Recipe: Nacho Garden with Chili Salsa

We serve Pulled Pork Nachos in our restaurant, but serving a dish for business requires numbers and logistics that almost always result in a recipe with constraints. The joy in home cooking is having to do whatever that comes to mind, blow up your budget of heaps of preferred ingredients without concerning yourself with customer dissatisfaction. I am most creative when I know I have the freedom of doing what I want exactly as I want it. It's this sort of planned out spontaneity as the recipe can change last minute because something pops in your head as you are making the dish...or in the case of the hero photo above, it's because several other people were involved in the preparation that by the time I saw the final plate there were bread sticks and thyme twigs scattered on my nachos!  

I can distinctly remember that scene wherein I asked my friend to arrange the nacho on the serving plate because I was still busy doing another dish for the party. I instructed her to start with the nacho chips on the bottom followed by the slaw, then the meat, then the salsa, topped off with onion and chives sour cream sauce and melted cheese. I have given her the liberty to just play with the layer of ingredients that I had individually prepared beforehand. And as I was making the pasta she came to me and whispered, "Look at what your brother added on the nachos." I turned to see and rolled my eyes when I saw random stuff on it like bread sticks and sprigs of thyme. You see, my brother's concept of cooking is that as long as it looks good it'll taste good...even if it means feeding you raw chicken with beautifully chopped up grass.

Snippets: Asakusa, Tokyo

Taken September 2, 2017 along one of the alleys in Asakusa area in Tokyo. 

You know that feeling when you thought that all is set, then you go do a final run-through only to realize that you missed to include something really special? Well, this was the photo that I had to include in the picture book I was making. For sixty pages plus a cover and back, it took me three days to scan through thousands of photos (1964 photos, excluding the ones I had deleted) I took in Japan almost two years ago, and lay them out in an eye-pleasing fashion. I edited hundreds of photos, mix and matched the ones that looked good side-by-side, and redo a couple of pages before submitting it to the printer. It was on my third day, I just finished 60 pages of layout, and I was scanning the gallery to look for the perfect shot for my front and back covers when I came across this image. I loved it so much, with the lighting, colors, symmetry, candidness, and especially the Japanese dude staring directly into the camera right where the draw lines are in perspective...it was a perfect accent piece that I wanted to include for my inner pages. With this one photo, I ended up rearranging probably six pages just to accommodate the proper sequence and space for this photo. No regrets, even if it meant deleting one page in exchange of this. I actually deleted the only image of Tokyo tower I had in the album for this one. Why? Well Tokyo tower is probably present in every photo of every other person who traveled to Japan, but this one is a moment that no one else has captured, and it's beautiful because of that. This was the side of Japan that I enjoyed seeing most.

We Are by HAEVN

This came in as one of YouTube's recommended video just a few days ago, right before my bedtime. I clicked on the video, the orchestra started playing, I closed my eyes and waited for his voice, and by the second line I was enamored. I fell asleep that night to this melancholic music. The next day I searched for HAEVN's playlist, and I ended up listing to the whole album without skipping a single track. Seldom does it happen that I enjoy an entire album from the first song down to the last, and this was one of those moments that I could just listen to it on repeat. I'm glad I found this refreshing yet tasteful and timeless music. 

Foodtrip: Bali

Going to Bali was an on-and-off trip for me. For four consecutive years, Bali has been in my radar but always took the backseat when pit up against another country. To me, Bali is one of those places so easily accessible that I often end up choosing to fly to a different destination year after year. So was the case that when I finally booked a flight, it didn't occur to me that I was actually going until about a week before the trip. I barely did my research, not really sure where I wanted to go...but for one, I knew what I wanted to do, eat.

We had an evening flight, and so we arrived in Denpasar International Airport roughly almost midnight. The first conversation I had with my host was:

Host: Sisstah! So what you wanna do in Bali?
Me: I'm not sure, but I want to try local dishes—
Brother: She has a list of food on our itinerary!
Host: Really!? (Proceeds to laugh) Okay okay, tell me what you wanna eat
Me: (Got the itinerary that I made and skipped to the bottom part of the page where I wrote just a list of local dishes that I wanted to taste.) 
Ayam Bakar Taliwang (grilled chicken)     Gulai Otak (brain curry)

Pepes (herbal packet)                             Beef Rendang (rendang)

Soto Betawi (Jakarta soup)                     Babi Guling (lechon)

Nasi Ayam Campur                                 Mie Goreng (fried noodles)

Martabak Manis (sweet martabak)
Brother: (Asks our host) Can we have dinner before going to your house?
Host: Let's start with Nasi Ayam!

In the end, I wasn't able to cover all grounds, but it was a good start.

