Watermelon iced tea

watermelon-iced-tea

It was Sam who gave us our first taste of watermelon iced tea. She cut seedless watermelon into small cubes, dropped them into glasses of iced tea, gave Speedy and me each a glass and, oh wow, were we wide-eyed with surprise! So simple, so basic, so very refreshing. How could we not have thought ... (more)

Lobster balls and long beans stir fry

lobstaer-balls-long-beans-stirfry

Sam likes buying those frozen seafood balls in the grocery — fish balls, squid balls, shrimp balls, prawn balls, crab balls, lobster balls… I always ask her to choose fish balls over the others because I am allergic to crustaceans. Last time, she wanted lobster balls and she couldn’t be persuaded to choose something else. ... (more)

ice-cream-mochi

When Sam’s in the mood, she makes magic in the kitchen. She browsed the web for instructions on how to make mochi, I gave her a bag of glutinous rice flour and she made pink mochi with a bowl, a fork, the microwave oven and red food color. The first time she gave me a ... (more)

On cardboard sandwiches and tummy fillers

Saturday night, we went out to see The Avengers. Alex had seen it with her school friends on opening day because, well… she had to be among the first. It’s a Robert Downey, Jr. thing. She’s smitten. Speedy and I, on the other hand, hate seeing any movie on opening day. We don’t like jostling ... (more)

The trellis, the sampaguita and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

trellis

When we were living in the city next to my grandmother’s house, Sam and Alex spent a lot of time in my grandmother’s garden. Alex was very young then, just learning to talk. Sam was already the most talkative toddler ever and she liked to christen the plants and flowers. Because it was the Disney ... (more)

The Vegetarian Kitchen: if you need a great introduction to meatless food

vegetarian-kitchen2

My first encounter with vegetable protein was a disaster. I was in high school, my mother was flirting with vegetarianism, she bought bags of TVP (textured vegetable protein) and added the cubes to meat dishes. The TVP label said that when cooked with meat, the TVP would acquire the same taste, color and texture of ... (more)

Sam’s rum, lychee and lemon cocktail

lemon-lychee-run-cocktail

The recipe was born as an afterthought. Sam loves lychees — canned, for convenience — and her favorite thing to do with them is to make a lychee smoothie by roughly pureeing the fruits in a blender along with the syrup, sugar and ice. But because she can’t finish an entire can of lychees by ... (more)

A sad day in Casa Veneracion

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On Saturday, after lunch, we were watching TV and Sam had her guinea pig on her lap. Pepper, our cat, came in, sprawled on the floor, Sam picked her up and decided it was bonding time for guinea pig and cat. She called me over to show how the two were getting along. I got ... (more)

The rocking chair for breastfeeding or sipping a mojito

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Sam was born on August 20, 1992, exactly two months before my 29th birthday. And for my birthday that year, Speedy gave me a rocking chair. He had this idea that if I held Sam in my arms, sat on the chair and rocked gently, she would soon be asleep. Well, it worked when Sam ... (more)

This little pig is all we’ve got this weekend

guinea-pig

We already knew that Sam wouldn’t be coming home this weekend because she’ll be out of town on a photo shoot. We were, however, expecting that Alex would be home. In fact, because she doesn’t have classes on Fridays, we made preliminary arrangements to pick her up on Thursday afternoon. But she couldn’t come home ... (more)

Surprisingly great loot from our midnight shopping

mogu-mogu3

Since my mother arrived on Thursday, she had been talking about the free McDonald’s meals she was entitled to from her credit card purchases. Apparently, there’s a promo that for every single purchase of so much, there’s a free McDonald’s meal somewhere. But since the freebies have to be personally claimed, no one wanted to ... (more)

Growing alfalfa sprouts at home

alfalfa-sprouts

Alfalfa is a flowering plant that belongs to the pea family. In the West, it has long been grown for cattle feed. In Chinese and Ayurvedic medicine, alfalfa has been used for centuries to treat many health disorders. From Herbal Supplement Resource: Alfalfa has a long history of use in China as an appetite stimulant, ... (more)