:: mac and cheese ::

Do you love cheese? I like eating cheese and due to that I could never resist a hot plate of mac & cheese. I usually eat Secret Recipe's prawn macaroni with cheese but if I want to have it at home I just buy instant mac & cheese by either Kraft or San Remo because they are easy to cook. The limitation of eating mac & cheese from Secret Recipe is its price because a plate costs RM16++. It is okay for once in a while affair, but it is not okay if a plate is insufficient to fulfill a big appetite and what if you keep on craving for it every week? Can go bankrupt wo! Meanwhile, although instant versions are cheap in price the taste on the other hand is incomparable to the cooked version because it is not as rich and satisfying.

I have seen my bestie, Rabby who is always good at cooking posted pic of her mac & cheese on Twitter twice and they looked delicious. The other day she shared her mac & cheese recipe and I was surprised that it is so easy. I don't know why I always thought it is not easy to cook mac & cheese (and not even bother to google, duh). Well maybe I was used to cook the instant version so it is already stuck in my head that instant food is always the easiest.

I have planned to cook mac & cheese for Ady and of course I am not giving him the instant one so yesterday I followed what Rabby taught me and impressed with the end result because it looked yummy. Even Ady liked it a lot and ate until his tummy was round and packed.

look can be deceiving but not this one

Now I can eat as many mac & cheese as I want and the best of all is having it in my own preference with more creamy, cheesy and extra sauce. (Fattening or not I don't care). I have sought for Rabby's approval and I'm sharing the recipe here for future reference. I have changed the step a bit and this is how I cooked mine:

Easy Mac and Cheese Recipe

Ingredients:

- butter

- fresh milk

- flour

- sliced cheddar cheese

- mushrooms (optional but I used champignions)

- salt & pepper

- macaroni

Steps:

1. Boil water. Pour macaroni when the water is already boiling and leave until cook.

2. In a sauce pan, heat butter (2-3 tbsp) until it melts.

3. Pour in fresh milk depends on how much sauce you want.

4. Stir the milk and butter until half boiling.

5. Mix some flour with water. Pour slowly into the pan and keep on stirring until the sauce is quite thick.

6. Put in the mushrooms, salt and pepper to taste.

7. Tear cheddar cheese (3-5 pcs) into small pieces, put into the sauce and stir.

8. Pour cooked macaroni into the sauce and mix them all together.

9. Ready to serve.

posted from Bloggeroid

:: daging goreng kunyit berlada ::

It is already 6th of Ramadhan. Alhamdulillah, it is almost a week now and we should thank God for His endless blessing. So how is your Ramadhan so far? Do you cook for iftar or are you enjoying glorious choice of food from the Ramadhan market? After so many months break from 'visiting' the kitchen I have managed to make a come back and brush up my amateur cooking skill although I still don't cook every day. Now it is less than 5 hours to iftar. Many of us may have started thinking and planning what to eat or cook for this evening and I am happy to share that I will be cooking nasi lemak because my bestie, Fila will break fast together with us tonight (yeay!).

Actually I wanted to share about this dish we had 3 days ago during sahur and it is daging goreng kunyit berlada (chilli fried beef). It was my first time cooking it and just a simple one, but for me this kind of dish could entice my appetite more than having curries during this fasting month. I was happy because Mr. Husband requested to have it again for iftar on the next day so it must be good eh? {Ahak ahak.} Anyway, during the sahur I paired the spicy beef with pajeri nanas but on the second time, hubby wanted to eat it only with sunny side up egg, sambal belacan and soy sauce. Very simple but he managed eating 3 plates of rice with the dish and I feel so sorry that his tongue is now sore due to the spiciness.

So now, how to cook daging goreng kunyit berlada?

What we need:

a. Meat - cut into thin, small pieces 
b. Large onion - sliced thinly  
c. Chillies (cili api) up to your own preference
d. Turmeric powder (serbuk kunyit)
e. Salt
f. Cooking oil

What we have to do:

1. Pour some turmeric powder and salt on pieces of meat. Mix them all well together.
2. Heat the cooking oil.
3. While waiting for oil to heat up, crush the chillies well with a bit of salt then lightly crush the onion.
3. Fry the meat until they turned brown then put them aside.
4. Fry the crushed chillies and onion until the onions are golden.
5. Pour the fried meat into the pan again and mix it well with the chillies and onion.
6. Done and ready to be served.

