The fall treats from Tim Hortons. Pumpkin spiced muffin and doughnut. There was even pumpkin spiced tea offered, around the Halloween season.

Cinnamon raisin, blueberry, whole grain, plain…. lots of options available for just a bagel. Can’t make up your mind? Try this “everything bagel.” Toasted “Everything bagel” with cream cheese (choice of plain, strawberry, or garlic & herb).

Hot breakfast sandwich, with a seasoned egg patty, a slice of processed cheese, and choice of sausage or bacon, on freshly baked tea biscuits.

Yummy breakfast sandwich!

Hot breakfast sandwich for the bagel lovers!

Candy Cane Doughnut; chocolate doughnut with chocolate glaze, and candy cane sprinkles. Needless to say, it was for the Christmas season!

Pastry filled with cream cheese and topped with raspberry jam.

Caramel Apple Fritter, made of chunks of apple and spiced of cinnamon.

Canadian doughnut, in conjunction with the Winter Olympics Games 2010 held in Vancouver, British Columbia on Feb. 12th to 28th.

The tropical decor reminded me a lot about tropical countries such as Malaysia. Miles and I went to this restaurant during lunch hour and enjoyed their lunch entree. It was a pleasant experience. We had the choice of mild or spicy for our food. Needless to say, we opted for spicy! Miles who used to take Canadian spicy has improved on his tolerance for spicy food dramatically by getting used to savouring the authentic hot & spicy Asian food ;)

Miles ordered this “Trini-Curry-Wrap up Roti (Indian flat bread).” A choice of chicken or tofu in cashew curry sauce with chickpeas and vegetables, wrapped in roti and served with garden salad tossed with in-house mango vinaigrette.

I had the “Twist of Jamaica.” Crusty Pastry filled with seasoned ground beef and Tandoori onion rings, drizzled in sweet chili sauce.

Here are some sweet pictures I’d like to share from the engagement party that Miles and I attended last weekend. The colour of the theme was YELLOW!!

The main cake and multiple cupcakes displayed in tiers.

 Yellow roses icing on top. Very nice!

 Food…food…and more food!

 Elegant cupcakes; white cakes with buttercream icing. Yummy!

 One of the many dessert trays; lemon tarts, sugar cookies, cherry squares, red velvet cupcakes, cherry balls, chocolate peanut butter balls, and Oreo balls.

Shrimp (a.k.a. prawn) cocktail with seafood sauce in a shot glass, garnished with dill leaves.

The night scenes in Saint John, on a quiet evening.

Out of all the dishes we ordered, dessert was the only one exempted from the hot & spicy category. A warm, hot, and spicy lunch on a cold, windy winter day :)

 Fish in soup with numbing spice. The more you eat, the tastier it is! And of course, the more intense burning sensation is on tongue!

 Thick and yummy beef soup with eggs.

 Fatty pork with mixed veggie. Does this remind you of bacon?

 Ma Po Tofu. Tofu and pork cooked with hot spices.

Crispy Milk for dessert. The crispy texture resembles the Chinese doughnut, filled with soft and sweet glutinous rice. It tasted great on its own, even without dipping in condensed milk served on the side.

The otak-otak recipe caught my eyes one day and I decided to give it a try. Sure enough, it reminded me a lot of the Malaysian otak-otak. Yummy!

Ingredients:
(A)
~ 500g fish fillet, chopped
1 medium onion
1 tsp belacan chili
1 tsp lemon grass powder
1 tsp galangal powder
4 dried red chilies
180 ml thick coconut milk

(B)
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 egg
1/4 tsp sugar
1 tbsp cornflour
1/4 tsp salt

Directions:
1. Grind ingredients (A) with a kitchen blender until a fine paste is formed.
2. In a mixing bowl, mix together the fish paste and turmeric powder. Add the rest of the ingredients (B) into the fish paste. Beat the mixture until smooth.
3. Rub some oil on the banana leaf. Pour the fish mixture onto a 20 cm x 20 cm banana leaf. Wrap around tightly.
4. Bake in preheated oven at 400 F for 15-20 minutes, or until firm to touch.

Serimuka, one of my favourite Malaysian desserts! I had a craving for it last week and decided to make some. Yumm…the soft texture and sweet pandan flavour of the egg custard layer compliments the salty, coconut flavoured sticky rice layer at the bottom very well. It’s a labour intensive process to make the dessert, that’s why it’s considered a special treat ;)

The recipe can be found here. Enjoy!

Living in the small city of Fredericton with the population of 51,000, I’ve been quite blessed with the reasonable cost of housing here. What can you do with $675? Perhaps a monthly rent for a comfy and spacious bachelor apartment, or a decent size two-bedroom apartment. Of course, as you’ve expected, kitchen, living room, bathroom will be included as well.

