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Memorable May

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My health hasn’t been in the best shape this month, so it has been a hell of a hard month for me. The main highlight I had for this month was the DAA conference, but I found myself getting sick right before my travel. Luckily, it was only a domestic flight, so I was able to drag myself out to Hobart. Unfortunately, travel and sickness don't make a good match; it was challenging. But it still ended up being a wonderful trip, mainly because Tasmania is such a beautiful land! I would love to go back again someday (Hobart blog will be up soon). Getting sick this month has made me realise the blessing of good health, once again! It's something we don't appreciate enough until something hits us. The past few weeks have been quite stressful; I could almost tell that I had reached my breaking point and was going to get sick. Honestly, I'm so grateful to my mum for flying home this month. Her presence in the house makes a big difference in my life. To the world, it may have ...
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Jittery January

Hope everyone is having a good year so far? I cannot believe the first month is over already! Unfortunately I don't have any food pictures to share this month because I haven't cooked much at all. Even when I did, it was something that I had no time to take a photo of. My mind is preoccupied with something else, and it has been really difficult to get things done. To be honest, this month has been a hell of a month for me. It was stressful, exciting, crazy, painful  depressing...(the list goes on). There were times when I was very close to giving up. I don't think I have felt the range of emotions I experienced this month in any other time in my life. I can't really explain how overwhelming it was, without bringing in the context (will reveal soon).  
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The Vogue Cafe

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I've been thinking about going here for a while now but somehow never end up going because Macquarie is far and out of my way. I've seen so many Instagram posts displaying their ever so fine looking drinks which always gets me drooling! I took my time to pick a drink, trying to choose between Nutella, peanut butter and Oreo. I decided to go with Nutella as a safe choice because Nutella is one of those things you can't go wrong with. The veggie AF dish looked great but I was slightly disappointed after I tasted. The dish had multiple ingredients- falafel, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, rocket, Spanish onion, cashews, quinoa, poached egg, garnished with mint, lemon and olive oil. The combination of quinoa, cashew, rocket and falafel wasn't as satisfying as I was expecting it'd be. It wasn't bad, but at the same time, it did not stand out to me. I found the falafel flavours a little dull; it wasn't as authentic as the Lebanese ones.  Veggie AF ($1...
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Floriade 2016

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Hello everyone! Please excuse my lateness for posting Floriade pictures. I can't believe it took me well over a month to get this out. The past month has been very busy and I somehow forgot about this?! My visit to Canberra was a very short one but enjoyed every moment of it. It kind of made me realise that I should go away more often. I came back feeling very refreshed and happy! The last time I went to Floriade was 2014, so it was nice to come back after two years. I tried to do a little experimenting with my camera, and happy to say, I think I've improved from last time :P I'm starting to realise my love for detail photography, the close up flower ones are probably my favourite. Hope you like the pictures :)
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Black Star Pastry (Strawberry Watermelon Cake)

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Some of you might know about the desperate attempt I made last year for the Strawberry Watermelon Cake (see previous post at  Black Star Pastry ).  Yesterday I had the privilege of tasting this cake at a party. I got super excited as I’ve been wanting to try this for almost a year now. I was so tempted to just skip the mains but I patiently waited for dessert time and made sure I left space for the cake :P In the meantime, I went to take a close look at the cake (could not resist, for obvious reasons) and I was amazed at how magical it looked. It was constructed beautifully starting with a layer of almond  dacquoise followed by cream, then a slice of watermelon with cream,   almond  dacquoise and cream again. Finally, it was topped with strawberries, pistachios and dried rose petals. It was a quite a delicious cake but unfortunately, it did not meet the expectations I had. I liked certain elements, such as the lightness of the cream layers, f...
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Parramatta Lanes

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I heard a lot about Parra Lanes last year so I thought I'd make a time to see out this year. At first, we had a lot of trouble finding out where we needed to go. I've heard Parra Lane gets spread across over multiple stations to distribute the crowd. However, the problem was that the places aren't always easy to find. After walking around for some time, we managed to get hold of a map from a security staff. My main reason for coming was to try some knafeh; I've heard so much about this dessert from people who came last year. But we realised this particular shop was furthest out from our location. First stop was Koi Dessert Bar but there as a long line. While waiting in line, I decided to try the strawberry watermelon gelato from N2. I've always been a huge admirer of the strawberry watermelon cake from Black Star Pastry . I thought it'd be an interesting combo to have it in a gelato form. It surely was, I quite liked the gelato cake, it had a very stron...
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Holiday cooking (Part 1)

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After completion of my thesis, I had the best time doing some cooking experiments. I spent a part of it overseas (see part 2 ) I've posted the recipe for kale chips and wholemeal date and walnut loaf . Veggie mess of zucchini, broccoli, beans, carrots and bean sprouts Rainbow trout cutlets with potatoes, zucchini, tomato and bean sprouts Sesame sprinkled salmon with tomatoes, peas and wilted spinach Wholemeal date and walnut loaf Kale chips with tzatziki Chicken spinach parcel with sweet potato mash Chocolate banana ice cream with flaked almonds (vegan) Oats, coconut and sultana cookies Poached salmon, sweet potato and walnut salad Asparagus and prawn curry Sweet potato, chicken and capsicum skewers Lemon herb salmon with sweet potato mash and zucchini Crumbed chicken on a stick Wholemeal fettuccine with lamb, zucchini and asparagus
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Winterlight

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W interlight? What's that? I hear you ask! Well, no one seems to know what it is because it's such a small event. So I thought I'd write about it and make it all trendy haha :P So basically it's a local winter festival happening in Parramatta. It's kind of like a mini version of vivid but it's on during the day as well. Activities include ice skating, workshops for kids, various food stalls and much more! Oh, and did I mention there are big bunnies too? :P Winterlight is at Prince Alfred Park and finishes on 12th July. 
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Struggling September

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This month wasn’t a smooth month for me, as you can tell from my major delay in getting this out. I’m finding it so hard to keep up lately! I officially started working on SPSS this month. To be honest, I have never had a good relationship with statistics, and it has never really been my area of interest. I decided the best to go about it would be to remain optimistic, but this wasn’t always easy. There have been days when I felt confident after picking up a new skill, and there have been other days where I felt very lost and barely made any progress at all. But the good thing is that I submitted my systematic review paper. I know I won’t hear back for a long time, but at least it’s out of my hands for now. Hopefully, this will give me more time and energy to work on the statistics. In other news, we had an EMCR symposium in our building. I’m part of the organising committee so we needed to do lots of prep beforehand. While I wasn’t in charge of many things, I still found it h...
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El-Phoenician Restaurant

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My homie just got back to Sydney so we caught up for dinner! We haven't had middle eastern food together so we decided to go with Lebanese cuisine. It was pretty light because we went on a weeknight. As usual, we took a very long time to decide what we wanted to eat. The staff kept rushing us asking if we had made up our mind. We did not like this one bit because we always take our time to order, and we felt it was unnecessary to pressure us into ordering because the restaurant was almost empty!   Eggplant dip was the best; it was smooth, soft and creamy. It was my favourite. I could literally eat this every meal; eggplants are one of my favourite vegetables (yes, I have too many favs when it comes to veggies!) Hummus and Lamb was an average dish. It didn't really stand out to me; I didn't hate it, nor did I love it. It turned out to be our least eaten dish from the night, and it's one dish we wish we didn't order. Mixed platter was pretty good, seasoned wel...
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