Family Time @ McDonald's

I have fond memories of going to McDonald's as a child with my younger brother. Our parents would take us there for special occasions, such as birthday celebrations and as a treat whenever we did well in school examinations. My favorite was the McEgg and it was something I would order almost everytime I visited McDonald's.

Many years have passed and as a parent myself now, I also love sharing quality time together with my children, in McDonald's, the same was my parents did with me.

Our children love the Chicken McNuggets; this is their default order upon entering McDonald's. We usually order a Happy Meal with Chicken McNuggets (there is nothing quite like getting a free toy with your meal) and an additional portion of nuggets and of course a sundae each, allowing us to chit chat and share the food on our table.

Bonding over nuggets and ice cream

Our family enjoys spending quality time together at McDonald's, bonding over food and ice cream. During our last trip here, one of our discussions was how best to eat McNuggets. Us parents like them with the BBQ Sauce provided, Baby C likes them naked with no sauce, and Baby D was showing us his new way of eating them - dipped in ice cream sundae :P It is nice seeing our kids sharing the chicken nuggets with each other and how much they enjoy eating them.

Recently McDonald's have launched 2 new sauces that heighten the McNuggets experience - the creamy French Cheese and sweet Honey Mustard - Dip 'em and share 'em!

For more info, please visit McDonald's website.

*This is a sponsored post.




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Tokyo Kitchen, Ikon Connaught, KL

A couple of weeks ago, we checked out Tokyo Kitchen in Ikon Connaught. During lunch time, they offer some pretty affordable Super Value Set Meals (price starting from RM8.90, up to RM16.90).

Items on the set meal include chicken teriyaki, Sapporo ramen, Wagyu yasai itame and kaisen yasai itame. Hubby ordered the chicken garlic fried rice set (RM8.90) while I had the yaki soba (RM12.90) set; both comes with chawanmushi and miso soup as well as refillable green tea. The food was tasty enough and good value for money.

We also ordered a plate of salmon sashimi (RM11.90 for 3 pieces), however it was quite thinly sliced and not fatty enough for our liking.

We enjoyed the California roll (RM6.90 for 4 pcs); love the generous coating of tobiko on the outside and the filling includes cucumber, crabstick and avocado.

To fnish off our meal, we ordered the daifuku mochi (RM7.90), which came in 4 different flavours - red bean, peanut butter, pandan and black sesame.

After our meal, Hubby drew Baby Sumo on one of the wooden wishing boards and hung it at the restaurant entrance. ;)

Super Value Set Meals available from 11am to 5pm only.

Parking available inside Ikon Connaught, rate starts from RM1 for first 2 hours.

Price: Total bill RM56.55.

Location: Tokyo Kitchen, Lot G-01 & GR-01, Ikon Connaught, Jalan Puncak Gading, Taman Connaught, 56000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

GPS Coordinates: 3.081713, 101.731177





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Recipe: Tutti Frutti Chocolate Birthday Cake

Every year, we would ask the kids what cake would they like for their respective birthdays. On Baby D's birthday wish list, he stated "chocolate" and "blueberries" as the criteria for his birthday cake.

Tutti Frutti Chocolate Birthday Cake

Yet again, Hubby was in-charge of baking the cake and I was to decorate it later. I found some cute digger candles in the bakery shop, which I thought the boy would like. Hubby made our trusted two layer chocolate cake recipe, which I sandwiched and topped with lots of fresh cream. The cake was decorated with chocolate chips in the centre, followed by blueberries and whole strawberries, and nicely finished with the digger candle in the centre.

Birthday boy loved his cake

We sang Happy Birthday 5x cos he wanted to blow the candles again and again ;P

Tutti Frutti Chocolate Birthday Cake
Recipe by Baby Sumo, adapted from here
Preparation time: 30-40 minutes
Cooking time: 25 minutes
Serves 8

Ingredients
For the cake
150g self-raising flour, sifted
25g good quality cocoa powder
175g unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
175g caster sugar
1 tsp baking powder
3 eggs
1-2 tbsp milk

For the whipped cream
200g whipping cream
1/2 tsp icing sugar

To garnish
100g blueberries
4 whole strawberries
2-3 tbsp chocolate chips


1. Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan. Grease and base line 2 x 18cm sandwich tins with baking paper.

