Strawberry Fields…forever!

Now that the soccer season is already finished our Saturdays are less full. We are now able to travel a bit further out and not worry about being late for anything.

What we really set out to do was go fruit/vegetable picking (read: any fruit/vegetable other than strawberries). I madly searched the net for places we could visit. Unfortunately though, Google was only coming up with “fruit picking jobs”. I did not really want to go strawberry picking as that seemed so cliché. I also wanted to show my kids how a variety of fruits and vegetables grow and not focus on just one.



As Queensland is nearing summer there are plenty of fruits and vegetables in season. Grapes, melons, passionfruit, apples, avocados, asparagus, mushrooms, beans, potatoes are just some examples.

As it was nearing lunch time already and we still haven’t got anything planned I succumbed to the call of Strawberry Fields. Yup, that’s the name of the strawberry farm we visited! Catchy don’t you think? They must have spent a lot of moolah in their creative department.



The weather forecast that day had a lot to do with the fact that there was barely anybody there when we drove in. A thunderstorm was predicted to occur late in the afternoon (and it did happen as we were driving back home). More for us then, I thought.



What you do is pop in the reception to grab some plastic containers (baskets would have been better, but anyway). You are then assigned a field to pick strawberries from. You then go back to the reception area to weigh your harvest and pay. It was $8/kg that day.

The kids got really excited (myself including) as we got near the field. Each plant was overflowing with fruit! And not mediocre fruit at that. They were big, plump and very sweet! We bought some cream and chocolate sauce and started devouring them right there and then!


Although I had a lot of reservations in the beginning the day turned out to be really good. The main thing was, the kids had a wonderful time and could not wait to go back.

Chilli Crab ala Kidpawan

When I’m feeling generous and want a special treat and have loads of time I would cook Chilli Crab. It is not really complicated to make but it does take a long time to prepare and cook… Ok, Ok, it’s quite involved but the reward at the end is worth all the effort.

Chilli Crab is an original Singapore dish. You’ll find lots of variations to this dish on the net. I based mine on the one I found in the Australian Gourmet magazine in the late 90’s. I can still remember my wife, heavily pregnant with our first child, photocopying the magazine for me. I was studying for my final exams at State Library of WA but she decided to tag along to keep me company. I tweaked the recipe a little bit to suit my taste better. It worked then and still works now more than a decade later.

Chilli Crab ala Kidpawan

4 fresh blue swimmer crabs cleaned and quartered
Some flour
4 large onions
2 cloves garlic
6 slices ginger
Chilli flakes/powder to taste
1 large onion chopped (yes, another one)
1 cup tomato ketchup
1 tablespoon sugar
1 cup stock
Salt to taste
Oil – lots of it

1. First you need to make the chilli paste. Combine the onions, garlic, ginger and chillies in a food processor and blitz until they turn to paste. You can make this as chunky or as fine as you like.
2. Heat up some oil for deep frying.
3. Coat the crab pieces in flour. Shake off excess flour then fry. Set aside fried crab.
4. Heat up a bit of oil the sauté the chopped onion until golden brown.
5. Add the paste and cook for about 10 minutes.
6. Add the tomato ketchup and the sugar. Cook for another 2 minutes.
7. Add the broth.
8. Add the crab pieces. Make sure all the crab is coated well by the mixture.
9. Lower the heat and simmer for about 2 minutes.
10. Serve hot with jasmine rice

Confectionary Warehouse

“Pasalubong” is a Filipino word I find difficult to translate in English. It’s not exactly a “gift” or a “souvenir” but it could be both. Aside from looking forward to seeing my parents again after a trip somewhere I always get excited about their “pasalubong” (what they’ve brought back for me from their trip). It did not matter how far or how long they’ve been away they always brought something back.

I know how good it made me feel to receive “pasalubong”. I want my kids to experience the same that is why I always try to have “something” for them from every trip. It did not have to be anything extravagant. It did not have to be unique to the place where I’ve just been. It just had to be something.

My recent trip though did not give me much opportunity to shop. I was confined to the office then the hotel and the airport. Unless you’re buying duty free the airport is not a good place to go shopping.

Thankfully, there’s a lolly (candy) outlet near the airport in Brisbane. Instead of driving straight home we took a detour to the Confectionary Warehouse. The kids already knew where we here heading as they are quite familiar with this place. Imagine the noise in the car created by their excitement!

It’s nowhere near the poshness of Dylan’s Candy Bar in New York with its connection to Ralph Lauren but the range is pretty astonishing. It’s a warehouse after all. They claim to have over 12,000 lines of lollies and chocolates. I don’t know how true that is but it is a pretty amazing claim!


You’d think the kids would have had enough? If your answer is yes you obviously do not have any of your own yet.

I wanted to be an American…yesterday!

There are a lot of significant world events that have happened in my lifetime but none more meaningful than what took place in the United States of America…yesterday!

For a moment, as I hear Barack Obama graciously accept the mandate given to him by the American people, I wanted to be an American! I was envious I was not one of the people who put him in office. I was jealous of the fact that I was not there in person to hear him speak! I wanted to be a part of his victory speech.


Although Barack is not my president for some peculiar reason his appointment meant a lot to a coloured person like me living in society similar to that of the US. This, I find difficult to put in words.


When Barack said:
But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to -- it belongs to you.
I wanted to be part of that “you”.


And then he ended with these words:
Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
And that is also my hope.


Yes you can! And you did! Congratulations to all Americans!

Off to the Hunter...Again!

I’m in the Hunter Valley again for the second time in less than a month.

I don’t mind going to the region. But there are certain realities I have to accept about trips to this part of Australia.

