22 February 2011

Legal Alien in Singapore + more about food....

We have now collected our ID passes which allows us to do all sorts of things in Singapore, ie establish banking facilities, creche application for TJ, hire/lease a car. Our ID cards look very similar to the Victorian Driver's Licences. Green card with a B&W photo, name and date of birth. Only unique differentation is my fingerprint mark on the rear of the card. I believe that we have to renew our cards every 2 years to continue remaining legally here.

The visit to the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) was followed by a return visit to the organic restaurant I described in the Gastronomy blog, called Real Food. We indulged yet again in good food and gave our bodies another injection of vegies and fruit. Here's what we had:

- Broccoli apple juice (very weird flavour. not sure we'd go back for that again)
- Celery apple pineapple (delish)
- Fresh & Grilled Vege Salad with herb greens and avocado, topped with roasted nuts and dressed in balsamic vinegar and oil
- Orange Vinaigrette Salad: potatoes, eggs and roasted pumpkin, with cherry tomatoes, olives, orange slices (TJ ate them all), baby radishes and herb greens. Tossed in fresh OJ, mint, herb vinegar and olive oil.

Very cleansing and filling.

Yesterday, I was finally able to make the first dish at home. With some basic utensils and ingredients, I made a cous cous salad with raw vegies, olives and dressed in a mix of oil, lemon, parsley, ground cumin and ground coriander.

I made another batch today, as John is on a 5 hours teleconference until 9.45pm. I am happy to report that he has had the first half of the cous cous salad and has very much enjoyed it. Expects to finish it off during his dinner break.

Next challenge is to find some new recipes that I can use in a wok with yet again limited ingredients. With no car readily available to do a big supermarket trip, ingredients for the pantry are acquired a little bit at a time. I can just about pull off a stir-fried chinese broccoli in garlic, soy sauce and oyster sauce, just need to add something a little more substantial to that. Meat is quite expensive, so I need to be selective and clever.

Okay, so we seem to be eating all the time. I promise though it's only the standard 3 meals a day. We are just out so often as we wait for our boxes to arrive and our pantry is decently furnished a respectable selection of ingredients. However, then you may be bombarded with my own Asian culinary experiences. Either way we are eating very well, very healthy, getting huge doses of Omega 3 and whilst not bad on the waistline, it's not reducing it either.

Ciao.

Silv

PS: We are still having deserts though. Usually a scoop of ice cream. Except for the caramelized almond semifreddo we had at Tavolo Italian Restaurant. We moaned through every bite. Annie, I am taking you there just for the desert. You can have food if you want but desert, I am ordering it.