Pix from the Farmers' Market in Raub

The Sunday market in Raub is an endless source of inspiration and fascination for me because of the colours, textures and motifs that can 'accidentally' come to life if one only takes the time to observe...

Harmony in reds and yellows

A study in greens

Contrasting white and orange

Pink torch gingers...

Repetitious forms in harmony of yellow-green and neutrals

Muted reds and neutrals in a sweeping motion

Beignets de fleurs de courgette

On our way down from Mount Brinchang to Sungei Palas, we stumbled upon a vegetable farm called 'Mountain Strawberry Farm'. I wanted to know if anyone was growing zucchinis (courgette in French) and so we gave this one a try. Happily, they do grow zucchinis - just one single row of it. The worker that attended to us, a Bangladeshi man who has been working in the same farm for the past six years, was surprised that I wanted to buy zucchini flowers above all vegetables offered for sale because he too, eats them from time to time (I didn't ask how). However, when I told him that I only wanted the female flowers (those with a tiny zucchini attached to its stem), he became reluctant because (I could understand why) each female flower plucked equals to one future zucchini fruit lost. Besides, he didn't know what the boss lady might say to him...Not wanting to put him in a fix, I ordered a kilo of fresh zucchinis, some leeks, tomatoes and a head of iceberg lettuce and he happily plucked a dozen of male zucchini flowers for me to 'try'...all's well ends well with a little concession on all sides...

Cabbages in neat rows...

Tomatoes in the green house...

Pea flower...edible but not for sale either. The zucchini patch is on the back row...

The male zucchini flowers...not exactly what I wanted but will do for this time. I am sending the seeds to someone I know in Cameron Highlands to have them grown...

Voila the end result. I was pleasantly surprised with the result as the fried flowers were delicate, fragrant (somewhat like a fried sweet potato) and delicious. A sprinkle of fine sea salt at the end really helped bring out the delicate flavours of this dish.

Recipe for the batter:

In an ice-cold mixing bowl (double bowls with ice put in between)...
1 egg
3 tablespoon of flour
a pinch of salt
pepper
ice cold sparkling mineral water (like Perrier)

Thin the batter to a liquid consistency. Remove the pistils from the flowers and gently rub off the tiny hairs around the stems of the flowers with a piece of kitchen towel. Swirl the flowers gently in the batter and deep fry them in hot oil until golden (this will really only take a minute or two). Drain off the oil with kitchen paper towels and serve immediately with a pinch of fine sea salt.

Our 9th Anniversary Dinner

We celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary on the 14 March by throwing a dinner at home with some friends...

The table all set for dinner...

First course, a simple appetizer of king prawns sauteed in butter, herbs and tomato puree.

Main course: Oven-baked chicken with lemon, served with gratin de pommes de terre dauphinois

Recipe:

For one whole chicken (serves max 6)

2 unwaxed lemon (I grow my own)
3 strips of bacon, cut to tiny strips
1 whole head of garlic, smashed with skin
2 bay leaves
60 g butter
1/4 cup oil
1/4 cup strong liqueur like cognac, brandy or whisky
salt and pepper to season

Season first the chicken inside out with salt and pepper. Put the bay leaves in the chicken cavity. Preheat the oven to 220 C. In a small saucepan, saute the bacon strips (cut to pieces called lardon in French) using the melted butter in oil and add the garlic. Deglaze with the liqueur. Season the chicken inside out with this mixture in a roasting pan, adding zest from the lemons and bake for about 1 hour until tender. Before serving, prepare a roux (basically flour fried in butter as a base for sauces) and pour in the cooking juices from the roasting tin to make the sauce. Season accordingly.

For the gratin:
1 kg of new potatoes, peeled and cut to thin slices
1 liter of full cream milk
salt and pepper
dash of nutmeg

In a pot, half cook the potatoes using the milk seasoned with salt, pepper and a dash of nutmeg. Arrange the potatoes into a gratin dish, pour in the hot milk and add pieces of butter on top before putting the dish into a preheated oven. Bake until golden. Alternately, cheese can be added at the end of the cooking to give it a crust (I used Gruyere cheese).

