:: Food N Nutrition ::

This week was Group 4's microteaching! The theme was on Proteins hence you will realise the dishes are high in protein content. We cooked Ngo Hiang with Tofu Cream Cheese Sauce, egg tart and baked fish with cheese sauce!
Short lesson =) Protein source:

Ngo Hiang with tofu cream cheese sauce
- chicken, tofu

Egg tart
- Egg, milk

Baked fish with cheese sauce
- Fish

All the food tasted yummy! Just kind of daunted by the fact that 1 egg tart contains the equivalent of 1 egg yolk! Sounds unhealthy to me.....though i like to eat egg tart, i rarely eat 2 at a time which is good! =) People who loves egg tart, remember to control the number of egg tarts you eat as it contains egg yolk which is high in cholesterol. Last but not least, a display of group 4's presentation (; It was kind of rush so did not manage to take a few more pictures.

Group 4 microteaching

Thank you group 4 for the yummy food you have taught the class!

:: Textile ::

Here comes our 2nd assignment!! A weaved bag! =) Dr Mok mentioned that there will be minimal sewing for this bag....never did we expect, what followed was not easy too!!

We were given 4 pieces of cloth, 2 coloured and 2 printed ones. All the colour combination was painstakingly matched by Dr Mok, Miss Chin and Miss Soo. There was red, green, blue and yellow (cant remember if named all!) There was 1 popular colour that ended having to vote as there was higher demand than supply. Luckily for me, there were just 5 people asking for yellow hence there was no need to vote. Chose yellow as it looks bright and cheery =)

We had to cut out the fabrics into 1 inch thick pieces. Many of us were so afraid of cutting wrong measurement as Dr Mok stressed that she did not have extra. Guess everyone of us were so worried and did a good job with cutting (; Shown below is the picture with all the strips! We had to iron some white layer thing inside the cloth to give it some shape.

Starting off with planning the design

The weaving process is kind of complicated so i will not explain here lest i confuse my dear readers =) Looking beyond the starting materials, we have a picture of the initial weaving! In the picture, i had only 2 layers of weaves. And do you know, we actually just used those white glue used for handicraft to stick the strips together! To our surprise, the glue was able to hold the strips together !



2 layers of weaving

Finally after so much time spent on weaving, we can finally see the product.


Finished the weaving!

Ta daa! My finished bag! With yellow handle strips and it also come with a yellow cloth as inner lining.

Final product =)

While doing the weaving, some thoughts went through my mind. We know that Thailand sells alot of weaved bags right? I suppose many of it were hand-woven and the price maybe slightly more expensive (of course it is still cheaper compared to singapore!) but as humans (ahem* singaporean?), we still want to slash the price despite we can afford it. After going through the process of making this bag, I really understand their hardwork and time spent on working on the bags. I can tell you, it is definitely not as easy as we thought! You have to go through the whole process to feel the strain and pain. Guess if i were to go to Thailand and purchase weave bag, I should refrain from slashing prices! Afterall, they just want to make a living with the skills they possess =)

:: Textile ::

This is a very overdue post =X

Our first task for textile module was fulfilling the competencies profile. Remember the one i mentioned for F & N where we had one as well? That is used to assess our cutting skills and handling of kitchen equipment. Similarly for textile, it is used to assess our sewing skills.

We sewing many different types of stiches and sewed shapes like circle, triangle and square. Some shape requires pointed angle while some requires round and smooth angle. We also did zig-zag stitches and back stitchess. First time encountering terms like "basting"... "gathers"... Tried searching for videos on YouTube to view the respective sewing methods. But we all know it is still different when it comes to doing it on our own, right? Nevertheless, it was a good training and experience for me! =)

This has proven to be difficult for some of us! =( especially for people like me with no background or handling of sewing machine, whats more, different sewing techniques! It was definitely a struggle and we had to compete with time! We were not able to complete during class time and we had to find time to go back to the lab and sew.

Last but not least, a picture of what we submitted for our competencies profile.

For competencies profile

Really have to thank my classmates for their help! =D Always so ready to offer their help and never find me irritating when i kept posing questions. Thanks alot ladies! =)

:: Food N Nutrition ::

This week was group 3's turn for F & N microteaching! We whipped up 4 dishes instead of the usual 3 dishes. We cooked carrot cake, cabbage roll, broccoli soup as well as fruit trifle!

