May 10th: Epic Meal Time -- Leftovers Edition ;P

Making food in a shared kitchen is harder than you'd think. Not only is there the obvious issue of fridge space and cleanliness, you also have to take care of other peoples' leftovers (i.e. turn them into delicious things and feed them to hungry people so that they don't hang around forever) and gauge how much everyone will eat so YOU don't leave leftovers for the next person to take care of, or worse, sit uneaten in the fridge until it goes bad!

AMAZING fried rice with green beans, red peppers, and vege-ham.  I don't know how Putao does it.  We don't even have a wok!

This is especially important for me 'cause I make dinners on Thursdays, and there's no Friday or weekend classes that require meals, so any leftovers will sit until Monday, at which time they are probably not so delicious. But before I get to do anything Putao (the CUTEST little old lady EVER) makes lunch for the daytime Thursday class. It's always difficult to gauge how much will be left 'cause even though there are 50 people not all of them stay for lunch. This particular day she made food for 50 and only 30 stayed, leaving us with a GLORIOUS amount of leftovers. Since dinner is usually about 20 people's worth (sometimes 23-25 if Tingquan and/or another adolescent male shows up) this worked out AWESOME for me :D

May 9th: Taiwanese Ratatouille

But first, a surprise dessert! Lishui brought it back from somebody's house...I can't remember who's, but it's delicious!

White Fungus Dessert Soup with Nuts and Dates

I love dessert soups ^o^ Growing up mung bean soup was my fav, but recently taro has taken its place! I really like wood-ear/fungus too, so this was a really tasty one.  That orange thing is a yam, not a carrot ;P

For Thursday night I planned for ratatouille, 'cause I'd been having some MAD eggplant cravings.  Also zucchini cravings.  TT___TT Apparently the market by my mom's house has zucchini sometimes; the one I live by doesn't.  either way they're hard to come by here, but we DO have eggplants in abundance.  Delicious delicious Asian eggplant~  Guess what I subbed for the zucchini?

May 2nd: AVENGERS

It was a lovely Wednesday to go see Avengers in (accidental) 3D at the Ambassador Theater in Zhongshan!

"Do we have to see it in 3D?!"

Turns out Gracie doesn't like 3D movies.  But it was the only showing at a time we could all meet up, so 3D it was.

Face of resignation.

We met up for lunch first.  Found Kirin Pasta in an alley, and they are vege-friendly! :D

April 28th: Garden + Wa Pizza with Tai and Gracie

 Some weeds flowers in the garden.

These ones close up in the afternoon and reopen in the morning!

Yellow flowers in bloom.

Yellow flowers with buds and fluff head.  Love!

 Food and People after the jump!

April 16th: A Breakfast of Sorts

April 14th: The Return of the Leaking Bathroom

Self-explanatory title. On the bright side, this time the leak was within the bathroom instead of seeping into the living room :D  It's also appeared to stop leaking since the weather warmed up.  Dunno what's up with that, but whatever~

The leaking corner in question.

The curiously sepia water that leaked from the corner.

JESSICA ARRIVED! Weekend Fun Time with Smoothies and an Excursion to Donghai

After missing her connecting flight in Chicago Jessica finally arrived safe and sound Saturday 'round noon-ish. No pictures 'cause EVERYONE looks terrible after 20+ hours in transit. Instead, oggle at these pictures of Tai and me enjoying smoothies at 79Style Cafe at Taipei Main Station K mall while waiting for her to show up!

Hazelnut Coffee Smoothie.

Delicious and filled with CREAM (topping...not real cream, obviously ;).

Matcha Smoothie!

Delicious but too sweet.  I couldn't finish it Dx Gotta remember to ask for no sugar every time!

Actually we ended up meeting Jessica at Mommy's house, and then Mommy had to leave right as we got there 'cause her brother just came back from mainland and they had to talk about moving my maternal grandpa to Taoyuan. And then we ended up going back to Taipei main station (Y mall this time!) and showing Jessica all the fun otaku stuff. Gracie stayed home 'cause she has FINALS D:< We watched her work on two different projects while we were at Mommy's house O_o  Stay strong Gracie!

'round dinnertime I took a bus to Taichung for fun time Hochi youth class while Jessica and Tai apparently got lost for 3 hours in the city (I have yet to affirm this; this is just what Facebook tells me. And we all know FB speaks the truth.) At the class we did a bunch of meditating and worked on our group projects and worked on the youth camp stuff for over the summer -- I'm in the service group for both, so stuff like finding support staff and making up shower charts and scheduling etc. Gotta write up that script for the how-to movie we're shooting still...I'M SO SORRY WEITING! I PROMISE I WILL GET TO IT THIS WEEK! Look! It's Yi-An and some creeper on their way home from class!