Salad of romaine, radicchio, sorrel with toasted cashew nuts.

For dessert, orange-olive oil sponge cake served with orange liqueur syrup, to go with a cup of French infusion (verveine).

Recipe for the cake:

1 cup flour
3/4 cup sugar
5 eggs
3/4 cup olive oil
zest and juice of 2 oranges

In a mixing bowl (I don't use electric mixer), separate the yolks of the eggs from the white. Beat the yolks with the sugar and flour, add in the olive oil and half the orange juice.

In another bowl, beat the egg white with a pinch of salt to form stiff peaks. Fold in 1/3 of the egg white to the cake batter and the rest after this initial melange. Immediately put the mixture in a preheated oven (about 180 degrees) and bake for about 40 -45 minutes.

Zest an orange and cooked it together with the juice of the orange and 1/2 cup of sugar to form a syrup. Add a tablespoon of orange liqueur at the end. Serve as a sauce for the orange sponge cake.

Flora of Gunung Brinchang (2)

This is my third time up Mount Brinchang (6666 feet) and the trips never disappoint, despite the intermediate showers throughout this trip. We were at the Cameron Highlands for 2 days for a short holiday and it rained the 2 days we were there. Undaunted, we decided to give the Mossy Jungle Trail at Mount Brinchang a try after a lingering morning rain on our second day...

Spectacular view of morning mist rising from the mountains after the rain (from the observation tower)...

Another breath-taking view...

Farming activities at Brinchang...everywhere, scores and scores of red mud mar the fragile highland landscape and if you take a leisure drive down the Blue Valley and Bertam Valley, the sights are shocking as to what extend agricultural activities are permitted on sensitive highlands...

Hopefully, these views will last...

Delicate orchids on tree trunks in the rain

Almost alien-like: flowering bodies of lichens

A heath rhododendron

wild raspberries

A delicate pink rhododendron at the entrance to the Mossy Jungle Trail

View from the Mossy Jungle Trail.

Another rhododendron...

Big Nepenthes cups dangling from mossy tree branches...

Beautiful trio of Epigenium longipes.

Another close-up.

Rhododendrons are flowering everywhere!!!

A mountain epiphytic orchid, Chelonistele perakensis

Strange looking cabane on the way out

The rape of Mother Nature: Rafflesia situation in Raub

On Sunday 6 March 2011, I visited the farmers' market in town just to check out the local produce as usual. As I was reaching the end of the line of stalls, I was left dumbfounded to find a middle-aged man sitting nonchalantly on the tarmac selling...horrors of horrors...Rafflesia buds! Not wanting to alarm the man, I posed as an interested weekend tourist who didn't know any better to fish for information and guess what - the flower buds were sourced from the Rafflesia site in Ulu Dong, the current conservation candidate site in Raub!!!

Besides efforts from the limited manpower of the Forestry Department, the locals seem uninterested to conserve their natural habitat and this is where NGOs need to play a bigger and more active role. I hope MNS is paying attention and taking actions in the near future. I pledge to write to the Director of the Malaysian Forestry Department and MNS to solicit their immediate attention. Sale of Rafflesia flower buds has stopped for awhile now but a long period of silence at the site has definitely emboldened the looters...researches by some local universities are on going but I am sad to say that it merely never go beyond sampling, sampling and sampling and the continuous activities only serve to further tax the already heavily embattled site...

The mindless local selling these buds simply cut off the roots to extract the buds instead of plucking, albeit killing off the host and the parasite (Rafflesia is a parasitic plant).

Rosy salmon coloured bud, indicating freshly extracted flower buds within a week of blooming.

Among my first postings on Blogger

I dug up some old postings from the past in my blog list and this particular posting deserves a re-posting for all to read: it was about my experience of a 3-day visit to Paris with a friend just before coming home to Malaysia after having studied 5 years in France.

Last Dance in Paris (from 01 July 2009)

Enjoy!