2. In a large bowl, place flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and mix well.

3. Using an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until it is creamy and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Then, add the eggs one at a time, and beat well, repeat until all eggs are used. Mix in the flour mixture from Step 2. Add a little milk if the mixture is too stiff - it should fall easily off a spoon.

4. Divide the mixture between the two tins and level the surfaces of the cake mixtures.

5. Bake on the same shelf in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes or until the sponge springs back when pressed.

6. Leave to cool for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely. Peel off the baking paper.

7. Using an electric mixer, whisk the cream until stiff. Place 1 cake layer on the cake board, then place 1/2 of the cream on the cake. Put the other cake layer on top, and finish off with the rest of the cream. Arrange chocolate chips in the centre (in a circle), then followed by the blueberries and strawberries.

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Happy Mid-Autumn Festival + Handmade Lanterns

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival to all my friends and readers! Wishing you a wonderful celebration with your families and loved ones.

We celebrated last night, one day early, as kids would need to go to bed early tonight as they have school the following day. During the day, we decided to make our own lanterns for the celebrations. We had some leftover expandable plastic tubing (7" diameter) from when we did our home renovations years ago and had our kitchen hood fitted. We cut them into 8" lengths each to make a lantern each for the kids. This tubing was perfect for lanterns as it is translucent (for the candle light to shine through) and also holds its shape well so no further reinforcement is needed.

The kids decided what design they wanted on their lanterns and us parents helped them sketch it on the lanterns with marker pen. Then the kids painted the drawings with craft paint and after the paint has dried, Hubby put on the base as well as made a handle for them. Not bad for a handmade lantern at all, and one of a kind ;) Well done kids!

We had a mooncake party at home before our lantern session, which had to be done indoors due to the bad haze in KL! Kids were super excited to parade around the living room with their handmade lanterns.

Handmade Lanterns for Mid-Autumn Festival 

What you will need:
7" Expandable plastic tubing (translucent)
Wire mesh (for base)
String
Craft Paint
Brush
Marker pen

1. Cut about 8" length of tubing with scissors. Decide with your kids what design they would like on their lanterns, and help them sketch it out using the marker pen.

2. Using craft paint, your kids can paint the designs with minimal supervision. Allow to dry.

3. If your child wants to, you can do another design on the other side of the lantern. Baby D picked Minion as well as Pingu for his lantern.

4. Allow paint to dry. Once dry, make 4 small holes about 1.5cm from the base. We used wire mesh as the base (but you can use anything else u have at home) then using string, string the base to the lantern.

5. At the top, you can also make 2 holes using scissors, then string to make 2 handles which you can hang off a stick later on. Use tealight candles to light up the lanterns. Have fun!

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Mel's Drive-In, Resorts World Sentosa, Singapore

There are many restaurants within Universal Studios Singapore in Resorts World Sentosa to choose from, and a very popular food outlet here is Mel's Drive In. It's an American diner serving burgers and hot dogs.  The decor is retro with shiny red leather chairs, chequered tiles and jukebox with several vintage cars lined up at the entrance.

We ordered the Crispy Chicken Burger (S$11) which was pretty good. Just as the name suggests, the chicken was crispy on the outside yet moist on the inside. Enjoyed this. We also tried the Chilli Cheese Dog ($10.80) - messy but tasty. All burgers and hot dogs are served with fries. We swapped one of our fries for onion rings... they were crispy and light. ;)

We also ordered one of the kids menu item (dino nuggets with fries -$10) as it comes with a collectible item. Worth it as we got a kids lunch box with Woody Woodpecker on the front, and Baby D loves it. It's now used as a box to store his toy cars at home :)

Read more about our Resorts World Sentosa adventures here.





