Easy Snack Recipe to Share :)

Easy and yummy :)

As some of you have already known, I work part time inside the kitchen these days to fill my free days since the beginning of the year. I treated it as if I am doing the internship like any school students, just like during my school time around two decades ago. 

To tell you the truth, ssshhhhh..... it was not a difficult job to do. However, thanks to my high initiative level, I could learn many things from my two Senior Chefs, whom both are much younger than me (in fact, I am usually the oldest in the team, although not always, hahahaha....)

We are entitled with free staff meals given by the company during our working day (lunch, dinner, or both). And I feel very fortunate for being able to taste so many delicious food from various kitchens surrounding us without having to pay a single cent. Most of them are made with good quality of food and prepared by many experienced chefs. 

Usually I will take heavy meal for my lunch break (pasta, rice, soba, with meat and/ or vegetables). So usually at night, I will take lighter and fast one like yoghurt, bread, soup, and sometimes, I have to take nothing during busy nights - as we did not even have time to rest.

The company where I work sells Italian food. And they too sell simple side dishes like small-cut pizza bread, some with salami, mushroom, garlic bread and so on. The ingredients used are very simple, but they taste very nice!!!

Before that, not many people realised it. But lately, these side dishes have become significantly famous and the sales increases a lot!!! These days we have to prepare the batch almost daily compared to once per two or three days from the past. 

Here in my blog post, I want to share with you the trick in preparing such easy snack dish that can comfort you, especially when you do no feel like having a heavy meal. 

As you can see the photo above, I will share with you the recipe to make a simple snack bites using baguette (or whatever bread that is available at your side), butter, egg, mayonnaise, fresh avocado, tomatoes, salt and pepper. 

If you use baguette, you can cut it into any length that you want. I cut it shorter so that it can be shared with many people at home. After that, cut it open into half so that you can put the ingredients easily on top and bite them easily. 

If you use normal bread that has already been so thin, you can cut them into two triangle or two squares, according to your wish. 

FYI, you can store the unused baguette inside the fridge for few days. Do not afraid that it will become hard because after heating it with butter, it will become soft and nice. 

For the bread, you can heat up your pan with little butter (medium heat) and put both sides of the bread until a bit brown (too much butter will make it soft and oily). You can use your fingers to press on the bread to ensure all surface is heated instead only at the sides. 

Next, boil the egg. Many of you may boil the egg before but using "agaration" to judge the timing and all. Sometimes the egg is not fully cooked. Sometimes the skin is hard to peel or stick to it. Sometimes the egg is broken and cannot be used. So here, let me share your the tips and tricks :)

First, boil the water. While waiting for it to boil, you can prepare a bowl with water and fill it with ice cubes (to ensure water to turn cold). I chose this way over running water to save water. 

Second, after water boils, add salt into the pot. Then put the number of eggs you want. Set the timer to 12 minutes. If you do not have a timer you can set it on your mobile phone. When time is up, take a spoon, scoop the eggs out from the pot and put it into the ice cold water that you prepared earlier. Only the eggs are in, not the hot water. Mix it and leave it around 5-10 minutes, and you are ready to peel it. Before peel, first knock the egg surface all over. This way, you will peel them very easy and fast. You will notice that the egg is firm and hard too!!!

Chop the eggs into smaller pieces, and put into another bowl. Add mayonnaise, salt and coarse black pepper. Mix them well and voila! One filling is done!!!

Last one, the avocado and tomato mixture. Here in Singapore we have accessed mostly with small avocados and the price is quite expensive. So I do not use it much, only one or two, but if you want, you can put as many as you like. I need to learn from my Chef on how to remove the avocado meat in tact, as recently we have to serve one of the dishes to our customers. Hahaha....

Use small knife, cut it into two (the longer side), and when the two lines meet (as the seed is in the middle), move the two half to left and right so that it will move out from the seed. Use the knife to remove the seed, but please be careful not to slice your finger!!!

After that, take out a spoon. Hold the half avocado with one hand, and use the spoon to go underneath from the right to left side, make sure all meat is scooped well with it, then remove from the skin. Put the meat into the chopping board and remove the meat from another half. Cut them into smaller pieces and put it into another bowl. 

