Losing Weight and Chinese New Year
Posted: January 30, 2014 Filed under: Blogging, Trip and Event | Tags: Chinese New Year 2 CommentsFinally I can get up and go out after four days bed-resting at home. I was food poisoned on last Sunday. Thanks to that jerk. That “not-so-fresh clams” who had brought me into fever and acute stomachache. But ya’ll know, there’s always something good behind every sorrow. I effortlessly losing my weights!!! Not weight, yes you read it correctly, weightS. Just like most twenty-something women, it seems that I can’t eat as freely as I used to because it’s getting too hard to lose a kilo nowadays. That’s why, at the end I’m glad for this week’s stomachache drama. Pinch me. I may sound so shallow for that reason but whatever works, right? Hahah.
Well well well..I’m on the way to Jakarta right now (2pm this afternoon) and stuck on the toll road. Neither the traffic nor weather is friendly but the show must go on. Chinese New Year family gathering is just too important to be missed out. So here I am, under a stormy rain and traffic jam going to the flooded Jakarta. My friends said I’m crazy for keep going there in this kind of national flood disaster.
Chinese New Year really matters for some reason for me. Here they are…
- The first reason is a kind of love-hate relationship. Nobody hates the red envelope on CNY and so do I. That’s the loving part. But at this silvery age,it’s also embarrasing to join the younger peeps lining for envelopes. Hate it.
- Foods. Besides Christmas, this is the only occasion when abundance foods are literally abundance. Forget “staying in shape” and go eat tat yummy fatty pork!
- Red clothes. I know many families don’t wear red clothes any longer in CNY but in my family, red is still kinda crucial. Pink and orange are still acceptable but wearing black. white or even blue is a big no. “Hey you, you with that blue shirt, you are not allowed to go in, just wait outside..” That’s how strict my family is. I’m joking.
- Family reunion. Besides weddings, CNY is the only occasion when most of the family members gather altogether. So imagine hundreds of people talking in Hakka accent wearing red clothes. How festive!
This is the first time I write a post via my mobile and really intend to make it short. Losing some kilos before CNY is relieving so I can eat more without burdened (Hahah).
Happy Chinese New Year to you guys who celebrate! Hopefully the upcoming “Wood Horse” year will bring us greater happiness and prosperity!!!
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5 What to Eat in Malang
Posted: January 18, 2014 Filed under: Asian Food, Indonesian Food, Indonesian Street Food, Malang, Trip and Event | Tags: Java Dancer coffee Malang, Malang, Mie Gang Djangkrik, Nasi Bhuk Matirah Madura, Nasi Campur, Nasi Pecel Mustika Panderman, rawon dengkul, Rawon Nguling Malang 2 CommentsI just had a trip to East Java with my family after the New Year day. Actually it was a short 8-day trip to Malang and Surabaya only. We had so much fun and also ate so many delicious foods! Consider myself lucky for having a fellow foodies family. Forget pizza, steak or sushi as in this post I will reveal some of the (un)/traditional foods you have to eat when you are in Malang!
Nasi Pecel Mustika Panderman
What to eat : Nasi Campur and Nasi Pecel
Price : IDR 9000 – 15000 / $ 0.90 – 1.50
Highlight : This place has been established for long time and also very well known in Malang. The price is very affordable and the portion is just right for breakfast.
Address : Jalan Rajekwesi No.10, Malang – East Java
- Nasi Campur
Nasi Pecel
Rawon Nguling
What to eat : Rawon dengkul (knee), Rawon daging, Sayur Lodeh
Price : IDR 10000 – 57000 / $ 1.00 – 5.70
Highlight : The rawon dengkul was amazingly flavorful with rich broth, the knee parts were chewy yet tender and came in big portion fit for 2-3 persons.
Address : Jalan KH Zainul no.62, Malang – East Java / 0341 324684
Rawon is served along with raw beansprout and relish
This kind of plate will be served on every table directly even we do not order. We pay what we eat from the plate.
Nasi Bhuk Matirah Madura
What to eat : Rice with some selections of proteins such as tempeh, empal (sweet fried beed), fried innards (tripe, paru, and etc.). The rice is also served with rawon or lodeh tewel (jackfruit lodeh).
Price : IDR 9000 – 15000 / $ 0.90 – 1.50 (depends on what and how many pcs you choose)
Highlight : All of the innards are cooked nicely, tender and well-seasoned. The rawon is also really nice, a more savory type compared to the sweet-savory broth of the one in Rawon Nguling.