Guess how old Yi-An is!!! Scroll down for the answer!

..
...
....
......
........??

BAM!

Okay she's in high school.  Apparently some people think she's like 25 or something, but I think it's just 'cause she's relatively tall -- she's almost as tall as me!  But it's okay, thanks to the Asian Anti-Aging gene and cultivation she'll probably look like this forever :D  I can't wait to see her as a cute old lady! She'll be the most adorable old lady in the history of forever. /earlymorningblogging.

Taiwanese Ice Cream Truck

In the States when your parents (or grandparents) reminisce about their childhood they'll might tell you about things like running after the ice cream truck as it rounds the corner, its melodic ice cream song heralding the arrival of summertime bliss.

In Taiwan your parents might tell you a similar story about running after the agarose guy as the mechanical 'clack-clack-clack' of his agarose stand announces his presence well before his push-cart is anywhere to be seen.

Actually, this guy had his hooked up to a bicycle -- PROGRESS! Taiwan has it.

We came across this stand right outside an MRT station in Banciao (I can't remember which one...but it's right next to a highway...) and my mom was overcome with joyous waves of nostalgia. Of course we had to get some.

The metal bowls are filled with a slightly firm brown-sugar agar agar jelly.  These guys also tend to sell mochi (the white disks) topped with peanut powder.  Try to get it without sugar if you can manage -- these were very sweet!

The clack-clack-clack is made by this device, whose sole purpose is to let everyone within earshot know that agar treats are only a few steps away.

The wheel at back has two sticking-out-bits at different intervals.  The two steel rods at left have that metal disc in the middle that the sticking-out-bits can catch on.  When rotated the result is a rhythmic clacking as the sticks are raised and dropped on the metal stand below.

This vendor put figurines on top of the two clacking sticks, which are usually just bare steel.

Hello Kitty and Mimi endorse this vendor's delicious agar treats.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've also spotted a stand on Xinsheng S. Rd. & Renai Rd. in Daan district, but only in summer :)

Feb. 2 青年弟子營 Day 4: PHOTO TIME Lunch edition [Part 2]

More lunch preparation photos!


Fried tofu skins---delicious!

Feb. 2 青年弟子營 Day 4: PHOTO TIME Lunch edition

I got to play with a Canon 550D and a...can't remember the lens...like 15-200mm or something like that. If you right-click it should be in the pic info. AWESOME range. HIGHER ISO than the Rebel Xti. LOVE EVERYTHING. BUT I didn't take the time to optimize all the settings, so most of them turned out just a little bit blurry. RAGE.

We are assigned shifts on the camera so we can practice! I got to do lunch yesterday, and I'm doing dinner today~ Oh happiness!!!

Light Check! And the door to the kitchen ;P
Let's see what's inside...

Feb. 1 青年弟子營 More of Day 3, and the Mysterious Day 2 Pictures Solved!

My camera has been taking really good pictures of food recently! Usually my pictures look GROSS (if you've been following my cooking blog you are acutely aware of this ;P) I think it has to do with the white tabletop; it fools the camera into thinking there's a lot of light xD

This is one from last night:

Taro rice vermicelli soup with pepper-salt daikon pickles, broccoli, and cherry tomatoes! It was a lighter meal than I would have liked, especially after climbing 13 flights of stairs -- TWICE! and doing some plank variations (more cardio @_@), but I'm actually feeling really good today, especially considering how sore my thighs and back were yesterday xD

As for the mystery...

Jan. 1 - Feb. 1 青年弟子營 Days 2 (?) & 3

I found these mysterious pictures on my camera...that I didn't take @_@

Jan. 30-31: 青年弟子營 1 & 2

I planned on starting this post with a picture of me on the bus, but the file was corrupted when I copied it from the camera card D: It was a good picture too!

Instead, you get this:

There were all these gross dead (and some alive) bugs in the dorm room when Ingting, Kathy, and I got there the night before.

We cleaned it up and it's all good now :)

Jan. 11: At the Compassion Field

Chillin' at the compassion field with Jackson (the little kid)

Jan. 07: Piyo Piyo

Piyo Piyo is a duck character. It's like Hello Kitty, but usually only found on high quality baby goods.

I love it way too much. I couldn't find a wiki page on it, so I guess it's not that e-famous, but it is rather popular in Taiwan.

This sponge is the best sponge I have ever had in my entire life. It is soft on one side and just exfoliate-y enough on the other. Further, it is very absorbent, yet easy to squeeze dry, and it creates an exceptionally rich lather using just a little bit of soap!

When I go back to America I will buy 400 of them so I can use it for the rest of my life. No joke.

Chinese --

Japanese

MY SPONGE IN ALL ITS GORGEOUS ENTIRETY.

