Are some traditional breakfasts healthy enough to take in a daily basis?

If you are overweight and often felt lethargic this breakfast health advice may help you!

By NZChefSi

There are two obviously, emotionally disturbed teenage siblings crouching under my roof this summer, they would sleep at 3 am and love to get up at 3 pm naturally, upon calling them for breakfast at 1 pm - that was after I returned from work from 20 minutes’ drive away suburb of Auckland which started since early morning, they would be so reluctant to get up, the first thing they did was poking their nose with the half-opened eyes to see what I was cooking. If it was the boring “breakfast” they would return to the bedroom again and told me, “Wait a minute!” And that wait a minute would be another two hours sleep until they got up with finally eyes fully opened.

Honestly, as a trained chef I have been using them as my Guinea pigs to learn what teenagers actually like to eat, especially in this case, the two teenagers have been fed with all the best foods since babies. Traditional western style big breakfast doesn’t attract them anymore, I don’t like to cook it for them as among the foods found in the big breakfast, ask yourself, how many of them are not preserved or convenient foods? Bacon, sausage, meat patty, muffins, baked beans, hash browns, ketchup and even orange juice. So, how many items in the big breakfast that you eat in a cafe are really freshly prepared less than 3 days ago? Most of the time you could only find that the egg is the only freshly prepared food and follow by additional one or two items are freshly prepared and this varied from cafe to cafe in Auckland.

Imagine an older person sitting in a café eating his or her pan cake in the morning with the sweet maple syrup on top, some people eats the same breakfast food likes the routine Lord’s prayer without getting sick of it. I remember I had an older lady friend, I saw she added a big tablespoon of white sugar into her coffee every morning, I kindly reminded her to reduce her white sugar intake due to her age, she rebuked to me that she was very healthy, she even added an extra sugar into her coffee, I knew she hated me to “mother” her around.  Over the months, I saw more wrinkles appeared on her pretty face, a year later, she got diabetes.

If you don’t know about diet, eating less is always healthier than eating more starch, sugar and chemical additives “infested” breakfast. So, what is the best, the healthiest and the most appetizing breakfast?

Breakfast Drink:

1. First thing in the morning, give half a glass of warm water mixed 3 drops of lemon for children. Give 1 glass of warm water with 5 drops of lemon for an adult.

2. Children under 18 years old, they should not drink any tea and coffee. Store frozen mixed berries in your freezer. Rinse your frozen berries (or simply use fresh mixed berries during summertime), add water labelled up with the berries, then use a stick blender blend them until pureed. This will help to wake up kids prepared them to go to school, they surely will prefer this than the milk. They just need a half glass of this ultimate berries juice.

3. For adults, you can have a cup of coffee or tea, you only can have a teaspoon added raw sugar or honey in it. You only do this once a day.

Breakfast Starch:

Try not to eat too much starch during the meal, it will help to reduce your weight abruptly. As a modern mode of life is so different from the traditional mode of life, the changing of intake of starch must be changed to suit modern days lifestyle.

1. Your choice of healthy starch is important, try not to eat too much starch during breakfast. Try not to eat the white bread. Especially there are many children or older people who begin to develop a digestive problem with gluten.

2. You can have a piece of toasted sourdough bread, 2 tablespoons of oatmeal or a piece of gluten-free bread (e.g. Indian dosa). The amount of starch you eat should not more than a ping pong ball size (before the leaven), it is around 4 tablespoons of cooked rice (serve children’s portion to 2 tablespoons cooked rice if you serve it as breakfast).

Protein:

1. The main protein in the morning universally is almost the eggs and the milk, there are controversies went on, but let you tell you this sad Disney animal story before you decide what kind of milk or eggs you should take. There was a cow after her baby was born, she was so happy, the baby kissed her and she kissed the baby, the baby drank its mother’s milk filled with love, but very soon on the morning their master took away the new born calf, actually he brutal threw it into a pile of injured new born calves in front of its mother. And the master thought that this way the calf wouldn’t consume too much milk from its mom, so he could sell more milk to his customers. Do you think this cow milk’s constituent is the same anymore? When you are in grief, there would be different kinds of hormones flowing in the milk with no love but just the stress hormone and anti-stress hormone. Do you think cow won’t grief for its baby being taken away or never able to see its baby again in its lifetime?  And if you keep locking your hens inside the cage, and you eat its eggs daily, now you know why kids are super patience when they crouch in front the computer screen who acted dormant with no different than those caged hens!