As my boss said to me earlier, oily cooking is not good but it is ok to consume it once in a while. Happy break fasting peeps! :-D

:: protect & whitens ::

- Do you want to protect your skin from harmful UV rays?

- Do you want your skin to look naturally flawless?

- Do you want to have a fairer skin tone?

If you say yes to all or even any of the questions above, you might need to consider wearing this powerful lil thing:

It's the PERFECT SUNSCREEN by COSMODERM

I have to admit that I did not really care about UV rays before but now after learning about the short term and long term effects, I have made a move to wear sunscreen as my daily routine. Perfect Sunscreen by Cosmoderm is the best choice because besides protecting my skin from harmful UV up till 8 hours with Sun Protective Factor (SPF35) and PA+++ (maximum protection from UVA), it also works as a foundation. What I like the most is its silky smooth texture and its ability to cover blemishes only with thin layer of application, hence makes one bottle lasts longer than it should be. Hey, that's value for money ;-) My skin even feels smoother thanks to the sunflower oil and hopefully the jojoba oil plus vitamin E can help to reduce that nasty shingle scar on my forehead.

Perfect Sunscreen not only suitable for ladies but also for gents and comes in 5 shades: Nude (suitable for teenagers and men), Natural Pink, Natural Beige, Medium Beige and Tawny Beige. Price for 30ml is RM29.90 and last but not least, Cosmoderm products are Halal as certified by JAKIM. Gunakan tanpa was-was ya! 

This is the perfect time to try Perfect Sunscreen because they are currently having this contest where you could win up to RM1,000 cash in their 'Pertandingan Rebut Duit Raya'. Just snap a before and after photo of yourself wearing the product and upload it on their Facebook page. There's no harm trying. Just imagine if you are the lucky winner - you would walk away with RM1,000 cash to spend for Hari Raya and that is equivalent to many pieces of new clothes, shoes or how ever you want to spend it. Why wait? Contest runs from 1st July until 5th August 2012.

By the way, here is Cosmoderm's model of the day (ihiks):




Visit here for more details on Cosmoderm and its products:
official website: http://www.mycosmoderm.com/
facebook page: http://facebook/cosmoderm

:: ready for radzuan's? ::

Craze over designers' affordable ready-to-wear collections will continue with this:

ThePoplook has announced its special collaboration with the respective designer a week ago. Although people are still crazy about Jovian's ready-to-wear, I believed this is going to be another fashion madness because Radziwill for thepoplook would not be available anywhere else except on thepoplook website.

If you are familiar with Radzuan Radziwill's collection, you could anticipate looking at his signature, intricate workmanship in his famous kaftans. If the sneak peek above is too vague, just look below and decide whether you would want to join and beat hundred or thousand others to own a piece tomorrow.

The one in red looks 'inviting' o_O

Price range would be from RM119 - RM179 and it is the cheapest among other designers so far. Now, will you be waiting in front of the monitor at 11 am, tomorrow?

I know I will.

*keywords: radzuan radziwill raya collection 2012, radzuan radziwill for the poplook

:: first ramadhan ::

Alhamdulillah once again we are blessed by Him to meet the holy month, Ramadhan. We are lucky this year because the first fasting day falls on Saturday so many took the chance to have their tarawih, sahur and iftar with family back in home town. I am here in Subang though. Planned to go back Seremban next weekend instead and I look forward for it. Besides meeting my parents and sister, a must have thing to do is going to the Bazaar Ramadhan at the stadium area. Hopefully the booth that was selling nice putu piring is there, like last year. Despite being encouraged to do good deeds and all, the most talk about subject through out the Holy Month is no other than food. You can't run from discussing about what for sahur or iftar everyday. Like now, I want to share what we had for the first sahur this year because I cooked something I never cook before.

