The Soup Queen

Remember I was complaining how my hair was falling like crazy some months ago? My hair salon lady told me it could be the rice intake. So I started eating more rice and also ate a host of other stuff (black sesame and white sesame seeds) and realized that my hair issue did improve. Organic Herbal Shampoo Powder from Vanamoolika India The back shows you the ingredients used in this powder shampoo.  I also observed that my hair fall increased when the weather was hot and my scalp was sweaty and itchy. I usually wash my hair every two days but sometimes when my scalp became too itchy, I had to wash my hair daily. I realized it also helped prevent hair loss. I deduced that when my scalp is itchy, the hair follicles may be "open" and this made my hair drop. While I feared daily hair washing could increase the number of hair dropping, the reverse was true. When I washed my hair daily and my scalp was cool, hair fall became less and less. I was so relieved! ...

Ripe berries or fruits from my 9 foot curry leaf tree.  This is a photo of the ripe fruits from my 9 foot curry leaf tree or known scientifically as  Murraya koenigii   . Yes, most curry leaf plants are about human height.  Mine is a bit special because when it was still a young sapling, I used a lot of my own homemade compost . It had so much of nutrients that it started growing taller and taller.  Right now, it is shading the compost pots!  Which means I am cooler when I stand under this tree to do my daily composting. You see how wonderful it all works out to be?  Because these berries attract the Asian koel (black birds with fiery red eyes which make the annoying loud "ku-yo, ku-yo" sounds), the curry leaf seeds get propagated everywhere.  Yet some drop right under the tree and start growing. I have a curry leaf sapling attack haha. I keep pulling the saplings up as there's just too many.  Besides throwing ...

Remember I mentioned about he shou wu , a herb that helps hair growth? It's also called Fleeceflower Root or Polygonum Multiflorum. (My hair shenanigans were a big deal to me. You can read about Shou Wu Chih or my hair darkening tea posts.) I bought some - actually RM5 worth of it - and boiled it a couple of times. Each time I also added some dried black dates too. Initially I'd simmer the herb over the stove but later decided to use my slow cooker. When i couldn't finish drinking it all I'd store it in an old-fashioned thermos flask. Two weeks ago I was in town buying dried scallops and Chinese sausages for my mother in law when I decided to ask the shop assistant if they had he show wu. Mind you, this was a Chinese medical store cum grocery store.  So below was what they recommended to me. It was RM16.50 for a 200gm pack. When I opened it, the slices were thicker and darker. It wasn't sliced thinly - in fact it was hard and knobbly lik...