A fine savour on simple pleasures

My aim is to reduce the tension in my mind by sharing my thoughts and experiences in the things that I love; which I could not express openly due to circumstances. Be it in doing stupid things, experimenting on new recipes, failings in research work, writings..just some doodle ranting stuff

Friday, February 24, 2012

Simple Potato Cream Soup, Cheap DIY hearty soup for all XD




I've made this soup for as long as I can remember. Since I knew how to made cream soup, I've never bought canned concentrated cream soup anymore..I found them to be soo expensive although the price of the ingredients are soo cheap. This might be due to the branding, and of course, the popularity.

Everytime I made this, people will assume that it is canned cream soup..haha..but nonetheless, Malaysian don't usually make ur own cream soup.. :)

This is a cream soup that doesn't use cream at all (laugh). You can even substitute the non-healthy ingredients with the healthy ones yay XD Very cheap and tasty, healthy and quick! I usually prepare this when I have leftover baguettes to dip with or a part of beef stroganoff-Yue's-suke-hati-cincai-style spaghetti.

How much will you get of all these ingredients? 1 big standard pot of rice (usually u can cook 6-7 cups of rice grains in it)
For 8-10 person

Ingredients
5 russet potatoes (or whatever potatoes you have, get the big ones, if small put in 7-8)

 Peeled potatoes

1-2 c of plain flour

2-4 tbs olive oil/vege oil/butter/margerine

 I prefer this brand of butter

1 cube chicken stock
1 can of evaporated milk/full cream/low fat milk (go ahead, whatever oso can, 1 small pack yea)
3-4 dash of italian herbs
1-2 slices of cheese
pepper
salt to taste

*optional (any of it or all of em or none of em oso can)
chunks of carrots
chunks of celery
crumble hard boiled egg whites
croutons

Methodology

1. Wash, peel and cubed the potatoes to about 1/2 inch in size. Soak in water for a while to remove starchy residues.

  Cubed potatoes soaked in water

2. Drain the cubed potatoes well with a colander. Transfer to a bowl, layered the colander with paper towels and return the potatoes to it, toss well for a few mins to let them reasonably dried out

3. In a big pot, at low-medium fire, add in the 2-4 tbs olive oil/vege oil/butter/margerine, I usually add in 2 tbs of olive oil and 2 tbs of butter (not melted yet)


4. Pour all cubed potatoes in the pot with melted butter+oil. Increase fire to medium. Stir fry them until a bit translucent. Don't stop moving those hands..I dun wanna let the cubes stick to the pot.

5. Add in the plain flour directly to the pot (DO NOT DILUTE WITH WATER) and immediately roux them together. You just have to keep on stirring to combine the flour with the potato cubes. They will stick to the potato to form a somewhat coating element. The texture of this combination will be sticky yet dry in nature..its perfectly fine





Addition of flour
The flour coated potatoes


6. Add in water, about 0.5-1 Litre or so..it depends as long as its at least 1 1/2 inch above the potatoes. Keep on stirring and let the water dissolve the flour into gooey consistency (you must aim for a partially thick consistency)..if too thick, add a bit more water..do stir at all times..


7. You can put in any other veges here..do not put in soft veges please. Let it simmer for 5-10 mins at low fire.

8. Pour in the evaporated milk/full cream/low fat milk, up to you how much, but make sure its not too watery, adjust the texture. Add in the chicken stock, salt and pepper to taste. Stir for 5 more mins

After adding some corns to the mixture (this is rice cooker pot)

9. Now you can add cheese and let it dissolve in, some dashes of italian herbs (if dun have the combi, parsley only oso ok)..if you have cream, do incorporate it now.

10. Just before serving, add in crumble egg whites/croutons..can garnish with a bit of cream on top and cracked black peppers :)

Done! Very easy and satisfying!

Note: In this photo, I prep the potatoes in a wok first because I dun wanna spoil my rice cooker pot. When finish step 5, I transfer to the rice cooker pot before adding water on stove. Another advantage, when serving, I can put in the rice cooker and let the soup stays warm.

