Lots of food

I would like to declare my love to eating food. 

From $10 Chicken Schnitzel in a local pub

To home made 'bento' lunch. None are as pretty as bentos in instagram, but still..

Pic 1: Rice with chicken mince, rolled omelette, stir fry veggies

Pic 2: Fried salmon, rice with furikake, rolled omelette, steamed veg

Pic 3: leftover spicy beef, karaage chicken, rice with furikake, umeboshi and some japanese pickled cucumber

Went back to Lorrainne's pattiserie for the famed cheesecake. at $9 it's a pretty expensive cheesecake, but it is worth it. It's lemony and very light and fluffy, you won't realise that you have eaten the whole cake yourself. 

On Thursday I had dinner with the parents at Menya ramen. Good as always

Took the parents to Blue Mountains on Saturday. My mom have been here 100x but my dad have never been, so going to see the three sisters is obligatory. We had brunch at Fresh Espresso & it was great. I didn't take pic because I was really hungry & have demolished my meal before I thought of taking a picture. I & my dad had the Fresh Breakfast which is excellent, Mom had their King Prawn risotto & the Mr got the slow cooked pork sandwich. They acknowledged the Mr's dairy intolerance & made coleslaw from scratch which is awesome.. Excellent service I tell you. 

Rolling hills on the way to Jenolan Caves. I can stare at them the whole day

We went to the Imperial Cave on our trip. It's so hard to capture the beauty of the caves! You gotta come and see it yourself to actually appreciate the prettiness. There is an underground river thing in this cave which is lovely.

We ended the day by getting El Jannah roasted chicken of course. With the whole lot. My parents loved it & joined in the El Jannah fan club

The Mr ran the City to Surf yesterday & finished just under 1.5 hr mark. Not the fastest but awesome on him (he's not the super fit gym type & only trained 3 weeks prior). The beach was packed to the rafters but it doesn't stop us from having a great day out. Can't wait until it's properly warm so I can come to the beach more often.

Hope you all had a great week! Christmas (!!!!) is coming soonn

Last week....

My birthday was 2 weeks ago and the Mr took me to a carb galore dinner and a chocolate making class (bought it in Groupon) last week. The man knows me well.

Had this pasta at Portfofino in Leichardt. It was okay but Shitake mushroom in a pasta dish is a bit weird..

Our chocolate class was at Kimberley's chocolates in Lilyfield. Here is the chocolate man who taught us how to make those yummy ganache filled chocolates

That's the Mr, overstuffing his chocolates with ganache. He actually did a great job, his chocolate came out much shinier & in better shape than mine. I really enjoyed my short 2 hours class & would recommend it. On Fridays they do the basic chocolate making class and on Saturday they teach you how to work with chocolate- making cakes, tempering chocolate etc. Hopefully they do groupon deals soon so I can go to the Saturday one!

Love pretty cups

My Rowenta vacuum is still working but as it is a bagless and cordless, it is pretty much useless in sucking up my long hair from the carpet. I gave up on brushing the carpet/picking up my hair from the ground before I vacuum last week and bought this new one from Appliances Online from Sunday. It comes with lots of vacuum heads and the turbo cat & dogs vacuum head works like a charm for my carpet. It picks up all the hair so easily. Loving this vacuum, it's 11/10 (so far)

Priceline had 40% off skin care this Monday and Tuesday so I picked up a couple of things. I'm loving the 10.0.06 mud mask & I should have bought more of them. Other than the above I also got some Burt's bees chapstick and Garnier hand cream. 

A colleague took me to Lorraine's patisserie, which is in the Ivy complex & close to my work. Bought this Frangipani tart. It's the bomb I tell you. It looks spongy but it's not spongy, sweet but not too sweet. Serving size is perfect for a 3pm cheat snack. Love it love it. Apparently the Cheesecake is great as well ('Best I ever had' said the colleague). I'll come back here later today to get one full cake for my mum and bro...

My dad's flying into Sydney tomorrow so the next 2 weeks shall be interesting. 

Have a great weekend guys xxx

You are awesome

I think we don't say this anywhere near enough. Here are some ideas….

1. You astonish me.
2. You’re a virtuoso.
3. Your sagacity is stunning.
4. You’re a glitterbomb of glory.
5. Your genius would be alarming, if it wasn’t so damn consistent.
6. You’re a marvel, mama.
7. You’ve blinded me with science!
8. You just revived my faith in humanity.
9. I want to orbit around your splendor like a satellite.
10. I want to clone you for nefarious purposes.
11. I want to Xerox everything you say, and fax it straight to my cortex.
12. You’re a polished opal in a pewter world.
13. You’re luminous, lady.
14. You’re a smooooth criminal.
15. You’re all that & a bag of kale chips.
16. You are FAR fucking OUT!
17. You blow my mind like a Cat 5 hurricane.
18. When did you get so wise, woman?
19. Where did you pick up those sexy mind-moves?
20. BOOM! Brilliance strikes again.
21. Color me enlightened.
22. Radiance abounds.
23. I’m honored to share even a miniscule fraction of your miraculous DNA.
24. If it wasn’t completely inappropriate & biologically impossible, I’d be having ALL your babies.
25. Your acumen is making me weak in the knees. 
26. You’re like a laserbeam in the night. So bright. So right.
27. You’re more addicting that Twilight, The Hunger Games & street-grade cocaine, intertwined.
28. You’re so fantasmagoric, I almost wanna join Facebook — just to stalk you.
29. You are simply . . . beyond.
30. You foxy freak of nature!
31. You’re the cat’s meow, the dog’s howl, and the curmudgeon’s harrumph — all rolled into one.
32. You’re the genuine article, baby.
33. Do they sell you in bulk? And can I pre-order?
34. May I have one of you in every color?
35. Aaaaany chance you’re up for adoption?
36. You ooze ingenuity.
37. Your ebullience is infectious.
38. You’re a charmer.
39. You’re a prize.
40. You’re my personal Yoda.
41. You remind me what ‘possible’ feels like.
42. You dazzle me to the core.
43. I like the cut of your jib.
44. I hang on your every tweet.
45. One in a million? More like one a googleplex.
46. You’re a revelation.
47. You’re a machine. More, plz.
48. Your mediocre ideas are MENSA-level hotness.
49. You redefine ‘divine’.
50. You matter. Full stop.

