Vegetarianism: Sufood Food Preview

I realised that I haven't blogged for 2 months (since Sep)! Life has been pretty busy - with a mix of good and bad.

September had been mostly enjoyable because we went for a vacation to New Zealand - Southern Island. That I will blog in another post. It was generally a great trip with some hiccups along the way, which made it VERY memorable. It had been SO memorable that I have to work on my negotiation skill a bit to convince my husband into visiting New Zealand someday again.

October had been a "buggy" month with QW falling sick =_= *sigh*

So yes, this post is extremely back-dated! But as we always say, better late than never!

Back to the focus of this post. Previously, I had experience being a woven wrap babywearing tester. With thanks to my sister who won the lucky draw to Sufood[1] Food Preview for two, I had the opportunity to be a food tester this round ;) I felt very excited from the day she shared this great news with me :)

The scheduled preview date was 28 Oct 2015. We were to sample and give feedback for dishes which Sufood planned to include in their menu from 1 Nov 2015 - which means they are all available now!!!

The whole experience as a food tester was very refreshing. Let me share with you a quick run-down of what happened that night:

Sufood set aside a section of their restaurant where all the testers were seated together. Although my sister was told to invited one more friend (which is moi~), they were pretty gracious and accommodated my hubby and QW in the same section. Of course, hubby got to pay for his own set meal and get to enjoy the samples as well ;)

We were served in the following sequence: soup, main dishes, dessert and beverages. Each time a dish was ready for tasting, they will bring the dish to us so that we get to (obviously) take lots of photos!!! Then, they will take them away to serve us a portion of the dish. Their marketing staff then came around to explain the dish to us: conceptualisation, how it may be eaten, etc. And of course, they also collected our feedbacks for their chefs.

Alright, I know there has been a lot of words to read thus far. Here are some photos of the delicious dishes we got to sample that night to break the monotonous essay mood ;)

Misto mushroom soup

First, we tried their Misto Mushroom soup. I would say it was quite flavourful. Kind of like the diluted Brand's fungi essence. I liked that you can see the fungi (e.g. brazil mushroom, button mushroom, etc.) that were used to cook the soup. I tasted a tinge of ginger and confirmed with the staff that it was indeed one of the ingredients. My only complaint? I wished there were more than ONE brazil mushroom =_=; My sis ate the one and only...

Sufood staff busy portioning the dish

Soup after being portioned

Next up was Zesty Oyster Mushroom Rice. It is like bibimbap-kimchi fried rice. As you can see from the photo below, it is very colourful. These 5 colours (yellow, white, green, orange and purple) are colours of Sufood. Not only are they vibrant, they look appetising and is great for health. I am sure you have heard talks about eating a variety of naturally coloured food and anti-oxidants, so I won't repeat how healthythey are. By the way, the eel-looking mock meat is oyster mushroom. I personally feel it needed more seasoning. My meat-eating friends would probably agree that it lacks the "sea" taste of an eel. Overall, the dish is decent and filling enough as a main though. 

Zesty Oyster Mushroom Rice 

 A portion of the fried rice

The Lucky Clover Pizza was my favourite main dish that night. Two main ingredients used in the leaves are spring onion and hericium erinaceum (lion mane's mushroom). The spring onion side tasted juicy and fresh, while the hericium erinaceum side is chewy and meaty. As you can guess, I ate the leaves individually at first. If not for the insider's information, I would never have thought of folding 2 leaves together to eat. The best outcome would be to fold the spring onion with hericium erinaceum sides to eat. 

Lucky Clover Pizza

The Rainbow Baked Pasta is actually baked conchiglie. This may not be as filling as the Zesty Oyster Mushroom Rice, but I prefer its taste. This was my next favourite main dish after Lucky Clover Pizza. Once again, the various colours come into play, which made the food looked appetising :)

Rainbow Baked Pasta

Last and perhaps the least, we had White Ferula Pasta. You probably can sense that I did not enjoy this dish, can't you? It might have to do with the fact that it came out as the last main dish. My stomach was beginning to feel full and hence did not appreciate this dish as much. I felt it was too oily. I did reflect that to their staff and was told it might due to the olive oil used in basil pesto and also when cooking the pasta.