Address : Jalan Trunojoyo no. 10EF (nothern side of Kota Baru Train Station) / 0341 7703377
Nasi Bhuk
Nasi Rawon
Depot Gang Djangkrik
What to eat : Pangsit mie (Wonton noodle), Baikut goreng (Fried pork ribs), Kolokee (sweet and sour chicken), Tami seafood (seafood crispy noodle)
Price : IDR 10000 – 60000 / $ 1.00 – 6.00
Highlight : Malang is famous for its Cwie Mie or Pangsit Mie or Noodle, Gang Djangkrik is one of the most notorious place to eat best cwie mie in town. They cook delicious Chinese foods in proper portions fit for family diner.
Address : Jalan Kawin kios 26, Malang / 0341 566283
Seafood Crispy Noodle / Seafood Tamie
Kolokee / Sweet and Sour Chicken
Java Dancer
What to eat/drink : Single origin coffees in various brewing method, chocolate, tea, light bites like fried mozzarella cheese and pizza
Price : IDR 10000 – 80000 / $ 1.00 – 8.00
Highlight : They serve (said as the best) coffees in Malang! More to add, Java Dancer is a really nice place with Javanese traditional ambient that would make you stay for hours.
Address : Jalan Kahuripan no. 12, Malang, East Java / 0341 8199899 / www.javadancer.com
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Good Food and Wine Show 2013
Posted: June 27, 2013 Filed under: Melbourne, Trip and Event | Tags: food blogger, food review, GFWS, GFWS 2013, Good Food and Wine Show 2013, melbourne, Melbourne day trip Leave a commentThis post is about my visit to Good Food and Wine Show 2013 or GFWS on 7-10 June. I barely realize that it’s already the last week of June and I haven’t got the chance to post about GFWS. It will be too long if I post about GFWS in July, won’t it? Well, I went to the first day of the show and too bad could not make a visit on the other 3 days.
As other food expo, one of the most anticipated thing is the food testers that were provided all day long at almost every stall! Goodies, tiny bits, food samples were overloaded during the show. I have to say, I went home with a happy full tummy that day! Apart from the freebies, all the exhibitors offered discounted price for all of the products too. No wonder many people came with or even bought a shopping cart! (Yes, they sell shopping cart there!) I had a chat with one of the visitor and he even told me GFWS is a good chance to buy foods in bulk then store and use it for the whole year until the next GFWS coming. Wow!
This event is held in 4 different states Australia-wide, Melbourne, Sydney, Perth and Brisbane. The Melbourne one was held at Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in Southbank. Similar to my MICE post, this is going to be more into pictures than words but I have less pictures this time. Hopefully you still can enjoy it.
As a dairy products aficionados, The Collective-great dairy was one of my favorite! They have haloumi (Greek’s cheese made from goat milk) and many kind of yoghurts. I bought the passionfruit and the berry ones. They are so delish!
They served the yoghurt in small cups and visitors could taste all of the flavors.
Who doesn’t love Cha Time? This one was even free! Visitors could buy Cha Time in a cheap price, only AU$ 3 per regular cup and taste all of the mini cha time new flavors.
So sweet, pretty and colorful, yet the beer is also sweet too! Nice but kinda too sweet for me.
Yalumbra was one of the most-eye catching stall. Nicely decorated stall, friendly staffs and good stuffs oferred.
Watching the hilarious Australia’s first master chef Julie Goodwin was really fun and entertaining! Love her!
The two lovely sales lady gave me a pose! They have many varieties but I could not manage to try each of them.
Lovely stall of Spirits of France! All of the three staffs (2 French and 1 Aussie) were so kind. We had cups of different French liquors but as its sweet characteristic, it’s just overly too sweet to have it without anything to make it balance.
Some of the exhibitors held a cooking event. Participants had to pay a certain amount of money to join the cooking class and then enjoy the foods together.
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Melbourne International Cofee Expo 2013 – MICE
Posted: May 29, 2013 Filed under: Coffee, Melbourne, Tea, Trip and Event | Tags: coffee, coffee business, coffee geek, melbourne, Melbourne International Coffee Expo 2013, Melbourne Showgrounds, MICE 2013, tea Leave a commentMelbourne International Coffee Expo was held on 23rd- 26th of June in Melbourne Showgrounds, Flemington. It’s about 30 minutes from CBD by tram 57 that will bring you right in front of the venue. It was my first time stepping Melbourne Showgrounds as well as my first time attending a coffee event. MICE 2013 is the second one after the first MICE was in 2012. I went to MICE 2013 with my coffee geek bf for the rest of last week-end, (practically 4 days from Thursday to Sunday).
