Getting to know each other.

I got tagged. Read if you're nosy or bored xD

1. What time did you get up this morning? 7:30 AM2. How do you like your steak? Rare medium! Mmmmmm bloody meat....
3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Iron Man 2 in a cinema full of munchkins
4. What is your favourite TV show? House MD, CSI and Bones.
5. If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be? Cape Town, South Africa baby!
6. What did you have for breakfast? Nothing...>_&gt I am waiting for the pastries to get delivered to
7. What is your favourite cuisine? I eat everything! as long as it tastes good xD ok just not pork haha! I can probably eat Japanese food for the rest of my life tho!
8. What foods do you dislike? I dislike greasy food! also dislike pork!
9. Favourite place to eat? Too many to name! it depends on the type of food xD but I really love going to Kingyo on Denman!
10. Favourite dressing? Honey mustard.
11. What kind of vehicle do you drive? I don't really drive in Canada, I'm too scared I'll end up driving on the left side of the road! but I own a 2010 Toyota Matrix xD
12. What are your favourite clothes? Jeans! and clothes that look like wrinkled rubbish bags according to my mum xD
13. Where would you visit if you had the chance? Japan! hopefully end of this year...
14. Cup 1/2 empty or 1/2 full? Half full - esp if it happens to be Chinese herbal medicine >_>
15. Where would you want to retire? on a farm somewhere in the country where I can keep lots of animals, and grown fruit trees haha!
16. Favourite time of day? When it's time to leave work!
17. Where were you born? According to my parents, Hong Kong. According to me, Somalia!
18. What is your favourite sport to watch? hmmm...toss up between F1 and footy! Oh and hockey when the Canucks aren't losing!
19. Who do you think will not tag you back? why do they have to tag me back?
20. Person you expect to tag you back first? As above
21. Who are you most curious about their responses to this? Everyone's! I'm nosy didn't you know?
22. Bird watcher? Nope, Vancouver only has crows, pigeons and seagulls.
23. Are you a morning person or a night person? Night to the dismay of my old fart boyfriend!
24. Do you have any pets? A Rottweiler, a tortoise and now we're getting kittens!!
25. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share? I need to pee really badly right now but I need to finish this questionaire first!
26. What did you want to be when you were little? In the CID - Criminal Investigation Department. My mom even made me a laminated ID card with my photo n everything! I wanted to carry guns and chase down bad guys! Yes I played with guns as a child xD I didn't like dolls and I still don't like them! Too much cop shows as a kid...wait I still watch cop shows haha!
27. What is your best childhood memory? Fishing with my daddy at the pond in the local park. It was probably illegal -__-
28. Are you a cat or dog person? BOTH!
29. Are you married? No
30. Always wear your seat belt? I hate seatbelts, they always end up cutting into my neck!but I have to wear it in Canada because apparently if they catch you, you get fined -__-
31. Been in a car accident? Yes, my mom's car got totalled by an idiot who didn't look before changing lanes on the highway so he knocked our car and we went spinning into the fast lane! I thought I was gonna die!
32. Any pet peeves? When people say "Yaknowadyamsayin" - I don't, and when they pronounce "Herbs" as "Erbs" - you're not French.
33. Favorite Pizza Toppings? traditional - mozzarella, tomato, and basil.
34. Favorite Flower? Star gazer lillies
35. Favorite ice cream? Grapefruit
36. Favorite fast food restaurant? Don't eat fast food.
37. How many times did you fail your driver's test? Once - I was still in the testing yard -__- I had to alley dock and I knocked over the cones.
38. From whom did you get your last email? A client
39. Which store would you choose to max out your credit card? Chapters?!
40. Do anything spontaneous lately? shopped xD Sheila it's all your fault!
41. Like your job? I love it!
42. Broccoli? yes but only if cooked.
43. What was your favourite vacation? I don't even know if it was classified a "vacation" but I spent 6 months in Paris xD
44. Last person you went out to dinner with? The Pookie
45. What are you listening to right now? 5fm on streaming audio
46. What is your favourite color? Purple but I have a disease of buying teal eyeshadow.
47. How many tattoos do you have?er......
48. How many are you tagging for this quiz? Everyone that reads it!
49. What time did you finish this quiz? 10:04 AM
50. Coffee drinker? Nope! I get the jitters if I drink it and then I get a caffeine headache for the rest of the day!

Nunu's Kitchen - Cooking With Dog's Gyudon

Food I make!


