~ Momo vs Mini UFO ~

Every once in a while, UFOs will appear in my house. Momo, being such a loyal protector of your household, will chase after it and try to destroy it. Ok, it's really little remote controlled UFOs that my dad got from China. He loves these little toys.


It's tiny! It's just made out of styrafoam and a little plastic chopper. And whatever else that makes it fly of course. These things are so fun. They look like physics projects. He has a bunch of these things and when they break, he'll know what parts to switch out to fix it. I didn't realize that my dad is this geeky. I guess that's where I got in from.


Momo loves these things! He is a little bit afraid of it, but wants to catch it and kill it. One of the helicopters was destroyed by him after he caught it. It was in his mouth for 1 second! So, my dad is extra careful not to tell Momo actually get to it. Here's a video. Enjoy!


By the way, these pics and videos are taken with my Nokia N86. Not bad for a phone right?

~ How to Make Hot Chili Sauce ~

My dad finally got around to making the hot sauce. I think it's becoming an annual tradition. We had a very good crop of chili this year so we ended up with a lot of hot sauce. There's really no recipe. Every time he makes it, it's different. This year, he used:

• red chili
• garlic
• fermented black beans
• rice wine
  
• salt
• oil

Step 1: Prep the chili's and garlic
Take off the stems from the chili. Sun dry them a little bit. Then, skin gloves of garlic and cut off the bottom hard part. Garlic to chili ratio is about 1 to 5.


Step 2: Chop up the chilis and garlic
You can chop them yourself if you are not making a lot. Chopping gives it a more solid texture, less mushiness. But since we had so much, we decided to use our blender. If you plan on chopping it yourself, make sure you wear gloves. These babies will give you a nice burn. Cold water, ice, cold milk, aloe gel and rubbing alcohol will only provide temporary relieve.



See how mushy it is? Let me tell you that it took a lot of time to soak and wash this blender to get rid of the garlic smell. So, don't use your juice blender for this. Unless you want a lil kick in your juice.


Step 3: Mix in salt
He totally eyeballed this. I think he used about 2 table spoon for this huge bowl of chili.


Step 4: Put the mixture in a glass jar and mix in the wine
This is crucial. This rice wine is as strong as hard liquor. It's not your mom's rice wine that she splashes into her dishes. This is hard core stuff.


Put enough to cover the mixture and add a little more.


Step 5: Wait...
Leave it in a dark corner (or your pantry) for 2 weeks.
Image of chili clock from Etsy shop SpareTime. Click on the image to go to the listing.



Step 6: Mix with chopped fermeted black beans
Or whatever you want to mix in. Examples are dried shrimp, dried scallop, and fried scallions. Try and have fun. I am guessing that anything that spoils easily shouldn't be put in this mixture.

Step 7: Cook in oil
Put the mixture in a big wok. Put a lot of oil. The oil should be about 1/2 inch above the mixture. Once it starts boiling, put it in medium/low heat. Stir occasionally. Let it simmer for about 15 minutes. Make sure you open your windows and doors and turn on the fan. This is going to make your house smell really spicy. May make the kids cough.


Step 8: Wait...
Wait for it to cool so you can pack it up.


Step 8: Jar it up!
We have all these glass jars from pasta sauce, store bought hot sauce and even baby food. Comes in handy at a time like this.


This batch is not as hot as last year's batch. I couldn't even eat last year's sauce! Just the oil was enough to burn my lips. But, this one is acceptable. And it has such a nice red color. I love seeing the results of our hard work! Ok, it was mostly my dad's hard work. I am very proud of him :)

~ The Famous Fish Tacos at Carbon ~

My brother said, "We are taking you to eat fish tacos." I hate fish. I have only started to eat some fish in the last couple of years. He knows that. But, he insisted that it's good. I gave him the blank stare. His wife said, "It's an orgasm within an orgasm." Ok, that's all I needed to hear. I want to see what this O within an O is all about.

So, we drove around and parked under this bridge. Everything looked so gray and industrial and then there's this big red sign. "Carbon". It's pronounced "Car-bone", by the way.


According to their menu, they are all about "Authentic Mexicn Food"...."Burritos and Tacos with emphasis on protein versus filler"...."Live fire cooking"..."Signature Elote" and more. Inside is nice and cozy, except that I noticed two holes that look like bullet holes in the glass where my head was when I sat down. Oh well, that's not going to keep me away from good food :)


So, first up, the Elote. It tastes like spicy mayo with corn. I love mayo. I love a little spice. I love corn. I love it!!!