2. Try to integrate a small piece of braised or stewed meat to replace bacon, meat patty or sausage, unless your sausage or patty is freshly made without any chemical additives.

3. Beans are the excellent protein substitute; however, you have to make sure you have cooked the beans well to prevent food poisoning (https://www.thoughtco.com/food-poisoning-from-beans-3975994). The most famous breakfast dish using sprouting peas is the Burmese Pe Pyot (http://www.tastymemories.net/2012/04/pe-pyot-boiled-peas.html), the cooked sprouted peas is usually sauté with onion and turmeric powder then serve together with a starch component like rice or naan.

4. Due to bake bean is full of sugar, you can always prepare it yourself without adding any sugar.

Vegetable:

1. The most popular vegetable used for western breakfast is spinach sauté with garlic and nutmeg.

2. There is another highly antioxidant vegetable that many people are not aware of its benefit of Amaranth. Popped Amaranth seeds are a good choice to add to your muesli when you just want a fast and simple breakfast.

3. Asian loves to use breakfast with cucumber and tomato, it is advised to get rid of the cucumber and tomato seeds and skin, where lectins concentrated. According to a study conducted by Dr Steven Gundry, a heart surgeon and cardiologist from California, a link has been found between memory loss and proteins called lectins in foods such as cucumbers, tomatoes, whole grains, soy, peppers, sprouted grains and some dairy products. However, the lectin can be denatured during the process of cooking, fermenting or pickling.

Recipe for Savory Oat Meal

Ingredients:

2 tablespoon Quicker oat

1 cup of stock

50g minced meat

1 tsp of minced onion

1 tsp Grape seed oil

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1/2 tbsp pine nut

3 dates, chopped (Or fresh grapes)

3 walnuts

1 tsp basil seeds

1 tbsp Popped Amaranth seeds

½ Avocado, sliced (garnishing)

5g Cilantro, chopped (garnishing)

5g Parsley, chopped (garnishing)

Seasoning, grey salt, Kikkoman and black pepper powder

Method:

1. Sauté the onion with oil, add minced meat.

2. Add stock, wait until it boils, add oat, nuts and seeds.

3. Check seasoning.

4. Garnish with avocado on top and sprinkle with cilantro and parsley.

Recipes for Jumbo Pan Omelet and Flat Bread

This large-size pan omelet is sufficient to feed a whole family of four or five in the morning. It is so easy to prepare.

Flat Bread Ingredients (Yield 4):

0.5 cup Warmed water

1 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp yogurt

2 tsp Black sesame oil or olive oil

5g Chopped chives or scallion

1/2 tsp grey salt

1.5 cup Hard flour

Method:

1. Mix water with yogurt and oil.

2. Sieve the flour, mix in sugar and salt. Dig a well, add 1.

3. Slower incorporate flour with the liquid.

4. Knead the dough until it won’t stick your hand.

5. Cover the dough and leave it in a warm place for 2 hours then store in the fridge for a day or two.

6. Before grilling, mix the dough the with chopped herbs. You can roll the dough with pasta machine into flat rectangular sheet or you can tapper it into round shape naan.

7. Add a big of oil to a griddle, wait until it is smoking, grill the flat bread until it pops on both sides.

Pan Omelet Utensil and Ingredients :

A large size cast iron pan

6 Eggs, whisked, add salt and ½ tsp of vinegar

1 tbsp Butter

1 tbsp Grape seed oil

1 cup Chopped fresh tomato (get rid of seeds and skin)

1 cup Mixed colour capsicum (or baby spinach), Macedonian

4 Mushrooms, sliced

1 tbsp Pine nuts

2 tbsp Chopped walnut (or cooked peas like lentils, garden peas or chickpeas)

1/2 onion, julienne

1 clove Garlic, minced

1 Chorizo, sliced

100g Minced meat of your choice

10g Mixed herbs of cilantro, basil and parsley, chopped

2 tbsp Parmesan cheese, grated

8 Mozzarella cheese balls or 4 tbsp cream cheese

Seasoning, grey salt

Method:

1. Sauté the onion and garlic with butter and oil, then add the chorizo, then minced meat.

2. Add the vegetable and nuts, check the seasoning and then finally add the whisked eggs.

3. Place the pan into the preheated oven of 180 degree Celsius.

4. When the egg is almost curdled, sprinkle the Parmesan cheese on top and place the Mozzarella cheese balls on. Place into the oven again until the eggs is fully curdled and the Parmesan is melted.

