What you can't find, you make

Sweet and sour pork




Bak chor mee sua

Laksa

With home-made fish cake!



And sometimes what you can find may not be good enough.. so you make your own...

Banana bread


Fluffy pancakes (not from pancake mix ok!)
You don't have to be a great cook, all you need is the right recipes... seek and you will find!

Japanese Sponge Cake

Final product!

A more fruitful week

so.. what have i been doing?

For the first week i was super nua... I worked out only once during the week. I did not touch any books. Most of the time I was surfing the net and watching tv or korean drama. I have completed one drama by the way.

This week I decided to stop nua-ing! If not I will be really lazy when i go back to sg. So some improvement to my regime!

I studied two pages of the korean text book.
I vacuumed and mopped the house (intend to do this twice a week).
I have been working out twice every three days.
I went for a spouse gathering and learned the game of crud (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crud_(game) and will be participating in come competition in early October!
Hmm, I started on another korean drama...

And today I am going to start using my KitchenAid Electric Mixer to make japanese sponge cake! I was actually in the midst of reading the instruction manual for the mixer and decided to write this post.



This thing above costs $799 in Singapore but I got it for US$250 (~S$300) from overstock.com here. Big difference right?! Just need a transformer and I can use it in sg too - the voltage output is different.

Not sure how the cake will turn out cos i always find sponge cake the toughest - either they don't rise enough, they crack, or they turn out too dry. I feel that the best sponge cake must be soft, moist and of cos, spongy! I hope it will be nice, but if its not, i will practise and hopefully it will be good one day!

Beginning of life in Del Rio

Arrived in Del Rio (city), Texas (state)!

Friends have been asking me if I am safe as there have been news reports of tropical storms, wildfire, droughts and drying lakes.. well, I am for now! Texas is really huge, with a total area of 696,200 sq km as compared to Singapore which has an area 710 sq km, so I am really hours of drive away from the affected areas.

By the way, this is where I am (really close to the borders of Mexico):

So the plane ride here was a a really long one, 7 hours from SIN to Narita (NRT), another 12 hours from Narita to Houston then 40 minutes from Houston (IAH) to San Antonio. And to get from San Antonio to Del Rio, its another 3 hours drive. Other than the horrendous service of one United Airlines air stewardess, overall flight was not too bad - the leg from NRT to IAH was on Continental airlines and in-flight food (japanese - salmon!) was surprisingly good. The personal in-flight entertainment system came with a rather big screen and selection of movies was reasonable wide. Flight crew service was pleasant too - a couple of older american ladies and some younger japanese women - all very polite.

Because I flew on my birthday and Del Rio is behind Sg by 13 hours, i had a 37-hour birthday! HEHE.

For once, I really didn't expect Ah C to prepare something for me when I arrive, but he did!

He booked a suite (very value for money!) at the Air Force base in San Antonio so we could spend a night there and go outlet shopping (for essentials of cos) the next day before we drive back to Del Rio.

He baked a cake, which could have have looked nicer with practice :P but it tasted alright! Disclaimer: i am rather picky when it comes to cakes and desserts!

My pressies~

Ipad2!!!

And cookbooks from my girlfriends! I think its so easy for my friends to pick me a gift! On my 21st birthday, I got two exact same cookbooks from 2 groups of friends. And an apron. And a cake mixer. That says it all.

For dinner we had Mexican food at a highly-rated restaurant (tripadvisor) and it was good! Much better mexican cuisine compared to the usual tortillas, enchilladas, quessadillas which I have eaten.

Tortilla chips to start

Fried oysters

Grilled beef tenderloin, green chicken enchilladas with avocado butter sauce, rice and beans

Baked snapper stuffed with crabmeat, broiled lobster, grilled shrimp in signature Veracruz sauce

The following day we had a quick breakfast and a chop chop session at the San Marcos Premium Outlet before we headed to one of my favourite restaurants for late lunch-

Where I usually order the same things....

Crab cakes!

Grilled salmon with bbq sauce(very moist), mashed potates (the best mash I have eaten to date), fried onion strips

Back to our home in Del Rio (within air force base) - some sneak picts!

Living room

Bedroom:

Food storage room

Kitchen

Spot my KitchenAid mixer! :P

As the house doesn't come furnished (except for refrigerator, oven and dishwasher, we had to buy the remaining stuff. Probably looks sparse. As we were only going to be here for 9months (last 2 months in another location) , we merely got the necessities (and things I need to I don't go crazy from boredom).

Anyways, will update again!