Take out a tomato and cut it into small pieces, mix it together with the avocado. Add a salt and black pepper, and olive oil too, if you want. 

Then it is all ready!!!

It is fun, trust me! :)

Put them all on the dining table. Take the bread, spread the egg mayo first before the avocado, and you can bite out right away!!! It is great when sharing it with family and friends at any time. You can have them with wine, champagne, tea, or even beer and chips.

To be honest, even this sounds simple, I was too lazy or too stupid to make it before. Now since I have learnt it through my experience at work, it really makes me confident and feel that even simple, this skill can benefit many people, especially my loved ones whom I share my food and recipes with. Hahahaha.....

So, wish you all good luck in trying this, and give me feedback on this blog comments if you too benefit from it ;) Happy trying!!!

Fate

Fate (IG: rimareyka.writes)

Still related to my new passion, crystal love, I would like to share my experience and feelings with you here. You know, just like us, a human being, crystal too, required fate to be with us. Why I told you this? Well, it is because there are too many crystal out there that is looking for the owner.

I bought them online and offline. When getting them online, sometimes I could not choose as the platform was to sell to mass demand. So usually the seller will show few good ones then sell the rest altogether to everyone. And when your name appears on their list, it will depend on the speed of your Internet. The faster the speed, the earlier your name would appear on their end. And hence, usually, the better quality will be given first (although not always).

So, it happened many times that when we received the actual goods after days or weeks later, it turned out the quality we received could be satisfying and could also be unsatisfying. Nevertheless, it was ours and could not change. Unless, if there was significant breakage on it. 

My friend often conveyed their dissatisfaction when the quality they got was not what they expected to be. But you could not please everyone with that kind of selling system.

I could only told them, "It was fate ba. What is yours, is yours." And crystal is a natural thing. They come in many different forms, just like us, a human being. When we were born, we could not choose our look, as it would usually follow the genes of our parents. Some came from defect gene. And what we could do, was just to live with it. Unless if you are willing to go through aesthetic operation and make your look just like those Korean actor and actress.

The other way to get crystal as what you desired, was to find those seller that cater to one-to-one customer basis, be it online and offline. Online can be finding representative who will shop on your behalf (usually they will charge additional percentage on top of the item price), can be through online platform, like carousel, and offline can be purchase your crystal at the crystal shop (usually the seller will sell it at more expensive price as they do it for a living). That way, you will get your item at better quality, but more expensive price. 

And today, I just received my crystal that I purchased from online platform. By right, I should have received the item according to the picture shown by the seller. However, to my surprise, the level of discrepancy of what was posted and what was received was so much different. Check out the following photo below.

Top: posted Below: received

I ordered this dragon turtle red phantom. The above 2 photos were what the seller posted. But what I received was the below photos. Could you tell me, were I too fussy? Or you could also spot the differences???

The above was red phantom and what I received was more like red hematoid. Although both were red, but it was just different. I messaged the seller about it and she insisted that she only had one of its kind (dragon turtle). Therefore, I took the photos and showed it to her. 

Actually, although the inclusion in the crystal was not much, but the dragon turtle was full of rainbow. And I am the rainbow lover (be it real rainbow and the crystal rainbow). And when I sat down at my sofa, the sunlight from behind lighted the dragon turtle that I put beside me. The rainbows that appeared inside its body was really surprised me!!! For me, it was much better than the initial photos she showed (the one that looks more like red phantom).

It was like, hey, I fell in love to it for almost immediately and could feel the fate that existed between us. Wow!!! I was just dumbfounded and wanted to share my feelings with you all here. 

I forgave the seller right away and told her to check again at her side if she can find the initial pictures. I do not mind to purchase it again with the same price. 

Until now, I have brought many crystals into my house. They occupied one corner of my living room facing the Buddha altar. I love them so much and hope they can stay happily here together with us. 

Fyi, for those who do not know what dragon turtle is and what benefits it brings - "A dragon turtle (Lóngguī) is a legendary Chinese creature that combines two of the four celestial animals of Chinese mythology: the body of a turtle with a dragon's head is promoted as a positive ornament in Feng Shui, symbolizing courage, determination, fertility, longevity, power, success, and support."