Happy Friday! x

Credit to Alexandra Franzen

wanderlust

It's been really cold in Sydney in the past 2 days and looking at these pictures made me feel a bit warmer already.





















My friends have been planning on an epic Europe trip lately, but I have a strong feeling that it is not going to happen (lack of organisation, my visa issue etc). It came to my mind yesterday that I should go explore South East Asia, my home region, instead of Europe next year. It's cheap and I won't need to apply for visas to visit, being ASEAN and all. In my list are Bali (in style), Lombok, and Batam in Indonesia, then Ho Chi Min, Hanoi and Halong Bay in Vietnam, and then Cambodia for Angkor Wat.  At the moment I'm looking to go for 4 weeks... depending on the amount of leave I would accumulate from work I guess.

Have anyone been to Vietnam & Cambodia and have any tips to share? x

TOKYO Part 2: Ginza, Tsukiji and Imperial Palace

We depend on trains to get us around Tokyo when we were there. Our hostel is really close to the Ginza line station in Asakusa, so we catch this train almost everyday to attractions like Shibuya and Ginza. Tokyo rail network is really confusing because it is operated by a couple of companies instead of just one. We find it cheaper to buy the daily metro rail pass, which is 1000 yen, as this gives us unlimited use of the Ginza line and most of the subway lines in Tokyo. We can't use this to go on the JR line though, but this is not a problem because the Tokyo Metro usually operates another train line that is close to wherever JR line station you want to go to (for example, you can go to Akihabara station if you have the JR pass, but if you only have the Tokyo Metro Pass you can stop at Suehirocho, which is basically just 500m away from Akihabahara station). 

Only in Japan does train/railway attendant look so neat and fancy (and always happy to help!)

Ginza line takes us to Ginza (of course). We went there a couple of times during our stay in Tokyo. It's basically just one street full of high end fashion stores. Nothing too interesting here so did not take much pictures. 

 Tsukiji fish market is close to Ginza, but you do need to change trains to get here. 

 We came to Tsukiji at around 8am - did not bother to go to Tuna auction as it is impossible for us to wake up at 5am. When we got to Tsukiji we were not allowed to get in, as it is only open to public after 9am. So we decided to go eat breakfast at a sushi restaurant in the complex...

We looked up Sushi Dai first, but it was full of people and there's so much people queuing up outside to get in. I did some further googling and we went to Ryu sushi, which in a different block but not too far away. No lines here! 

The sashimi are nothing short of fabulous.  We ordered the seasonal special menu & they are all so fresh and tasty. They are pretty expensive though, I think we spent about 6000 yen for both of us. I think it is worth it though.

 I almost got hit by this mini car/trolley thing a couple of times when I was there.. what a hectic place!

 Not sure if they are mussels or what. So fricking huge!

We went to the Imperial palace (Tokyo station stop) after Tsukiji. Lots of office buildings, parks and fountains. We can see a bit of the palace but was not allowed to get in. We did get into some parts of the park though.....

Next stop: Odaiba and giant Gundam (I think..) x

trench coat lost

I lost my trench coat a month ago. I left it somewhere in Sydney CBD during a shopping trip with a soon to be married friend. I had that coat for about 4 years and we had some fun times together. It is only a $50 trench coat from TEMT, but it fits me perfectly, holds out very well & I love it dearly. I never really regard a trench coat as a staple and only just realised that after my trench is no more. Mostly because I have started embracing sweaters, and Sydney winter is not cold enough to wear a full on coat on top of my sweater. A trench will be perfect on top of my chunky knits. I guess it's time for me to buy a new one, but this time I'd like to splurge. My first choice will be this simple APC one; would like to have a Burberry coat but then I'll have to sell a kidney to fund for it. I think it's on sale in Incu.. will try to do a quick dash off work to see this tomorrow :)







These days I have been too lazy to dress up & always end up wearing some kind of tee with some denim. Casual workplace is the bomb yo. I love it 11/10 but sometimes I think that I am committing a fashion crime because I dress like such a slob. Well at least in my mind I look like these super chic but simply dressed girls.

This weekend was pretty uninteresting. Like my winter weekends in general. Therefore the slobby unoriginal picture posts. But whatever. Anyway, all I did was I went to my uncle's birthday BBQ, ate some shiz loads of food, and on Sunday I went to purchase some furnitures for the house. Those things ain't cheap huh! but furniture shopping made me feel like I'm such an adult. There were heaps of cute cushions on sale, and I was seriously tempted to practice the FF doctrine of 'never unknowingly under cushion'. but then I remember that I'm 23, rather untidy and basically can't handle the responsibility of arranging many fluffy cushions into perfect positions everyday. I came home cushionless, but I did get some pretty good deals on quilt covers which I shall show off once my home is looking nice & photo worthy.

enjoy your week peeps x