YJL

Its the shortest day of the year, Id think its supposed to get colder, but not this year. Actually, yesterday, it was raining and cold and slightly humid, but today is a sunny day and temperature jumps up about to ten degrees Celsius at high twenties.

It feels more like spring time had just arrived. According to forecast, its going to last about three days before the cold coming back, guess its the winters vacation.

Traditionally, we would have tangyuan, but I dont really care about the tradition except there is tangyuan to eat and its good to have them in cold winter days.

Since Ive stopped drinking coffee, tea, and sugary drinks around this past early November, although not strictly, but I rather not adding sugar if cooking the small unfilled tangyuan.

If not sweet, then flavor like from spices would do, unfortunately, I dont have those. Besides, I really dont like savory tangyuan. Surprisingly, milk is a quick solution. So, I cooked the azuki beans in pure water, than in milk to finish up with tangyuan.

Simple dessert and not too sweet. Now I do wish the weather went bad a bit, so I can really feel warm to eat.

It doesn't look as good as you buy from fast food restaurant or bags of frozen fries from supermarket, but I feel it tastes better. I didn't add any flavor on, just potato and oil.

After I took them out, I broke one, the feeling is same. Look at this cross section:



And, they don't bend! I remembered the fries I fried before, they were soft and wobbled like worms, though they didn't taste much different.



I learned from Jimmy's Food Factory on BBC, but I couldn't remember the exact detail. Anyway, here is how I did:

• Parboiled the fries for about 10 minutes, I used low heat. Somehow I felt I shouldn't be cooking for mashed potato, so I lowed the heat.
• Coated the fries with oil, then sent to oven. You can season, add some spices, but it's really not necessary. Great food doesn't require any added flavors. I didn't eat with salt or ketchup, only the original taste of potato.
• Once the top side started to wrinkle, I flipped them.
• I picked up and broke it, the feeling was right.
• I dropped one onto plate, crystal clink. Done.

If I recall correctly, if you freeze them, then you can fry them later. Just like the bags you buy from supermarket and this is how food factory manufacture French Fries, parboiling is the key. Something about the starch in potato, you have to parboil fries, so... uhmmm I forget the rest. ;)

I have also heard if you put fries in icy water for a while, 30 minutes I guess, make them really cold, then you fry them. It will be crispy, too. I will try this method next time.

(I never got him eating any human food.)

Nothing better than a cup of warm tea in a cold afternoon. Food is just a supporting role, what you have doesn't matter. But I like bacon and egg, so they must be on dish.

It's been more than a week, the weather has been always cloudy, sometimes, it rained. Spring is possibly being trapped somewhere. Few sips of warm tea or coffee can cheer up me. Rain, go ahead!

Aha... I enjoy exhaling the warm breathe.

Yep, I know it's not a healthy food to eat. But I could not resist the heat from them. They are some chemicals in the ingredients which I am not even able to pronounce them. I like the spicy and creamy flavor, I probably a Thai in my previous life if there is the reincarnation.

I have only eaten two of this Tom Yam flavor (still not sure what does that mean exactly). The first one, Tom Yam flavor instant noodles by KOKA, is not a product of Thailand, it's made in Singapore. I guess Singapore has many Thai.

The taste of the soup is fine, but I don't like texture of the noodles. I feel that is kind of fluffy, should be more tense.

The second one, Sour soup shrimp flavor instant noodles by Unknown, is my favorite, but if you eat again after a month later or so, yous stomach complains. You will visit your toilet for several times in a few hours. Even though, that can stop it being a best Thai instant noodles to me. Really spicy, sticky creamy. Evey time I eat this, I definitely clean up the soup, nothing left.