Sharing my Ideas, Views and Opinions !

Few weeks ago, I was in Aberdeen.  Due to long cravings for char siu and siu yok, I rushed all the way to Chinese restaurant to order few of these Chinese dishes. A close friend of mine reminded me not to have Chinese food in Aberdeen as it is will not be as good as what we have in Malaysia…but how bad can it be..

Without hesitation, I walked in to a Chinese Restaurant in the middle of Aberdeen City Centre, acknowledging it will be pricy, I ordered few dishes, just to ease my cravings. In a way, I am like ant seeing sugar. Not much of choices there, so, please don’t ask if I can order anything fancy.

Instead of having my dinner in the restaurant, I decided to place a take away order. The first one dish that I ordered is sweet and sour prawns. A lot of prawns in one container but  the taste, I would say it is delicious. If fact, I think I can cook better.

Despite Aberdeen is just right beside seaside, the prawns are frozen type and not the fresh type. That makes the prawns taste more like tendery type of meat instead of fresh juice prawns. How disappointing considering I paid about 16 pound for few of these small little creatures.

The waitress suggests this SCALLOPS with vegetables. From the name, it paints a mental picture in me that the dishes will come with a lot a lot of scallops and few vegetables as side than main. When I opened the aluminium foil, the dish is more like VEGETABLES with scallops.

But this dish is surprisingly good, just a bit stingy on scallops. Ohh.. I can also sense that they put a lot of MSG. All because as soon as I finish eating it, I felt the thirst that lead me to drink a big glass of water.

Finally, I can’t resist my temptation and ordered this, Siu Yok, Char Siew and Roasted Duck rice. This on cost about 17 pound. The rice is just simple plain white rice and not the oily type and the meats, so so only lor. Instead of usual cucumber, they put lettuce as a replacement.

Overall, I will also not recommending anyone to try Chinese Food in Aberdeen but in the event that you need to ease your cravings, you can do so by punching big hole in your wallet for these dishes which are not as good as what we used to have in Malaysia.. now I miss Malaysia a lot..

Stewed Chicken with Mushroom & Carrot

Ingredients

1 Chicken Thigh (Skinless)

1 Carrot (Cut into small pieces)

3 Mushrooms (Soak until soft and cut half each)

20 g Siow Pai Chai

½ tbsp Salt

1 tsp TikkoSS’s Secret Ingredient

1 cup Water

Ingredients A

1 tbsp Light soy sauce

2 dash White ground pepper

10 g Ginger (Slices)

Method

1. Wash and remove the skin of chicken thigh

2. Marinate chicken thigh for 1 hour with Ingredients A

3. Put all ingredients into  pressure cooker

4. Cook for 30mins (Cooking time may varies with cooking method i.e. if you are using pot rather than pressure cooker, the cooking time could be longer)

5. Ready to be served.

TikkoSS’s Easy Fried Rice

Ingredients

1 Big onion (Thin sliced)

2 Big white button mushrooms (Thin sliced)

3 Sausages (Thin sliced)

3 cloves Garlic (Finely chopped)

1 cup Mixed beans

2 cup Rice

1 Fried egg (For better taste, add few drops of light soy sauce whilst frying)

1 tbsp TikkoSS’s Secret Ingredient

1 tbsp Oyster sauce

2 tsp Sugar

½ tbsp Dark soy sauce

1 tbsp Light soy sauce

Method

1. Heat wok with 3 tbsp oil. Fry garlic until golden brown and fragrant, follow with onion until soften. Add sugar and 1 tbsp of soy sauce.

2. Fry mushroom until soften and fry sausages for 5 minutes.

3. Add mixed beans and continue frying for 5 minutes.

4. Add rice and keep stirring to prevent burning at the bottom of the wok.

5. Add oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce and TikkoSS’s Secret Ingredient. Keep stirring until the rice is well mixed. Ready to be served.

Stewed Phoenix Claws

Ingredients

30 pieces Chicken feet

2 Whole Garlic (Thoroughly wash with the skin)

300 g Pork ribs

10 – 15 pieces Shitake mushrooms

4 tbsp Light soy sauce

2 tbsp Dark soy sauce

2 tbsp Oyster sauce

1 tsp TikkoSS’s Secret Ingredient

750ml water

3 cloves Garlic (Finely chopped)

Method

1.  Heat pot with 2 tbsp oil. Fry garlic until fragrant and golden brown.

2. Add pork ribs and continue frying for 10 minutes. Add shitake mushrooms and continue frying for another 5 minutes.

3. Add chicken feet, water, whole garlic, light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce and TikkoSS’s Secret Ingredient, and boil the mixture for 5 minutes.

4. Simmer the mixture over small fire for 1 hour or until the chicken feet and pork ribs are soften.

5. Ready to be served.

Tips: Chicken feet have to be fried prior cooking but the fried chicken feet can be easily obtained from the market.

If you are holding a DSLR, you are prone to unnecessary attention. Is it cute girls asking you to take their photos? Neh.. not that kind of attention but people tend to have a bias views on you.

It is rather hard to hide your skills especially when people thought that you are paparazzi, private detective or maybe you are a nerdy photographer. Not knowing the real you, they will just stopped you and said, “Sir, you are not allowed to take photos in here”.

Hello, I have not even turn on my camera or open my lens cover yet. Duh.. Should I laugh at their ignorant or appreciate their courtesy? This is not a joke, k? This is based on true story that happened when I was in Golden Lounges in various countries.

To avoid superfluous embarrassment, my wife a.k.a iPhone will normally come very handy. What I normally do here is sneaking around all “business” men and catch them with their silly stunts . Some caught sleeping with drooling effect

Beside free food and drinks, free internet, free bla bla bla, there is a spot which I fail to take photos, the massage room. I really wonder if there is a pretty masseuse on action or just a robotic massage chair?

Remember all long queues before boarding the plane? It is not happening this time. Lucky me because I get to go through the priority lane like any other aging man, pregnant lady or those with kids. Yea I am pregnant and still like kids

Not to mention there was an air stewardess stopped me and said, “Sir, you have to queue up in economy lane” and stunt later after saw my ticket. Before the plane board, I managed to camDUCK myself in golden class.

Yea.. I didn’t dress up smartly when I travel, normally with only t-shirt and jeans. Sometime I didn’t even comb my hair or with my unshaved moustache. Why need to dress up? I thought we suppose to travel comfortably? Besides, I have no one to impress as well!

Why I like to travel? Free food! And in-flight entertainment. Before they served me with appetizer, an air stewardess approached me and asked for my age. She claimed that I am very young.

That conversation is not related to this post but would like to emphasize that she claimed “I am very YOUNG” hehe..

There is nothing much to talk about in-flight appetizers. Why? The portion is too small and I finished it before it can activate my taste buds.

But the main course is different! Absolutely different! Most of the time, you get a few choices, Western, Asians or local food. I managed to capture all main courses that I took from all the flights that I board recently.

Of all, there is one special one. Bim Bim Bak. This is a traditional Korean rice with mix vege, meats and pickles (see photos above – the bottom one). I called it “rojak” rice as you need to mix everything in on bowl before you dine it.

All taste equally good but a meal is never complete without dessert. Strawberry Haagan Dazs was served as dessert. Once I tried it, I want more.. hehe.. ice cream always makes me happy and that is why I label it as happy food.

What I do next on the plane? Watch movie and sleep laa.. What else I can do, right? Err.. Ok.. I was disturbed by a group air stewardess as usual.. Not I disturb but being disturbed instead.. wonder why but I am going to censor that in here.