Saree making

Alice's wedding is less than 2 months away. The 3 of us bridesmaids have to get our saree blouses tailor-made soon to avoid the pre-deepavali rush at the seamstress.

Since Christine, Sue-Ann and I have been travelling at various times, this is the only weekend where we can get our acts together.

We decided to yumcha at this nice HK dimsum place in DJ (i can never remember the name as it's very Chinese - but it's super easy to locate cos it's the corner shop, same row as Maybank).

After a hearty yumcha (coupled with loads of eggs tarts), we were ready to go check out this tailor recommended by Sue-Ann's friend.

We took a while trying to decide on a design we like and we had to communicate with our friendly tailor, Muthu what exactly we wanted. We also sought his professional advice on whether the material will suit what we had in mind.

I was the first to make up my mind cos I've done some research online and i sort of had an idea what i wanted. Anyway, there's no pix of me as my right eye was slightly swollen cos i woke up with a sty this morning. Hope it'll subside soon :(

Then it was Sue-Ann's turn to take her measurements.

Christine couldn't make up her mind whether to make a halter neck or a blouse with sleeves.

See? I told you Muthu is friendly. Look at that smile.

Sarees in different shades of pink

~*~*~*saree blouse designs*~*~*~

source: internet

These are some of the designs i found from the internet. Obviously, some were more sexy and daring than others..

I told Muthu I wanted to make this blouse design. I like how the cap sleeves looked, but I couldn't decide whether I should have the back hooked (like the cream blouse [picture below this picture]) or just have it tied like this blouse below. In the end, I decided to have it tied cos I already have 2 very traditional saree blouses like the cream one below.

Fingers crossed that the embellishment/beadings on my material will turn out okay on the sleeves.

Ooh..sexy back

Aathe Textiles
(2 shops' away from Sri Paandi)
43C, Jalan 11/4,
Petaling Jaya.
Tel:03-7960 0219

We're pretty excited about getting together next month to collect the blouses already :p

My favourite things..Part 1

McPingu and I both love to eat. I guess it's apparent from the piccies we took together. Well, for one most of them were food-related. :P Not that i minded at all..

Let's start from our 1st date..

We went to Hajime for Japanese ryori.

Camwhoring while waiting for our food to be served.

Hotate ninniku

We love love the scallops. They were fat and juicy and what's more..it was value for money at RM16 per plate.

We ordered 2 types of hotate (scallops) - hotate ninniku and hotate avocado - as i couldn't decide which one. I wasn't too impressed with the hotate avocado though (maybe it was because it was fried with garlic and i wasn't too keen with the garlicky aftertaste). It was maa maa desu (so so only).

Black spider maki and california cheese maki. Oishi desu ne!

Grilled wagyu beef

We were a tad bit disappointed with the foie gras maki. It was supposed to be a special maki but somehow the taste of the foie gras was overwhelmed by the other condiments. Pingu then told me he'd bring me to this French restaurant in Manila for 'to-die-for' foie gras. :)

Grilled saba. Pingu loves this fishy dish. Must be a penguin thing :P

Kurogama (black sesame) ice cream and pumpkin pudding

The dinner was pure decadent....Pure pure guilty pleasure :P

~*~*~*~*One week later....*~*~*~*~

I went to Manila during the Merdeka weekend. Yups, those of us having long distance relationships make the most of each and every long weekend we can get.

Prior to flying, I baked some cream puffs to bring over as a surprise for Pingu.

This is my very first attempt at baking cream puffs. Was kinda nervous they wouldn't turn out nicely.

Piped a couple of heart-shaped ones too as I was feeling kinda mengada creative :P

My very first batch of cream puffs. Not too bad eh?

*note to self: must brush tips to avoiding burning them.

~*~*~*Manila - Day 1*~*~*~

Bonifacio High Street

We had designer burgers at Brother's for lunch.






Love the juicilicious beef patty.




Pay close attention to the building behind me..





I stumbled upon Nuffnang's PH office :p Can you spot the Nuffnang logo?




It's the weekend, and you can see lots of ppl hanging out at High Street lepakking. Oh, I forgot, they have a term for it, it's widely known as 'Malling'.

At night, this is like the place for dog owners alike to bring their four-legged best friends out for a walk. I love it here.

Hmm..i wonder how I'm gonna be able to bring my 4 shihtzus out to play.. :P

Can anyone tell me what kinda orchids these are? These looked unreal :)

Bonifacio High St is like 5 minutes walk from Pingu's place. I love how convenient his pad is to most of the lovely hang out places. :)

Oh, have i told you that filipino's love to camwhore too? They do it everywhere and anywhere...anytime. When I arrived, I saw 2 pinoys camwhoring in the restroom at the airport upon arrival. Mind you, it was 5am at the time.

Next stop...Greenbelt

I've actually been to Greenbelt before. I was in Manila for a 2-week student exchange programme when I was 16. The programme was sponsored by both Rotary Club PJ and Rotary Club Makati West. Me and 4 other fellow Interactors had a swell time when we were here immersing in the culture and were being pampered like crazy by our gracious host parents.

Anyway, back to Greenbelt. The Greenbelt I went to at the time, was probably Greenbelt 1 and 2. They have now extended up to Greenbelt 5. So this place is huge now.


McPingu with his McGorgeous @ one of the more scenic walkways around Greenbelt.

Thought this was quite a nice picture of two girls prancing around playing to their hearts' content, without a care in the world. Their heads were bopping up and down and their hair were flying everywhere. So cute. :)

What a lovely gal. And she camwhored for me. awwwww.. :)

There's a lovely chapel in Greenbelt. It was time for mass and the chapel was overflowing with people. So, we hung out by the pond outside the chapel and I couldn't resist taking a picture of this lovely pair of ducks. They looked so in lurve, didn't they? (or issit just me?)

Dinner at this 'atas' French restaurant, Je Suis Gourmand

This is the place Pingu was raving about. The place for the to-die-for foie gras. Je Suis Gourmand is known for its delicious French cuisine and generous serving. Personally, i think each serving was big enough for more than 1 person.

I love how this place has an intimate setting and only has few tables inside and some outside (the smoking section). We were seated in a cosy corner that was not cosy enough to not hear what the other patrons were saying. Yeah i know, what an oxymoron. :P

This was taken using my lousy Casio Exilim

And this..using his canggih Canon SLR (fyi, i didn't do any photoshop here..mainly cos i dunno how)




Watch me operate his SLR. Dun play play :p




True to his words, this pan seared foie gras served on a bed of salad with reduced honey balsamic sauce was awesome! We ordered a serving to share and this was only my portion. Generous rite? Mmm..i am drooling again. I so miss this...

I had the cream based tomato shitake mushroom soup whereas Pingu had the white fish soup.

I wished I didn't order the soup though, cos i was stuffed after that. I couldn't eat when my main arrived.

Do penguins eat steak? I know one who does :P

My main. The prawns were perfect - so darn springy and chewy and ooh..let's not even get me started on the scallops. Yumm..

Only thing was, the pesto + buttery sauce made it very 'jelak-fying', i couldnt even finish a quarter of it.

For desserts, we had souffle with dark chocolate & grand marnier sauce.

I know i know, i told you i was stuffed, but i've got a totally different stomach for desserts :p. The souffle was superb i tell ya!

Je Suis Gourmand
G/F, Net One Center, Bonifacio Global City
Taguig City, Metro Manila
(02) 815-8801

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I shall post more later. Am having a tough time as blogger is pretty unstable/wonky at the moment. Just gonna post this and resume later. Till then take care, and stay tuned.

Happy weekend everyone! Muakisses ;)

xoxo
McGorgeous