SIMPLY READ, INDULGE AND HEARD WITH WORDS

Friday, April 13, 2007

De one with Food, Food, Food!

Predictable rain and sunny skies

Ever since young, I was very fussy with food. Wanna know why? Well, firstly it's partly because of the fact that I was brought up a spoiled-kid. Secondly, my mummy was to be blamed since she didn't cultivate me by exposing me to alot of food when she was expecting me.

Haha. Well.. the second reason is merely a superstitious opinion.

Regarding my eating habits during the young, couldn't really remember much personally. Apart, the most significant types of food I could remember were curry puffs and those green-pandan waffles (those which are getting popular recently) which I recognised as qi-air qi-air ("green green" in Hokkien) since it was green in color.

Not long after, the fast-food nations have already caught up. As a matter of fact, this is even so today. Fast-food... which never spare any chances from earning the delights of children and the cash inflow from their parent's pockets. For some poor kids, it actually burnt their pockets!

Needless to say the main "culprit" from McDonalds was "Happy meal". It's simply a MUST TRY for every kid alive, with those "tempting" and "irresistable" cute toys with accompanied the meal. Not forgetting, the bubbly, thirst-crunching coke/7-up and the "eat me, eat me!" chicken nuggets and "you sure you don't want to eat me" French-fries! Well.. erhum.. I fell prey to it, don't you deny you did.

Besides Mcdonald, I remember, there was a magical time when I had this delightful breakfast at Burger Kings with my mummy at a building in Shenton-Way, while we were waiting for my daddy occupied with his dental appointment. It was lovely!

Not forgetting the root-beer from A&Ws!!

Later, during my primary school days, the food I took regularly were those which I was exposed to in the canteen. I supposed it's applicable to majority of us. Of course, when I say "us", it refers to people around my era. Hehe. No offence but kids nowadays are rreeeaally even more fortunate than us back then. I wonder do they still bring home-packed food, contained in those plastic containers which those cute cartoons printed on it.

Oki, let's not divert from the blog... Oh, ya! Canteen food. Well, wanna know what I had back then?

HERE WE GO!! My 2nd runner-up.. *drum roll* this 20 cents salty crackers. It in long packets and in it, filled with shapes of many animals. I don't really have collects of what it was called. But it was really really "heavenly".

And now, the runner-up....... *drum roll with cymbal clash*.. It's 30 cents fried egg!! I remember I love eating this during my primary school until one incident, the smelly smelly yolk dripped onto my bag, leaving a mingling stench. Omg. Yuck!

*Fanfare*
The best of best was the 40 cents noodles in soup. I remember putting alot of chili in it.. and the guys will challenge who could take the spiciest! Foolish brats.

Beverages and fruits? I discovered my liking for orange drink when I was in Primary school. Also, watermelon was my favourite fruit back then. At 20 cents per plate, it's really delicious when the auntie sprinkled plum powder on it. Unusual right? Paradoxically, it's yummy yummy!

The variety of food diversified during secondary school. Well, let's see... I tried alot more food as my confidence to "experiment" developed with initial stage of adolescence. Ever since Sec 1, I found myself patronising the chinese mix-vegetable rice store the most. There were ocassional visit to chicken chop store.

Of course, my liking for orange soda continued to rule my taste-bud for drinks. The aunty who was the drink-seller knew me so well that she will present me a cup of orange soda everytime I approached the store. Haha. Fruits? nah... hardly have time for that.

Oh barger.. pity old orange soda was knocked off my "bill-board" chart for beverage when the emergence of green tea occurred during my JC days. Ouch! Couldn't help it...being health-cautious was another factor which support the change of preference.

Blame it on me being traditional or conservative in my eating habits. My liking for chinese mix-vegetable sticked with me throughout the two years. With exceptional alternatives to eat chicken chop with fried rice and burger when I'm too lazy to compete with a overcrowded canteen.

"For your private and leisure-reading. None of this entry which follows is by any means, strictly an innocent passing-statement, not intended to conflict, defame or inimically misrepresent the military defence"

Then.. NS changed my taste bud completely. Any food tasted heavenly when I was "captured" or "retained" in Tekong. *Sobz* Oh! For any mothers who are worried for their pre-enlisting sons. Need not worry lah. Army food are much better than it used to be, even when compared to 12 months ago! Ironically, alot of enlistees put on weight despite perceived that they would lose weight with all those strenuous training.

It's worth mentioning, the SFI is providing serviceman with really good food. The premier of all would be the Western.

After being being "retrenched" from NS, my eating habits change pretty frequently, it will remain domain for a period of time until it's taken over by another craze. Inevitaby, the eating place changed along too. Eating at restaurant became common. My favourite restaurant is Swensons. It was the first and an annually-visited restaurant where my birthday would be celebrated with the memorable "firehouse" - the alternative to birthday cake.

Having disclosed my favourite restaurant, I should move on to reveal my life-time favourite dish. Due to my frequent family vacations to Australia, since Fish N Chips was found everywhere.. it was unknowingly adopted as my favourite dish!

Pragmatically, I don't eat Fish N Chips for every meal just because I love it. There are others which I eat as well.. In the gradual accumulated 21 years, the "theory of food against different places and purposes" was developed.

The simple and easy.......

For zhi-cha (outdoor family food), I love hotplate "deer" meat; BBQ Stingray; "baby Kailan".

At hawker centres, I will choose Cha Hokkien (prawn) Mee (which I won't eat the prawn and sotong); Minced Pork noodles (which I won't eat the pork meat); mix-vegetable rice.

At food court, the first dish I will look at will be Japanese food or Korean food. Alternatively, I will try Fishball noodles.

The next range......

Fastfood. My all time favourite is Mos Burger. It was rank #1 until my encounter with Subway in 2006. Oops.

Mac Donalds are so "army". BK is good, I only eat their chicken sandwich, nothing else! Carl's Junior (suffer like hell since I've a small mouth).

The High end.....

When it comes to Western food, I won't mind Cafe Cartel, TCC, Fish n Co, Breeks.

Others, I would eat at selected places for specific variety of food...

For Japanese, I like Sakae (Mohan, too bad you don't eat Japanese food); For Thai, I love Thai Express; Pasta, go Pasta-mania.

I don't really have a taste-bud for dessert. Surprisingly, in 2003, I developed a craze for cheese-cake ever since I watched Initial D movie. Not any cheese cake wor.. only New York cheese cake (those plain type).

Love chilling out at cafes like TCC, Starbucks and Coffee bean (because of you, Honey).

Did I mention BBQ and Seoul garden? Those are strictly for entertainment purposes when I'm out with a large group of people. Hehe.

Well well..
looks like your drool's gonna drip onto the flood! *just kidding*
Oki oki.. that's all for now! ;p