Can you guess what could possibly be one of my wife’s greatest frustrations? For those who know her and her cooking prowess, you might be surprised to know that something related to her cooking had been a source of disappointment for her. No, not that she sucks at it. On the contrary, she is well recognized by relatives, friends and acquaintances for her superb culinary skills and many scrumptious dishes. In fact, she has become an inspiration to our school-age kids who, not surprisingly, put “chef” as one of their dream professions.

Read more and learn Mama Sez’s easy-to-follow recipes.

Cheesy Beef Caldereta by Mama Sez

Since Casa 3 (Preparatory to Grade 1) our kids are in school the whole day.  It is part of the Abba’s Orchard School practical life curriculum to train the children on table manners and use of eating utensils. As the child constantly take lunch on his own, he advances to independence. Wow, I just realized that I have been preparing our kids’ lunchboxes for 4 years now. I didn’t notice it’s been that long, probably because I am enjoying and getting much satisfaction doing it. Having to wake up at 5 o’clock in the morning every school day to prepare healthy but enjoyable lunch and snack treats for our school kids, on top of a healthy breakfast for everybody, is a challenge I am taking with pleasure.

Read more on the criteria that I have been consistently following when preparing their lunchboxes.

Parenting tips from pregnancy to discipline, on food preparation to health & wellness for kids

Lately, my taste buds have turned to craving for Asian flavors. I seemed to be always looking for spicy yakisoba, shrimp dumplings, sushi, sashimi, veggies in oyster sauce and orange chicken. Even my snacks have that hint of Asian as I stuff myself with siu bao (Steamed Pork Buns) or some siu mai (Shrimp dumplings) that are abundantly sold in kiosks around the place where I work.

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Meat sauce. Bechamel. Cheese. Think rich, yummy lasagna. I love it! The many times I have made it though really became too rich even for me. Imagine all that butter you need to make your bechamel sauce.

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You all know how much I love cheesecake. I made a simple cheesecake, a chocolate cheesecake and now I have successfully whipped up a mocha cheesecake. This was inspired by the most perfect coffee cheesecake that my friends and I had while enjoying coffee and great conversation at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. Surprisingly, my cheesecake proved to be the most perfect among all those that I have baked. No cracks, intense taste. So I am sharing with you my tried and tested recipe. Enjoy!

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It was my first time to go to Boracay, so I was looking forward to 2 things: the beach and the food. I was really looking forward to lots and lots of seafood on my short stay on the island.

[Read more at stoicpassion.com]

These days I always get chided for not sharing my recipes for dishes that I serve to friends and family. I tell them its not that I don’t want to share, I just have limited time to sit down and actually come up with witty words to go with the recipes that I publish. I don’t want my posts to be just a recipe. I try to add some story or two to accompany my recipes because in reality my recipes are parts of my life.

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Kubiertos.com in partnership with Discovery Travel and Living is giving away 10 cookbooks by DTL’s famous chefs, Willie Harcourt-Cooze, Kylie Kwong, and David Rocco to 10 lucky readers of this blog. All you have to do is post a comment here about what you plan to do this year to make Christmas extra special. You can post as many ideas as you want as long as they’re unique. It would be understandable if the basic idea will become similar to others but the details should be uniquely your own. (Ex. Special Christmas dinner can be an idea of many people but you can make it unique by how you plan to do it or what dishes you plan to cook to make it special). The contest will run from December 13 to December 27.

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Being the busy bees that my hubby and I are, there isn’t always time to pack up and drive to someplace nice so we could just unwind and relax. However, about an hour away from the city, (at least without heavy traffic and all that) there lies Tagaytay, a small town frequently visited by those longing for some cool air and warm meals.

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I am so in love with Pepper Lunch’s Beef Pepper Rice. But its not possible (or practical) to dine out there everyday so I did my best to try and create my own version of a dish that is made out of Beef slices, rice, and a lot of pepper. It was a challenge to exactly replicate the appearance even the taste of the dish that came over from the Japanese but it was something that satisfied my craving. I used thick strips of beef as that was what we had available so for next time, I will make sure to buy super thin slices (like bacon) for my next beef pepper rice.

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Greetings from AQ Services International!

We would like to invite you to apply for a mystery shopping program. It would require you to mystery visit several petrol stations.

1. For these mystery shops you need a PERSONAL CAR (motorcycles are not allowed). You are required to observe the service and facilities standards of petrol stations.

2. Reimbursement: The shop fee is 450 Pesos per shop. You are required to make petrol and store item purchase. The minimum amount to spend on fuel is 200 Pesos.

3. Deadline: These mystery shops have to be completed within the one week and the surveys must be completed and submitted within 24 hours of mystery shopping, latest by the 14th of November 2009

Please note that these mystery shops are to be executed between 9 am to 3 pm, 7 days a week (Including weekend).