Well, I hope they love us back too and together we stay happily ever after.... :)

A Little Reflection

Are you wasting your time???

It has been a while since my last post. How are you doing guys? Hope everyone is doing good and blessed with good health. Covid has changed so many things in us but hope that it will not let us being defeated by it

I have heard many bad news for the past 2 months of who have had it and who could not manage to survive. The death happened to anyone, be it young or old. I can not imagine how the related person have to face it and go on with their life.

This will only be a short post as when I looked at the quote above, I had a sudden inspiration to write this. 

Ok, alright. Because of Covid, we can not travel. And well, I can not travel. So I have plenty of time to spend. Naturally, I should spend it doing something like working, back to workforce life. 

I can choose to go back doing the office job, fully use the qualification I attained years ago and get the salary I deserve, or doing something else, something I love doing, something my passionate call me for, but the return may not be high or enough. Well, for some people, money is never be enough right?

Since a year ago, I had chosen to work part time, a job that many people generally are capable to do, whether you have experience or not. And fate brought me to land to another place, which is more suitable for my liking and personality. 

And starting February, apart from my part time job, I had started to pursue my interest related to something I used to love, but not die-hard loving, which was crystal. 

I was mesmerised by the beauty of the nature. They were nature too, built in over million and billion years naturally. And they were believed to carry many positive benefits with them. 

When I started my second part time job, I often felt unease. It might be due to a new place, and also the nature of the job that needed me to deal with items that could harm me, such as: knife, cans, slicing machine, hot pots and pans, hot water, oven, and so on. 

Bruises and cut wounds took turn tattooing my parts of body every week. Actually, it was something that I could avoid, but somehow, it happened. So I started wearing crystal to work: a pair of earrings, necklace (that I hid inside my shirt), and 2 bracelets (one left and one right - they were put in my pockets when working).

Somehow I could feel the energy from it. They might not prevent me from getting wound and blisters, but they helped me in keeping myself calm when it happened. 

It was somehow giving me calm effect, believed that they were there to protect me, give me strength and confidence, calm me down when it was busy or angry, and they too, helped me in clearing the misunderstanding, encouraging me to speak up what my heart was saying, and at the end, won the heart of my colleagues. 

You may or may not believe, but I personally feel it inside me and what change it has brought me into.

Both part time job and crystal interest may not give me enough money to live by. In fact, every month I spent most of my salary to purchase the crystal. But anyhow, I still feel that it is better than taking the full time office job that would not make me happy because the motivation would be to earn bigger money, but not because I like the nature of my job. 

So since it is part time, I do not work every day. One week, I may work 2 to 4 days only. The rest of the time, I spend it to engage myself in buying crystal (physical and online), getting design inspiration, learning how to do it, making it, and so on. This way, I can use my creative side in making DIY crystal bracelet too upon the buyer request.

For now, my sisters are my greatest supporters. Few close friends are also supporting me too. To be frank, I do not earn much from it. Because I am happy enough that they too believe in the goodness from it. Just as long it can cover the cost, that is enough. 

So going back to the quote above, I just want to tell myself, and to confirm it, that there is no rules that I must work office job, earn lots of money, in order to call myself living my life in decent way. There are still many other choices that I can make (while I am still given that choice), and still call it living my life according to my wish, my passion, my love, and then work out with the little money that I earn. 

Most important, keep my health (both physically and mentally) in good state by developing positive thought as much as possible, spread good things around to people surrounding me, live stress-free life (the more you earn, the more you attach your life style with it), learn how to balance (when to buy and when to stop), use my other talent in good way (in this case, my creative side), and just be myself. Be happy and content with everything, and never compare my life with other people. 

With this post, I hope you can reflect into what you are currently doing in your life too. Whether you are living your life according to what you want, whether you can fulfil your dreams or on the way into it, and so on. Always remember, there is no right and no wrong, but it is better if you can give yourself a chance to follow what your heart is saying. Wish you all a great day ahead!!! Stay safe and take care!!!