Inspired

After the delicious pumpkin filled with seafood last night, I was motivated to try my hand at a pumpkin sweet potato curry soup.  On the streets here in the fall there are these carts that sell roasted chestnuts,  quail eggs, and gigantic roasted sweet potatoes!  Picked one of those bad boys up and I was good to go.  One of my first grocery trips in HK and I found canned pumpkin.  I haven't seen this stuff since the US so I immediately snagged a can for no other reason than the fact that I could.  It's been sitting in the pantry ever since, and seeing as I don't have an oven I was a l little confounded as to what to do with it...until pumpkin seafood bowl!

Last night's dinner turned out delish!

Success!

Saute garlic and onion
Add chicken stock
Add can pumpkin
Add sweet potato
Add Indian curry (from India!)
Garnish with parsley
Finishy!

Of course nothing in my kitchen is ever that easy so of couse I ran into one snag when my stupid can opener broke 1/4 of the way through opening the pumpkin.  I already had the onion and garlic on the stove as well as a pot of rice for Paul's lunch the next day.  So what do I do?  I went ape shit on that can!  I pull and pushed and levered, and finally I made an opening big enough to get some pump mush out!  Victory was mine!!


For Paul, the carnivore, I tried my hand at fried chicken.  I don't cook meat often, and when I do, I certainly don't fry it, but I had chicken breast, eggs, and panko bread crumbs and to my delight it actually came out pretty damn well for a first attempt!  And so as not to be wasteful, used the leftover egg wash and made a mini omelet.  Post dinner and we started watching Forks Over Knives.  Have you seen it?  Perhaps no meat for a while....

Pumpkin Curry Soup with Fried Chicken Fingers

Welcome to the 21st Century

Here it is, 3 years after the iPhone first came to market, and I am getting one!  Actually two.  Paul and I just ordered the new iPhone 4s and they come in Friday!!!

Yata grilled meat selection.  See the duck tongues on the left?

Sunday and we're on the go again.  Paul and I head up to Shatin in the New Territories to watch Catherine's rowing race.  We had never been there before and figured it was as good excuse as any to check out a new area.  Maybe it's just me, but New Territories remind me an awful lot of Korea.  Tons of apartment buildings all looking the exact same all in a row.  Meh.  We saw some of the rowers heading up to the start line, but decided we didn't want to sit around and wait for the race to begin, so we explored.  We found a Yata and had an amazing avocado salmon crepe and grilled salmon stuffed squid.  Why doesn't our Yata have a grill and crepe place??  Post snack and we head back to SPK (San Po Kong) for some pre-dinner relaxing.

I told sassyhk.com that I would write a review of Ruamjai for their blog as I'm trying to build up my writing portfolio.   Paul and I went once when we first moved here, loved it, and so invited our new friends to come taste so more of their Thai delicacies.  And try we did!

Don't you love when you make drunken plans on a Saturday and they actually happen!!?  Nina, Kenny, and Andrew arrived right at 6:30 for the Thai feast.  P and I had made reservations earlier and the waitress told us we could bring out own wine with no corkage fee.  Got to love that.  In the month or so since P and I had first visited Ruamjai, we seem to have forgotten it's, shall we say, unfortunate interior.  There's no ambiance.  This place is all about the food.  We gather around our folding table and order a plethora of dishes; baby Chinese cabbage cooked in garlic, flat noodles with chicken (pad thai), pumpkin seafood curry, a whole edible goldfish,  and chicken and pork satay.  Everything was just as yummy as we remembered!  I took a poll around the table and it seemed the pumpkin curry was the star.  I need to add this to my dinner repertoire.  Pumpkin + coconut milk + seafood = HEAVEN.  I could seriously eat this every day. Seriously.  Every. Day.

We finished dinner and still had 3 bottles of wine (5 people. 5 bottles of wine. you know how we do) left so everyone came back to the Latitude to imbibe on the 6th floor patio.  It's so nice to have an outdoor space to have people over.  It's usually Paul and I traveling to see people, so it's nice to be able to finish your wine and head up to the 19th floor when it's all over.  No hour long bus ride here! Twas a wonderful Sunday evening, and Nina, Kenny and Andrew said it was worth it to come ALL the way over to the dark side for the best, most authentic Thai in HK.