We will inform you from the 19th October onwards if you are selected for one or more mystery shops. Do check your mailbox for updates!

Summary:

Project: Mystery Shopping for an oil & gas company
Task: Evaluating and Research
Time: 9 am to 3 pm, 7 days a week (Including weekend)
Deadline: 14th of November 2009
Fee: 450 Pesos
Location: Philippines

If you are interested in getting some extra money over the weekend please contact my colleague or myself at feisal@aq-services.com or me at alessandro@aq-services.com.

TELL A FRIEND

We are always looking for new mystery shoppers. If you have friends or family who might be interested, please refer them to us. You can redirect them to our website or use the following link (copy paste the link in your browser if it is not active):

http://www.aq-services.com/mystery-shoppers/tell-a-friend-about-mystery-shopping

With the initial hype that comes with a new place gone, I was secretly hoping that Charlie’s would not be too crowded for lunch. It was almost 1pm after all so I fully expected that only the regular clients remained. But we arrived to find no table available and there was quite a wait for us to do before we were able to enjoy the food that many foodies have talked and written about.
Being so close to where I worked, many were surprised that I hadn’t even tried Charlie’s famous Philly Cheesesteak or their Buffalo Chicken Wings. I have long since resigned to the fact that there are certain expectations when people know you write about food. So my friends were supportive when I suggested we eat at Charlie’s and off we went and waited for a few minutes for a table.
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Feeding a household that is composed of a family of 4 (3 boys) and 2 nannies can be a strain to one’s creativity in the kitchen. Too many times, I hear the frustrated sighs of “Again?!”, when the kids find out what is being served for dinner. Often, when I try to reengineer the previous day’s leftovers, it would be my hubby that I would hear complaining that my skills were not enough to hide the fact that I was still serving leftovers. It is a chore simply to come up with unique and delicious dishes to serve your hungry family. After all, how many times can you serve Adobo, Sinigang or Kare Kare?

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I have been reading up on several bloggers’ DiscOVIries contest and only now found a theme that I can participate in. Surprisingly though, I found the theme through tech blogger Javyee instead of another foodie like me. His week 3 contest encouraged bloggers to show their passions in terms of the gadgets you have or use related to it. This theme is named: Display Your Gadgets. Javyee is a tech blogger so his photo included his collection of computer, camera and podcasting equipment. Nice.

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I must confess I have disliked drinking milk ever since I crossed the line and left preschool. I also do not like milky tasting or even milky looking dishes or treats like a milkshake or white chocolate or ha ha what do you know, polvoron. I do however love to mix milk in cooking and baking where the milk complements a dish instead of the main ingredient.

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While Metro Manila residents braced itself for the impacts of Typhoon Pepeng, the temperature lowered as the winds grew stronger. I wanted to keep warm but did not want another cup of coffee as I was already plagued by a bunch of nerves just by monitoring the weather. And then I thought, hot chocolate would be perfect!

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Before I frequented TGI Friday’s, my favorite hangout was Chili’s at what used to be Greenbelt 1. I had earlier on decided that I liked Chili’s chicken fingers (or crispers to them) more than TGI’s and who can resist their Country Fried Chicken with that awesome gravy? Those two are my absolute favorites that I must say I never got tired of ordering whenever I eat there.

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I am not really sure what triggered the frozen yogurt craze in Manila but 2008 brought out a lot of frozen yogurt stores in and around the metro. Frozen yogurt is not an entirely new concept as many ice cream or cold dessert places offer them as alternatives to their usual fare. However, I believe it was only recently that specialized outlets selling only frozen yogurt sprouted in abundance.

Personally, I never got around to jumping on the bandwagon, so to speak. To me, yogurt represents something healthy and therefore “not delicious”. I can never imagine yogurt as a dessert. I never attempted to put it in my cakes and I have never had the courage to make my favorite Greek sauces out of it.

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I think I have eaten Philly cheesesteak sandwiches before in one form or another. I just cannot remember how its supposed to taste like. I wasn’t even sure why the sandwich had Philly in its name and for what purpose it was. What I recall though is a sandwich made with crusty bread, smothered in beef, onions and cheese (where Cheez-Whiz is often used). Grease is also expected to play a major part as that seems to be a trademark of the original version of this sandwich.

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I found myself in Greenbelt 5 with my husband as I quite forgot that there was a Royce’ store located along the ground floor that I knew we couldn’t possibly avoid. Too late I realized as I saw his eyes light up and his feet carry him towards the glass counters where lots and lots of Royce’ chocolates were out on display.

Of course he had to choose the same Nama Bitter chocolate that I bought him months ago. I offered to buy him something else just so we could try other variants but he wanted to stick to what he was sure tasted absolutely great.

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