Then, it was the Fire Grilled Steak and Tequila-Lime Marinated Grilled Chicken Breast tacos.


There's medium and pineapple salsa if you want some too. They were ok. Nothing spectacular to me.


The steak taco was good! I could taste the live fire! Or whatever makes it taste very ... grilled. It was juicy and not too salty.


The chicken one was a little bland.


I had to put some hot salsa on it. That hot salsa had a pretty good kick. Good thing I had a big cup of authentic horchata. It definitely cooled the burn.


Ok, the famous fish taco. It's Tortilla Encrusted Tilapia with creamy tequila lime sauce and cabbage.


I can deal with fried fish usually. So, I was pretty excited.


It's a pretty big taco. I had to hold it with both hands. The fish was crispy and the sauce was tangy. With the cabbage and the flour tortilla, it didn't feel too oily at all. I like it a lot even though I usually don't like tilapia.


Next time I go, I am definitely getting more elote, steak and fish taco. Price is not bad at all. $2.5 for each taco. $2.75 with cheese. The elote is $1.75 for a small and $2.75 for a large. They also have burritos for about $6. Chicago's 10% tax sucks though.

I don't think they have a website, so here's the address:
300 W 26 Street, Chicago.

~ New Years Celebration ~

Happy New Year! Did you have fun on New Year's Eve? I didn't really party this year. It's been very busy lately and still busy now, so I just wanted to chill with my fiance and count down with him. Well, before the count down, of course we had to end the year with good food. And that means hot pot!


The future in-laws came over. My fiance's nephew had a lot of fun! I found some stickers and he started putting them on his daddy's pants.


But of course, his daddy decided that my pants will look better with stickers.



This is what happens when the food isn't ready. Thankfully, we started eating and he got distracted with the food.


As the night went on...the stickers magically moved to his face..... :)


After dinner, my fiance and I went out to count down with our friends at a local sushi restaurant. Before I left, I gave Momo a New Year kiss.


Then, the real New Year's kiss....ok this was taken 5 minutes before the count down. But close enough.


Hot pot was awesome. We had so much food that we did it again tonight. We still have a lot left. I think it's gonna be instant noodles with hot pot ingredients for lunch and then stir fry hot pot ingredients for dinner tomorrow. I actually slept really early (1:30am). Sleeping earlier is my unofficial new year's resolution. It doesn't look like it's going to happen tonight though. Javascript doesn't program itself. Good luck with all your resolutions! Have a great 2010~!

~ Holiday Shopping Spree ~

I must admit...I shopped a lot this holiday season. There are just so many awesome deals going on. It's very hard to resist! A few days before Christmas, my fiance and I took a little trip to Hagerstown Outlet. We were in a rush, so this is all we could grab. We had a blast at Guess outlet. We both love Guess and they had 50% off sweaters and coats plus I had another 25% off coupon. Then Kate Spade had 40% off every thing and Nike had....well just lots of stuff. Look at our spoils! :) About half of that was Christmas presents though.


Then, when my cute little cousin visited, I took her to Arundel Mills the day after Christmas. Oh my god, the parking lot was so full! People parked their SUVs and Jeeps on the grass and piles of snow. This is halfway through the mall and look at all those bags of stuff we got already.


She's so lucky though. She got to go to Woodbury in New York today. She got tons of stuff! Look at this crazy line for Uggs.


I think she took this picture to taunt me.


I also went to Montgomery Mall yesterday because my friend said Guess had a good sale. It was late after all the errands I ran because there were so many people everywhere! We only had 1.5 hours and I had a lot to do. My main targets were Guess, Bath and Body Works, and Sephora. I found this awesome faux fur hoodie at Guess that I absolutely need. It is so warm and soft and cozy!!!


They only had white at the store and it was half off. I usually wouldn't pay this much for a hoodie but I couldn't resist. I was caught up in the buying frenzy. They have this on the website, but only in black and not on sale. $118 is definitely too much for this, but $50 is not bad at all :)


Then, I rushed to Bath and Body Works because I wanted to get more of those sheep slippers that I got before. They didn't have anymore though. I had a $10 off $40 coupon to use on top of their semi annual sale. Look at all those lotions and stuff! That's all for my aunts and cousins in Hong Kong.


