Repost: How to recreate 36 world cuisines with 3 spices.

Source: http://visual.ly/how-recreate-36-world-cuisines-3-spices

Recipe: French Toast with Caramelized Bananas

Ingredients:

6 slices challah, brioche or any thick bread (I used italian since that's what I had on hand)
3 eggs
1/2 cup whole milk
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla
4 tbsp sugar
Clarified butter (as required)

for the caramelized bananas:
1 banana
few sliced almonds
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tbsp clarified butter

In a bowl, whisk eggs, milk, cinnamon, sugar and keep aside. Soak slices of bread in mixture. Heat clarified butter in a non-stick pan and fry bread slices until golden brown and remove from pan. For the caramelized bananas, add clarified butter to pan, add sugar, bananas, almonds, cinnamon. Let it cook for 1 minute. Stir everything to combine.

Pour on top of french toast and finish with dusting of icing sugar and sliced strawberries. Also,very important, serve with dollops of salted butter. Must be salted as it contrasts really well with the sweetness of the french toast and banana topping.

(as you can tell, I like to cook quick without much preparation or decoration.)

Our 3rd Wedding Anniversary

This past Sunday marked our 3rd anniversary together as husband and wife :) We didn't really plan anything extravagant. Well, let me rephrase, I didn't plan anything--Currently, I have so much school work that everything else is blurry to me. As most of our life is governed by food, this anniversary was too ruled by grub and needless to say, I don't regret it :)

The morning of our anniversary I prepared some french toast (first time for me) with caramelized bananas and almonds on top of it and dusted with some icing sugar.

For dinner, we went to a Malaysian restaurant called 'Secret Recipe'. We've been here before and everything on the menu just tastes exquisite.

 Malaysian beef curry: Chunks of tender beef brisket in a coconutty sauce with eggplant and okra.

Sambal fried rice with shrimp: Fried rice with sambal paste, eggs, shrimp, fish sauce, etc. Absolutely delicious!

 Penang Char Khay Teow w. chicken: This is like a variation of Pad Kee Mow (thai), where flat rice noodles is sauteed with bean sprouts, fish sauce, eggs, chicken, etc. Swoon-worthy!

Beef Roti Murtabak: Star of the show! Amazingly flaky, buttery dough filled with spiced, ground beef and pan-fried, Served with a curry dipping sauce. Hubby and I are coming up with all kinds of ideas to try make this at home.

The food was fantastic. The ambience was great (we were the first ones for dinner...we had an early brunch!).We had so much leftovers, hubby took some to work today. I am just sitting back right now and wondering how three years just flew by. All kinds of cliche phrases and sentences come to mind in moments like these. I'll just say that its been a great journey so far with the usual share of ups and downs...but at the end of the day, we have each other, and that is all that matters. 

Watters Creek

Hubby,  I and some friends visited a beautiful locale called Watters Creek in Allen, Texas. Its a cute shops and dine kind of area in a soothing, naturalistic environment. 

Fort Worth Japanese Garden

Hubby and I visited the Fort Worth Japanese Garden a few weeks ago (where I massively bruised my ankle on a very rough piece of rock). The garden was a little heaven of emerald goodness with ample koi fish ponds thrown in there.

Like Wars, Unfriending and Drama on Facebook!

I've been on Facebook since 2004...pretty much since it was invented and boy has it evolved! For those of us who use it, I think Facebook controls us in more ways than one. For instance, when we upload pictures and update statuses, we expect some kind of response from our friends, either in the form of 'likes' or comments. No likes or comments means you are a nobody. To make matters more intense, we start getting worried when our close friends don't like our posts. Is she mad at me? Is she better friends with that other person whose posts she keeps liking? All kinds of thoughts run amok through our minds. Initially, liking wasn't much of a big deal. But now...now liking means the world in the Facebook community. A lack of likes from an active Facebook friend is guaranteed to mean some kind of beef. I say active friend because if you were to compare all Facebook friends, you'd be in a fix as inactive friends rarely show any activity on Facebook. A like can mean so many things...from a pat on your back to 'yeah I still like you'. I am not stingy with likes for the most part but when I see friends and acquaintances (active ones) being thrifty with likes, I close my 'likes' shop too!

Moving on to unfriending. I probably unfriended a few people here and there a long, long time ago. However, in recent times, I have started to think about unfriending much more seriously. The social networking landscape has changed immensely over the years. Even compared to 5 years ago, statistics indicate socializing is much more prevalent online than anywhere else and I predict the numbers to only go higher. For instance, when someone unfriends me now, I feel much more affected than I would have 5 years ago. Now, if I am not feeling so groovy about someone, I will simple Unfollow them. Its a simple function that keeps that person out of your news feed. No fuss no muss. I feel especially sad when I see someone unfriend me who I haven't met in a long time. There have been instances where someone will send a friend request a few months after unfriending and usually this is someone I am not to close to...make absolutely no sense. I say, if you have a problem, just unfollow and if they are a real threat or cause for concern, thats when you can hit that unfriend button.

Overall, Facebook has changed the mechanics of our relationships with our friends, family and acquaintances. I don't know how much more it could change our relationships, but something tells me its going to be downhill from here as too much of a good thing, can be bad.

This is so beautiful...