Soup in A Bag, Lighter choices

Watching your diet find it hard to get cereal that is not loaded with sugar . Here in Korea there is not much choice but here is something that I have tried ."Bran enriched whole grain wheat flakes with sultanas. Fortified with vitamins and iron." 30g is only 97 calories

lighter choices from Tesco. Add some fresh fruit and you have a great start to your day.

So not feeling to good I walked around home plus looking for comfort food . When I came across this Broccoli cream soup. Also here was potato bacon soup and more traditional kimchi chi gae. Not very expensive It was less then 1500won.

Pictures to share.

I finally got the pictures from our Charlottesville, VA trip on our Anniversary in August. Here is the link to my flickr account for you can view them! Feel free to leave comments!

Charlottesville Pictures

How to curb smoking during Ramadhan.

Most doctors will suggest quitting smoking in the Month of Ramadhan. As for some people are not afraid to drop dead of heart attack or lung failure, so they keep on smoking like nobody business all the other day, but when it comes to the Ramadhan, they dare not smoke. An example of that some people is me

Anyway, fasting is the only time to ensure one is smoke free from dusk till dawn, where one willingly by the order of god, shall not put in his rongga rongga anything be it food or whatever lah, or else, one will be sent to hell to smoke forever. Also included in the instruction is not to have sex or masturbate, whether purposely or accidentally. Hik, how does anyone accidentally masturbated? And also some other things that we cant do during ramadhan.

amik kau, mampu? This is not chain smoker, this is machine gun smoker

Anyway, I read somewhere that smoking is not about addiction, but its about habit. For someone to stop smoking he needs to stop the habit of smoking. The chemical compounds in a cigarette are not harmful enough to make one addictive to smoking.

The problem most smokers have in quitting is to stop the habit of putting something between the lips, inhaling and exhaling the smoke and the action of moving the hands down and toward the lips regularly or the habit of must have a ciggy after every meal.

Click for larger view: this community service advertisment is brought to you by Alfred Dunhill of London

So in order to do this, they suggest we do something else to break the habit. Such as eating chewing gum, eat, or any activities that might make us forget to smoke.

I also read that you can stop smoking anytime; even if you failed you should try to do it again, and again. If a person failed to stop smoking, it does not mean he cannot stop smoking permanently. We must try repeatedly until we succeed.

Last night, I could not sleep again, yes again this insomniac is really bugging me. For once I wish I could be as normal human being and sleep at night, when we are supposed to sleep.

Anyway, while I was watching the tele, a lady doctor came out and gives some tips on quitting smoking. She said Ramadhan is the best time to stop smoking, because most everyone managed to not smoke while fasting. I know someone who do not eat and drink but only smoke during ramadhan, but that is another story.



But as soon as hearing the azan, all smokers will run to their ciggy and end up smoking more then they usually do over a period of time. I know someone who can finish a whole box of 14 cigarettes in the time frame of 2 hours. Buy the way, that person is yours truly, me.





So she said, one way of doing it is to delay your sahur. Try to have sahur as close as possible to the imsak time. By doing so, you would have no time to smoke after your meal and had to continue fasting. Doesn’t that sound very convincing isn’t it? Somehow it sounded workable.

Well, I am trying to do that today, and guess what? The longer I wait for the imsak, the more I smoke, and it is only 2 am now. If I wait until 5, I might have burn my lung.

So I guess her advice is to those who sleep at night and not wait until 5 o’clock to have his sahur.

So i assume, since it does not applicable to me, i will continue to be a chain smoker until my lung fail to work or i have a heart attack.

Its not my fault i cannot sleep.

hik hik hik

Excuses, excuses, excuses

Excuses. Excuses. ‘Excuses’. How such a pathetic little word can conjure up a myriad of negative feelings is a mystery. Whenever I hear the term I often think of a judgemental sports teacher (not a particular sports teacher, but more of a generic sports teacher that seems to have been a miniscule but nevertheless influential character in the lives of most people) snatching a note from the hand of a notoriously un-sporty pupil:

‘Bloody hell Jenkins, what’s your excuse this time?’ the word excuse proffered in a nasal and offhand fashion suggesting that even a broken neck and debilitating bout of rickets would not be a sufficient reason to avoid cross-country.

It’s a word that teachers never utter with surprise (unless mock surprise) or sympathy (unless mock sympathy). It is invariably said with derision and followed by a scornful sigh. It was always a moment of great satisfaction when, in the occasional times when the excuse was genuine and worthy of a significant amount of pity or sympathy (car crash/illness/emergency hospital visit), the look of disdain was replaced by one of guilt. You could be sure that a whispered and reluctant apology would be forthcoming at the end of the lesson.

Anyway, what does this apparently irrelevant and potentially insightful voyage into my school days have to do with food? Well, nothing really. But I thought that rather than launch straight into my own excuses for not writing anything for the past week, I’d begin by discussing excuses themselves and putting them into a context that most of you should be familiar with, thereby getting you ‘on my side’ as it were.

So, metaphorically at least, I am now that red-faced boy at the front of the class who has arrived late wearing trainers instead of the regulation black shoes. Without his homework and no dog to blame it on. And has forgotten his sports kit, and where the sour-faced teacher may be delighting in my predicament, most of my class mates are rooting for me for they know that there must be good reasons for all of this.

And there are. There are good reasons why I’ve still not yet posted the much requested falafel recipe. There are good reasons why I’ve not been replying to your wonderful comments. There are good reasons why I’ve not yet written about the second part of our preservation adventure. There are good reasons why I’ve not relayed the story of the further foraging adventures, the wild mushroom risotto, the homemade pizzas, an apple and blackberry crumble made almost entirely with free produce, tasty cheeses from Neal’s Yard Dairy, supremely good coffee from the Monmouth Coffee Company and a trip to the market where I met a couple who raise their own Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs.

Starting with the falafel – we did make them. We made perfectly formed, well-spiced, nicely cooked little rounds of tasty chickpeas and some delicious flatbreads and a batch of hummus to serve them with. And then the camera ran out of battery which shouldn’t be a problem for someone with a girlfriend that is an editor of at least one photographic publication but we decided that instead of search for a charger, we’d rather eat our dinner while it was warm. No photo, no recipe.

For the second part, I’ll bracket all that together under the umbrella excuse of having other stuff on, namely learning to drive.

After putting it of for seven years, and spending a further twelve months learning how to control an automobile without damaging anyone or anything, last week I took my (second) driving test.

And I passed. I passed with flying colours and just four minors and can now drive a car, unaccompanied, on any British road. The downside was that a vast chunk of last week was taken up with an intensive driving course which somewhat negated my ability to write.

Oh, and we had my brother staying with us as well so I couldn’t well spend the remaining free time, the time when I wasn’t behind the wheel of a small car, tapping out a few thousand words for the blog. Don’t get me wrong – you are all very important to me but I know my priorities. And they shall be resumed forthwith.

In the mean time, feel free to head over to my other blog and read about things that aren’t food related. A lot of it is about the US Election and Sarah Palin.

Normal service shall be resumed with the utmost haste.

www.justcookit.co.uk