite simple to make.

So here’s before we put it in the oven:

And this is the finished product:

 

It turned out yummy! Again, not too sweet, and not oily, and super moist!

The only problem that I had was that I used a smaller pan than the recommended size from the recipe. This meant that the suggested baking time may not be enough for my cake because at around 35 minutes, the center portion of the cake was still wet. I had to leave it again in the oven for another 15 minutes… I was worried because the carrot cake may end up too dry just because I wanted to get the inner section of the cake to bake! Good thing it didn’t!

I didn’t make the cream for now. Maybe on my next attempt! What I want to do next is to add one of my favorite ingredients to the carrot cake next time, chocolate chips!

By the way, we don’t finish everything each week. I end up giving a few of my friends the food, they do the taste test (like the siopao, banana bread).

food again

I kept myself busy this weekend by spending a lot of time in the kitchen, and in food related activities. Well, I did clean the bathroom, which I hate doing, but is a necessity anyway – in other words, no choice! Oh and I did go back down to the garage just to check if my bike’s back – but of course it’s not! I must be wishing!

And so instead of punishing myself for not getting better locks for my bike, I instead decided to move on by being a busy bee for the rest of the weekend. So here were the results:

Barley and Lentil Soup

I love making soup because it is very easy to make and at the same time, there are no rules… you can put in whatever you want, season it, and that’s it! But so far, my favorite soup to make is barley and lentil soup. I like barley because its texture is the same as rice and you know how we love rice! And it’s healthier than white rice too.

According to this livestrong article: Is Pearl Barley More Nutritional Than Rice? -

Including more whole grains in your diet can lower your risk of heart disease and help you maintain a healthier body weight, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Both pearl barley and brown rice are examples of whole grains. White rice is an example of a refined grain. While some of their nutritional components are similar, pearl barley is a better source of fiber, iron, potassium and folate than either brown rice or white rice.

Lentil on the other hand, is a legume. It’s quite healthy, high in protein and fiber and they give some added thickness to the soup.

The rest of the ingredients I added were broccoli, mushroom, tomato, green peppers, and veggie broth. I didn’t get the taste right after, but my aunt helped me with seasoning it further, and after a few adjustments, it actually tasted pretty good! I made a whole bunch… it’ll probably last us a whole week. Haha!

Banana Bread

And so I’ve been waiting for my bananas to go overripe for more than a week already and finally it’s ready. When I say overripe, I let it turn to black, you know how bananas turn out if you don’t eat it, they turn black, and that’s the state I want my bananas to be. I got this recipe named “Ridiculously Simple Banana Bread” from my aunt and that’s what I followed. To add some more zing into it, I included chocolate chips too!

I think it turned out pretty good, better than what I expected. It’s moist and it’s not too sweet too. My boss in the office brings her home made banana bread to the office every now and then, and I think mine’s much better. Hahaha!

Elderflower syrup – Carbonated Water Drink

Last Friday night, my friend brought me to this wonderful vegetarian restaurant and got me to try out different types of vegetarian food. That was one of the best dinners I’ve had, but I think I’ll reserve that for another post (if I can get to it). One thing that stood out was that he wanted me to try out an Elderflower drink. That’s the first time I even heard that word! No idea at all what it is. And so when it was served, oh did it make a really good impression. It’s a nice sweet flavor. Actually reminded me of sprite, but a lot less subtle. So anyway, I enjoyed it so much that this morning, I went to Gourmet Warehouse, as suggested by my friend because that’s where I can get this (the one of the left):

It’s an Elderflower drink concentrate, like a syrup, but not as thick as let’s say, pancake syrup.

The one on the right, the Gerolsteiner is a carbonated water that I got from a regular grocery store here.

The suggested mixture is 1:6 between the elderflower and the carbonated drink. You can also add some lemon and ice to the drink to make it yummier!

And thus, I made my own drink! Wonderful!

Stolen: my Kona Dew Black 46

My first expensive bike that I love so much… is now lost and probably will never be found.

The last time I used my bike was last Saturday after I rode it to go to Granville Island to attend a walking tour. The next time I was going to ride it was supposed to be this morning, when I was about to go for my Saturday morning bike ride to Stanley Park. I was all geared and up and ready when upon going down to the garage to get my bike, my bike was nowhere to be found!

And more annoying things this is, my other old bike, which I locked my kona with, was still there! F**K!

The problem is, the bike may have been stolen any day of the week!