Chicken Pad Thai

Pumpkin Seafood Curry 

Edible Goldfish Stuffed with Lemongrass

Sunday Funday crew; Paul, me,  Andrew, Kenny, Nina

Epic Wine Fail

I had been looking forward to this winery tour for a long time.  Ever since Rakesh, the owner of Platinum Wines, told me of its existence well over a month ago.  The event was organized by Wine Lovers in Hong Kong, although upon arrival none of the organizers were in attendance.  Odd.  Do they know something I don't know?

Let me back up.  Paul and I take the subway, to the bus, to an hour away little island called Ap Lei Chau.  Neither of us had been, but we had heard rumors of designer stores and to me this translated to this is going to be an awesome cute little beach town.  We arrived 2 hours before the wine event to check out the island and get some pictures for Foodie's Street View.  Fail number 1.  Ap Lei Chau is abandoned.  There were no cute stores or restaurants, although we did find one pizzeria from which we were stared at for a minutes and then ignored.  There were however, an abundance of 711s.   Feeling betrayed we sat, Diet Cokes in hand, and watched the fisher boats float by.

Looks can be deceiving

Wine time and we took a taxi, who had never heard of 8th Estate Winery (clue #1), to this industrial park where there are no stores, no people, and absolutely no signs of a winery.  We saw a similarly lost looking couple and deduced they were looking for wine too, so we wandered together until we finally found the building.  Go up an industrial elevator, down an industrial hallway, turn an industrial corner and all of the sudden you're in this beautiful tasting room.   The room is full of barrels and in the center of the room is a large dining table with 2 cheese spreads (which weren't that great and when the crackers ran out, they were never replaced.  Poor form).  We were characteristically the first to arrive so we stood around and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  After 10 or so people arrived the staff decided it would be ok for us to "try" the first wine.  Oh and did I mention this cost $180 each (~$22) and two hours of commuting?  By "try" I mean there was a little splash in the bottom of your glass, sipped once and it was gone.  And then we waited and waited and waited.  Finally enough people had gathered so we got the "tour."  The founder, Lysanne,  began the tour with a preamble "Sorry I'm so ahhhh, but it's been a whirlwind of wine events these past few weeks."  That's nice but it's 4 o'clock in the afternoon, drink a coffee and pretend like you're happy to see us.  The tour went into one room where she very generally described their wine making process.  They get their grapes from Australia, Italy and Washington, USA, so they came make wine year round.  I would like to tell you more about their wines, but that's basically all I got from the tour.  It was quickly ended with, "You guys probably want to get back to drinking, so let's go back to the tasting room."  Yes, true story, but sadly the drinking she alluded to didn't so much exist in this winery.  We tasted, literally, 3 red wines and a dessert wine, they took our glasses and we were left to stand empty handed.  When we asked if we could buy a bottle and sit outside one of the staff replied, "Ugh, well, I have some paper work to do, so you can stay til I finish that, but we don't want everyone staying."  Well ok then, we're out.

So that concludes the worst wine event I have ever been too.  Uninformative, lack of actual wine tasting, and lack of any enthusiasm from anyone at the winery.  WTF?  Who opens a winery and isn't super excited to tell everyone about it!?  PS aren't you trying to SELL your wines?  We got not even one smile from the 3 people working their, no way would I spend even a dollar here, even if the wine was superb.  (Their shiraz was actually pretty good).

New friend Nina and I out in LKF

Silver lining: We met great new friends!!  Nina and Kenny just moved here from NYC a month ago, and Kenny's co-worker/friend from Deutsche Bank, Andrew, just got here a few weeks ago as well.  We all got on so well, bonded about how much the winery sucked, so we cabbed it to Happy Valley Brew Pub for BEERS and fries.  We went out all night and made plans to meet again for Sunday Funday.  I suppose if wine tasting is going to suck, it's better to suck it together.  

fengqi.asia

I woke up reasonably early this morning, the sun was shining, and I decided to go for a quick little 4 miler.  31 minutes later and I hop in the shower.  I go to get a little pump of condition and son of a bitch shoots straight into my eye!  Must have been saving conditioner gunk for weeks to get that kind of precision and height! All I'm thinking is, "Oh no I have to go to this winery today with a puffy eye.  That or it's going to look like a smoked a pound of hash!"  Luckily for me I was in the shower.  A quick flush out and the crisis was averted. Shampoo I would expect this from you, but conditioner?  Really?

