Weekly Photo Challenge: ARRANGED

It’s my day off! I’m used to getting up early so I decided to prepare our breakfast.

And so while waiting for my small family to wake up, I decided to take some shots. I remembered this week’s theme for the photo challenge 🙂

scrambled egg with chicken frank sausages

buttered pancakes

french toasts

regular loaf bread

beef bacon

fruit slices

Table is ready 🙂

Now, it’s time to wake the guys up 😀

Have a great day ahead, everyone!

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Birthday!

I had a nice time last night! My birthday was celebrated at Kuya Oscar’s flat, and there were lots of food, singing and dancing! Thanks to all who came even on short notice!

Thanks also for all those who remembered to greet on SMS, email and Facebook! FB is really amazing! Now, even my classmates in the elementary years, and long lost friends I have not seen in ages, could send their birthday greetings!

Thanks to my wife and baby who stayed awake until 4am this morning to keep me company on my party.

Ans thanks to the Lord for another year of blessed happy life.

Love u all!

Ref Cake

My wife’s fridge cake recipe…

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Ingredients:

1 200g Grahams Crackers, 1 1/2 cup all purpose cream, 3/4 cup condensed milk, 1 can fruit cocktail.

Procedures:

1.  DO FILLING – In a bowl, combine chilled cream and condensed milk.

2.  LAYER – Lay 8 pieces of crackers in an 8 x 13 rectangular pan. Pour cream on top and top with fruit cocktail. Repeat process to make 2 or 3 layers, ending with the cream and fruit cocktail on top.

3.  CHILL and SERVE.

White Spaghetti

Ingredients:

1 kg spaghetti pasta, 1/4 kilo of chicken, mushroom pieces and stem (1 big can), meat loaves (1 small can), 1 can Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom, 1 big can Evaporated Milk, 4 gloves of garlic, 1 medium size onion, butter, salt and pepper, cheddar cheese.

Cooking instructions:

1.  Cook pasta noodles per package instruction. Drain and set aside.

2.  In a separate container, boil 1/4 kilo of chicken, then shred into small pieces.

3.  In another container, start cooking sauce by sauteing garlic and onions in butter. Add chicken shreds. When chicken is cooked, add mushroom stems and pieces, small diced pieces of meat loaf. Add Campbell’s cream of Mushroom, Evaporated Milk. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

4.  Place cooked sauce on top of pasta. Placed grated cheese on top.

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Jen, this is your request!

Empty Can??

Have you experienced opening a canned good, and found that there was nothing inside? What did you do then?

I just experienced one. What I did, I searched the internet for the customer help desk of the company who made the product. Luckily, I found it and sent a letter through email. I wrote:

Good day! 

My name is Nelson and I’m a loyal customer of San Miguel/purefoods products even here in the UAE. I recently purchased a can of Purefoods Vienna Sausage (140g), but to my dismay, when I opened the can, there were no sausages inside – only water! 

Of course I cannot return it to the grocery shop coz it’s not their fault, especially since I bought an unopened can. I took a picture of the can, but of course I know it’s difficult to claim that it’s empty when somebody can just take out the sausages and take picture of an empty can. 

I am writing not because I wanted to claim anything. I just wanted to remind you guys that you need to check on your quality control because this incident can also be happening to your other customers, and they are just not reporting. Please look into your packaging processes and check if something is being mislooked. 

Thank you and I hope that I get my money’s worth next time I buy products from your company. More power.

 

Nelson Bautista

Abu Dhabi UAE

 The company immediately answered the following day. Their reply says:

Dear Sir:

Greetings from San Miguel Corporation!

We highly appreciate your feedback regarding our products/services. We have noted all information you have initially given us regarding your concern. Also, we already forwarded your concern to the Quality Assurance team of Purefoods Hormel Co.

Should you have other concerns, please let us know. We will be glad to assist you.

Sincerely,

Julie Ann Estalilla
San Miguel Customer Care Center
Tel. (632) 632-2000
Fax (632) 632-3299 Mailbox No. 2005

PUTO (Steamed White Cake)

This is my first try in baking a puto! It was made easy by White King Puto Mix which was also available here in the UAE.

I just followed the cooking directions written on the box, and used our rice cooker to steam the mold. I used cheese instead of butter as topping. And presto! a delicious classic puto! My wife and baby loved it!

Chef of the Year!

My batchmates held our Christmas Party last night. We had lots of parlor games, dancing, singing and gift-giving.

I won the “Chef of the Year” award for my dish, vegetable pastel. It’s the first time I received recognition for my cooking!

We had a nice time! Merry Christmas everyone!

Salad Day

I have gained a lot of friends here in the UAE. We would meet almost weekly in my flat and sing our hearts out on my Mediacom videoke system. We call our gathering “salad day” (which came from the song, Gold, which would usually be part of my repertoire :). I think this is our way of getting rid of homesickness.

Last December 8 was one of our longest gigs. I cooked white spaghetti and potato-tuna salad.

Check out this youtube videos from the November 16 session. Kulitan lang! 😀

Fruit Diet

I have been eating quite poorly in nutritional value for the last couple of days. Just this week, I had adobong babsy, adobong chicken, cheeseburgers, hotdogs and  meat loaves. That is because I had to cook food that was easy to prepare,as I did not have much time to stay in the kitchen.

Aside from that, my meal times have been quite erratic. I usually load myself heavy before coming to work because I know the next meal would only be after 7 to 8 hours. My workplace is such a busy and stressful surgical unit so I only get something to eat when it’s less busy.

I feel guilty trying to advise my patients to eat healthy when my packed lunch in the staff fridge contained the oily adobo pork. I’m like a preacher that does not practice what he preaches.

So today is flush out day. I am only eating fruits and juices today to wash out all the toxins. I know I can not maintain this kind of diet for a longer period of time with my kind of work, but I promise to try eating healthy more.

Whew, it’s this time of the year when we write our new year’s resolutions, which get broken eventually. Hehe 😀

Last Night’s Bday Dinner

It was one great evening last night. It was the first time that my flat was filled with people and it was so strange to look at my living room full of guests, when most of the time it was filled by no one but me.

 

People started coming in half past seven. Some came from the morning shifts. Most of my guests were my batch mates – the same people who took the same plane coming here for the first time in UAE. Everybody had their new stories to tell, after having worked in our own respective units for the last three weeks. 

 

My preceptor Jaime came in as well and gave us some info about the in and outs on working in the UAE.

 

I wished there were videoke and some dancing, but I did not have the appliances yet for that. Well, it’s understandable since I have not even worked for a month. I only had my laptop’s media player for the background music of the night.

 

By the way, they loved my world-famous spaghetti! They also liked the buttered veggies! Successful home-cooking!

 

It was a nice evening when my flat was filled with stories, laughters and cheers.

 

After my guests left, I did a quick party “post-mortem” care. 

 

I woke up this morning and made some more cleaning. I’m working three nights starting tonight. Hell, I’m back to reality.