MICE is an absolute big event, indeed. People from all around the globe were talking and actually attending this event. The first 2 days were specialized for trader or coffee business people while the other 2 days opened for public. I enjoyed every single visit even though the first 2 days were slightly better as not too many people there so it was easier for talking, tasting and taking pictures 🙂 As the coffee geek bf is running coffee business back home so we came down since Thursday. During the expo, I was highly attracted by many fascinating well-designed stalls, in opposite he enjoyed his coffee and tools hunting.
There were so many people attending MICE 2013, and this is a proof that coffee is really a big thing everywhere. More people know and understand coffee better than ever! The popularity spreads and grows not only in coffee drinkers nation that mostly has reached its maturity cycle but it is really everywhere including Indonesia.
Last week-end was also the peak period of my coffee history! 🙂 Seriously, since I don’t really drink coffee, or let’s make it I really don’t drink coffee normally. So, having cup by cups of espresso all day was a real challenge for me. As a poor amateur coffee drinker, I had those after-coffee symptoms such as fasten heart beat, headache and stomachache. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed the experience of coffee tasting! No regret though.
I am excited as much as the coffee geek bf, that’s because I am sure there will be tea stalls as well, which was true. People start talking and murmuring that tea will be the next big thing and I was pretty sure those specialty tea business owners would not pass this event. MICE is such a great opportunity for everyone in the business. Unlike my other posts, this MICE 2013 post will show you more pictures than letters. Enjoy the post!
Picture is not mine
The giant Rainbow stall of Aussie’s famous coffee giants, St. Ali and Sensory Lab
Toby’s Estate stall
Supreme Coffee stall is one of my favorite! Very warm, pretty and unique. Me love!
The full-color and attention-grabbing coffee stall. Interesting that they really provided balls for people to play.
One of the busiest stall during the expo for the whole 4 days, Proudmary!
Cupping Session at Proudmary
Griffiths organic coffee spacious stall
CUPACOFFEECUP stall from New Zealand, they can make customized reusable coffee cup for your cafe!
The calming and serene Veneziano stall
Prana Chai’s owner was explaining his product to the coffee geek bf!
Chai with 11 spices from Prana Chai was so delicious. Yes, we had cups of the yummy chai latte!
Serenitea, one of my fave tea from Victoria also participating the event! Simply elegant with black domination stall and don’t forget the nice goodies!
Hario, The Japanese coffee-teawares company was located altogether with St. Ali and Sensory Lab Rainbow big stall. I’m captivated by its tea brewing tools!
Grenade Stall from Tea Cartell and Cartell Coffee Roaster. Wide-ranged of tea varieties where their stall presentation made it possible for people to actually see, touch and smell different types of tea. I love this stall with the friendly and kind-hearted owner 🙂
Grenade from Tea Cartell with their tea products, Zealong
Tea Drops stall
Somage Fine Foods stall, my favorite one! Neat, everything seems to be well-designed and most importantly, amazing products.
World Barista Championship 2013 – Final Round was Full House!
If you love coffee/tea/foods/beverages/new experience, I highly recommend you to attend the next MICE event. Not to count what my bf got from this event and not to count all the bites and tasty cups offered too, 🙂 I myself as a layman in terms of coffee could say I got many new things to learn both in coffee and tea. The opportunity to meet the coffee and tea experts, have a direct chat with them, watch the World Barista Championship and World Brewer Championship were also the highlights to point out.
All the spirit, passion and excitement towards the food and beverage industry (especially coffee and let’s mention tea) were fascinating and priceless! Well done MICE 2013!
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2012 in review
Posted: January 14, 2013 Filed under: Trip and Event | Tags: Bali, Bandung, blog 2012 report, blog annual repot, blog report, blogging, entertainment, food, food blog, food blogger, food review, media, melbourne, recipe, restaurant review 2 CommentsThe WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 4,600 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 8 years to get that many views.
Click here to see the complete report.
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BBQ Picnic!
Posted: January 13, 2013 Filed under: Asian Food, Melbourne, Trip and Event, Western Food | Tags: Albert Park, Albert Park and Lake, Albert Park Melbourne, bbq areas, BBQ picnic, food, food blog, food blogger, melbourne, melbourne cbd, Melbourne day trip, picnic Leave a commentDuring the Christmas holiday I spent one of the day for a BBQ picnic. I am so excited about picnic and since currently I live in a picnic friendly country, I am totally spoiled. In this country you can find parks everywhere and most of them especially the big ones, equipped with barbeque area or people call it “barbie” in here. This is my second barbie picnic as the first one I had it with my classmates after the exam.