What a lousy, depressing (and expensive) for a weekend to start. Iniyakan ko pa iyan. Nakaka depress talaga.

Just in case someone just stumbles upon my blog and my bike somehow, here’s the picture.

It’s a Kona DEW Black 46

Stolen around Fraser Vancouver area.

Ramen and Ice Cream

I invited my friend to join me and have a yummy ramen lunch at Motomachi Shokudo. It’s been two years since I was last ate here and it’s still very good. 

Afterwards, we were craving for desert so we walked by Denman and saw Marble Slab where I ended up eating this! It’s similar to Cold Stone creamery. Yummy.

 

We were so guilty afterwards that we decided to walk from downtown all the way to Broadway for MEC store where I was looking to buy front and rear lights for my bike. I think the distance was roughly around 5km, took us an hour or so. And what made it more tiring was that the sun was out and shining the whole time. Nasunog na ako, napagod pa. Well, I do hope nasunog din yung ibang taba ko from the ice cream! But, I was able to walk by Burrard Bridge which showed a spectacular view of the English Bay area.

I was exhausted that I asked my aunt to pick me up from the store afterwards. Haha

Juicy Chicken Breasts

After n times, I think I finally nailed down my juicy chicken breasts. I think I finally got it. My two previous attempts of cooking a juicylicious chicken breast has been a success! I’ve attempted to cook it a lot of times already and they usually ended up dry. But this time around, it was really juicy and tender!

My recipe is simple. Chicken breast + seasoning - salt and pepper, and maybe some garlic powder and oregano. What I used to do was after seasoning the chicken, I put it inside the oven. The problem is that they always end up dry because they get overcooked! Quite tricky. Chicken breasts cook so fast! 

After a few more tries, I finally got it. Thanks to Google's search, I got to try one way that made my chicken breasts really juicy! And it was very simple! 

The solution was simple. Cook the breasts in a pan first, you can use butter or any cooking oil. Cook it only for a while, you don't want to cook it thoroughly Maybe just after 5 minutes, the breast should be partly cooked already. Afterwards, put it straight to the oven. I use around 375 degrees (preheated, by the way), and I leave the chicken for around 10-15 minutes, turning it over once. 

Now, on to getting my potatoes right (which I still haven’t perfected!).

`

The Chief

No, this is not about Sir Chief (which by the way, thanks to my recently installed TFC, I can now watch Be Careful With My Heart again).

I’m talking about Stawamus Chief.

After two years, I got to climb Stawamus Chief again! I thought it was three years ago, but I guess not – it was two years ago based on this blog post.

The hike this time around was much easier from what I remembered before. I think it’s because the mountain was dry, making everything a little easier, especially climbing up. Aside from that, I also remembered that the when we got up to second and third peaks, there wasn’t much of a view to see because it was very foggy. But this time around, I finally got to see the view, and what can I say, it was amazing.

This was the view from the top of the second peak. We skipped the first peak and went straight to the second peak. Took around 1.5 hours, I think.

By peak 2.5, (half way to third peak), this was the fantastic view of Squamish:

Here are my friends enjoying a short break:

I find that hiking down the mountain is as hard as hiking up. Going down puts a lot more stress in your ankles and your knees. I woke up this morning with my legs hurting like crazy.

3 of us, out of 5 got stung by bees though. We accidentally plowed through a path full of bees. Their sting was quite painful. I got it by my right calf and it was swollen a bit for some time, but eventually subsided. I put some meds after as it was aching a bit last night, and I woke up this morning feeling nothing on the sting bite. But then again, my whole legs are still aching.

After wards, just like our previous chief hike, we went for a nice meal after at Whitespot. I had two full glasses of milkshake (butterscotch and blueberry). So much for all that calories I burned during the hike! I may actually even have gained.

Until next time the chief! Hope to see you again.

some random thoughts

The thing that I really miss the most about the Philippines is my family and friends. To be honest, there are times that I feel sad because I know I am missing a lot of memories from there. Events like, birthdays, parties, or even just regular get togethers with the family and friends.

But whenever I feel sad, I try to focus on the positive side of things.

I think about how blessed I am to be here. I think about how I can walk around here without much stress. I think about how I can run around the neighborhood, how I can ride my bike for 30 kilometers within the busy city and still feel safe. How about the outdoors here? Beautiful. Traffic here is nonexistent in comparison to Manila’s horrid traffic. There’s so much more to say.

Aside from these, the friends and family that I have here reminds me that even though I am away from my friends and family back home, that I still have people here who I can enjoy and have fun with.

