Noms: Cook like a crazed woman when scorned

If you read my blog regularly - and I hope you do :) I get into a cooking/baking frenzy when I am upset.
So guess what I did on Monday night. And yes it does take me that long to get blog posts up. Things were cray cray here this week so hence the delay.

Scanpan Accent 24cm Box

First of all, let me state that the Scanpan Accent fry pan was gratefully sponsored by Kitchenware Direct. The lovely Brad sent this to me really quickly! If you have missed their recent sale, get on the mailing list for awesome Scanpan discounts! I bought a wok(yes I was a Chinese with no wok) and a little 20cm nonstick frying pan in the recent sale. I had to cook this magic marinara, the recipe was courtesy off Nat. Thanks again!!

As this was her special family recipe. I took out the big guns. Check out the shiny frying pan. I am not used to a stainless steel pan. But the only difference is you probably need more oil than non-stick and you need to have the pan hot before you put your ingredients in. However, I probably would not use this for frying an egg - that's only because I am lazy to have to clean it after. This is dishwasher safe - I had to check this a few times because I am paranoid of ruining my cook ware. And I am lazy a big fan of the dishwasher!

Because I like shiny things .. look at my Marc x MJ phone cover!

Magic Marinara was SO EASY to make and honestly Mick is not really a fan of marinara but he loves this now. I am a bit embarrassed to post this picture as I think it does not look as glam as Nat's or Mama Nat's version. But we slurped it up! Now that I am writing this post, I have forgotten that I am out of white wine for cooking. Bah!!

Magic Marinara

And because I was upset about what happened in Chanel. I also made a toffee apple pudding. This is a caramel like self saucing pudding with sliced apples at the bottom of the pudding mix. And also ... we ran out of butter making this. Can you believe it?! This house has no food at all! I have not made this since I was house bound as a stay at home mum (those were very dark days) with Pickles and D. I used to make it so often that everyone on Twitter thought I was a domestic goddess.. which I clearly am! I think I have associated this with being at home and could not bear to bake it after that. I don't know if I have missed eating this .. not sure. I think I prefer a chocolate self saucing one. :)

Toffee Apple Self Saucing Pudding

The cleaning up bit of using this frying pan was really easy. We just stuck it into the dishwasher. The pan is sturdy, the handle did not get hot and I really thought that the first thing I would make with this was a frittata as it is also oven safe. I am loving this slick looking frying pan so much, I am now addicted to Scanpan and stalking Kitchenware Direct for their sales!

Noms: Kraft Whipped Peanut Butter

Whipped Peanut Butter

Ok I have been living under a rock. A rock called shopping in Aldi and Costco for too long. I had stopped going to normal supermarkets or I do a dash in and out of Leo's all the time and stopped browsing. I did not know this existed! I was reading the Aldi Appreciation thread (oh the irony) in Vogue Forums and I see a post of Whipped Peanut Butter. I was like what.is.that?

I got a SMS later in the night - it must have been Friday night as I remember being a poker widow. Anyway I digress. My SMS from Bestie K saying I HAVE TO BUY whipped peanut butter and it's from Coles/Woolies. Ok in my head I read it as caps to I HAVE TO BUY. Anyway, it took me a few weeks to get to a normal supermarket. It was Leo's that I went to on a Wednesday night before heading home. You know that you have been shopping in el cheapo r'us supermarkets for too long. When you see $5+ for this jar and your first reaction is. 5 BUCKS! 5 BUCKS! I had to shake off my el cheapo r'us shopper and just put it in my basket. I also bought a nice bar of Black and Gold milk chocolate. It was truly indulgent night. If you know me from the forums, you'll know that I am a big Aldi Choceur Hazelnut fan.

I had this on crumpets and it was yummy. I'm trying to not give this to the boys because of the price. We go through a Costco American sized jar in a month if I let them! So this one is just for me.

Whip it good.

The day that Chanel Chadstone almost ruined

You know how you DINKs have date nights every like I dunno every week? Well Mick and I have date days. The days we drop the kids off and run off to do whatever the heck we want. We eat in peace without being yelled and somehow ended up deciding to go to Mecca, I mean Chadstone as I wanted to go to Miu Miu and Louis Vuitton.

I was wearing these "jeans that look like jeggings" not with the flip flops but in hot pink sneakers and my old Miu Miu. I was telling Mick this is the store that Mum and I got distracted and the security staff had to tell me that my son had run away from us! I was greeted nicely by the security staff, they do have the best security people though. Then I got the disgruntled sales person. You know those ones? Yeah.. Superstar Chris style. I got the Hello and assessment up and down. From my head to my toe paired with a lovely look of distaste for my existence in this store. Maybe she moonlights as fashion police and my jeans were bordering on jeggings and I was wearing the equivalent of leggings as pants. She stared at my faded old Miu Miu and stared at me. I was judged.. I was not fashion forward or could not afford anything here.