It was such an unplanned picnic and I had it with the same lads that were going to The Meat and Wine Co. the week before. After a quick grocery shopping on Sunday morning, we headed to the afternoon mass first before starting the feast. As I stated above, this is such a sudden-without-proper-preparation picnic so the first thing we did after church was looking for available BBQ area in any parks located around the Melbourne CBD. You know what I mean, we didn’t even know where to hold the picnic! 😀
Since it was still on holiday week season, we found it hard to find one. Almost all the BBQ areas are occupied by others and on the other hand, we were dying of hunger! It was already around 3.00 p.m. in the afternoon and we haven’t had anything to eat before.
Luckily after a hard searching along Albert Park, we could get a really nice BBQ spot in front of the Albert Park Lake. And guess what? I am so in love with the view and the weather that day (except the strong wind that blown away our stuffs and couldn’t be caught). I bet everybody will love it too, well yeah, how could you won’t? The BBQ area is right on the side of the blue lake with flocks of both white and black swan swimming happily.
This beautiful picture of Albert Park Lake is not mine and a courtesy of http://kikichaos.com
Alright then we started the preparation as the guys did the grill and the ladies did the foods prep. Due to the quick and rushed shopping, we didn’t buy a lot of foods. We had lamb, lamb cutlet, diced tenderloin beef, chicken chunks, Aussie’s banana prawn, patties, burger rolls, hotdog rolls, dips and onion! Yeah, we didn’t have any veggies or fruits but fortunately we still had fruit juice and that onion to be caramelized.
Eventually, the four of us could not finish the foods and the wind was getting stronger that we decided to go home and continue the cooking at home instead. At home, the ladies tried their best to cook Garlic Prawn and we did love it! Ssstt actually the guys didn’t love it as they said the prawns were too salty. It might because we added rock pepper salt and put additional garlic salt in the end. Hehehe. Our last menu of the day as it was almost midnight, we made burgers with onion and garlic seasoned patties. We did an experiment by putting shredded cheese inside and and re-mold the patties before grilling them. A yummy way to end a tiring whole-day picnic feast!
I didn’t think to make a post about this picnic at first but since after I uploaded the photos through one of my social media account, lots of my friend asking and showing their interests therefore I want to share the experience with everyone. So I apologize for the incomplete pictures especially there is no photos of the BBQ foods itself. 😀
Sadly, there is no way you can find this kind of public facility in my country and based on what’s happened this far, it seems very hard to maintain the public facilities for a long term usage. Too bad. I would love to have parks and nice public facilities back home one day 🙂
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This is The Cherry Season – Trip to Cherry Hills Orchard
Posted: December 4, 2012 Filed under: Melbourne, Sweet Treat, Trip and Event | Tags: cherry farm, Cherry Hills Orchard, Melbourne day trip, Melbourne event 2 CommentsThis is the cherry season! Earlier in the fourth week of November, I got a message asking me going out on Sunday to cherry farm, located near to Mount Dandenong. My friend said this is kind of once a year season, so absolutely a yes yes yes. Lol. The good thing is all of us are free this Sunday (“us” refers to the same troops as the French Festival event).
Dandenong is so far away from where I live as it is located in southern side. I went to my friend’s house first to make it easier. I didn’t think that it will be a quite long travel. It took around 1,5 hours to reach the farm. We had a fun chit chat along the driving time and also spoiled by beautiful scenes and warm weather. I feel so grateful for all the perfect combinations I had to spend my first Sunday in December, great people and great time.
The view along the road
Out of our prediction, the cherry farm which is Cherry Hills Orchard was crowded by visitors this Sunday. This Australian family owned farm is one of the biggest cherry supplier nationwide too. I overwhelmed by the beautiful scenery (as always) bah! Right after parked the car, we met few Indonesian families there. It reminds me when I went to the Tulip Farm in Tasselaar that I met Indonesians everywhere, front side-back side, left side-right side all Indonesians. Hahaha.
After paying the ticket and grabbing our buckets, we directly headed to the cherry areas, actually there were many and we just randomly chose one of them. I barely knew that we should pick the dark red-grape color one instead of the red color one. Errrr I mean the red one looks very tempting and too pretty, too bad the red cherry tastes sour. Many families were having picnic on the ground (Oh well they are so well-prepared for picnic time!), other families having it on the wooden tables available around the farm. There was also a Cherry Bus that can take the visitors to other cherry land areas but we were too lazy either to queue or go to other spots. :p
We were too excited picked the dark red cherries and took tons of pictures. While we were happily picking and taking photos, suddenly an officer girl came and said that was not the picking area and we should go to the actual areas nearby. The first sentence after her warning was “Wait we want to take one more shoot..” and she replied like “Okay make it very fast..” Hahaha. The officer girl was so cute as she seemed nervous and her appearance made me think of Wendy’s icon girl with the 2 sided braids.