(telephone conversation - translated from Malay language to English)
Hubby: What are we going to eat for sahur?
Me: That's why...what do you want?
Hubby: Tomato rice?
Me: (pause) hahaha *nervous laugh*

Tomato rice is hubby's favourite but I never cook it through out my entire life. Hubby said it is ok if I don't want to do it but I took it as a challenge. Googled few recipes but ended up calling his mother for instructions. Eventually it is not as hard as I thought and MIL's version is the easiest when compared to recipes on Google. I started cooking at midnight together with side dishes and the end result of the set looks like this:



Hubby wanted the red sauce to be separated with the chicken so we had tomato rice, fried chicken, red chilli sauce and green curry potato. Too bad I'm having tongue pain right now thanks to over consumption of garlic peri peri sauce and kimchi. They were very spicy until they 'burnt' my tongue and causes my tongue lost its senses so everything I eat tastes blunt. I even had to ask hubby to taste everything I cooked. Hopefully this is temporary or I will become so thin due to lost of appetite.

Well that is just a brief story about our first Ramadhan this year.
The Holy Month is not about fasting and food but an opportunity for us Muslims to gain as many pahala as we could through Quran recital, prayers, doing charities, zakat and many more. We would not know whether we are allowed to go through the next one so let us treat this like the last one. May all of us have a bless Ramadhan and happy fasting to all Muslims out there. Peace and love, always.

posted from Bloggeroid

:: 1 year 1 month ::

If 1901 hotdogs has special discount date every month which is on the 19th, we have 17th as a special date because Ady was born on the 17th and so does I. A month has passed after Ady's first birthday. He is another month older and as at today, our baby...


...can walk! He started with standing without holding anything for few seconds during his first birthday week and he has improved ever since that with walking a step or two forward, then able to stand from a sitting position until he can walk by himself. Nowadays he keeps on walking around the living room but still not confident enough to walk at shopping mall.

...can climb up and down the bed and sofa to play with his toys. Ady is into colourful blocks and still into real stuffs like bottles and boxes. Mama can have some 'me time' now that he is able to play on his own *yippee yeay*

bubble bath time with his favourite bottles

...can clap his hands when I sing 'If You're Happy', ABC or when he listens to any music he likes. The cutest moment is when I sing the song while he is not doing anything. Once I started singing, his face somehow brightens up and he automatically raised his hands and clap clap clap. Cuteness.

...can convey message through gesture and facial expressions. For example, Ady will turn his face towards me or make sound if he doesn't want something I offer and I know he wants milk if his face brightens up together with a laugh when I show him the feeding bottle.

...waves his hand to say goodbye. Actually he only waves his palm up and down but at least he understands when people say "bye". When he is in good mood, he waves with a smile but if he is not in a very good mood he waves with a stern or expressionless face and it was funny to see him like that.

...still speaks in his own baby language. We keep on teaching him to say 'mama' or 'papa' but he usually repeats with "atah" or "tah". Well, maybe that is mama and papa in baby language? Anyway, we always catch Ady singing in his baby language song when he is playing on his own and it is so adorable!

"Who's the boss? I'm the boss!"

Our son is taller and bigger now but I still cuddle him like a baby. Alhamdulillah I can still breastfeed him until today (although not exclusively) and that might be one reason why he is so attached to me. Until today I still love watching Ady sleeping and this is a pic of him taken in the morning of 17.07.2012.  

 How could I resist to look at that serene face and pouty lips?

Mama loves you, baby!