5. Sprinkle some more Parmesan sparingly and also the herbs.

6. Eat together with the flat bread.

Children’s Mood and Food

Did you feed your child with the wrong kind of food? 

I have not taught young beginners ’piano for at least 20 years after I designed an instructional music appreciation course for the very young beginners, Kinder Virtuoso Program (KVP).  The earliest batch of children that I taught under this KVP probably are now professionals around the globes, some of these children had been very privileging to have a uniformed driver and nanny to bring them for the lesson, they got extremely busy parents, it also hinted me they severely deprived of their parents’ immediate attention and cuddles.

I vividly remember, it was an early Saturday morning exactly 20 years ago, a little 5-year old girl popped in the classroom, without uttering any response to my greeting, she picked up a pencil angrily poking a chair’s red plastic cushion seat in a fast speed. I couldn’t stop her on time, so I let her did it curiously, after she destroyed the whole chair, she quiet down, I didn’t utter a single word to her, I pretended never see what had just happened. I never informed her nanny or told anyone what she did.  I told myself, “Well, at least she did it in front of me, but there were many kids would poke it or draw something on the wall behind my other teaching staff or me!” Eventually, all these red chairs only lasted for a year, I decided to change the whole music school’s chairs to solid metal chairs!

Often, people just saw that music teachers earned high teaching fees, they didn’t see other hidden problems that caused some of the best full-time music teachers to receive the least stable income, due to their inconsistent income, they appeared insecure and not so confident. Of course, we are not going to talk here about the majority of the female piano teachers who have a professionally eminent husband to back them up morally and financially.

I learned that if a mother doesn’t spend her full attention, time and playing with her little children, children would express their emotion and boredom by drawing on the wall, playing high heel shoes and even umbrellas. And imagine this, how about if you developed their musical notation recognition as earlier as possible, if you are busy, at least they could go play the piano to hit some simple tunes instead, or you can start to ask your children to help you in the kitchen to peel carrots, but please don’t do it if you have a hyperactive kid who may stick his finger to your cutting blade unexpectedly.

However, beside spending their full attention, playing and teaching kids, most parents have ignored the facts that food can cause children’s moodiness. I learned through the years that good diet is one of the key factors to children’s physical and emotional stability and development. The most difficult children to take care of are those who have allergic, is it developed in the fetus during the pregnancy period due to genetical reason, a mother’s inappropriate diet habit or imbalance diet?

One of my ex piano student, now a professional piano teacher WhatsApp me told me frustratedly that he plans to leave Singapore permanently due to he is allergic to the filtered tap water from waste water.  He and his piano students’ families even bought the $6K Kogan filter machine to filter such filtered waste water and then boiled it, unfortunately, they still developed rashes or diarrhea, he told me if they changed to drink bottled water, their allergic reactions would be gone immediately. Now this shows us diet or even simple water not just plays an important part to our health but it also could bother our mood.

Otago University’s research scientists already has proven that some properties from fresh vegetables and fruits that could give us good mood but during cooking would be denatured. It means that if you eat more fresh fruits and vegetables, you will have higher EQ and happier as well.  However, this cause a problem to children and even adult who don’t like to eat fruits and raw vegetables, in this case, especially the children’s parents have to be creative in their recipes and cooking method to coax the children to eat a yummy version of raw fruits and vegetables.

I noticed the serving vegetable’s portion in most Chinese families, normally they only serve a plate of stir-fry vegetable for the whole family, which is actually not sufficient to the dietary requirement, that’s why intestines or tummy cancer is quite common amongst Chinese. We need at least 3 servings of vegetable and 2 serving of fruits a day, a portion size in fact can be measured according to an eater’s individual palm size.

