I made some yesterday using the tray and the recipe Valerie gave.
Since I don’t stock sugar and milk, I used agave and rice milk in the batter with whole wheat flour. The madeleines were delicious, especially with ice cream.
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Are we warned enough about genetically modified (GM) food, aka Frankenstein food?
Does it bother you that biotech companies generating GM crops are owned by drug and chemical companies? Well for me it does, very much!
GM food giant Monsanto is owned by Pharmacia, a big and powerful drug company. Another giant is Syngenta, a merger between 2 companies owned by big and powerful drug companies, Novartis and Zeneca. Other giants are Bayer, BASF, AgrEvo and Phillip Morris (tobacco).
When I read what others say about the strong $$$-motivation behind such a company via GM foods and that they also say such a company isn’t particularly concerned about protecting consumer’s health, I know they know what they are saying and they are not lying.
Already independent investigators are warning of the problems when animals are fed with GM feed. We don’t know enough about the effects on humans and do we want ourselves to be part of the experiment? And why are we producing food through such unnatural means…high-tech food that never existed until now?
The reality is rice, corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets, squash, tomatoes, pineapple, canola (rapeseed) and potatoes are the predominant crop plants (there are still others not listed here) undergoing the gene altering technology. Don’t exclude their derivatives, e.g. corn flour, corn syrup, tofu and etc.
In some countries, it’s not against the law to intentionally omit or remove labels that would inform consumers they are buying GM food. So it’s bad news for us here.
Buying organic food is currently the best way to escape GMO (genetically modified organism).
Brands with GM ingredients that are in stores right now include:
Baby food - Nabisco Arrowroot Teething Biscuits, Enfamil, Similac
Baking mixes - Aunt Jemima, Betty Cocker, Pepperidge Farms, Hershey’s
Breakfast - Kellogg’s, Nabisco, Nature Valley, Quaker Chewy Granola Bars
Chocolate - Cadbury, Hershey’s Kit-Kat, Kraft, Mars, Nestle, Swiss Miss
Condiments - Del Monte Ketchup, Heinz Ketchup (regular & no salt) Chili Sauce Cocktail Sauce Heinz 57 Steak Sauce, Hellman’s, Hunt’s Ketchup (regular & no salt), Kraft
Cookies/crackers - Famous Amos, Keebler, Nabisco, Pepperridge Farms, Snack Wells
Soup - Campbell, Healthy Choice, Pepperridge Farms
Check here for a list of food which contains and doesn’t contain genetically engineered ingredients.
Non-edible items that may contain GM ingredients include cosmetics, soaps, detergents, shampoo and bubble bath.
I hope you’ll join me in a few days for the site seeing post where I’ll be compiling a list of handy tips + resources on GM.
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My family and I have been here a couple of times, it’s a restaurant that takes you back to old Chinatown where life was hard and food was simple. The restaurant serves the beggar bowl tofu, olive rice, ah gong’s (grandfather’s) fried tapioca leaves, herbal soups and many others.
One of their signatures, the Samsui Ginger Chicken is a dish frugal Samsui women (hardworking ladies who labored in construction sites) ate in the past where it was prepared only once a year during the festive Chinese new year.
The tall clay pot pictured contained our soup of the day which was corn with other ingredients (didn’t catch what the waitress said).
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Stopper tabs
Not too long ago I found out that aluminium foil and cling wrap boxes have locks, which involves pushing in the tab on both sides of the box to keep the roll within in place.
My cling wrap from Japan (on the right) has the same feature too. See that white thumb?
Since tabs are missing on my box of parchment, I made 2 with a pen-knife. Just for fun.
Any tabs on yours?
Lid pocket
Blade placement
Something closer to my heart…the placement of the serrated blade, and apparently there are no rules.
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These 2 pages from the fabulous Livingetc magazine (Dec-Jan 2000) are my favorite expressions of food served in a less predictable fashion.
On the serving tray: fish fingers on mint peas, rice rolls with salmon roe, a pack of Thai sweet chilli sauce, watermelon squares and a drink.
(L to R) Rice rolls with salmon roe, avocado chilli cocktails 1, Italian stuffed tomato2, tamarillo-lychee-and-papaya cassata3
1 Avocado filling: mix pureed tomatoes, tabasco, lemon or lime juice and a dash of ketchup.
2 The stuffed beef tomato is seated in the middle and you might have to look harder in order not to be misled by the red bowl. A slice of green pepper takes the place of the stem.
3 3 different of semi- frozen ice layers are prepared separately before they’re stacked together.
Looking at my Livingetc mags bought since 2000, it’s hard to ignore the price changes throughout these 8 years: starting from S$11.00 per copy, in recent times the price had ever shot up to more than 60% before reverting to its current $14.30 (up ≈30%). On the British side, the price in 2000 started at £2.60 and it has now arrived at its current £3.40 (up ≈30%).
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This weekend was time once again for buffet sampling so with my family, we came to Greenhouse, one of the restaurants in the hotel.
Just some apt F’s to sum up the dining experience:
Food
Lots of seafood.
Four musicians
Fireworks
They were part of a rehearsal that took place near the hotel, in preparation for next month’s National Day Parade on 9th August.
Fellowship
I believe we were the last to leave the restaurant, after more than 4 hours of slow feasting and chatting. That’s quite a norm for us.
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