Year of the Rabbit

we chinese people have an excuse to break our new year resolutions coz we get to make another long list for the lunar (chinese) new year, which usually takes place a month after the 1st of Jan. so this is the starting of the work week for the year of the rabbit.

friends who know me, know that i am a big fan of fengshui and bazi... besides being a raw foodist. i am into metaphysics. is that a strange combination of interests? who knows? so my fengshui teacher says 8th feb at 6am is a good time to start work for the new year except for those with a rat hovering in their chart (which includes me!) so thank good ness for that, i dont have to go to work at 6am. my dear husband says he will go to work at 6am, so we shall see... according to my fs teacher, people who have been following his choice of dates invariably make lots of money for the year.

which gets me thinking about priorities in life... is it money? health? happiness? peace? who are we kidding? we all need money to survive and do good, but how much is enough? the past year has been an eventful year for me, i went to 105 to do a raw food chef course, worked with matthew kenney on his four seasons hotel project (which was an amazing experience) , made many new raw food friends, i was fortunate enough to have an excellent teacher teaching me meditation, as i teach her how to prepare raw food... i also went on a metaphysics learning spree. it was a year of information load on my little brain. i loved it!

at the same time, i also saw some families fall apart, friends come and go... learning a lot about life. meeting some

through it all, i discovered that i have evolved hopefully for the better?

i am told that 2011 is going to be the year of change for me, especially as the rabbit hops in.... of course its so generic, arent we all changing and evolving?

i was very lucky at the begininng of this year to have the opportunity to meet with someone special. one new lesson i learnt is that sometimes we have to be selfish to be generous (not in the exact words... but close to that..) and there is nothing wrong with wanting, its attachments that creates problems. a lot of common sense stuff, but not so common after all... we think we know, but how much do we really know.

perhaps i have taken my life for granted, being healthy, having a wonderful husband and son.. and having a peaceful life. i met with my friend's guru last week and i started reading more about him and something he said which had a huge impact on me, nothing fancy, probably hear it all the time but it just didnt register before ..."our life is very precious, we should cherish it and make it meaningful."

how many of us actually feel that? to appreciate how precious our life is and cherish it and make it meaningful? i must admit that i have not given much thought to it before, making my life meaningful.... but now i have and i am going to make it a conscious effort to remember that and to make sure i live my life that way... its my new journey for 2011....

have a great rabbit year!

2011 a great new beginning

i told myself mentally this week that i am going to start blogging again... the last time i wrote was when i finished at 105. my last meal there, so to speak. how my life has changed. who would have thought that i would one day be known as a raw food chef (it still makes me cringe when someone calls me that... i am so not used to being called a raw food chef, i don't see myself as a raw food chef, just someone who happens to know how to prepare raw vegan cuisine.

2010 was an eventful year..... i am grateful for all the experiences that i have been through, enjoyed most of it. i met many wonderful people, i had to learn to let go. my baby went away to boarding school. life changes.

as i begin my life in 2011, it makes me reflect on what i have done in the past year and think about what i would like to do in the years to come, especially 2011. i feel that i am entering a new phase in my life. havent quite figured that out yet. hopefully i will soon....

may 2011 be the beginning of the best years of your life too...

xxx

my 105 school project pictures...

in reverse order... i can't seem to cut and paste! anyway....

dinner project

coconut cream fruit cocktail...

singapore style fried noodles

thai style mango salad

lunch

breakfast ..

lunch

My last day @105degree

It's amazing how time flies when you are keeping busy. Today is my last day at 105 degree academy. I've learnt a lot while I am here, I'm glad I had the experience.

We had to do a breakfast, lunch and dinner project for the course. I think this was what made it special for me because it allowed me to use my creative energy and create my own menu, not decided or controlled by anyone. Coming from a very limited background in cooking and preparing food, this was an interesting and challenging experience.