This summer was extra special too (and jam packed). I got to attend a few bridal showers, plus just last Saturday, I got to join a few friends for Lechon, Vancouver style!

 

Things like these remind me of how blessed I am.

It does help too that I’ve been here a few times for the past five years so home sickness is really not something I feel every now and then.

Not that I don’t miss home. It’s still a place I terribly miss. But thanks to technology, I can still feel close to the family back home.

Things are different from before because of technology. Now we have Whatsapp, Skype, Hangouts, email, you name it. We even have a whatsapp group where I chat with my family regularly. You can send photos too! Which is why I’m always updated with how the nieces and nephew are. And don’t forget about skype too. When the family recently had a small get together to celebrate my sister-in-law’s birthday, I got to be in the photo too! Digital anyway! Pwede na! This is proof that technology can still keep us together even if we’re continents apart!

 

And how about sending post cards to people back home? It gives me a smile just thinking about how surprised my friends were when they got the cards (at least I hope they were!)

Being away from home can be quite challenging. And it never ever helps to sulk about the situation because thinking of the glass half full, instead of half empty is the much better perspective on how to look at any situation. I can’t say things are perfect here either. But I choose to be happy.

And of course, it does help that I have something to look forward to in a few months time!

Oh, and how about passing my road test exam yesterday? I am now officially a licensed driver here in British Columbia!

Kona

A year or so ago, I bought myself a new bike back in Manila. Check this post. It was a good bike, but not great. And unfortunately, Malabon area wasn't suited for cyclists so I ended up not using it as much (but that's just one of my excuses). Now it's currently gathering dust in our garage. Hmm, maybe I should just sell that.

Anyway, over the past few months, I've mentioned that I’ve been using my aunt’s old mountain bike to ride around the area. I’ve been enjoying biking here because Vancouver is a cyclist’s city. It’s very bike friendly. There are bike lanes and paths everywhere. Especially during the summertime, there are a whole lot more cyclists you’d see around the city. I’m still not a cyclist commuter, but who knows, maybe next time I’d be like my teammate, who goes to the office using her bike.

As much as I love riding around that bike, there are two major problems with that bike. First is that the lower gears are very noisy. Since it wasn’t used for a long time, it just probably needs more tuning, or maybe even parts replacement, who knows. I had it checked out previously, but he said that it might have to be replaced. The challenge with being unable to switch to lower gears is when you’re riding uphill. Bike just gets too heavy that I have to just walk the uphill area.

And this brings me to the next concern that I have – the bike is a bit too heavy for me. It’s actually built as a mountain bike. I wanted something of a hybrid between commuter and road bikes.

And besides, it’s really not mine, it’s rusty….

And… ok, I’m giving myself a lot of reasons why I need to get myself a new one.

And thus, last Saturday, I finally got it. My new toy!!!!

It’s a Kona Dew 2013 model. It’s the basic model of the Kona line of bikes and it’s a hybrid between commuter and road bike.

My cyclist friend recommended a nice bike shop by Burnaby and so I decided to drop by there last Saturday. My friend actually recommended this brand as well, and when I asked the shop keeper what he would recommend, he actually recommended this Kona Dew for me. It’s a pretty good bike model for someone who’s simply looking for a good ride to get around the city.

He allowed me to test the bike outside the bike shop (there’s a bike pathway just by the back). After riding it for just 5 minutes, I loved it so much that I went back and bought it at once! 

It is however on the pricey side…but nothing to worry about because I’m loving it so far!

I had to wait for Sunday night to finally ride it out in the city.

My first ride on my Kona was going to Granville Island, which was roughly around 16.6 km according to Runkeeper. I rode it at night, while the sun’s just about to set. And such a wonderful experience because not only did I get to see the sun set by False Creek, but also discovered that there are public pianos situated at different locations along the seaside path, and anyone can freely play on it. I got to watch this awesome lady playing and you can actually see a crowd forming already.

My second bike ride yesterday, I took a different route – towards the Langara golf course. Nice route too. I still hate uphills though (who doesn’t?).

This weekend, I’m planning to go ride further out to Stanley Park this time. A lot of cycling routes available so it should be a good and safe ride too.

Now, the next project I have to sell off my aunt’s old bike, that is if it still has some value. Who knows, maybe we can still get some money out of it.

Eventful Summer

2 bridal showers, and 2 weddings.

3 down, 1 more to go.

Looks like I came here just in time to attend these special events.

