Outfit Post: San Mateo Caltrain

Hello, everyone! I hope you are all having a great Saturday.

The husband took me out on a date (movie and lunch) at downtown San Mateo. I am not sure if we're getting older but the activities we do often doesn't involve a lot of physical strength lately.  All we do is eat, go shopping or watch a movie. I have to admit that shopping burns more calories than watching a movie. At least there's a bit of exercise right there. LOL.

I'm wearing the H&M top I bought on clearance a few days ago. It's a sequined encrusted top and I paid 5$ for it. Can't beat the price and who says you can't wear sequins during the day? To downplay the flashiness of the top, I wore it with my tattered boyfriend jeans, strappy sandals and leather jacket just in case it gets colder in the late afternoon.

 I love the low-heel in my sandals but since I am wearing it for the second time today, I feel like I'm gonna have blisters later. It's not broken in yet and the straps near my big toe is rubbing onto my skin. And oh, I got this sandals on the clearance rack at DSW last month.

How did your Saturday go? Tell me about it.

Singapore-Style (Inspired) Chili Crab

My husband and I have been craving crabs for quite some time. And even though Dungeness crabs are still in season they're pretty expensive. But tonight, the husband felt extravagant and bit the bullet. We bought a three-pound worth two pieces of dungeness crab for dinner. I cannot remember what the authentic chili crab tasted like from one of our travels to Singapore 5 or 6 years ago. I stumbled upon this recipe at foodnetwork.com  from Tyler Florence and tweaked it a little bit to whatever ingredients that was available in my kitchen. It was surprisingly good although I cannot really say it's authentic. But we loved how the flavor came together. Sweet-spicy and a little sour.

Ingredients:

2 Dungeness crab, cleaned and cracked (the Asian supermarket cleaned it for us and hard shell removed)
1/4 Cup banana ketchup (what we had in the pantry)
2 Tablespoons chili-garlic paste (I used the bottled Lee Kum Kee)
2 Tablespoons low sodium stiry fry vegetarian sauce (also from Lee Kum Kee)
1 Tablespoon dark soy sauce
1 Tablespoon tamarind soup powder dissolved in 1/4 cup of water ( i didn't have tamarind paste)
3 Tablespoon sesame oil
4 Green onion stalks, chopped (separate the white and green parts)
1 (1-inch) piece fresh ginger, peeled and sliced thinly
4 Cloves garlic, minced
1 Jalapeno pepper, chopped
2 Tablespoons cilantro leaves  and more for garnish

Cooking instructions:

1. Steam the crabs for 15-20 minutes or until color turns bright orange. Set aside.
2. On a bowl, mix together the ketchup, chili-garlic paste, soy sauce, stir fry sauce, and tamarind soup. Set aside
3. On a large wok, pour the sesame oil over medium-high heat. Add the white parts of the scallion,ginger, garlic, half of the jalapeno, and chopped cilantro. Saute for a minute of two or until fragrant.
4. Add the steamed crabs and stir fry until covered with all the spices. Pour in the sauce and toss until the crabs are well coated. Cover for 2 minutes or until the sauce thickens. Keep stirring until the crab has well absorbed the sauce. Turn off heat.
5. Garnish with the remaining jalapeno peppers and cilantro. Serve with steaming rice. Enjoy! 

Stop and Smell the Flowers

Don't you just love flowers in the spring and summer time?

I kind of not in the mood to write these days and I am slacking again.

Trying to find some inspiration from nature. 

I snapped these pictures from our usual Sunday walk from church going to the mall.

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Foodventure at The Grove Yerba Buena

I have read good raves about this restaurant from some famous bloggers I've been stalking in my idle time.

And I have been aching to try it out myself.

So on a trip to San Francisco yesterday with my husband, I had one agenda in mind: eat lunch at The Grove. 

Just like the herd of tourist having lunch at The Grove, a picture from the entrance is in order.

Look at the excitement on my face. It is written everywhere.

My order is an apple chicken salad. The serving is huge enough to share and served in wooden bowls with toasted sourdough bread. I am a sucker for all kinds of salad so this one gets a thumbs up. Nothing extraordinary but good.

The husband ordered the cheesesteak sandwich with a cup of vegetarian soup. I love the soup with a hint of cilantro and avocado. I will order it next time.

What our tablescape looked like. Rustic and homey. They serve breakfast all day and freshly squeezed juice too!

I had to mention that I had the most delicious squeezed apple juice for the first time in my life. No kidding. It was soo good I thought about all day. While my husband didn't like his "Arnold Palmer" juice. It wasn't bad. It was okay for him. Nothing special about it.

How much we spent for lunch. I would say it wasn't overpriced and with the thought that I loved the apple juice so much, I'd say it's all worth it!

The rest of the day spent roaming around SFO. Even had the chance to watch a free concert at the Yerba Buena park to cap the day.