Shown below is the presentation of the carrot cake! We even did piping! See the cream on top of our carrot cake? We did that using piped cream provided by Ms Lu and Ms Nur. We were even given decoration bits to flaunt our creativitiy and design. Seriously, i had no idea that real carrots were used in making the dessert, carrot cake =x The carrot cake tasted yummy with strong taste of cinnamon plus raisins!! I don't know why but raisins always tasted very yummy when used in baking =)

Carrot Cake

 We cooked broccoli and leek soup. It was quite similar to the one i did during the cooking session conducted by Miss Chin. I think it serves as a good dish to trick kids to eat vegetables since children tend to resist eating vegetables. I only started eating vegetables when i was 15! It was because i took F & N, i learnt the benefits and importance of eating vegetables =) Then i started "forcing" myself to eat vegetables... Intrinsic Motivation huh...

Broccoli and leek soup

Next up we have cabbage roll. We fried the meat with vegetables and wrapped into a roll using par-boiled cabbage leaves. The cabbage leaves were so huge! Jit and i were laughing at how huge the leaves were which resulted in "grandpa roll", meaning super fat cabbage roll haha...
People who are interested to learn more about par-boiling, please refer to this website for more explanation: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-parboiling.htm

Cabbage roll

I forgot to take picture of the fruit trifle!! Below is the picture of the overall presentation. Did you see the small cup with fruits on top? That is the fruit trifle. I remember during my contract teaching, one of the boy did something similar to that, cool isn't it?


Final presentation

Thanks group 3, for teaching us to cook yummy desserts! Not forgettin the healthy soup and cabbage roll! =D

:: Home Economics ::

Prior to last weekend, it was such  a busy period....F & N microteaching...ICT personal assignment....Bio presentation...and TADAA~ Finally managed to take a breather over the last weekend =D Remember what you read about the donuts? (if you cannot remember, scroll down to refresh your memory) Today we are back at the topic or garnishing =)

Went to suki sushi restaurant at Novena area for a nice lunch. Shown below is salmon (pronounced as SA-MON) with mayonnaise...and decorated with fish roes! Cute isn't it?

Salmon roll

Next up is shitake mushrooms served with coriander leaf as garnish. I can't identify the yellow garnish though =( but it can be eaten haha I thought the serving looked very appetising, do you think so too?

Shitake mushrooms

Next up is dessert! Definitely it was not straight after my sushi lunch! Popped over to the TCC at clarke quay. Ordered the following 2 cakes!

TCC cakes

A very chocolatey cake with raspberry and macaron as decoration =) Chocolate cake does not appeal to me but if you are a chocolate cake lover, you should give this cake a try. If you have noticed, the cake is made up of 2 layers. The top layer is mousse like texture, which gives a bitter taste. The second layer is the sponge cake which helps to neutralise the bitterness. So it makes a good combination (;


Devil's Chocolate Cake

Last but not least, we have sour cream cheesecake! Frankly, i have no idea why is it called sour cream cheesecake.... there was no tinge of sour cream, it tasted like New York cheesecake? Nevertheless, i still like it since i am a cheesecake nut! haha... Overhere, we just have a simple deco using halved strawberry. Nothing exciting but simplicity can be nice too isn't it? =)

Sour Cream Cheesecake

Beautiful skyline view from 1-Altitude 

Last but not least, just want to share a place with all of you. If you want a place for a short chill-out, you can try 1-Altitute! It is located at Raffles Place level......62! Yes you did not see any typo mistake! It is at level 62! If you have been to Equinox, you will love this place! =) Not only does it offer a great view, you can view the surroundings at one glance! And i mean all the surrounding 360 degrees view =D You can see Swissotel opposite you, over see the IR / flyer / esplanade.... 
But there is age limit and dress code rule, so do check it out before you pop by! I would advice interested people to go at a later period since there's heavy haze right not =( Do take care peeps!

:: Food N Nutrition ::

This week was the 2nd group for microteaching and their theme was on "Meat". We prepared 3 dishes where 2 involved the use of chicken and last but not least used mutton. 1st picture shown below, you will notice there's a sunny side up. Its actually a poached egg! It took quite awhile for the poached egg to be cooked. Parsley was used a garnish and bread to go along too! =) You are supposed to use the bread and dip with the chicken "sauce" and eat.



Next up is the mutton masala. I forgot to take picture of another chicken dish =( The mutton masala tasted bit sour as we swopped coconut milk with yoghurt which explains the sour taste. But its definitely healthier!

And the group even prepared tags for us!! So thoughtful i must say =) Its colour printed and even laminated! Its so cute isnt it!! I love the cow =) haha since i like cows...



The group's presentation =) With menu, flowers and candle.

How can i miss out my favourite effect picture (; Great job! Group 2 classmates!

:: Food for Thought ::

Came across the following news in Google....

Apparently, this lady has bought a Mcdonald's hppy meal and tried to do an experiment on it. Any idea what she would be doing? Haha! She tried to determine why mcdonald's food does not rot!! Interesting, isn't it! So she bought the meal and took photographs everyday to show the progess of rotting.....And guess what? There was not much rotting in the food! *Gulps* Why is that so???