As it always is when you’re moving to a new place, it’s quite hard to meet new people, let alone make new friends. I am quite blessed and lucky that I’ve been here a few times, which helped me establish some nice relationships with people already. And that made it possible for me to attend such nice and memorable events. In fact, after all the preparations that the friends did just to help make the special occasions awesome, I realize more how great and nice these people are and how much they care for their friends.

Now last Saturday, we had a party in…. guess where…. a yacht! How cool is that.

And you know what made it even better? It was also one of the nights of the Honda Celebration Of Light. It’s similar to what we have back in Manila – PyroOlympics. That night, it was United Kingdom and their theme was James Bond! This is the first time I got to watch the fireworks here, and add to that, watch it from the best seats on the house – from a yacht! Awesome! 30 minutes of wonderful fireworks. Unfortunately, I only had my phone with me so I didn’t get some nice shots. Themed music was also playing in the radio so that everyone can enjoy the show more.

So of course, the nights ends with almost everything perfect, except that I had to carry this small table, that unfortunately pulled a strand out of my dress, which clearly shows that there is a “run”, just like in stockings. It’s just a small damage, however, the thing is, I just borrowed this dress! Grrr! What a way to spoil the day!

Hi Jollibee

Hi Jollibee, we meet again. I travelled 3 hours each way, plus an hour wait in the border, just to see you. I was in the road for most of the day.

But it was worth it, just to be able to eat this. I thought additional side dish lang yung fries. I should’ve picked steamed rice instead. Chicken Joy’s the best with rice!

Running

Summer’s here and my friend Ally has convinced me, for two consecutive weeks, to go running out about in Vancouver.

Last weekend, we went running around Stanley Park. I was there way too early and while waiting for her, ended up talking to a Romanian veteran. He had so much to tell me that he can actually write a book about it and I think it’ll sell. But I’ll save that for another post.

Anyway, I haven’t been to Stanley Park for two++ years and I haven’t ran that long for a while, so I was feeling uneasy about running an 8-10km run path. But anyhow, I prevailed, and here’s the result:

 

I didn’t like my run during this time because I was wearing my jacket, which was heavy, and during the middle of the run, the sun showed up all of a sudden. Needless to say, it was very very warm the second half of the run. Plus the fact that I didn’t put any sunblock, so there you go, I was dark right after the run.

On the other hand though, who would not enjoy running when this is the view that you see:

It was a rather tiring yet fulfilling run. I was dead tired the last 2 km, but right after I got to the finish line, and started walking instead of running, I felt better once again. Of course it helped that I gobbled up a nice breakfast of two scrambled eggs plus two toasts after! Think about it, by 9 AM, I’ve done my morning exercise and breakfast. I’m guessing on a Saturday morning, majority of Vancouver are still in bed!

It seems like I want to torture myself because this Saturday morning, once again, Ally invited me to run and I said yes once again. But this time, instead of Stanley Park, we ran via False Creek area. I think the running path of Stanley Park is much better because the path is paved. As for the False Creek path, there are some that are stone and gravel paths. Still pretty nice.

Ok, here are my results:

Compared to the previous run, it looks like I’ve improved my pace quite a bit. Not much though. I still can’t run the 10k under 1 hour. That’s my target for this year.

As usual, the view is magnificent. But the best part? Eating at Terra Breads Cafe right after. I don’t think I was just swayed by the fact that I was tired and hungry after the long run, but really, I had one of the best sandwich paninis and hot chocolate by a long mile compared to other stores. I would definitely go back here. Maybe next week again?

 

For some reason, I still ask myself why I want to run. I run during the weekdays (1-3 times) and then now on the weekends as well!

And so I’ve thought and thought about it recently, and here are some of the answers I have:

1. Running is an exercise, and exercise is something I always crave for. I feel lousy when I haven’t gone exercising for a long time.

2. Running allows me to see different places from a different view.

3. I am inspired to run more whenever I see a senior citizen still running, or a family who is running with the dad or mom pushing the baby cart (with their kid in it). When I get to have a family of my own, I’d like to bring my kids with my on my runs and exploration (even if they don’t do the running and I do the pushing).

4. Running makes me feel free. It makes me forget a lot of problems, sadness, and it makes me feel happier!

5. Whenever I get to improve my time, or maybe finish a 5 or 10 km, I feel really accomplished. And the fact that you, on your own, worked hard for it. It feels great.