The cover page on top is what I ate in Parachute Cafe in Canggu. The place was beautiful with a real parachute as canopy to those who wish to dine al fresco.

Walking Around Yongkang Street, Taipei

Yongkang Street has a special place in my adventure's list as this is the first place I explored on my solo trip around Taipei. I stayed in the area for three days, getting a chance to go walk around at a leisurely pace for hours. The easiest way to get to Yongkang Street is by train. The train station closest to it is Dongmen Station. It helps that it's an interchange station, meaning two rail lines pass by here, the MRT Red Line and Xinzhuang Line. It won't take many steps from the station to reach Yongkang. There are also bus stops in the area, but I was too afraid to ride and miss my stop on buses here, considering I know zero Mandarin.

The street at first glace is this busy mix of tourists and locals, thanks to the popularity of some restaurants in the area, including the michelin star restaurant Din Tai Fung down at Xinyi Road. They're known for their dimsums and xiao long bao. The vibe of the area is more of this artsy back alley that has a mix of popularly staple restaurants with small independent cafes and shops. It's a hip residential area with price ranging at roughly mid-to-high price points with a meal that can cost for around 100TWD for up to over 700TWD per person. The best time to be in the area is either before lunch or late afternoon to avoid the crowds. As early as 9pm though, you'll find yourself almost alone as tourists tend to disperse right after dinner, leaving a couple of young locals just chilling within the area.

I'll walk you through briefly with some of the photos I took along the way. And fyi, I travel to eat...so the ratio of images of restos to other shops is 3:1 in this post. 

Quarter Life Crisis Moment #12

Ever reached that stage in life wherein you kinda want an adventure of sort, but then you don't want to be in a position of too much discomfort? It's like, "Yeah! Imma go somewhere and have the best time...but I can't be hassled with anything impractical or too tiring...so maybe next time?" It's one of those moments that goes with the saying The mind is willing but the body is not. I can feel my body slowly aging and tiring too easily, occasionally giving in once tested to its limit. Like oh-ehmm-ghee, I got a massage a few days prior after a week of continuous physical and mental activity, and in the massage I heard several bones cracking...now I've come down with a flu AND THAT'S NOT HOW IT'S SUPPOSED TO WORK AT JUST 30! D: 

Me and my friends when planning on trips now begin with the question, is it worth the effort? We had talks of seeing mountain peaks but it mustn't require extensive hiking time...so until now, I haven't been close to a hiking trail nor a mountain peak. We wanted to go glamping as well, but the idea of sleeping in a tent sounded uncomfortable in spite of the supposed glamour of it...so we ended up checking in a room with a jacuzzi. Even when it comes to and fro a particular place, I'd rather close my eyes at the amount and get a Grab rather than having to endure several transfers and wait lines in transit. Right now I am appreciating the value of paying for practicality rather than saving a few bucks in exchange of wasted time and energy. This comes at a price though, and it does not come in cheap. But at the end of it all, we are getting a little older, and standards must get a little higher as we age. It's all part of bettering ourselves and aging gracefully. After all, we can still be grounded, at the same time live marvelously as long as we are working on what we can demand to deserve. 

Pet Peeve # 236

I just arrive from an hour-long flight home, my parents come fetch me and the first question that often pops up the moment I close the car door is, "Are you hungry?" I never say no to that question. And before my mom asks if where we should eat, she briskly hands me over a piece of chicken pocket pie, "Here, it's good." This has been our ritual over the years whenever I go home. I eat the pie in the car on rare occasions, but oftentimes I take the pie home and eat it at our dining table. Over the years, I have learned to eat ceremoniously that it's uncomfortable whenever I am in a non-ideal position to dine properly. This includes having to eat in the car, in movie theaters, in stadiums, on a blanket by some scenic view, in my room, or any non-dining area that does not set the mood for a proper eating position. I don't know...I am somehow distracted and hassled by the idea of having to eat while not having the right table nor utensils to do it. I guess aging gives us the option of not being practical, instead having a sort of sophisticated standard that gives us less option of having fun. But for me, I take it that I prefer to do things one at a time, if I go watch a movie I watch the movie without smearing butter all over my hands. If I am to sit through a game or concert, I don't want having stuff on my lap nor my armrest that I will have tolerate as rubbish the moment I finish the stuff. If I'm by the beach or watching over a mountain with the most scenic view, I want to just be there in that moment to stare at it and not chew on a sandwich. If I'm in my room, I want to be not eating because the ants will come. 

Now take note, I said eating...drinking is something completely different. I bring a bottle of beer or a cup of coffee and stare at a view in serenity. Now that's the perfect situation for me.