* this entry was posted on 17.07.2012 and edited on 20.07.2012 *

:: salute for jovian mandagie ::

Three days ago I posted an entry about affordable Raya collection by famous local designers with intention of sharing the great news. As you may already aware, another awaited release is JOVIAN ready-to-wear collection by no other than Jovian Mandagie himself which will be available starting this Sunday. On a different note, I somehow surprised about sudden trafic increase to this blog since past few hours. After being left in question marks, I have finally found the answer and the reason came from this screen shot:

Honestly I feel appreciated with such gesture. JM also thanked and mentioned few more blogs on his Facebook wall; and I believed other bloggers are also in awe as I do. Jovian is a big name in local fashion stream but he still got the urge to appreciate bloggers - wow, salute! For a nobody in the blogging world like moi, of course I am feeling a bit excited so please pardon my starstruck. Thank you for your effort in recognising us, Jovian ★

Anyway and anyhow, if you are interested to get any design from the JOVIAN ready-to-wear collection just check JM's official FB page (search: Jovian Mandagie) for photos and latest updates. Among latest news posted on his wall as at this post is published are:

The collection will be available only at First Lady boutique in Jalan TAR this Sunday, 15.07.12 and Zalora online store on the evening of Monday, 16.07.12. Arrival at other First Lady outlets (Shah Alam, Melaka, Johor Bahru, Penang & even Singapore) will start estimatedly on 19.07.12 onwards.

:: one happy weekend ::

Weekend is hours away. Before it arrives I wanted to share about the previous weekend. We started our Saturday with a wedding at Titiwangsa. Not the Titiwangsa lake, but Jalan Titiwangsa somewhere around there. It was my ex-hommie's wedding - Julie or better known as Opet to us with her partner, Aie. The bride and groom looked fab in their white songket. Besides the tasty main dishes and cendol, they also served putu piring which is my favourite kuih. I guess this is the first ever wedding that served putu piring and I like that brilliant idea. Welcome to married life, sweet couple. We are happy for you and wishing you an everlasting love.  

Ady couldn't stop staring at the bride and groom

We did not know where to go after the wedding so I suggested us to drop by at Mid Valley for the Maybank Treatpoints Fair. It is an annual event for Maybank card members where we could redeem our points for items and get extra bonus points for spending. We used to go to the fair but never redeem anything because I was so stingy but that day I intended to utilise some of the points. The crowd was huge. We did not know what to get at first but hubby then suggested on getting garment steamer. We looked at two brands but finally settled with one by Faber instead of Phillips because Faber's came with adjustable hanger rod, which is really convenient. We even tested the item on the Poplook's chiffon maxi dress that I was wearing. The result was convincing until another lady who helped me ironing my dress took one steamer home too. There goes 47,600 of my treatpoints. 

:: designer's for raya? ::

Collaboration between famous designers with giant retailers have started in the West. With a fraction of the price, customers are able to own designers' items such as Mulberry (for Target), Roberto Cavalli (for H&M) and many more. Such trend is now available in Malaysia where local designers have started collaborating with the giant retailers. The most talked about collection for this coming Hari Raya is 20 by Rizalman for Tesco. It was launched last Sunday, 7 July 2012 at selected Tesco around Malaysia and it was sold like 'hot fried bananas' (you know what I mean, rite :-D).

I went through the pictures on Friday and felt in love with few designs. Thought of going to check them out at Tesco on the next day but I totally forgotten! Now the small sizes must be sold out so I can say goodbye to these pretty avant-garde pieces:

...and these modern and sophisticated ones...

*SIGH*

*SIGH*

*SIGH*

But, but, but it's okay... because if I (and you) still want to don in designer's clothes there is still another chance because Jovian Mandagie will launch his affordable ready to wear this coming Sunday, 15 July 2012. Mark your calendar too ladies because the collection, JOVIAN will only be available on zalora.com.my and selected First Lady boutiques. These are among my favourites and the price range is RM280 - RM320.

This fantabulous orange dress is on top of my list.

AND it is the most expensive one - RM380.

*wave and cry in corner*

Apart from those two, thepoplook has also spilled out about their collaboration with another Malaysia's most renowed designer for their Designer Raya collection. Which designer is still a question mark but the collection will be launched at 11:00 am on Tuesday, 24 July 2012. I wish it is RizmanRuzaini because I love their style and detailing but we just wait and see-lah. 

I guess many women will look gorgeous in their designer outfits this coming Raya. We have not start fasting and the purse is already thin -__-

*image source: google, murai.com

:: just the two of us ::

I suddenly remember about this particular scene in Austin Powers 2 where Dr. Evil and Mini Me sang "just the two of us" when they were in prison. It was funny and sweet.