6. And best of all, you look forward to reward after the run!

Maybe I’ll find more reasons next time. But for now, I still enjoy torturing myself. :)

* By the way, I am using Runkeeper app and it is fabulous. I love love the data it’s able to save, and most importantly for me, is the map and the pace (splits).

yummy!

 

Doesn’t this look yummy?

Don’t be fooled though. I only cooked the chicken, the mexican rice is actually one flavor of Sidekicks, a.k.a. easy to cook meals. :)

But last weekend, I did prepare, with the help of my Aunt – my amah’s amazing, yummy, delicious siopao! I still need to work on properly closing the buns. If you don’t close it properly, there’s a tendency that the sauce from the inside will ooze out – as we call it… “sinipon”. You’ll actually see a lot of the siopao in the pictures below that were not closed properly.

On another note, I’ve also been into making healthy fruity smoothies lately. It’s very simple to make – grab some fruits, chop it, blend it with crushed ice. Healthy and yummy! I bought a ton of mango and grapes (my favorite!!!) and instead of just eating them all the time, I just decided to make smoothies out of them as well.

The one of the left is the grape. This is my favorite so far – but I still can’t mimic the grape shake that I love from Pancake House.

The one on the right is the Mango shake. I’ve also mixed mango with banana or apple. I find the mango-banana combo much better than the mango-apple.

One thing that I find nice with my new life here in Canada is that I feel like I have more time to do things. Maybe it’s because of the lifestyle here. Kahit walang katulong, I get to do more things. Or maybe since we do everything here on our own, I’ve become less lazy.

But I’ve been thinking about it more, and I really think one of main reasons is that I have more energy to move because I’ve been sleeping pretty well here, given the “regular” work hours now and the relaxed commute. Not only that, I do get more exercise these days which gives me that extra energy boost. So even though I find myself getting sad (missing family and friends back home) every now and then, I still find the positive side of things – that I can wake up each morning to a nice place, to a great job, and to a wonderful family and friends who I am still in contact with regularly (thanks Whatsapp! and gtalk and skype).

Bike and Frame

My aunt’s friend Mike is a serious cyclist and he offered to tune up “my” bike last  Wednesday for free. He even gave me a free (according to him – very cheap) bike horn, but will still be useful nonetheless.

This is technically not my bike. My aunt won this bike 5 years ago, and unfortunately, it has never been used since. And as I’ve always wanted to bike around the area anyway so I decided to adopt the bike as my own. It’s a mountain bike and a bit heavy though.

And now that it’s passed the safety checks (though Mike, the cyclist friend, said that he’ll update my brakes next time he drops by), I finally got to use it today do some errands! I biked going to the bank, and then went straight to a framing gallery to pick up my order.

This framing gallery makes custom frames for any of your framing needs. I had this name board that I’ve been carrying around which was a gift a few months back. So instead of this name board rotting in my cabinet, I decided to go try and get it framed last week. It was the first time I got something framed and it was a nice experience. You get to pick everything from the frame type, frame color, and even the boards, what’s the size, etc. It’s a complex piece after all. The lady in the shop who would be doing the frame was really helpful. She helped me decide the design and gave me suggestions on what would be nice. In fact, when I picked up my order earlier, she remembered me and even gave me a discount from her original quotation!

And so, here’s the finished product!

And that is now properly parked in my room:

Cooking Attempt #2

I picked another recipe from my recipe book to cook this past weekend.

Veal Cutlets with Red Pesto Sauce

I couldn’t find some of the ingredients in the recipe so I had to look for alternatives.

For example, the red pesto sauce required sun dried tomatoes, and all these other fresh herbs. Some of them, I couldn’t find, some only sold by bulk in the market, and I didn’t want to waste all that money buying 1 bunch of veggies, when you only need a teaspoon of it. 

Instead of veal, we used sirloin instead. We got a great deal out of two huge pieces of sirloin steak for only $12. The picture below is just the size of one – I just split it in half as it is huge. Look at that sirloin cooking. Yummy.

The red pesto sauce, in my opinion, was the best and unique part of this recipe. It’s a mixture of a lot of ingredients. And since I love Italian stuff, this definitely suited my taste. I loved it. I had so much leftover too that we decided to use it as our spaghetti sauce too! We just added some chickens and more mushroom.

 

I had a few leftover baby potatoes left so I decided to roast them! Unfortunately, I left them in the over a little bit too long, and it got burnt a little.

Nonetheless, not the best looking picture, but I consider this dish a success!