Too bad the “actual areas” is not as interesting as the forbidden area. That is because there were not as many cherries as the first area we went. We think they should give clearer notice which are the allowable area and which are not since we didn’t find it yesterday. Ci Celi is going to make cherry jam with the cherries! She is amazing in this kind of thing. Last week she uploaded some photos in the making process of apple-berry jam for Christmas presents, so lovely isn’t it?
Very pretty, seems like the artificial one!
Ci Celi and Mumun
Look at the grape color cherry! Which one is more mouthwatering for you, red or the darker one?
We can eat cherry as many as we can manage while we were in the farm. The picked cherries in the bucket will be weighted before we go out from the farm and sold for 10$ per kg which is cheaper than in the supermarkets. I could not eat too many cherries, never be a real fan of this fruit actually. But I love the happy time, the scenery and especially the new experience I had in here. We spent about 1,5 hours in the cherry farm and continued the day to another spot nearby (find out on my next post) and not to forget we bought cherry ice creams too!
I cherish every moment in life and make it as a happiness celebratory. I enjoy every green and beautiful scene I see. I love the fresh air in my every breath. I can not find them easily back home since it has polluted everywhere. I feel grateful in every single simple thing that made my day happier. I hope you guys do too.. 🙂
No photo of Ansen here, but these photos are credited to him as he was very patient being the camera man. Hehehe. Thank you!
Note : The entry ticket is 10$ including all you can eat cherries in the farm and 10$ per kg for the picked cherries. Prepare foods and drinks if you gonna have a picnic there. Cherry Hills Orchard is going to open until next January during the cherry season.
Cherry Hills Orchard-474 Queens Road, Wandin East, Victoria 3139 Australia
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Tea Travel to Tea Leaves
Posted: December 3, 2012 Filed under: Melbourne, Tea, Trip and Event | Tags: melbourne, Melbourne day trip, tea, tea cup, Tea Leaves, Tea Leaves Melbourne, tea review, tea shop, tea travel 2 CommentsI can say this is my another tea travel after a couple of months. The shop is Tea Leaves, located in the Tourist Road, Sassafras of Mount Dandenong, Victoria. This small shop is a tourism award winning shop in Sassafras and has a very delightfully warm atmosphere. They offer more than 300 teas, ranged from all tea types, tisanes, herbs, spices, fruit and flower infusions, coffees and chocolates. About 3 months ago Ci Celi gave me a box of nice Jasmine green tea from this shop, the tea packed in a foil bag inside a sliding wooden box and it smells very nice. Finally I can make a visit to this tea shop last Sunday 🙂
Tea cup selections
Once I entering the shop, I was overwhelmed by happiness of so many lovely tea cups and pots in any sizes, shapes and colors. Me and Ci Celi could not stop the “Ooohh” and “Wahhh” expression during our visit. Hehehe. So many types and variations, so many styles and colors and everything just captured my attention very quickly! Their loveliness evoked my greedy shopping syndrome “Oh I want this but I want that too, oh actually I want them all” You know that feeling, don’t you? Hahaha. 🙂
Floral pattern tea-set
Another explosion was when we jumped into the organic tea areas. I repeated the same activities as I always do in a tea shop, opening the tester jar, smelling, commenting, opening another jar and so forth. It took me quite a long time to do that and decide which of them would go home with me. I spotted some unique herbal tisanes there and my favorite selections are the Japanese Morning Dew, Japanese Gen Mai Cha, Rosebuds Herbal Tisanes, Mango Black Tea and the Strawberry Champagne Black Tea. We spent quite a long time choosing the tea and considering the cuteness overloaded tea cups. I did not buy many types of tea since I still had plenty of them at home that I could not even finish them until now. Even I have a cup of tea almost everyday, it’s still hard to finish all of the tea boxes just by myself.
One of the organic tea shelf
Organic tea area
Coffee area
In the end I just bought the Rosebud herbal tisanes and Strawberry Champagne Black Tea. I will make the review later about them but one thing that I can guarantee they smell so damn good! In my opinion this tea shop is a recommended tourism spot if you visit Dandenong area, in addition there are many other cafes and unique shops nearby too. Ahh it is Thursday already, means week-end is coming real soon! One more day to go, hope you guys have a great week-end 🙂 Cheers!
Tea Leaves Aust Pty Ltd
380 Mt Dandenong Tourist Road, Sassafras Victoria Australia 3787
Email info@tealeaves.com.au
Telephone +61 3 9755 2222
Fax +61 3 9755 2222
foodandteatraveller 