Imagine… an apartment unit in the above picture is all you can get in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia. How big is it? About the size of two parking spaces!! The 270 sq. ft. “micro loft” includes kitchen and bathroom too. Amazing! It really makes me wonder, if we’re now following the footsteps of some congested cities such as Tokyo, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. The whole idea of these “micro lofts” is to allow low-income individuals to be able to afford a place of their own. Nonetheless, living in an apartment about the size of a standard bedroom will certainly drive me nuts!

Ingredients:
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 cup all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp hot water
1/2 tsp salt
2 + 1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:
1. In a mixing bowl, cream together butter, white sugar, and brown sugar until smooth. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then stir in the vanilla extract.
2. Next, dissolve baking soda in hot water. Add to the batter along with salt. Stir in flour.
3. Lastly, stir in chocolate chips. On a ungreased cookie sheet, drop cookie dough by large spoonfuls, about an inch apart.
4. Bake in preheated oven at 350 F for about 10 minutes, or until edges are lightly brown. For crunchier cookie texture, extend baking time for another one to two minutes.

* Yield: ~ 4 dozens

Recipe can be found here. I used pork this time, for a change. It tasted just as great!

An Australian Definition of a Canadian
In case anyone asks you who a Canadian is . . .
       
You probably missed it in the local news, but there was a report that someone in Pakistan had advertised in a newspaper an offer of a reward to anyone who killed a Canadian – any Canadian..
   
An Australian dentist wrote the following editorial to help define what a Canadian is, so they would know one when they found one.
     
A Canadian can be English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian or Greek. A Canadian can be Mexican, African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, Arab, Pakistani or Afghan.

Toblerone chocolates come in white, milk, or dark chocolates. Take your pick!

Too small of a piece? How about turning this chocolate bar 45 times larger?

A Toblerone chocolate bar that weighs 4.5 kg! It’s 45 times heavier than the regular 100g chocolate bar. It’s humongous!

Good news to the Toblerone chocolate fans out there. Your chocolate supply for the year! :P

Last year, however, I celebrated Christmas with Miles and his family. A truly Canadian Christmas celebration; Christmas tree, treats, gifts, food etc.

I couldn’t remember the last time I was excited about Christmas and anticipated for the Christmas morning to come. Even though I never truly believed in Santa as a young kid, I was always looking forward to receiving my stuffed Christmas stocking on Christmas morning.

It brought back my childhood memory when I received a stuffed Christmas stocking in the morning! I’ve never had that many Christmas gifts in the past. Unwrapping each gift brought great excitement. That was one of the greatest fun celebrating Christmas!

Christmas decoration on the dining table.

Turkey and ham, with homemade beets and pickles for on Christmas day.

Homemade minced meat pie.

Plum Pudding. A must-have Christmas dessert in Miles’ family. It has a similar taste to fruit cake.

Hard Sauce, goes with the plum pudding. It is made of butter and icing sugar, and tasted like cake batter.

Christmas tree with gifts from Santa!

Cracking the nuts can be fun; walnuts, Brazil nuts, hazelnuts, and almonds.

We had joy
We had fun
We had seasons in the snow
But the snow that we played
was just never last too long

* Modified from “Season In The Sun” by Westlife.

The womanized “Winnie the Pooh.”

The cute snowman blushed as being kissed on both cheeks.

Despite the sadness of John leaving us, we had a great meal together. Of course, I had fun snapping pictures too ;)

The interior of the East Side Mario’s.

The signature crispy garlic bread. Freshly baked. Yummm…

Caesar Salad.

Bruschetta. Fresh Roma tomatoes, garlic, basil, olive oil and balsamic glaze served on herbed flatbread.

 Cheese Cappelletti for cheese lovers! Pasta stuffed with ricotta cheese filling, topped with even more ricotta, baked with our Besciamella-Tomato sauce and our blend of Mozzarella, Provolone, Gouda and Parmesan cheeses.

Firecracker Shrimp Farfalle. Large black tiger shrimps sautéed in extra virgin olive oil with fresh green chilies, snow peas, Roma tomatoes and basil. Served with bowtie-shaped paste tossed with herbed garlic olive oil.

Zesty Sicilian Pizza. Italian sausages, Capicolla ham, black olives, pizza sauce, and four cheeses.

 Sizzling Calamary Al Diavolo. It’s the signature appetizer. Lightly seasoned calamari sautéed with garlic, onions, red, green and hot cherry peppers and served sizzling in a herbed tomato broth with lemon.

 The New Yorker pizza. Pepperoni, red and green peppers, mushrooms, pizza sauce and blend of cheeses.

Cannoli.

Cannoli (meaning “little tube” in the Sicilian language), one the most famous Sicilian desserts that can be found in almost all Italian pasticceria. The Cannoli shell is made of flour, sugar, salt, eggs, water, vinegar, and vanilla. It’s traditionally filled with rich and sweet ricotta cheese.

Chocolate Mousse cake.