Location: Mel's Drive In, Universal Studios Singapore, Resorts World Sentosa,8 Sentosa Gateway, Sentosa Island, Singapore 098269.


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Recipe: Healthy Honey Passion Drink

The haze is back! :( And during this hazy season, it is advisable to drink lots of water and eat lots of fruits and vegetables. Here's a great drink which is not only delicious, but will help you beat the haze too!

Containing passion fruit which is high in vitamin C and dietary fibre, this drink will give your immune system a boost. We are very fortunate that our passion fruit plant at home is bearing lots of fruits at the moment, however you can also buy them easily nowadays in supermarkets. The drink is sweetened with honey, which is also high in vitamins and minerals. Drink up and keep hydrated ;)

Also, a great drink to give to your water-averse kids.. they'll be asking for more. :)

Smile cos it's Fri-yay!

Bana-nana

Honey Passion Drink
Recipe by Baby Sumo
Preparation time: 1-2 minutes
Serves 1


Ingredients
1-2 passion fruit
1 1/2 - 2 tbsp honey
400ml water
5-8 ice cubes


1. Scoop the flesh of the passion fruit into the cup. Top up with water. Then, add honey to taste and stir well until honey is well dissolved. How much honey to add depends on how tart your passion fruit is and how sweet you would like the drink to be. Finally, add ice and enjoy ;)

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Neroteca Weekend Brunch, Plaza Damansara, KL

Neroteca has recently launched the Weekend Brunch in their Plaza Damansara outlet. The Weekend Brunch is available every Saturday and Sundays from 11am to 3pm and offers an array of delicious Italian spread and free-flow of Prosecco, red and white wine. The price for the buffet with alcohol is RM188 nett, and there is also a food only option for RM88 nett.

Free flow Prosecco or red or white wine

To start, there are mixed salads and premium cold cuts to choose from. We really loved the cold cuts, so we kept going back for more - there were 5 types of meat to choose from - spicy salami, wild boar salami, pancetta, honey ham and Parma ham. So delicious! From the salad selection, my favorites were the mixed seafood salad (with clams and mussels) as well as the grilled courgettes, peppers and aubergine. I have been told that they vary the selection of food served every weekend.

Live entertainment to keep us entertained

On the day of our visit, soup of the day was lentil soup - not a big fan of that so I gave it a miss. Instead, we concentrated on the mains  - on the buffet line, there were ravioli, lamb ribs, pasta, pork stew and vegetables.

The ravioli was stuffed with ricotta and spinach, and served with an Italiano sauce made of tomatoes, cheese and pesto; the pasta was a bit thick but the yummy sauce made up for that. Pasta on a buffet line commonly go soggy or clumpy, so we were pretty pleased to find the aglio olio pasta with pork meatballs here was still al dente, tastewise it was flavourful and spicy. The lamb stew in red wine sauce was also tender and comforting, but my favorite of all was the roasted lamb ribs. We were told that the ribs were marinated in homemade brown sauce as well as soy sauce and honey... absolutely finger-licking good!

There was also pizza cooked in their wood-fire oven.

Once you're done with the buffet, you can request for the waiting staff to serve the desserts to you. We were served a lime creme brulee, chocolate creme brulee as well as panna cotta. I prefer the lime over chocolate creme brulee due to its tanginess.

There is also a small cheese platter available

Thanks Neroteca for having us!

Verdict: Overall good food quality. We especially enjoyed the cold cuts and lamb ribs. 

Serves pork.

Price: RM188nett with free flow Prosecco, red and white wine, RM88 nett for food only.

Location: Neroteca PLAZA DAMANSARA, 17 & 15, Plaza Damansara, Medan Setia 1, Bukit Damansara, 50490 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Tel: +603-2011 5725

GPS coodinates: 3.149070, 101.653147



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