Fact 1: There are very limited flights available

There are 6 (oneworld airlines) flights a day to this region but approximately 70% of those are with the budget airline Jetstar. I choose Jetstar not because they are the best but because they have the most suitable schedules. The other disadvantage though (apart from flying no-frills) is that I miss out on points and status credits.

The flight this time around was made bearable by a colleague who brought some DVDs with her. Instead of just wasting a good hour flying time we got to watch one full episode of Sex and the City.

Fact 2: Our nearest office is more than an hour’s drive

The quickest and most convenient way for me to go to our offices in the Hunter is to fly to the city of Newcastle. Unfortunately though, our nearest office is still a couple of hours drive away.

Fact 3: Limited choice of accommodation

You would think being located in a wine region there’ll be plenty of choice of places to stay. There probably are but our choice has been limited to just two (Quality Inn and Mid City). They’re not bad places…if all you want to do is sleep!

Beef w/ Gai Lan for a double iron hit

We’re now about 34 weeks in the pregnancy. And we recently found out the Cherry is a bit anaemic. She’s now taking iron supplements (and will for the duration of the pregnancy) but we’ve also been advised to eat more red meat. That’s not so hard!

The recipe below does not have a lot of ingredients and is also pretty quick to make (as with most stir fries). And the added bonus, you get a double hit of iron! So, eat up!

Beef w/ Gai Lan (aka Beef w/ Chinese Broccoli)

500g rump steak cut into stir fry pieces

1 bunch gai lan

1 teaspoon ginger

1 clove garlic chopped

3 tablespoons oyster sauce

2 tablespoons light soy sauce

A bit of oil

¼ cup stock or water

1. Marinate the beef using 1 tablespoon of the oyster sauce and 1 tablespoon of the soy sauce
2. Prepare the gai lan by cutting the vegetable in half separating the stalks from the leaves.
3. Heat up the wok in high heat. Add a bit of oil. Stir fry the beef in batches to avoid steaming the meat. Set aside the stir fried beef.
4. Add a bit more oil to the same wok. Stir fry the ginger and the garlic for about a minute.
5. Add the stalk part of the vegetable and stir fry for about 2 minutes. Add a bit of stock/water.
6. Add the beef back in and stir fry for another minute.
7. Add the leaf part of the gai lan together with the remaining sauces and stir fry until the gai lan has wilted.
8. Serve with steaming hot jasmine rice.

Love in the Time of Cholera

SYNOPSIS (taken from Urban Cinefile) :When young Colombian poet and telegraph clerk Florentino Ariza (Unax Ugalde) first sets eyes on the lovely Fermina (Giovanna Mezzogiorno) he falls desperately in love with her, vowing to be faithful and in love till he dies. Fermina's widowed mule trader father (John Leguizamo) is furious; he wants a man of social standing and wealth for his daughter, so takes her far away from Cartagena. On their return to the city, Fermina meets Dr Juvenal Urbino (Benjamin Bratt) who has earned a great reputation as the doctor who brought good medicine to the city, fighting the curse of cholera. They soon marry and spend a few years in Paris on an extended honeymoon. The mature Florentino (Javier Bardem), who has inherited a small shipping company, continues to nurture his love for Fermina, although his vow of fidelity has been broken ... several hundred times. Even in his old age, Florentino retains his love for Fermina, in the hope that perhaps one day ....

After reading the last page of the book I immediately dropped my lunch plans and headed straight to the nearest shop that stocks the DVD of Mike Newell’s film adaptation of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera.

I was so excited to watch the film! I made sure dinner was finished by 8pm and the kids are asleep by 8.30pm.

It still baffles me why filmmakers would choose to make a movie in English spoken with a thick non-English accent. Any film done in this manner is pretty hard to take seriously. And the actors just sounded ridiculous. Why can’t they just do it in straight English? Or better yet, why not just use Spanish which was the book’s original language?

Giovanna Mezzogiorno certainly looked beautiful all throughout the film but her portrayal of Fermina Daza somewhat fell short of what the author intended. I found it really challenging to find something in her that would make Florentino Ariza linger for over half a century. I think it was pertinent that the audience fall in love with her to make the film more plausible.

There was also a lot of “verbalisation” of emotions. I did not want the actors to “say” what their character is going through or what their character is feeling! I want to see it in their performance!

Mike Newell (director) and his scriptwriter Ronald Harwood opted for a literal interpretation of the book rather than a combination of fantasy and realism which is what characterises Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s works. As a consequence the film looks clumsy and incomplete.

In the end I couldn’t help but wonder how a director with a better understanding of the author’s language and culture – Pedro Almodóvar perhaps or even our very own Carlitos Siguion-Reyna – would have handled it.

Breakfast at Work

From personal observation I’m quite saddened by the fact that breakfast, which is supposed to be the most important meal of the day, is largely neglected. The most preparation people do in the morning is “open a box”. I suppose they are comforted by the “health promises” printed on these boxes. Makes you wonder though why society is getting fatter and fatter.

Everyday of the working week I have my breakfast at work. Anytime before 8am is just too early for me to eat anything.

Cold breakfast was never my thing (as mentioned in a previous post). But thankfully at work we’re provided with a pretty well equipped kitchen. There is no stove but I have managed to make the sandwich press work beyond “what the box” says (as you can see in the photos).

One of my other dislikes is the drip/filtered coffee. It features prominently in Hollywood movies and when I was young I couldn’t wait to grow up and start drinking this stuff. How wrong was I? It’s actually quite horrible in my opinion. But thankfully at work were also supplied with an Italian espresso machine (De’Longhi Magnifica) that makes really good coffee.

Here are some samples of my breakfast in the office:

1. Ham & Cheese omelette

2. Roti Paratha (with Nutella)

3. Eggs & Toast

4. Pancakes

5. Arroz Caldo (Rice Porridge)