Cooking Attempt

Here’s my first attempt to cooking one of the recipes from the cook book Leda gave me last Christmas. I picked the Mustard and Rosemary chicken. It’s quick and easy to cook, with simple ingredients too. Tada, here’s the first attempt:

What went wrong

As you can see from the picture, there were a couple of things that went wrong. First, is that I had the proportions all wrong. I cooked too many potatoes, while I cooked a too little of the chicken. I didn’t realize the chicken fillets ended up being small in comparison to the potatoes.

The chicken tasted good, but the potatoes were missing a lot of seasoning. Next time, I’ll try to season it with different types of seasonings (aside from pepper!).

Also, the spinach were a little too big, I think. The recipe actually called for baby spinach, which we couldn’t find so I used the regular spinach instead. It’s still good, but I think I just needed to chop it into smaller sizes.

What went right (or so I think)

The chicken was pretty good. It was just mustard + rosemary + lime juice + garlic but tasted yummy.

I think that’s the only one that was right though. But it’s still a good start. I’ll cook again next week. Will hopefully get the hang of this cooking slowly, but surely.

Establishing a Morning Routine

One of the good things about being back to working from 9-5 is that I have the whole morning to be able to do what I’ve wanted to start doing even when I was back in Manila – create a nice morning routine.

They say that habits are hard to break, but it’s the same the other way around, habits are hard to establish too. And since I’ve been here, I have attempted to start an exercise habit for myself.

Beginning last week, I started running for around 20-30 minutes in the morning. Every Monday, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, I wake up at around 5:45 AM, and then go out the streets to run around. The weather’s been pretty supportive so I’ve had no problem dragging myself out of bed and enjoying the run outside. I still wear three layers (including jacket), unlike other runners I see, who wears one layer of shirt only. After a few minutes of running anyway, your body heats up and you won’t feel the cold anymore.

Afterwards, I walk around a bit more to cool down, and then go back home to get ready for work.

I try to change up what I do on Saturday. Since this is a non work day, I decided to explore something new.

Last Saturday, to make things a little different, I went for a 1.5 hour walk around Queen Elizabeth Park instead of running. It was quite the walk too. Based on my pedometer, I had 9000+ steps done! And the walk wasn’t that bad either. The weather was cool, and the scenery was very pretty.

 

This is as much of the sun that I saw that morning 

Next week, apparently the Grouse Grind is now open so I might just do that (if I don’t get lazy as I need to take the bus to get there). I’d prefer to doing it on my own first (no pressure from other friends who are way faster than me!). I haven’t done this for two years so hopefully, I can still do good. Or maybe I might go for a bike ride, who knows.

Tomorrow is the start of another week and I' hope I can continue this routine. I read somewhere that if I can do this for 4-6 weeks, then that I’ve probably succeeded in making it a habit and I might just find it hard to break this “good habit” by then. That’s one of my mini goals anyway. Once I’ve established this, then that’s when I’ll incorporate an additional activity and then establish a new habit once again. I’ll take it one step at a time.

Essentially, the overall goal is to be able to keep healthy when I am here.

walking and reading

walking

This is where I walk by every day going to work.

 

Via this route, I can take the bus, but since it’s only a kilometer, I usually walk, and then take another bus to work. That’s what I enjoy here, you can walk anywhere and feel quite safe and peaceful.

Of course, only if the weather is good. If the weather is freezing cold, I don’t think I’d feel happy walking around!

And since I take the bus now, I also get to read more now!

reading

And thanks to Rhys – I finally have it:

I’ve been delaying buying one for the longest time, and I finally have it! Paperwhite!  And it is the best. You can now read at night! That was one of the main problems of the kindle before, you need a night lamp to assist you with reading in the dark.

I already gave up my samsung tablet to my parents and sister in Manila and so far, kindle and my smartphone has totally replaced the tablet (which means, I am not missing it).

What I found amusing with Amazon is how easy it is to purchase books, and to load books into your kindle. You can do your shopping either via the amazon website, or via kindle’s store itself. For my first book, I bought “Silver Linigs Playbook”. I’ll talk more about this on another post.

Another thing that made me love kindle even more is how easy it is to load files into it. It can be as simple as sending a file via your "kindle” email, which loads it into your online repository (via its cloud) and then automatically syncs to your kindle! Managing your books online is good too.

My bus rides and bus waits have been made more interesting by my kindle. I’m currently reading “The Girls With The Dragon Tattoo”. Funny thing is, I’ve read the second and third book already! Haha