I wanted to work on a singaporean theme and prepare food that people at home can relate to and will eat, which is why i chose to make the singapore style carrot cake and the laksa, coz they are the perennial favourites of all singaporeans, not to mention the char kuay teow of course.....

so for my three course dinner menu, i had to make a char kuay teow for my main course. for my non singaporean friends, char kuay teow is fried flat noodles, the classic dish that everyone misses when they are away from home. never mind that it's cooked in lard and as unhealthy as it can possibly get.

but to convert that to a raw fried noodles is quite an interesting challenge. i decided on a "singapore style fried scallop vegetable noodles" gourmet style of course.

and this is what you get ->



for the first course, it was a tough call to think of a singaporean theme so i stole the idea from thai cuisine and made a thai green mango salad, a raw version of course, without the anchovies and the fried shallots...



for my dessert, i wanted to replicate something like an ice kachang or a chendol. but with raw being the main theme, that's out of the question since i cannot cook beans.

as a result, the original ice kachang evolved into coconut cream tropical fruit cocktail with fresh mint and organic white wine... yummy




we had a mini party with invited guests and the A-team (level 2 students and some of the staff from the cafe) so we had to plate our dishes. i had a lot of fun with that.


i'm satisfied with how it turned out.... anyway i am tired, going to get some rest now. have a beautiful day :-)

say cheese..... crepes anyone?

one of the experiences which i was looking forward to when i came to 105 was to make cheese. not just ordinary boring cheese but sexy mouth watering looking cheese. we did it! and yes it was sexy, mouth watering and it even tasted good! actually, it was really really good!


one of the nicest things about being at 105 i think is that we are given the option to decide what we want to do given a basic foundation on the recipe... meaning... russell taught us how to make a basic cheese recipe and then when we make our own, we could decide what variations we wanted to make.

i decided to make some blue cheese..



cheddar cheese - i only made a very small portion of cheddar cheese coz i wasn't sure if i would like it since i'm not crazy about the traditional cheddar cheese. it turned out alright.




and my special (which turned out to be my favourite and some of the girls like it too


and we also made crepes, sweet and savoury ones. i don't know what i was thinking when i made mine, that i made it too thin and it became too crispy to be used as crepes. so i couldnt fold mine nicely into crepes like russell showed us...


not one to give up easily, i decided to improvise and made my own version, sunny side up!




the yellow mushy bit is tofu scrambler which is supposed to be a replacement for the scrambled eggs.

i didn't make the sweet version coz at that point, i just had enough of food.... is that possible?

my sprouting project and collecting spring water

at LL, we had an opportunity to do some sprouting in a big glass jar but somehow the experience did not seem to register in my mind very well.

here at 105, we each had a mini sprouting project and mine was to do a spicy salad sprout.



so we each had a sprouting tray and fill it with compost from a big sack of compost. of course i used a glove!



when i was at LL, taking care of the sprouts seem like such a big responsibility, especially to those who had the experience with the soil grown wheatgrass.

for some strange reason, this was pretty easy... i wonder why?



so after a couple of days of watering and my babies are sprouting! :-)




did i mention that we even had a day out collecting spring water? it was fun. drinking spring water directly from the source is an experience. well, it was cold and very refreshing but i certainly didnt expect it to be coming out of a pipe!




it was a nice experience, especially for someone so used to just buying bottles of mineral water. so now, instead of buying mineral water, i can just fill up my water bottle!

recipe creation

this week seem to have flown by. i can't believe it's saturday already. so much has happened since chocolate day. it's been a very interesting and totally enjoyable experience though. i think i'm learning so much more here than i did at LL, for one i feel a lot more confident about preparing the recipes by myself.

midweek came and we were given instructions on creating our own recipes. what started as a very daunting task, which is to create our own breakfast and lunch item for the group to try. everyone were very excited and enthusiastic to do something. it's a very creative bunch of people in my class and we had so much fun!

i decided to have a singaporean theme to my recipe creation. i think the challenge of translating a raw healthy vegan method to the typically unhealthy fat laden favourites of every singaporean like char kway teow (friend noodles), chai tow kuay (carrot cake) and laksa makes it seem like an almost impossible task! well, i decided to take on the challenge to recreate a singaporean carrot cake recipe for a raw carrot cake recipe for my breakfast recipe, and for my lunch recipe, i decided to work on a raw laksa.

the original singapore carrot cake looks like this, the traditional style...



and this is my raw creation... no greasy lard, no eggs. it actually taste alright! i even managed to make a pickled "chye por" radish which taste very yummy!




and then the singaporean laksa...



this is quite a challenging task. laksa is one of my favourite comfort food from home and i like it pipping hot. i don't have eggs and chicken with it though since i am more geared towards a vegan diet.

so i decided instead of the eggs, chicken, bean curd, cockles and prawns that you will find in a typical laksa dish, i am making a raw vegan version with mung bean sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower, what you would find in a vegetarian curry i guess and i also introduced pineapple (stolen from the penang laksa version!)

and this is what i got....



the taster portions for my course mates and instructors...



everyone seem to like the raw versions, so i think i did ok :-)

have a great weekend!