Lunar New Year Day 2: More Food~

I swear, I do more than just eat food in Taiwan.

But it just so happens that taking pictures of food is easy(-er than taking pictures of stuff I actually do, or people. I'm terrible at photographing people. And events. And places (serious lack of spacial reasoning). And pretty much anything that moves on its own or exceeds a foot in any dimension. Unless I get complete control over the entire situation; then it sometimes turns out okay. But most of the time not so much. And that is why most of the photographs are food. And the rest are people pulling faces cam-whore style :D ) And writing commentary about those photos is easy(-er than coming up with actual content. Nobody wants to read about what I think. I think. I mean, you might discover I am a horrible narrow-minded person with peculiar tastes in just about everything. That's not very reader-friendly, is it?)

Plus, everyone can relate to food. You experience it every day. Constantly. You ingest it three to four, or even five or six times a day! Or maybe just once or twice, if you're on a budget, or very busy, or not feeling up to it.

But in Taiwan, there is not such thing as 'not feeling up to it'. You can walk down the street and pick up a filling meal for 50-200 NT any time of the day. ANY TIME. So that just leaves busy and broke.

Tangent aside, here is a SUPER DELICIOUS bread I got from Matsusei (a medium-high-end Japan-based grocery store). Normally I don't get bread from groceries (or convenience stores) because they are never as good as bakeries, and bakeries are everywhere, but Matsusei bakes its bread fresh daily, and this one looked good (carbivores can gauge the tastiness of bread based on appearance. I shit you not. It has taken me years, but I've gotten pretty damn good.) Plus it was 20% off 'cause it was made yesterday! Seeing as I planned on eating it straightaway, I couldn't care less.

Whole-grain bread with sticky black/purple rice, longan (dragon's eye fruit), and orange rind.
Purple rice and longan porridge is a winter dish, so it was like this super-awesome marriage of wholesome bread and traditional cold-weather food.
It was set up like a danish, except instead of fruit filling there was sticky black rice with the longan. Plus there was bits of sticky rice-longan and probably some dates and stuff mixed into the dough, along with the orange rind bits, so instead of just having all the tastiness it in the middle it was EVERYWHERE, and just EXTRA flavourful in the middle.

I will make it one day. Probably with some craisins thrown in instead of longan, 'cause I like craisins better, and they are easier to get ahold of in the states.
Actually, I should tell Mari about this -- she could probably make it since she's a bread-making CHAMPION.

New Year Happy Time :D

No work 'til Friday!

Tai convinced me not to go in during the break, even though I could get SO MUCH WORK DONE WITH NOBODY THERE O___O But I guess it's good to spend some time at home with family ...and clean (although you're supposed to do all that before the new year, 'cause it'll 'sweep out the good luck' if you do it after. But you're always super-busy gettin everything done beforehand so that you can go on vacation for a week, so it really doesn't make much sense. I compromised and didn't start cleaning 'til today.)

In any case, check out this cute notebook Tai picked up for me!

I love the Engrish!

Jan. 18: Hochi Youth 1-day Class

1/17
18:00 -- get off work
18:30 -- get on bus to go to Taichung
21:20 -- arrive
22:00 -- sleep

1/18
4:30 -- get up
6:00 -- Lirusong
9:00 -- breakfast
cleaning
class
lunch
nap in sunshine
class
take a walk

purchase milk popsicles!
Hochi -- spinning meditation
18:00 -- dinner
19:15 -- leave for bus stop
22:00 -- coincidentally meet Hsuantzu's friend at the MRT
22:20 -- home
2:00 -- sleep.

Dec. 20-27: The Flavours of Winter...and Christmas!

Ever since the Christmas party I've been putting in mad overtime to make up for my two weeks off, so there hasn't been much time for blogging!

Here's some of what I've been up to~

Cream-Cheese Apple Pie for the X-mas party at work!
They got a little burnt, but they were SO GOOD!
I also made: 1) Marc's Mom's Cheesecake (reduced sugar), which was a huge hit
2) 'Sugar Pie with Pecans', as requested by my Canadian boss -- it's pretty much pecan pie with maple syrup.
3) A (fugly) gingerbread house (we still have pieces...I've been eating them for almost a month now!)
4) ALL OF THE MASHED POTATOES EVER...with buttery carrot bits! This was AMAZING!!!
Luckily, I had plenty of helpers:

Most of December, in a Nutshell

These past three weeks have been SUPER busy putting in loads of overtime -- I was put in charge of one of our VIP students for a week and a half. I'll be getting two weeks off at the beginning of February though, so that'll be nice :)

Finally had a 'normal' week this past week, but things are picking up again 'cause now I'm in charge of making the food for the company Christmas party -- more overtime yaaayyyy!!!

Anywho, here's what we've been up to in the interim~