Doesn't the chandelier look like a booby tassel? 

Yesterday afternoon was an interesting one.  As I mentioned I didn't know what the event I was going to was.  Turns out it was a launch for some new cloud technology, fengqi.asia.  I'm still a little unclear about what exactly it is, perhaps because 1/3 of the hour long explanation was in Cantonese.  All was not lost though.  I made some good contacts in the banking and technology world, got a free key fob for attending, had some mediocre wine, and some excellent food!  The highlights were the skewers with a tomato, rare beef and fig, cheese foi gras puff pastry, and my absolute favorite mini grilled ham and cheese!  The turnout was pretty funny.  There were over 100 people there, 95% of which were Chinese, and 95% of which were men.  I was definitely the only Caucasian woman there, and I'm pretty sure the other white dudes were the CEOs and CTOs of the two companies who put this product together.  After introducing myself the first question everyone asked was, "How did you find out about this?"  Oh I have my ways.

Post reception I met Paul for dinner.  I had already eaten, but I wanted to profile this cute little street where Kameron and I had dinner the previous night.  Hau Fook Street will make an appearance in one of the upcoming Foodie magazines.  Paul and I popped into this tiny little Chinese place that Kameron said she and her parents like to go to, and we ordered a small thousand year egg and fish meat congee, and beef n noodles.  The congee was amazing!!! My new favorite and it was $21! (~<$3).

thousand year old egg w/ fish meat congee

Work N Play

This morning I attended Work N Play's monthly meeting at Cherry's (of Aeris magazine) suggestion.  Despite the fact that it was at 8:30 in Central, I am super glad I went.  This meetup group meets often to talk about what's new in social media and how to use it to grow your business/online exposure.  Today's session started with everyone giving a brief 3 word introduction of themselves.  "Hi, I'm Lauren.  Looking for work."  The main act was Casey Lau's presentation about his companies past and present, advice on using social media, and then and he strongly (STRONGLY) encouraged everyone to keep a blog.  Check!  Most people there were in marketing or PR, but there were a few entrepreneurs and even wine guys.  Love wine guys!  I passed out my card, got some, and have already sent out emails.  Man these tech savvy people are quick at getting back to you!  I'm used to waiting a day or sometimes weeks for a response, not minutes.  Lessons I learned:

1.  I still don't know what it is I want to do so I'm going to do it all.  Keep blogging.  Keep applying for Finance jobs.  Keep networking.  Keep writing. Keep wine tasting.  Keep harassing wine guys.  Keep on keepin on.

2. Social media is key.  I'm back on Twitter, I need to spend more time on linkedin, and there are a shit ton other sites I haven't even heard of that I need to get on.  I also promise I will try to make my blog the most interesting it can be.  I just borrowed a camera from Foodie for this week, so I'll get you some pictures.

Crabstick roll that was much enjoyed for breakfast this am

Oh you're interested in what I came home to last night after dinner with Kameron, who is super sweet by the way.  Sushi!  Paul got off work at 4:30 because the teachers had to stay late on Halloween for a party, so he came home and rolled me some crab rolls.  How sweet is that?  Any of your boyfriends ever make you sushi??  Didn't think so.

I met Kameron in Tsim Sha Tsui (TST) and she showed me this really cute back street (off Cameron St) with all of these tiny mom and pop restaurants.  We went to a homemade noodle place where I didn't get noodles, hmm, and it made me eager to come back, sooo, Paul and I are going to head back tonight and check out some restaurants.  I think I may do an article for Foodie about the small little alley; Street Views for those of you who looked at Foodie.