So here is our rendition of that song in photos.

Just the Two of Us - Mama & Ady ♥

"...Just the two of us, we can make it if we try
Just the two of us, (Just the two of us)
Just the two of us, building castles in the sky
Just the two of us, you and I..."

:: my new favourite makeup ::

Other bloggers have been writing about this makeup brand for ages, but it is better late than never for me to write about it. If you always read this blog you may noticed on my interest towards MAC Cosmetics. Yes, I am an avid user of MAC because the quality is good, long lasting, nice colours and also suits me well, but despite all that I am actually a mix and match person. Not everything I got from MAC because I believed different brands have diffferent killer products. I swear by MAC's Studio Fix foundation powder and Paint Pot cream eyeshadow but I still open my purchase for other brands especially for items like lipstick, eye shadow, eye liner and mascara. Telling you the truth, the best mascara I have ever worn is from Maybelline and it is better than MAC's mascara, which is easily smudged. I used to wear lipsticks by Maybelline too and really love them because they are light in texture and not strong fragranced like some expensive brands.

MAC Morning Frost Paint Pot from Christmas 2011 Glitter & Ice Collection is my daily essential

My life is unberable without this MAC Studio Fix in NW25

I do not mind buying makeup from over the counter brands like Maybelline and Silky Girl (their Funky Eyelights Pencil is awesome) because as mentioned earlier, different brands have different killer products so although we are brand conscious, do not ever judge a brand without testing the product beforehand. Established brands may not always produce good makeups and 'cheap' brands may not always have less quality makeups. Few of my friends told me that SimplySiti makeup products are good especially their eye shadow, which shows local brand can also have quality products and can be purchased without breaking the bank. Ah, don't let me write about makeup because I will end up straying from the main subject, so now let's get back to the subject, shall we? 

The brand I wanted to talk about is actually Topshop Makeup. It has been here for more than a year already but I just managed to try their product within these few months. It was an accidental visit to Topshop after getting my Fashion Fast Forward membership from Dorothy Perkins. Being a Fashion Fast Forward member, I am entitled for 10% discounts for any products from DP, Topshop, Miss Selfridge and Topman. I was with my BFF Nor and we somehow got stuck at the Topshop Makeup's island testing and applying their products. There was a promotion that time where shoppers will receive a makeup bag with purchase of 5 makeup items. Nor who always couldn't resist such promotion (and because the makeup bag is large and nice) decided to purchase 5 eye liners, which were then given to all her BFFs including me as a gift.

The black kohl eye liner is my first Topshop Makeup product but few weeks later I returned my visit and purchased Crayon eye shadows in Whisper and Ramble. With additional items bought by Nor, I also managed getting myself the spacious makeup bag which has now turns into my lunch pouch. The Crayon eye shadows are fantastic! It is glittery, rich in colour, easy to blend and most importantly, long lasting. I usually do my makeup in the car before going up into the office. Applying dry eye shadow with brush takes me longer than applying it with the Crayons because after drawing them on the lids, I can just blend them together with my finger. It is really easy and the blending result is much better. Not only that, the Crayons can also be a base which can be used to retain dry eye shadow and make it last longer. Totally worth buying.

The Kohl eye liner is an awesome product too. It is soft but bold so without hassle to apply, the colour is strong on the eyes. It doesn't smudge easily but through experience, it is more appropriate to be worn indoor (ie. in the office). Here are colours of the Crayons and black Kohl for reference in case you are interested.

1 - Crayon eye shadow in Whisper

2 - Crayon eye shadow in Ramble

3 - Kohl eye liner in Coal

There are 2 other shades for the Crayon, one in gold and another in lighter brown to Ramble, meanwhile the Kohl also comes in brown. Topshop Makeup also produced its line of lipstick, blusher, brushes and others; and you can always check them out in Topshop stores. As I mentioned earlier, I can get 10% off the price so just buzz me if you need my assistance to help you buy one. Toodles!    

*image source for MAC products: Google