Pork and Beans

We have once a week treat for red meat at home. We've been doing this for quite awhile now and it has been working out really well for us. Our diet consisted mostly of vegetables, fish and chicken. I made my own version of pork and beans last night and it was a hit. My husband loved it. 

Ingredients:

• 1 Rack of baby back ribs
• 1 Cup red beans soaked for 8 hours or overnight in cold water
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 4 Cloves garlic, minced
• 1 Medium onion, minced
• 2 Pieces carrots, cubed
• 2 Stalks celery, chopped
• 2 Tablespoon chopped fresh parsley (if using dried, 1 teaspoon)
• 2 Tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro (if dried, 1 teaspoon)
• 2 Bay leaves
• 3 Cups of vegetable stock
• 2 Pieces jalapeno peppers sliced, rib and seeds removed
• 2 Teaspoon tabasco or any hot sauce
• 1 Can 8 ounce tomato sauce (you can also use canned tomatoes just make sure to cut them roughly)
• 1 Teaspoon brown sugar.
• Salt and Pepper
• 1 Teaspoon cornstarch dissolved in 2 teaspoon of water

Cooking Instructions:

1. Separate the ribs by cutting them off individually. Render the fat by putting them on a nonstick pan and letting it cook covered in medium heat letting out all the fat we don't necessarily need. This is important for me every time I cook pork or beef stews. You don't put water in it as it will produce its own juice. This will take about 30-45 minutes. You will know it's done when some of the pieces has turned brown making them look as if they were actually fried . Remove the rib from the pan and discard the unhealthy fat.
2. Put the same pan back to the stove and cook the onion and garlic in olive oil until fragrant and translucent. Add in the carrots, celery, parsley, cilantro and bay leaves. Saute for a minute until well combined. Next, toss in the cooked ribs and vegetable stock. Cover and let simmer for 15 minutes or until the liquid is reduced.
3. Pour the tomato sauce along with the jalapeno peppers and a dash of tabasco hot sauce. Season as you like with salt and pepper. Put in the brown sugar to balance out the acidity of the tomato sauce. Simmer for 5 minutes more.
4. Lastly, thicken the sauce with the cornstarch mixture and cook for 2 minutes before you turn off the heat.
5. Serve with steaming rice or toasted sourdough bread. Enjoy!

Outfit Post: Smurfette Sunday

 I feel like a boho princess and I am soo excited to be able to wear this Free People dress to church today. I got this at a good bargain the last time I went to Marshalls. I featured it in one of my haul post last week. 

This look reminds me of Maria Mercedes, a free-spirited girl in the early nineties in the popular Mexican telenovela or tv series back then, which was a huge hit in the Philippines. Anyway, you can Google about it and see what I mean.

We met Smurfette at the mall earlier today and had the chance for a photo op. I was giddy like a kid. It was my first time to see the actual smurf mascot. It was an event sponsored by Sony and I guess an ad campaign for the upcoming movie.

The Sony guys were so friendly and offered to take our photo with Smurfette. I was shy to stay longer as we were the only adults with no kids in tow. They had a lot of activities for kids and pop-up mushroom cottages set up like the ones in the movie.

I hope you all had a smurfy Sunday!

Chicken Arroz Caldo

My husband is feeling a bit under the weather these days. He's been very busy with work lately and what better way to perk up his weekend is a serving of our favorite chicken arroz caldo. It's one of our comfort food when we're getting the flu back home. Pretty much very easy to make. I believe even if you haven't cooked anything in your life, you can do this.

It is a must to make a good stock out of any chicken parts you have. Make sure to buy free-range chicken and those fed organically. I bought kosher chicken from Trader Joe's, cut it up into serving pieces and used the bony parts and a little bit of chicken breast to cook my stock. Put bay leaf, onion, ginger and pepper cloves to make the stock more aromatic (it's completely optional).

Ingredients:

• 1 Pound chicken cut into serving size pieces (any cut of meat of your choice)
• 1 Cup uncooked sticky rice or thai jasmine rice, washed and soaked in 1 cup of cold water for 30 minutes to an hour
• 5-8 Cups of chicken stock
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 4 Cloves garlic, minced
• 1 Large onion, minced
• 1 Large ginger, julliened 
• 1 Teaspoon, kasuba or saffron (safflower) 
• 1/2 Teaspoon ground black pepper
• 4 Pieces hard boiled eggs
• 2 Tablespoon green onions, minced
• 4 Cloves garlic, sliced (to make garlic chips for topping)
• Lemon or lime wedges
• Chili oil (optional)

Cooking Instructions:

1. In a pot, heat olive oil in very low heat. When oil is heated, put in the sliced garlic and fry until brown and crisp. Make sure not to burn the garlic as it will taste bitter. Drain in paper towels and set aside.
2. On the same pot, put in onion, garlic and ginger. Saute until fragrant and translucent. Put in the cut-up chicken and cook until brown on all sides.
3. Add in fish sauce, black pepper and soaked rice (include the water or what's left of it). Pour in 5 cups of chicken stock. 
4. Saute occasionally (keep stirring if you can) and simmer for about 20 minutes. My mother usually keeps on stirring until the rice becomes sticky and puffed-up. Yes, this a labor of love and an arm workout at the same time. If it dries up add more chicken stock. 
5. When the rice is cooked and the consistency is creamy, add in the safflower and adjust the seasoning. Add more fish sauce if necessary. Turn off heat.
6. Top with hard boiled eggs, garlic chips and green onions. Sprinkle a little chili oil on top too and lemon or lime wedges on the side. Enjoy!