So, after twenty years, I decided to return to New Zealand which I acquired a PR more than a decade ago. Initially, I stayed with my extremely busy tiger-sister’s family, I couldn’t teach piano in her house, so I became her housekeeper, gardener and cook, initially she wants a cook who knows about food and safety, so she taught me basic food handling knowledge started from grocery shopping and later, her thought has evolved to a higher level, she wants a professionally trained chef to cook for her and a family, so I ended up in a chef school.

Do you believe in a feng shui guru or a God? Two years in the chef school I never missed a single day, I never got sick, I was healthier than any younger classmates, I got the best academic results both practically and theoretically, but the head chefs of different commercial kitchens played a part of either a feng shui guru or a god in my life, they decided I am not fitted even to be their kitchen hand either due to my ethnicity, sex or age, it was very hurting when I saw how my chef school’s past Students of the Year all ended up either as the head chefs or much more higher ranking chef jobs. 

I finally convinced that my fate doesn’t belong to a commercial kitchen after a head chef in Grafton could make me waiting for more than three months for a kitchen hand job, I went there for 9 hours FOC trial,  after the trial, he asked me to email him my passport and the proof of my NZ PR status immediately, as he needed to write a contract for me. He promised me the fastest I could return to work would be 2 days later or the following week’s Monday, but I waited and waited, until I asked someone from WINZ to intercept him, at the end, I received an email after 2 weeks later, I was told the café didn’t have enough budget for a kitchen hand, but I saw there were so many new faces during their Christmas party Instagram last year. 

It gives me the proofs that there are good enough chefs are bloody good liars or mockers when they thought lower ranking apprentices, kitchen hands or an Asian chefs are someone that they could fool, make fun of and bullied, and I know I will be an abused victim if I continue to dwell in the chef industry where there is not a single mentor who genuinely cherish me enough, bravely protects me and treated me honestly and openly,  unfortunately I met all these chefs who valued hierarchy and social status more than a little nobody “cook”, and I was badly misled due to a chef mentor’s secretive behavior to hurt me badly emotionally, feeling, health, self-esteem and pride. They didn’t act like all my past world-class piano professors who helped me unconditionally, and that’s the tradition I also carried to my piano students, what goes wrong to the chefs’ tradition? Hierarchy, snobbishness and lies? I have a limited count of which chefs should I respect.

The day I felt so sad, so cheap, and hurt badly was when I read from an Instagram of a very young Thai executive chef how she sang highly of this mentor whom I admired and respected so much, he helped her, he raised her up and showered her with many sample gifts, and moreover I read how he could revive a career or lavish expensive gifts on someone he truly loves and cherishes, whereas someone 7000km meter away, he knew that I couldn’t find any job, he wooed me probably to check what was my intention on his celebrity status, when he thought I got bad intention he ignored me, when he came to Auckland, he never informed me when he would be coming, this hinted that he actually never planned to meet me. When I got an information from somewhere that he would leave on a certain date, I tried to get hold of him intended to meet him and gave him an interview as well, he told me he was sitting on the plane leaving Auckland already, the next night, someone saw his entourage in Auckland International Airport leaving at midnight. What he didn’t know was I spent my limited income to buy the expensive gifts for him, a token of respect but obviously, he never appreciated them from the way he ignored me. As a matter of fact, executive chefs always received FOC sample gifts from salesmen, perhaps it was the reason, my expensive gifts were inexpensive to him, he plays god again to finally decide my trust and respect on chefs and men. Being secretive often could misled people, I came to him bluntly told him I need his feedback in my thesis, but he probably thought that I had an unknown intention on him. If a person subconsciously thought so, he could act so to mould such a victim to fall into his trap. Deliberate ignoring or ostracizing is the greatest insult and humiliation of a mentor shows to his protégé. Whereas, at the same period of time, I encountered a well-known plastic surgeon on the airplane, immediately he would reveal to me of his happy family, I knew our friendship will last until I go coffin, true enough, last month, he bought his wife, his son and even his GM to Auckland, when he reached Auckland he SMS me immediately, we had such a good meeting. Did I ever harass him? NO, even I got his WhatsApp contact! I am so proud to have a very highly respected and eminent S.E Asian plastic surgeon who not just loves to cook, can bake sourdough bread, co-own an Italian restaurant chain in Hong Kong, a man who is genuine, honest and truthful to himself and other people as well.