I drag my jeggings self to the ready to wear section, there is a lovely pair of I think 10cm high and looked like it had a hidden platform, lambskin off white heels with silver CC toe. Oh.. they feel lovely. No price marking on the shoe. So I pointed to the pair that were on display at the door facing Louis Vuitton. "How much is that ..." I got barked at, "$970!!!!" I guess that is my cue to leave as fashion police clearly did not think that I even had $1000 on my credit card. Shoes in question are in the style of below picture.

Chanel Pumps screen grabbed from Chanel.com

I don't think I have ever been treated like this before in any store. I partly wished that my aggressive mother was with me, she would say this to her in her Singaporean Chinese accent. "Why are you so rude ah? Sick of your attitude." Twitter thinks that I should have my Pretty Women moment, you know I have white patent thigh high boots on hand right? I walked out fuming and really really angry, it really upset me and I had such a great day (except for Bunnings which smells like fertiliser) before this. But after I had a nice lunch at Capital Kitchen - I mean Pram City, and after I wrote my therapeutic angry rant letter, I decided not to publish that one. As you know at Pork Chop's Nest we are on Project Positivity (HAHHA!) and I do not want negativity floating around here.

So I am writing this as a social service on behalf of all Chanel Chadstone staff. If you want to enter their store, do not drag in some old Miu Miu bag. I guess I should have known better. Also Chanel staff eyes are delicate and do not want to see you in tight jeggings masquerading as jeans.

I guess it does get tiring working in a shop and getting paid less than half of a handbag each month, but still don't take your aggression out on customers.

PS. Miu Miu has the cutest ever new style bow bags. Did I say ever? You need to go look at their new designs!

Another hectic weekend.. new friends, gozleme again and noodles

Gosh.. another hectic weekend... Miss Directions you might want to have a nap like right now.

I feel so tired now that I cannot move my shoulders. My boys must be getting too heavy for me to carry them, that's the only thing that I can explain this. That or I have been running everywhere the entire weekend.

Oh hai I has monkey ears!

Took D out to Hays Paddock - btw can someone like gimme a million dollahhhh house on that street. kthxbai. It was cold, wet and cold. Did I say COLD? He told me in the car that it is not too cold for playground when I asked if it was too cold for playgrounds. He has his hoodie and hat. Such a good boy, he did not take off his hat at all. But it was wet and we could not use any of the slides. Plus that black hole of death slide is not D's thing. He wouldn't go in that one.

Geez I don't even know how to start this post about my weekend. I had taken D out to go look at a Chinese school open day. He wanted to eat out - he is my child after all. I told him that we have to take food back for Daddy and Pickles. He said no, I want to eat here, I want cake. So I had to drag him to the cake shop while our dumplings and noodles were cooking. Coincidentally it is next to a ClubX store. HAHAHHA!!! D copped an eyeful of nurses costumes. Anyway, I bought him a plain cake, it looked like a butter cake but they call it cheesecake. Ah.. well Box Hill what do you expect? Typical D, he only wants to have the cake, he doesn't want to eat it!! So I had to pack that home. I got dumplings noodle soup, boiled dumplings and some wanton style dumplings in soup. I blame the weather .. i just wanted soup everything.

I wait for noodles, I eat here

So D pulled up his chair and sits there. He tells me he wants a spoon. I asked what for? He said he needed it to eat. I got him a spoon and the sweetheart asked me where was my spoon and if I was going to use my fingers to eat. <3 him. He got very upset that we went home and did not eat our food there.

We had to go to the farmers' market today as I had ordered some beef to pick up. Honestly you need to get into farmers markets. This is where it is at! The best Pork Apple & Sultana sausages ever was bought at Manningham market from Happy Valley Free Range. It was so good, I emailed Rotary Club who organises this market for the supplier's name. I picked up a bag of bacon bones and some cheese kransky. I had to grab Pickle's hands off the plate of samples as he was ready to steal the entire plate. He had a tight hold on them!

Mmm Nommy Pork

I got spices from Spice Fusion before, I cannot even tell you how I stumbled on the site! But the Afghan rub has been an essential in this house since then. Butterflied lamb shoulder, Afghan rub, some lemon. Charcoal BBQ and 40 mins later. OMG! I am so glad that she is now doing the market circuit! I can save on shipping. LOL kidding...