TPumps Boba and Movie Date

Finally watched Despicable Me in 3D and we had so much fun! Like a kid watching your very first 3D movie in a theatre (yeah that fun). LOL. 

We're not new to boba and milk teas as it is sprawling everywhere back home (at least in Manila). So we've been seeing this hole in the wall kind of milk tea shop over at downtown San Mateo for awhile now and kept wondering why they always have very very very very long line all the time. I am not even kidding. So today, we decided to give it a try. Waited for about 20 minutes to talk to one of the ladies who takes your order before you advance to the counter and pay up.

So this is their typical Saturday afternoon line. It's a mixed group of people from different culture and color. It's a fun place to meet new friends too!

Colorful straws. Take your pick.

So my order consists of black tea, almond milk, taro, lychee and boba pearls. It was good and I think it quite lived up to its hype! What I like about it is that you can customize your tea or smoothie with so many different flavors. 

People here always gets my name right. I wonder why back home, they always spell it wrong every time. TPumps is not a hang out place where you have seating area to talk away the rest of the afternoon over milk tea. But definitely worth checking out and mingle with people. Who knows, you might find new friends. What's not to love with a healthy milk tea, right? 

Red, Blue and Stripes Day!

Happy 4th of July, America!

How would you like some classic crispy bacon and pancakes for breakfast?

We had lunch at the mall to scour any fourth of July sale this weekend. I had a good bargain at Gap and the rest of the stores didn't have anything nice left for me. I guess I was too late to shop as they started out last Monday.

I am trying out this trend of mixing metals. I am not sure if I can pull it off. What do you think?

My fail-safe outfit when I can't think of anything to wear is a preppy classic tee and boyfriend jeans. Here I paired it with my Dolce Vita sandals as it was quite hot out.

My husband is looking like he's going on a boat cruise to Malibu. I love it! He chose this outfit himself without me helping him out. I guess he's slowly picking up the pace now that we're married for more than three years and my stylist wannabe attitude towards his sense of fashion finally rubbed off. Yay! I couldn't quite bother him on his work outfits, he got that all figured out.

This is my instagram feed of us waiting for the fireworks to start at the Leo J. Ryan park in Foster City. We got a bit bored as it wasn't very instantaneous. The fireworks comes up like every ten seconds. We've seen better if not one of the best spectacles back home. I guess I expected too much. Next year, if we're lucky, we might spend it somewhere else. New York might be a good idea. (winks)

I hope you all had an awesome fourth of July celebration. Happy Independence day, America!

Riri Woo Review In The Rhianna for MAC Summer Collection

After the gruesome experience of getting the Rhianna collection for MAC two weeks ago, I got the first shipping from the UPS guy earlier. I was kind of disappointed why it's taking them so long to ship the items. My husband ordered three batches of the collection since they limit your order to one per item in a single transaction. Bummer, right? Out of the three, I only got the Riri woo lipstick and the Hibiscus kiss blush and bronzer duo today.

 I've never worn red lipsticks before because I don't think I know how to carry it and I feel like it makes me look more mature. I was just not ready then. When I tried to swatch it on my wrist, I kind of like how it looks. Very Marilyn Monroe-ish..

 It is a retro matte finish and since I am no beauty guru, I've just learned from other people's blogs that the formulation for this kind of lipstick is very drying. Hmmm. Makes me a bit sad if that's the case. My lips are known to be dry most of the time if I don't constantly slather on some lip moisturizer. 

 When I opened the Hibiscus kiss blush and bronzer duo, I was not impressed. It has very sheer application when I tried it on my face and the color pay-off wasn't that good. So I skipped it and used a different blush for the picture below. I used my trusty old Milani baked blush instead to give me that subtle glow.

I think I might have found the red lipstick that suits my skin tone. What do you guys think?

Update: 7/10/2013 : This is what happened to her after a week stored in my bag. Mind you, I live in San Mateo California more specifically in the Peninsula area and I think it is utterly ridiculous that the formulation of this lipstick is just so bad that it melted even if my bag has not been exposed to hot weather conditions. I know it's summer but it barely hits the nineties lately and I haven't been exposed to the sun for so long that might cause the lipstick to melt. It's absolutely ridiculous! The sides melted and the Rhianna signature got smeared and I've only worn this twice. I guess I'm better off selling the other lipstick then. It's not worth all the wait at all. I just think they should have done better with the formulation as I have other lipsticks from MAC and this didn't happen at all. What a bummer!