Being secretive to someone whom you think is a stranger,  lower rank in your hierarchy,  she is not staying your region, she didn’t know if you are married, a gay or cohabited with a famous woman, you could fool her easily.  She could only read you according to how you try to mold what you want your worldwide readers to know in your social media and promotion. Being a long-distance protégé has a great disadvantage, the mentor is always right even if he played as an authorized figure by acting secretive and manipulative, he could make you revealing everything about yourself which was more than a friendly term, he just wanted an answer that he molded for it obviously, and at the end he only brought shame and disgrace to a woman who fell in love, he told me off that I don’t know how to handle a long distance relationship yet he himself trying to observe me through a peek hole.

Who told you that a chef school and a NZ PR could guarantee you a chef’s job? It is just another chef trying to tell lies again.  Then, I discovered about the chef industry’s hierarchy which many TV audience didn’t realize, the chefs who have to raise up from hierarchy’s staircase would look at those MasterChef Winner or any chef school’s freshly graduate (in the case even I was awarded as the Student of the Year) with an imbalanced psycho, without any backdoor help, they have to work at least 10 years to become CDP, and another 10 years to become a head chef or executive chef.

What I learned from different trial outs in different cafes, restaurants, catering companies and hotels were they either want a good robot or they want a confident-look chef, as my character trained as a pianist.  I was always careful to approach something new and trying to improve something not right during the course, obviously, my character and competent are not suitable for a normal commercial kitchen.  

For an example, after making non-bake cheese cake for so many times, now I used full-cream milk instead of full cream to prepare it. People who ate it loved it so much, the cost is much lower, preparation time is cut down and it is much easier to prepare. Now, my choir members and students’ parents asking for recipes, I write FOC for NZ Mandarin Pages. I am born to have a tag writing FOC and can be bullied on my karma, even if my recipes are good, they worth nothing, even if I was pretty and intelligent, men just wanted something from me selfishly for themselves for FOC. 

What do you feel when you work hard for something, it is not being rewarded fairly as people around you are actually playing their part as a god to decide your fate? I learned that a life coach’s BS could receive 200 likes and paid so much to listen to her hypocritic smooth honey sweet voice which ones could learn more and FOC from the Bible or Koran.

Why I have to dirty my hands and develop a pair of ugly wrinkled hands during last 4 years for FOC, so I decided to find a piano teaching job that was strongly discouraged by gods surrounded me. When I was not famous yet in Auckland as a piano teacher, a Chinese teenager student asked me, “Teacher, why you are so confident that I can play piano at the end of the day?” I told her it was due to she was NOT the first student I trained, but first of all, I must discipline her mood and practise, so I spent an extra FOC hour to stay back for the lesson so I could teach her how to practise, after 3 months later, she has improved greatly. 

The main failure for a young piano student’s progress is their mood. You would be surprised to hear that most students that I taught were male students, it happened 20 years ago, and now it happens right here in Auckland again that I got more male students than female. But gender doesn’t play the differences on mood, how many of these Chinese children’s moms feed them with enough raw fruits and vegetables daily?

Have you come across or experience a student or a teacher spent 50% of learning or teaching time fussing, acting moody? I experienced both, actually such chef tutor sent me to hell for a while that I almost quitted my chef school half way.  A person’s bad mood not just bothered his teacher or students but he is wasting time on himself and other people.

Although New Zealand produces plentiful vegetables and fruits at different seasons, but what I noticed was Chinese families have been eating too little fresh vegetables or even stir-fry vegetables and fruits. Overdose of bad protein, starch and sugar can lead adult males and menopaused older women to strokes, who says diet knowledge and planning are not important for a family? How many Chinese want to spend on a family diet plan? It is just not a Chinese’s practice, but just remember this simple fact, if you want stable mood, eat your fresh fruits and fresh vegetables daily and sufficiently, you may find there is less arguing and fighting go on among kids or their parents.

Introducing a National Cuisine to Foreigners through Tourism

How to effectively bring most iconic Malaysian regional cuisines to the world stage?