Now it's off to profile some streets for Foodie, attend a mid-afternoon cocktail launch party.  I lost the confirmation email and now I can't figure out what the event is!  I guess I'll find out when I get there.  Tough times.  

Le Souk- Soho

After my meeting with Alicia last night, I met Paul and we hit up Le Souk.  My official Foodie Club review will be in the December issue, but here's a preview.  It was AMAZING.  This place was really phenomenal, and I'm not just saying that because it was free.  We started with a Spanish rioja, lovely, and the Egyptian mezze platter.  The platter had Moroccan cigars (phyllo with goat's cheese), babaganoush, hummus, falafel, eggplant/tomato spread, feta, olives, greens, Kafta (beef patties), and came with pitas.  All of it was superb.  Then for mains I got the sea bass tagine and Paul got the CousCous A Le Souk.  You guys know me and I'm not a huge meat person, but if I had to come back I would definitely get Paul's meat dish!  It was the star of the night. Although I must say the sea bass was lovely too.  Paul's plate had a mound of couscous with raisins in which you spoon a bowl of vegetable soup on top.  It was good, but the best part again was the meat.  There was no joke a whole lamb on his plate.  Ok maybe not a whole lamb, but it was a huge rack. I wish I had photos.  The lamb just fell off the bone and the two sausages had just the right amount of cardamom, and both were smothered in this delicious Moroccan sauce.  Needless to say, even after the big app, we licked our plates clean.  The owner, who was super enthusiastic and fun, told Paul he should share with me.  Ha he's clearly never met me as I don't so much ask, as just take a bite of everything.  Or two.  But, yeah everything was wonderful and Moroccan food is soooo up my alley.  Hummus?  Yes, please.  He also said they usually have Moroccan wine which is really good, but they had just sold out, so we'll have to go back to try that...and another rack of lamb.  Based on the amount of people who were there when we left, they should have no problem.  For you Hong Kongers, they also own Sahara and Antipasto.  I must go ASAP.

Post dinner and Paul and I made our way down the street to Maison Wines where we were invited to sample some Italian wines with the owners of the Cavalierino vineyard.  We tried 7 wines and two types of grappa, all of which were organic and quite delicious.  Much better than the usual French nonsense served everywhere here.  The Poggiano di Montepulciano, a cab sav, was definitely my favorite, but really all of them were really fruity and tasty.   They also had some of their home grown sausage and procsuitto to taste, but I was much too full for that.  They have this huge estate in Tuscany where they have 300 pigs, grapes, and olive trees for which they make olive oil.  We were invited to come stay at their vineyard/bed and breakfast in any time and I think one of these days we may just take them up on it.

And if this wasn't enough excitement for one night, we left the tasting and met Angie (my sub in Korea who now works for RBS) for a drink at Cicada.  I haven't seen her since one of my first weeks here so it was nice to catch up and reconnect.  We found out that we have a friend in common, Mirg.  The small little expat world we live in....

Today is busy busy busy.  Run, coffee with Aeris at 2, pick up camera from Foodie, tutoring x2, dinner in TST.  How does anyone find time for a job?

Lunch

I just made the best lunch ever.  Maybe it's because I miss Korean food, but man this hits the spot:

Kimchi, avocado, tomato, and shirataki noodles salad with mustard/soysauce dressing.  YUM. I think tomorrow I shall have the same with tofu.

Anyway, it's an exciting couple of days coming up! Today I meet with the editor of Foodie then out to dinner for Moroccan BBQ.  Tomorrow meeting with the marketing director at Aeris, an online "style and substance" magazine, tutoring, and dinner with Kameron.  Kameron is the daughter of Mei-Mei's best friend and just moved to Hong Kong.  I love meeting new friends!

Also on tap for this week, I have to write a review of a Thai restaurant and Cupcake Nails for sassyhongkong.com.  No Finance job, but at least I'm busy :)

Check out the November issue of Foodie, and me on pages 9-11, here:

http://issuu.com/foodie.hk/docs/foodie_2011_november_issuu

Check out Aeris's latest issue, now in Cantonese!, here:

http://www.aerismagazine.com/