White Ferula Pasta

Drinks wise, 4 out of their 5 colours were ready on the sampling day. Purple took its "leave of absence" because its ingredients were still on their way from Taiwan. Here are the breakdown:

Red - The Lively - Watermelon and tomato

Green - The Purely - Pineapple, choy sum and sour plum

Yellow - The Sunny - Orange and pineapple

White - The Comfy - Pear and yucca root

Purple - The Tasty - Beetroot and honeydew

I LOVE watermelon juice. So, I am biased towards The Lively because it is my LOVE and the most refreshing (in my opinion). To be fair, they were equally tasty. The Purely impressing me a tad more because it has choy sum in it! The pineapple and sour plum really did a great job masking the bitter after taste that the vegetable typically has. That made The Purely a pretty tasty drink, very easy to swallow.

I probably have to make a trip back to try The Tasty =_= Really curious about how it will taste like.

Dessert received the thumb's up and seal of approval from QW. Needless to say, it was the best dish of that night ;)

Mango Frollino

This is not my first time dining at Sufood. Thus far, Sufood has been a nice restaurant to dine in. It is just great to see that Sufood is creating and adding new dishes to their existing menu. It makes it more enticing to revisit them.

Personally, I just hope my sister's lucky streak continues :p

References:
1. Sufood
2. Facebook - Sufood

Motherhood: Babywearing Tester

I have been babywearing for a while (since Apr 2014). Recently, I have been offered the opportunity to be one of the testers for a ring sling and a woven wrap =)

Aloha & Light Silk Hemp blend ring sling is weaved, hand dyed and hand painted by Janel from Hawaii. Jars and Fluff [1][2], a local online shop, is our local vendor who partnered with Janel to bring in these vibrantly coloured ring slings. My review of Aloha & Light can be found on Jars of Fluff Facebook page[3].

In brief, the material is supportive, thin and airy. Pretty suitable for local weather. The colours are really loud, which I feel may only appeal to those who like very loud colours. Personally, this ring sling needs to "travel" through more hands. By that, I feel that it needs to be more broken in (worn, washed and ironed more times). The one thing about it that disturbed me quite a bit was that its colour runs when washed.

As for the woven wrap, I must say that I felt really honoured to be its tester. The main reason behind my sense of pride is because it is the first machine woven wrap produced by our local company CareRing Sling[3][4] =D I could hardly contained my excitement when I saw that one of the lines on the wrap label read "Singapore"!!! My review of Pearly Blossom Size 5 woven wrap can be found on CareRing Sling business page and Facebook page[5].

Though the wrap was not the usual length which I prefer, I can hardly find any flaws with it (apart from the fact that I am not a very pink/peach colour girl).

Disclaimer: I was given the chance to babywear with the said products for a week each. All opinions are my own. No gift or monetary compensation were received.

Coincidentally, the owner for both Jars of Fluff and CareRing Sling are certified babywearing consultants. From what I know, Nur Afifah of CareRing Sling happens to be Janna's mentor. Oh, Janna is the owner of Jars of Fluff~

I find the experience as a tester to be pretty interesting and very pleasant for the following reasons:

1. get to try out many pretty wraps and ring slings made of different fibres (cotton, linen, silk, etc.)

2. get to polish my selfie aka hand-pho(ne)tography skill =p

3. get to brush up my linguistic/writing skill~

4. get to polish my wrapping-QW-up skill *haha*

5. the support provided by the vendors are excellent - clear guidelines on what to write are provided, courier service to the next tester are provided for, the vendors are very responsive to messages...

blah blah blah~

The cons about being a tester is I don't get to keep the wrap if I fall in love with it~ *Sigh*

I hope to have more of such opportunities to try all the wraps =D Okay, that might be too ambitious =P I guess I will just have to settle for try as many wraps as I can while QW still let me babywear her~

PS: Actually, I have been given the opportunity to test another wrap soon ;) *excited squeal* *Sshh~*

References:

1. Jars of FLuff

2. Facebook - Jars of Fluff

3. Facebook - Review of Aloha & Light Silk Hemp Ring Sling

4. CareRing Sling

5. Facebook - CareRing Sling

6. CareRing Sling - Review of Pearly Blossom