By NZChefSi@ChefSarawak

Why Malaysian cuisines could never beat Vietnamese or even Thai cuisines’ popularity to foreigners except for the Sarawak laksa, if it was never being highly recommended by celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain, perhaps it is still another hidden regional cuisine of the part unknown world.  Sarawak laksa is actually a regional fusion cuisine found in one of the most remote Malaysian states to most eyes of West Malaysian, some of these Western Malaysian who has never been to East Malaysian still jeer curiously if Sarawakians are sleeping on the tree top. Perhaps yes, I was told that many Sarawakians' political awareness is still “sleeping on the tree!”  but without them, perhaps Malaysian political scene would look different and our national carrier’s third-class food served to passengers wouldn’t embarrass most Malaysian trained chefs. Malaysian always serve the best food and drinks to their visitors, but I don’t understand why it changes on the air.

To prepare food, bring to the air and serve the passengers after 6 to 12 hours period, the chefs have to think very hard like those dotting moms how to prepare their kids’ lunch boxes, how their kids could still enjoy yummy hot food without changing much in quality after 4 to 6 hours. It is something chef school students won’t get a chance to learn from their modules.

I decided to write this article due to on my recent trip to Kuching, Sarawak, one sunny morning after my breakfast, coincidently when I waited at the side of a backstreet alley of Kuching Kenyalang market for my ride, I saw a native trying to cut a piece of pumpkin with a blunt cleaver, his left hand held more than an inch away from the cleaver. Of course, he cut slowly. Why people still considered Malaysia as a third world country?  I think its commoners don’t even have the basic vocational skills, now who will teach them? I remember most older NZ chefs told me they were either trained by a famous French chef who would use a bread that his apprentice gave him wrongly to hit right on the head of such innocent apprentice and that happened to be my L5 chef tutor, or by Air NZ catering, it actually fostered the most chefs during the past decades to help NZ tourism and hospitality before SkyCity emerges. Since MAS does so well training their air stewards and air hostess, why don’t MAS also set up a scheme, trained its own crew of professional chefs through its own airline catering, one stone two birds, this will end up fostering many Malaysian future chefs to help to improve MAS food, to benefit own Malaysian hospitality industry and tourism.

When I traveled internationally during recent years, I rather starved myself by traveling Air Asia or Jetstar. But this round’s cross-continental traveling was unavoidable, due to my MAS air-ticket was not paid by me. MAS was known for its bad in-flight food, not until I finally ate them after many years, I could tell what went wrong now, the food actually went so wrong, except the smiles from the air stewards and hostess could please me.

MAS Inflight Drinks:

Rave: I won’t complain here, it did serve a wide variety of drinks and water. Mas used foreign red wine or white wine as Malaysia doesn’t produce wine. But for the fruit juice choices, there are always orange juice and apple juice, I really think that MAS should promote and serve at least a choice of own Malaysian national agricultural produce like coconut juice, soursop juice, pineapple juice or guava juice etc. Coconut juice (Cold entity) versus orange juice (Cold entity) or apple juice (Cool entity), what will be your choice? If I was the executive chef of MAS catering I would choose either UFC coconut water (does any Malaysian coconut juice taste as authentic as it?) or less sugar pink guava juice and soursop juice for the passengers. For a long distance traveling less sugar soursop juice should be drunk to boost one’s immune.

I did appreciate MAS’s wide variety of beverages served for economic class passengers, besides the juice, you can choose a white wine, red wine or a beer. Although fresh milk was not given for the tea or coffee, at least the convenient instant cream and sugar were provided.    

Picture: Soursop cured my severe sore-throat and symptom of bad flu within three days.

MAS in-flight Entree:

Rant: I looked at this American style soft bun pitifully, it looked like around 30 to 40g, often my European professors would not consider it as bread, for me I would consider it as Chinese style baked bread instead, as most Asian would prefer soft bun perhaps due to they don’t have a set of strong teeth. I pressed it with my fingers, it is not soft but brittle, a sign of overnight soft bun. It is not the bread where production begins by the old Boulanger at Olaf Mt. Eden at 11pm every night until dawn, and only artisan bread and bun could last into a longer time, that’s why most Auckland fine dining restaurants or bread connoisseurs would rather pay more for its bread. 