When cooking for bigger crowd with a relatively cheap utensils, you have to resort to these methods in order to maintain the pots you have :)

Cheers!




Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Performance review: Olivia Ong Concert, PGRM, KL

 Olivia Ong, she's so much my bro's type haha..she reminds me of my big sis (even same age haha)

A week or so ago, my hubby bought me a couple seat tickets to Olivia Ong's Are You Ready For Love concert from I love discounts. He knew how much I love this Singaporean singer since I always hum her songs when doing practically anything haha.

:)

Many might not know who she is, so I'll intro her to all :) She's a singer of singaporean origin, a chinese, with multi-lingual capabilities (English, Japanese, Chinese), studied in japan and even joined a jpop group there, Mirai..Saiyuki fans would know their song as it has been used in the anime, entitled "Open up your mind", before going solo. But to myself, I'd rather prefer her jazz songs from the Bossanova albums..the one I love the most is her rendition of "Fly me to the moon"..initially recommended by Michelle Phan from youtube..that's when I'm totally smitten by her sultry mellow yet angelic voice.

The thing is about her, once you heard her song, you can't forget how beautiful her voice was..(that's my opinion-lah XD) I myself can't stand today's songs..they make my head spin, seriously I will get headache when I open the radio to Flyfm or Hitzfm..it's juz not my cup of tea..So I only will listen to instrumental tracks, opera songs, or orchestras like Josh groban's, Emma Shapplin's..Andrea Bochelli's..hence, somehow I was able to enjoy her calming voice without a migraine..it's like a soothing cooling balm :)

So this is how much I like her

Although I live in Selangor, that day I have to go to a senior's wedding in gopeng, perak. We went to the PGRM hall  directly from Perak, its a 200km+ with heavy rain on the way for like about a 3-4h driving plus a slight traffic in KL area..it was nightmare..didn't have time even for dinner..thank God we could 'jamak' bcoz of that..but it was really tiring..We were afraid we would fall asleep in the hall due to exhaustion..

When we reached there, its really hard to get a parking, so we went to the next serviced apartment, Sri Cempaka building and parked there..it was so full as well =__=||| After redeeming the tickets, we entered the hall, I laughed when looking at the couple seats..they're banquet chairs tied up in pairs, with a pink heart balloon tied up in the middle..cute! but funny..

 The seats, as of 20 mins prior to the performance

All these were compensated with Olivia's presence..the audio system were awesome! and the projectors were clear n precise..the stage lights were dazzling! It was really well planned and well organized..although the hall was abit small..but it suffice..even the 2 singers who sang during opening were lovely..The performance goes on from 8 pm to 1030 pm..I was surprised again, coz in the event itinerary I saw it would be a 1h performance (if I'm not mistaken), so I was really happy..


The dazzling multicoloured lights..

Wasn't able to capture her dazzling beauty with juz a phone camera haha


She sang many-many lovely songs, most of em from her new album, Romance..i personally loved her song "A Love Theme"..it was sooooo lovely..when it's live, its get better! you'll get what I mean huuu


Her MV of "A Love Theme"


This concert caters to the chinese crowd, coz she sang many2 (lovely) chinese songs..old and new.. (I think I did hint a chinese opera song as well)..and she experimented on many2 styles on the different songs performed..(30 - 40 % of the songs were English) not one was bad..she also converse 99% in chinese..though I can detect some 'you know' sentence (since that's the only ones I understand haha)..I think I'm her only fan with a Hijab that night.. although I can't understand 1 bit of what she's talking, I found myself not minding it at all (although I hope next time she could talk at least 50% in english, I would be very grateful..I'm sure all our chinese friends out there would understand her perfectly too)

Well, its a great and lovely first time experience to a concert! (Not counting the occasional formal orchestra performance though) I loved it and will go again if I got a chance :) Thumbs up and keep it up gal!



Will definitely go again in the future :)

In the end, I never even dozed off during her concert.

Rating : 8.5/10

Go2 pick up her album! XD



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