After spending way too much time watching Cooking With Dog on Youtube, I decided to stock up on Sake, Mirin, and Dashi xD Let's just say you're gonna see lots of Japanese dishes on Nunu's Kitchen for a while!
Gyudon, or beef rice, is essentially a mixture of thin sliced beef and onions simmered in a sweet and savoury  sauce served over rice. Sometimes this is topped with an egg.
Please note that this style of cooking is very new to me, I'm not too familiar with Japanese flavours xD

Gyudon


You will need:

• 300g-400g thin sliced beef - I used shabu/hot pot beef. Try get a good mix of fatty and lean for a better flavour.
• 1 small onion - sliced into thin wedges and separated.
• Steamed rice.
• Mirin - a type of Japanese rice wine with a high sugar and low alcohol content.
• Soy sauce - I'm not sure what, if any, difference there is between Chinese soy sauce and Japanese soy sauce. I had a bottle of Kikkoman at home so I just used it xD
• Japanese cooking sake - I believe the difference is that cooking sake is salted...
• Brown sugar
• Granulated dashi
• 2 eggs
• 1-2 stalks of spring onion - chopped
• Shichimi spice - Japanese 7 flavour spice.

La Methode:

• Boil a pot of water, put eggs into a thick earthen bowl or pot, pour boiling water into the bowl enough to cover the eggs, cover the bowl with a lid.

• In the meantime, mix together the sake, soy sauce, mirin, and brown sugar. I have absolutely no idea how much of each to use, I just mixed it according to taste. It should taste sweet, but savoury at the same time. You should also taste the bite of alcohol from the sake. Once you have the sauce right, set it aside. 

• Put heat on high and melt a tiny pat of butter in your pan, stir fry the beef in the butter until it is still slightly pink. Remove and set aside.

• Pour the sake sauce into your pan, when mixture starts to bubble, turn heat to medium, add beef. Stir fry beef in the sauce for 1 minutes. Remove the beef.

• To the leftover sauce, add approx 1/2 cup water and the granulated dashi. When sauce begins to boil, add the onions. Cover pan with lid and allow onions to simmer in the sauce for approx 5 minutes.

• Once the onions are cooked down, add beef. Once the beef has heated up, scoop up and serve over steamed rice.

• Sprinkled chopped spring onion over beef mixture.
• Remove eggs from their hot water bath, crack open over on top of the beef.
• Sprinkle shichimi over the egg.
• Eat.

GIVEAWAY! $40 to spend at CSNstores.com!!!

It's Giveaway time!!!
I was recently contacted by Ashley of CSN Stores who kindly offered one of my readers a $40 gift certificate to spend on anything their hearts desired at any one of their over 200 online stores!
Brilliant! but who is CSN and what do they sell? Well, I did a little bit of digging and it turns out that they are one of the leading e-commerce merchants around! They sell everything from sofas to cookware to brand name handbags! Just take a look at some of the stores they have under their belt! They have been mentioned by all the big names such as the New York Times, Forbes.com, and even by Extreme Makeover Home Edition!
I'm not talking about brands that you've never heard of before, I'm talking about brand names like Diane Von Furstenburg, Le Sportsac, Liz Claiborne, Caphalon, La-z-Boy and much much more!
They are also a Better Business Bureau accredited company so you can shop in confidence.
Another thing I really like about their company is that many of their products have free shipping. I like free shipping xD
So what can $40 get you?

How about a vanity mirror? $44

Or a jewellery box? $26.99

A jewellery roll maybe? Very Chanel-esque may I add!$33.99

Fork out a bit n get a Liz Clairborne clutch? Love the colour! $59.99

I love these bronze sandals!$59

$52.95

Since I love to cook, I love pots and pans!xD $35.95 for the WHOLE SET!

And lastly, if I had the space, I would dearly love to own this vanity table! I love how Victorian it looks! $286

Got you guys interested yet? thinking of ways to spend that $40? Well stop dithering about and enter this giveaway!


Rules & Other boring stuff:

1. Giveaway ends June 2, 2010.
2. To enter, simply leave a comment on this post with the words "I want to shop at CSN!".
3. For extra entries, post about this giveaway on your blog.
4. Unfortunately this giveaway is only for Canadian and US readers :(
5. Winners will be picked by Random.org

And this is not a qualification rule but because I'm nosy, I would love to know what you'd buy with the $40 xD
Good Luck!