A badly produced bread regretfully is a waste, it continues to nurture innocence taste buds on the flight, I would probably eat it like a pig without fussing on it unless I have been starved for three days. I learned that many chefs can’t bake good bread, regretfully due to they are actually not interested in producing good bread, and also, they have not acquired the true European artisan bread yet since young.

Unfortunately, this white or wholemeal bun tasted worse than some internet amateur home bakers and it is served on MAS. If MAS can’t supply well-baked bread to its passengers, its own regional bread like steamed rice bun, steamed bread or even steamed rice cake ketupat may end up another soggy tale. Rice bun can be baked or even deep fried.

Seriously, MAS bread bun’s recipe needs a change for higher standard and quality, its yeast needs to change for French yeast, semolina must be added to promote higher protein to the existing hard flour, the dough needs to be rest for 6 to 8 hours in a chilled condition. The soft dough can be improved by fat and sugar, the crunchy crust must be brushed with the mixture of some natural magic portion flavored egg wash or just flavored water, brush the surface of the tapered dough periodically before baking. Good bread is just like any other food, it needs good flavor and texture in and out. After the first bite, you want another bite, although it is just a plain bun.

Rave: Butter gave was an extra plus but it helps if only the bun is good.

Rant: This was the second meal being served on the same 11-hour flight from Auckland to KLIA, I was again being served with stew, now the beef stew. Its carrot salad without being seasoned with any spice or herb, it was tasteless.

What I noticed was when I ate pies around different Auckland café, whenever I ate a pie without being seasoned with pepper, I would ask the chefs which chef school they attended before, they would tell me they were self-taught or trained directly in the different New Zealand commercial kitchens. I noticed that when I received my apprenticeship in Langham Hotel, Auckland, there was always a big bag of ground pepper, these European trained chefs in the main section could also tell the different strength between white and black pepper powder.  TT means to taste, it always indicates using salt and pepper, salt and pepper are like a husband and wife in culinary, it is the final checking on almost any food’s seasoning before serving.

I think it’s the time MAS menu should introduce Malaysian local herbs like lemongrass, ginger torch buds or Daun kesom to their salad or salad dressing.

Rave: Diplomatically saying I think the salad dressing was the child-friendly version, but I think most children won’t appreciate much on raw and hard to chew carrot salad, most of the time they just wanted to hear, “Oh good boy, you have finished your carrot salad!”  

Rant: Too special for me to chew and digest. Mung bean vermicelli that l ate since toddler but in this case, the vermicelli was merely being soaked in just warm water, drained, then being served as salad. I really guess the chefs who prepared this salad either knows nothing much about vermicelli or knows much more than me about vermicelli! This kind of "no cook" vermicelli often appeared in the Vietnamese spring roll when some of my chef school classmates who never cooked or tasted mung bean vermicelli before. It should be blanched quickly and refresh for salad or Vietnamese rolls!

Rant: Smoked chicken slices with sweet corn and raw cucumber. I like all the three ingredients, but the whole thing was degraded by the way how it was presented and prepared. Cucumber seeds need to be get rid of, it is not advised to serve so plainly --- like a naked infant walked along with his parents at the beach, at least the cucumber could be tossed by some chopped herbs herbal oil (or Malaysian cucumber relish acar could be introduced by garnishing it on top of the smoked chicken slices, so it won’t look too plain and too simple) if the chef didn’t intend to add salt to prevent it becomes soggy.

MAS in-flight Main:

Rant: MAS economic meal lamb stew for Ack to KL route. l am amazed who wrote this recipe and menu plan or if the chefs were following the recipe properly.  I wonder if the kitchen inside the tall wall opposite of AGS could prepare the similar meal much better than this! The French Bean turned yellowish green. Again, I couldn’t taste any spice in it, not even the black pepper.

Rave: Child-friendly meal!

Rant: After flying for a lengthy time, another similar main meal was served but this round it was the beef stew. What a wonderful “flying jail experience!” Similar sauce as the above but only the meat was changed! A typical lazy chef’s menu plan, all because I came across a chef produced this kind of menu exactly!

Rave: If you hardly have a chance to eat western food, this may taste great to you!

