Tuesday, July 24, 2012

My little chef and my granddad


There are a few dishes that always remind me of my granddad. Baked beans with mince pork, Cantonese-styled pork and potato/carrot soup, and black-sauce pork. He used to be cook in a restaurant, and he would whip up the most delicious meal every Sunday as that's when everyone -- my uncles, aunts, cousins, and us -- would gather to catch up. Attendance was compulsory.

After I got married and moved out, I asked my mum how to make black-sauce pork. It is so easy; throw dark soya sauce and light soya sauce over the pork pieces together with some crushed garlic cloves and a few pieces of rock sugar. Every time I smell the wonderful aroma of the sauce cooking with the garlic, I would always, always think of my granddad. How he pottered around the kitchen, said hello to us, and retreated to his room when dinner was over. He was a man of few words.

Today, as I was preparing the ingredients (and thinking about my granddad again), my 6yo asked if he could help me prepare dinner. Sure, why not. I had decided to add carrots to the recipe because Kit LOVES carrots. So Kai peeled the carrot and, with my help, chopped the carrots. I showed him the ingredients and he poured the sauce in for me, threw in the crushed garlic, carrots, and the rock sugar, and stirred them around and around.

It was the best black-sauce pork we've ever had together. I don't what it was. Maybe because it was made with love. Maybe because it is now a recipe passed down through four generations. Suddenly, I miss my granddad. But because of this dish, now my son knows a little bit about his great granddad. How bitter sweet.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Hanging around like Spider-Man


The winds of change are blowing once again. Just two weeks ago, my 6yo was very much into Ninjago. Now maybe because his younger brother is always screaming "Spider-Man! Spider-Man! Spider-Man!" every time we drive past a mall, which has the latest Spider-Man movie poster pinned on its wall, on the way home from school, Kai's life is now consumed by Spider-Man.


And because his big brother is SO into Spider-Man, Kit decided he is crazy about the web-slinging superhero too. Today, both of them snuggled down with a cuddly soft toy, in their spidey t-shirt to watch Spider-Man cartoons. Kit also refused to get out of the t-shirt and into his what is now boring Mickey Mouse pyjamas.


He also insisted on wearing Kai's Spidey glove to school. A few days ago, he started running around the house with his right hand in the air. It took me a while to figure out what he was doing.
;-)

Thursday, July 05, 2012

Captured (not) on film

My brother
In the Cloud Forest
-- by Tan Kai 
Not too long ago, we discovered that our 6yo has a good eye for photography. Not all his shots are perfect; some shots are blurry (mostly due to excited, trigger-happy fingers) but his sense of composition and aesthetics is not too bad at all! During a recent trip to the newly opened Gardens by the Bay, he snapped a shot of his soon-to-be-3yo brother looking down the waterfall in the Cloud Forest.


Which made me dig up a photo that I took of Kit at the recently concluded Children's Season at the Singapore Art Museum.

I love how both photographs captured Kit, a hyperactive toddler, in his quieter moments.

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