Flowers of my labour

After more than two months of hard work with my water tub garden, some nice results can at last be appreciated by all...my backyard garden is a small space that I have specifically maintained during renovation of the house because I need to see the sky when I am resting or reading quietly on my favorite bench. The same spot offers chirping and calls of forest birds that come nearby to the bushes and secondary growth of the adjacent property.

Delicate white flowers of the Chinese arrowroot, Sagittaria spp.

Close up. Observe the minutely detailed pistil.

A family member of the water hyacinth found commonly in ditches and waterways in Malaysia, Eichhornia spp. All one need to do is to get a sapling from the ditch and voila...this plant does not float like the water hyacinth but does have spongy stems, albeit a very long one topped with a heart-shaped leaf.

My white tropical water lily growing happily in a tub.

Delicate and silky white flower of the Giant Amazon sword plant, Echinodorus spp.

The beautiful lilac blue flower of the Blue waterlily, Nymphaea lutens.

The Reedmace (Typha latifolia) grew so tall so fast that it overshot my 8-foot wall and now, flowerheads start to emerge...

Aquatic ginger, kind of like the local Bemban of the genus Thalia. Very vigorous plant that needs frequent feeding but the result is impressive under the hot sun.

Close up of the delicately arranged flowers. They call this plant Water Canna in the nurseries (as the leaves resemble that of the Canna lily, and justly, they belong to the same family of plants)

New dig in Raub

For the past two months, I was puzzled by lights outside a rubber estate in Lurah Bilut, just a km or two short of Kampung Asap on the way to Bentong. Then, I remembered a friend telling me she had a wonderful dinner inside a rubber plantation (mystery...mystery) and finally, during CNY, someone visited me and noted that there is effectively a resort-like restaurant in Raub. As I commute weekly from Kuala Lumpur to Raub, I decided to pay attention at this point of the route and voila a couple of weeks back, they finally decided to put up their banners on the roadside indicating the business inside...

Flashback to Saturday 26 February 2011...out of curiosity and adventure, I drove my wife to the spot and into the rubber estate, trying to 'surprise' her. Already, there were two cars ahead of us and really, after 20 minutes or so driving through some really gravelly 'path', we arrived at the resort aptly named Valley Resort. Obviously, we were not the only curious diners in Raub and Bentong as a spread on some local papers and words to mouth finally worked for them - there were almost no parking available...

Hundred coloured flags adorn the hill - an homage to legendary Chinese heroes (what's the pertinence here?)

The flow of the stream in the estate, Sungai Cermin, was stratified with cement barriers to create more dramatic cascades along the property. At the entrance, the moderately impressive cascade is natural.

Lakes were created to keep freshwater fish (tilapia and grass carps).

Dining inside huts suspended over the stream. The table tops were cut from huge chunks of wood. Nice touch. Could do away with the plastic chairs.

The cabanes for rent (about RM100+) per night. Quaint but need to investigate the interior first. Judging from the overall appearance of the 'resort', I'll keep my reservations first...

Swirling schools of tilapias in the lake coming up for fish food. I find the odour from the fish waste overwhelming (even my appetite) as there weren't any system put in place to address the problem (could the owners be immune to fish odour?). Overcrowded waterways (with fish) is not the way to keep a healthy resort (nor to stay in) - the ponds should at least be planted with water plants to help recycle the fish waste and to keep the odour problem in check...

Dining alfresco

View of the 'stage' for Karaoke. Surprising take on the concept of a resort meant for 'de-stressing' (the owner told me so)...barely we were into midway of our meal at 8 pm and there were already amateurs singing full throttle. Be warned.

The water flows over the walkway. Nice.

Crevices that create natural jacuzzis.

Evening lights...

Water from the stream was diverted and exploited for the landscape. Good idea but need to have good filtering and waste management so as not to pollute the already very fragile stream...

Our meal: calamari and long beans cooked in spicy Thai sauce

Sweet potato leaves stir-fried with fermented bean curds.

Tofu home cook-style

Night falls...