Rant: KLIA to Auckland route, look at this chicken rendang really pissed me off completely, most Malaysian housewives could prepare this dish better without any recipe. Can MAS menu be more innovative? Deep fried your chicken with glutinous flour, then add on the rendang sauce later. It is better to serve ketupak if the rice ended up soggy like this. Most distasteful piece of chili being garnished on its top. I snapped this chicken rendang ordered by a passenger who sat next to me.

Rave: Place a hibiscus on next to your ear will be appreciated if it is a Malaysian garden party with Hawaiian motif, unfortunately, although Hibiscus is Malaysian national flower, on the world stage if a Malaysian pinched a hibiscus on his/her outfit, foreigners would surely think you are a Hawaiian! So, you want to promote your national cuisine by garnishing a piece of cut chili with seed on top of chicken rendang? Now you can't find red identity internatioanlly with Hibiscus  but you want to show people your chili? Please go to the market, get some ginger torch flowers, shredded it up finely, season, then garnish on top tastefully may effectively awaken the Malaysian national cuisine to call for international attention.

Rant: A typical Malaysian breakfast. Very disappointed with this yogurt brand, too sweet and too runny. Nasi lemak's anchovy was far too salty. Rendang sauce’s herbs were not browned and caramelized enough, l could still taste the green of the herbs. The tea served didn’t have much fragrance, we produced tea at Sabah and Cameron Highland, now what has happened? Why Malaysian own teas can’t be used to impress international passengers?

Rant: Lagsana was a bit too dry and salty just like its nasi lemak. Again, recipe should be revised or the chefs or cooks cooking skills and techniques should be monitored, trained and improved. The cheese was hardened. Blanched broccoli was just simply plain, was its purpose used to balance up the salty Lagsana?

Over salty and over sweetened food are always found in lower income group of people, what kind of passengers can afford flying cross-continent long distance and this is not Air Asia.

Rave: With a choice of Lasagna and Chicken rendang, good to hear there were such good choices. There were two kids flying alone with MAS escort during last year end, as their mom never wanted to prepare Lasagna for them, so they liked it and also because they were hungry.

MAS in-flight Dessert:

Rant: Brownie's texture should have crispy surface and chewy texture, little flour was added to produce brownie, it is mainly made up of quality chocolate chips, caramelized sugar, cocoa powder, lots of eggs, quality butter, some optional walnuts. This MAS version tasted like the chocolate cake instead! It is not necessary to serve a large piece of dessert, the dessert is a comfort food, an awesome small piece is much better and healthier than a large size piece called “junk food!”

Rant: This was served for both inbound and outbound flights. I only guessed it was the carrot cake due to carrot cake’s recipe usually called for cinnamon and soda. Overwhelming soda and cinnamon were tasted, I think carrot cost too much in Malaysia, I couldn’t taste carrot due to it was covered with cinnamon and soda. But surprisingly, I still could smell the egg which I thought vanilla could do a trick to cover the raw eggs smell, but there was no vanilla called for this recipe.

Terrible recipe, just like most poor kids suffered their untalented, calculative or stingy poor mom’s bad food, but have to keep quiet for ages - A typical Malaysian style.

Rant: Looked at the piece of cake at the side, I took a bite, I couldn’t tell if it was sugar caramelized cake or butter cake, it was so badly prepared.

I have realized the reasons why our variety of Malaysian cuisines have been undervalued and underpromoted by our own Malaysian, instead the second-class western food has been introduced on board, are we over-zealous to please westerners yet our national airline doesn’t have enough western trained chefs or just could employ mediocre chefs to prepare mediocre western food?

I was thinking why can’t MAS catering developed a fusion of Malaysian regional cuisines with a western twist, this kick-start could also introduce foreigners about Malaysian herbs, spices, and local produce effectively and also help to bring the best of Malaysian regional cuisines to world stage, and also help to sell our Malaysian agriculture produce effectively.

Even Hawker’s food could call for Michelin’s attention, MAS meal for economic class, although it has limited budget, if there is no severe corruption going on, giving the catering contract actually to someone who doesn’t love food but only interested in money, when the contract reaches the trained chefs, no good chefs would be willing to take such limited profit. MAS, a national airline which represents Malaysia should act as a leader to promote Malaysian regional and national cuisines effectively to foreigners.