Then I had to leave the boys and go to Doncaster on my own as I was meeting up with ladies from Twitter/Blogging. Ling from Best Beauty Blog and Vita from Making up 4 my age Yay!! I has new friends! Vita and I live in the next suburb to each other and funny enough, I had volunteered to pick her up if required. We had lunch at Groove Train and our next meet we had agreed to go to the nail polish wholesale place in Braybrook! 

So after our lunch, where else do you go but Daiso? I got a pair of training chopsticks and some weird bubble blowing toy thing which Mick tells me is toxic glue and not to let the boys eat it. Ok then... i did not want to tell him we used to put this near our mouths and purse the bubbles together - don't ask ok.

This thing stinks like it used to back when I was a child. 

Bubble stinky toxic thing

Bear training chopsticks

So I did all that.. plus shop for some groceries. Came home and cooked soup for the boys as well. Ok everyone can rest now... Masterchef is featuring dude food. I love dude food. Deep fry everything!

Random Score: Banana & Sirena Tuna

Sometimes I like getting off at Flinders Street station. I had to get off there last week .. or maybe it was the week before. Time is now a blur these days. They generally have giveaways that they don't do at other train stations. I stopped getting out at Flinders as they do not have new Myki readers and not many gates on Swanston Street. I mean seriously, there is a flood of people all exiting the place. You would think right!!!! Nope.. no new Myki readers and usually it does not read my card meanwhile I get yelled at for leaving the card in my card holder. First world country? Whatever. I'll leave my card in my LV card holder if I want to!

Anyway, I digress. Guess what I scored? Again.. I notice a colour theme here people. Anyone else? My last post? Yes?

I scored a Sirena Tuna and Rice thingee. When I walked out, there were people from Amnesty handing out bananas. Bananas! Ok then!! I remember when they were $20 or something a kilo and D used to hold me hostage to buy him bananas. Can you imagine handing out bananas then? People would be punching each other to grab more. It's like black market gold or something.

And we were all Yellow!

I am feeling the Neon Yellow big time ladies! I do not usually get drawn into fashion trends - lack of time to flip fashion magazines. Well more like no more budget for fashion magazines. But seriously, never mind that I am Yellow myself but Neon Yellow is really grabbing me this time and I don't know why!

I blame Seal for this big time. Everyone is doing yellow nails. I asked Jaztee from http://jaztee.blogspot.com.au/ if she could recommend a bright yellow when I saw her yellow nails on Instagram. She recommended China Glaze Lemon Fizz and I had a quick search on eBay for some sellers. OMG how good does that look? I'm so in love. Thank you Jaztee and seriously <3 this. I'm hesitating because my skintone is yellow and I'm not sure if I can pull this off. Any other fellow chink-tastic readers care to comment? I screen grabbed the below pic from eBay, it's not my nails and I'm still deciding.

Screen grabbed from eBay

Then I found this clutch from Aldo. Unfortunately it is the US site and I don't know if it is available in Australia.

It looks lime green in the picture but it's called "Peach Yellow" on the site. How cute is it?
Has anyone seen this in Aldo Australia? I bet it's 3 times more expensive though. LOL

Found this yellow necklace that I am really drawn to. But I don't usually buy jewellery so I am not sure if this will look good on me. For $10, I should just buy it!

Any ideas where to get a neon yellow clutch? I saw some at Colette for $30 and does anyone think Lemon Fizz will be ok on the Claw? Halp a sister here.

I love Aldi: Satay Beef & Rice Review

This is what Aldi says it looks like

You have no idea how much I wanted to love this. It was Satay, it was beef and rice. Hello.. what more does a Singaporean Chinese need?

I was SO HUNGRY and so busy, I peeled the box open stabbed the film and waited for the 6minutes. It beeped and I got excited... until I peeled it open and saw this.

This is what it looks like

I thought I would cry.. Aldi.. where the beef at? It was teeny strips. The Beef Strog that I first got (but did not review was the best I think) had hunks of beef. This was sad cat. There was onion things swimming in the sauce. I tried to push the sauce over the rice fishing for beef. :(

Anyway, the rice is actually a good one to have in a frozen meal. It actually works quite well. The sauce was a little runny but I think this is the Aussie way - more sauce than rice. Whereas us chinks is rice central. We don't do rice swimming in sauce.

Price: Tick - I think they are flat price of $3.99
Appearance: No Tick :(
Taste: Half tick, rice was decent-ish except the sauce was runny and sweet. There was big onion rings in there which was weird. There are peanut bits in this, obviously if you are allergic to peanut you would not choose satay but just sayin'. Where's the beef y'all? Bigger chunks please.
Will buy again Factor: Probs not .... there were better ones. I did eat it all though. 

P.S: This is not a paid post. I had shelled out $4 for my own meal.