Then, I had to go claim my free Sephora lip glosses. I didn't know they were gonna yell out "Happy Birthday" to me. I was a bit scared. But, these are cute. I love little beauty products.


The mall was closing and I had to find my friend who was still at Guess. I passed by Benetton that had 50% off everything and Express that had 60% off stuff and Victoria's Secret with their Semi Annual sale signs. If the lotions I got from Bath and Body Works weren't so heavy, I would've ducked into the stores to get some stuff.

I have to keep telling myself that I am going to Hong Kong in Feb. I need to save up my money for that. But, with all these deals it's so hard to resist. Oh well, I should stop shopping right now. No more...except for the beads I am about to order. I need them :)

~ New Prop for Jewelry Pictures ~

I haven't been happy with my jewelry pictures lately. I see all these awesome pictures in craftgawker and Etsy. Each awesome shop has their unique picture style. Some use wooden frames, some use simple rocks, some use branches and sticks, some use books or pages in a book, some use granite tiles, some use pure white background.


I really love the gray granite tile look. I love the texture and gray just looks good with so much! But, I want a more happy, bright feel to my shop. I don't know if gray does that. Though, I am ok with this background. It's just so...flat.


I also love just pure white background. It's so clean! One shop that does white backgrounds really well is CandyBead. I am a huge fan of this shop! Everything is awesome and the pictures are great! I have a hard time making all my backgrounds white though.


So, the other day, I was walking around at Target and saw this jewelry box. I was thinking maybe it would be good to take pictures of jewelry inside the jewelry box. I know it's not the most original idea, but it's worth a shot right?


The inside of the box is lined with pink velvet. I am not sure If I want to go with all this pink. I wish it was something less girly. Maybe a purple or green. But, it is what it is. I had my first session with this box today. The model is my new Drifting Snow Necklace. Look at that. No cropping and just needed a little bit fill light.


Tried using the white as background. I think the closed drawers doesn't show that this is a jewelry box though.



Opening the drawers a little bit helps, but maybe the shadow of the inside is too dark?



Opening it more shows the pink inside and soften the pictures more.


Now a completely different angle. I like how the drawers add depth to the picture. I like depth. Depth makes picture so much cooler. Think pink is still a little too much for me though.



By the way, this is all done in my kitchen. My dad put in new fluorescent bulbs and it's super bright now. I think the crystals sparkle more in sunlight, but I like how this kitchen light is working at the moment. So, what do you think?

~ Red Velvet Cupcakery in DC ~

My lovely cousin and her boyfriend came to visit over Christmas. Last night, they went out on their own to DC and came back with this big box!


Inside was these gorgeous cupcakes!! I labeled the cupcakes in the picture as well as I could.


So, they went to this place called Red Velvet Cupcakery. I told them about Georgetown Cupcakes, but they got lost and didn't know how to get to Georgetown. But these look just like the Georgetown cupcakes. I must say though, I like the pink, cutsy look of Georgetown cupcakes more.


Though this cupcake tree is very cool. I wish they have one in my office.


Anyways, so of course, I have to take some pictures!!



But, I am not the only crazy one. The boyfriend also has a DSLR, a nice Canon XS, I think. It's always nice to have someone else be crazy with you and take pictures of random things.


Check out this menu. It's also available of their website for download. $3.25 for a cupcake??? That's more expensive than Georgetown!


I ate the southern belle right away. It's red velvet with whipped cream cheese topping. It was good. The cream cheese was excellent!


Unfortunately, Momo figured out how to open the box and ate the champagne one, the vanilla one and licked off all the cream cheese off the other southern bell cupcake! I was so mad!!!!!! He really opened the box instead of ripping it apart! *sigh* He is fine though. No diarrhea and no puking. So, I only had 2 cupcakes left. I just ate the Morning Call one a little while ago. Yes, it's bad to be eating that at 11:30pm. But, it was calling my name. It was good too! I loved the coffee buttercream, but the last bite felt too rich for me. I like the cream cheese one more.

I think $3 for a cupcake is crazy. But, it's a great treat every once in a while. Thanks to my cousin and the boyfriend! I had a lot of fun while they were here. They are super cute! Momo had a lot of fun with them too. He misses them a lot. He keeps going into their room to look for them. I wonder if he realizes that they are gone?