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkup/2010/10/is_that_right_the_mcdonalds_ha.html
Click on the above link to view the report.

It is amazing that food left in the open does not rot! I thought it would rot though....Do take a look at the photographs she took, perhaps we should try it out too!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sallydavies/4951228723/in/set-72157624739645253/
click on the link to follow the progress of the phototaking.

The following article entitled "The secret to the immortality of McDonald's food" analysed WHY mcdonald's food does not rot
http://www.salon.com/food/feature/2010/09/01/burger_that_wont_rot

http://www.mcdonalds.com.sg/

Next time, we pass by Mcdonald's, perhaps we should re-consider "Am i lovin' it?"

Another thing to share, I have signed up for Mcdonald's open kitchen door!! So excited about it! =D People who are interested, do visit http://www.mcdonalds.com.sg/ to sign up for a date (only once a month so register early!!)

:: Food N Nutrition ::

Finally it's here! Today was the 1st microteaching lesson we had and guess what? My group was the honoured one to be the 1st group to conduct microteaching! Our topic was on food commodities: Rice and cereals. Shown below is the final presentation we did today! =)  

My group consisted of 6 people - Gmah, Hidayah, Farah, Mavi, Jay and I
We splitted up into 3 pairs.
1) Hidayah and farah did quiche with tuna fillings
2) Jay and mavi did couscous
3) Gemah and i did penne pasta with chicken grills

Our theme was "Staples around the world" so our dishes came from 3 different countries (if you notice, there are small flags on the dish!) In the picture background from left to right, we have different types of rice and rice products followed by different types of pasta.

Final presentation



Final presentation with my fav hp camera effect =)

Couscous on the left followed by quiche and penne pasta. We had a barley drink too! since barley is a type of cereal too! We made some mistakes here and there during the microteaching but i guess we did learn from it =D

It's amazing how 2/3 weeks just passed by from the time we know of this microteaching (and more stunning - being the 1st grp) to now where we have completed it! I have definitely benefited alot from this microteaching. Before this, i have no idea what is quiche nor couscous. Neither did i heard of it before! Well, we learn isnt it?

Most importantly, my group members! =D All of them were so friendly (as in i didnt know them that well before the grouping) and everyone helped each other along the way. And my partner Gmah, who had to answer my doubts and questions =x whenever i had it. Thank you Gmah! And a big thanks to all my group members!

Hope our classmates enjoyed what we taught them during the cooking session (;

:: Food N Nutrition ::

Lesson on Food Presentation! Look at all the donuts! =) haha you will realise some looks appetising but some *ahem just dont whet your appetite...

Thats why we have a lesson on food presentation. Food presentation can be anything from appearance to use of colour to types of plates/wares used. We had 3 marking criterias while marking these donuts, mainly 1) Toppings / garnishing

2) Colour

3) Serving Plate

 So each plate is upon 3 marks in total. Let me walk you through the different donuts presentation! (X) means deduct 1 mark and (/) means mark is given.



  

(/) Toppings / garnishing

(/) Colour

(X) Serving Plate - NEVER serve dessert in an oval plate, whatsmore a melamine plate!

 

  

(/) Toppings / garnishing - Topping as in tomatos were given but should avoid tomatos in this case

(X) Colour - Doesnt really match

(X) Serving Plate - Plate used is wrong as well, should have put in doiley for color contrast

  

(X) Toppings / garnishing - No garnish was used

(/) Colour - Bright

(X) Serving Plate - Kind of small for 2 donuts (we should serve 1 donut instead of 2!)

  

(X) Toppings / garnishing - nothing is used

(/) Colour - donut looks good =x

(X) Serving Plate - Cartoon plate???

 

(/) Toppings / garnishing - Heart shaped bits

(/) Colour - It looks so sappealing!! and nice that you dont bear to eat it!

(/) Serving Plate - Correct plate and allows color contrast

  

(/) Toppings / garnishing - Raisins were used

(X) Colour - colour dont look appetising to me

(X) Serving Plate - Wrong plate

  

(/) Toppings / garnishing - apples but you can notice it has oxidised and turned brown =(

(x) Colour - i think it is lacking in some colour or it seemed too empty

(/) Serving Plate

(/) Toppings / garnishing - Golden kiwi and cherry!

(/) Colour - It looks like a good match!

(/) Serving Plate - Typical white plate in a leaf shape!!

I forgot to take picture of the last donut =( but i guess the above is more than enough right? =D I guess, the best bet would be to use white plate which allows easy matching. Keep a lookout on how food is presented the next time you dine out in cafe/restaurant!