Nuit Blanche Paris 2012

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After almost 2 weeks of travelling around France (for work), i finally had the time to sit down and hopefully upload a quick post. Just learned that tomorrow is the annual Nuit Blanche in Paris.

Nuit Blanche which translate as white night, is a late-night art festival event which begins it’s roots in Nantes, France 1984. It’s so popular that soon many cities adopt this idea and have their own version of late-night cultural festival. (I read that over 120 cities in the world celebrate this now)

Interestingly eventough this event was created in France, it is only adopted in Paris from 2002.  Paris celebrates this annual event on the first saturday in october every year now.

This year, it will be on 6th October (which is tomorrow). It’ll start from 6:30pm to 5:30am the next day ! and coincidently, hub and I will be heading into Paris tomorrow morning (yay !)

Train / metro lines will be open all night thru to the next morning. And, it’s free between 2am – 5:30am (the next day). how cool is that?! And Museums are going to open their door to visitor all night long for free too. Wow.

hmm… I wonder if this means that shopping centres are also open all night long?!!! hehehe…

OOO… and for my friends and family in Melbourne, I read on wiki that Melbourne will host Australia’s first white night in 2013 !!!

till tomorrow night then. (I better get more rest tonight if I’m going to be partying all night tomorrow…Muahahaaa.)

Stir fried Scallops with baby Bak-Choy pasta.

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Hub and I went to Kuala Selangor over the weekend and bought some really big fat frozen scallops. Kuala Selangor is a little fishing town about one hour plus away from Kuala Lumpur (famous for enjoying fresh seafood at lower price).

It’s really simple to handle frozen scallops. I just took them out from the freezer, give it a good rinse and let it thaw by itself for about 15-20 mins. After that, I give it another good rise and pat dry. (Never soak your frozen scallops in water as it will loose it’s sweetness)

Ingredients (3 person’s portion)
  • 12 nos             Scallops (sprinkle with salt and black pepper)
  • 4 bunch           baby bak-choy (separate the leaves from stem)
  • 15 nos             cherry tomatoes (halved)
  • 4 slices            bacon (julienne)
  • ½ cup              marsala wine / white wine
  • 1 tbsp              Abalone sauce
  • 1 tbsp              pre-fried garlic (I keep one jar of fried garlic in oil around)
  • 3 portion         boiled Spaghetti
     
    Sauté the scallops on high heat and remember to keep them apart (no soup formed. Or you’ll have steam scallops in the end). It’s always better to have scallops slightly undercooked. So, I manage them by pressing on them with the spoon. I like it cooked till it feels like medium rare beef bounce. Then, I’ll lift it and set it aside.
     
    Next, sauté the bacon till you see the oil release from its fat. Put in the bak-choy stem and allow it to stir fry a bit first before putting in the leaves. Add the cherry tomatoes, abalone sauce and Marsala wine (You can just use any white wine but I love the sweetness of Marsala with scallops). Allow this to simmer for 2-3 minutes.

Add the pasta and Scallop. Simmer for another 2-3 minutes and it’s done.

Dinner is serve. Chomp chomp. I had it with a glass of chilled marsala. Simple healthy meal with tons of greens. Yay !

Happy Birthday Meimei !!!

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It’s my baby sister’s birthday this month. Unfortunately, I am not in Melbourne to celebrate it with her. But, we will definitely celebrate it again when she comes back for holiday end of this year. I miss you so much meimei (baby sister in mandarin). Thankfully, there’s wassap and chatting with her daily is so easy and FREE !

She sent me some pictures of the birthday cakes which her friends made for her. IT is absolutely stunning and really creative that I must share it here! My sister is very lucky indeed to have friends like this!

The foodscape cake is made with edible food like vegetables, bread, nuts, mushrooms, avocado, and etc). It’s so COOL, rite?!!! It’s so much more interesting than the average cake (Healthier too). I’ve seen some foodscape previously. But, most of the time, it is for advertisement. (e.g. cadbury chocolate). This is the first time I’ve seen it used as birthday cake.

Apart from that, they also baked her one choco-piggy cake. Aww… it’s so cute. Love the eyes and the nose! Kawai-ne (cute in japanese) !!! I want one too!!! Hehehe.

Happy Birthday dear Meimei. Hope you had a great one and an amazing year ahead. May the Lord continue to look over you, protect you and bless you abundantly.

And, Thank you Lord for surrounding her with precious friends and family at all time.