The Soup Queen

UPDATE: Please see this post as we are no longer practising PVH.  Before your eyes grow wide with surprise, no it's not me. I'm far from it. I couldn't be one because I may not have the patience to deal with people's problems. It's my husband, Nic.  In the past 3 years, his ability to help people spiritually has improved so much from the time he learnt PVH in 2016. In fact, he has learnt much on his own with his own research and reflection and solving health and metaphysical problems. This has brought me to believe that in his past life, he was a healer or herbalist or doctor. This is just a continuation of his past self.  When I say spiritual healer, what comes to your mind?  I've tested this question with many people; some are strangers, others are friends and some are family members.  Once I brought it up to a friend and she looked at me incredulously and said, "But I thought you were logical!"  How does being logical be at odds with being spiritual...

When I've been working too hard and sitting through too many Zoom meetings and having too many online webinars, my brain gets tired and my body feels heated up! I find that screen radiation affects me a lot so I try to limit my screen time and most times, to no avail! (It doesn't help that I am in the digital space and that I need to work on stuff on my Mac all the time - from my podcast to my live streams and to my main business ).  I felt really exhausted this week as I was also rushing to complete some important content for a client. She was in the running for a major award and needed help to brush up on her submission profile. The thing with submission profiles is that there's always a pressing deadline! And limited words is another. Most people think it's easy to write 250 words than 1000 words but trust me, it is much harder to be concise than to be long-winded.  So work being work, and life being life, a lot of things can stress up the body.  When I sit too lon...

Wood ear fungus and cucumber salad Sometimes I have cravings and of late I have craved mushrooms of all types! Hence my post on making snow fungus dessert and now this wood ear fungus salad.  This is a super easy salad that can be made in 5 minutes and goes well with rice or even as an appetiser.  Wood Ear Fungus Salad  A handful of dried wood ear fungus, soaked until soft - drain well  Half a cucumber washed and roughly chopped into chunks A tablespoon of sesame seeds, toasted  1 tablespoon of rice vinegar  1 tablespoon of soya sauce 1 teaspoon of sugar  1 pinch of salt  1 bird's eye chili, chopped  In a bowl, combine all the above. Mix well and let it rest in the fridge for 10 minutes. Serve chilled.  Benefits of Wood Ear Fungus Auricularia polytricha - that's their scientific name - is usually sold dried and you must reconstitute them by soaking in water before you use them. It has a crunchy texture and helps  people with high bl...

Just last week I made this dessert because I was rummaging in my kitchen and found some snow fungus. This is a classic dessert that any Cantonese would know. I was just surprised at myself that I haven't made this dessert in a long time. Maybe because I didn't have the key ingredient - snow fungus - at hand! What is Snow Fungus?  It is technically a fungus that grows on dead bark or tree stumps just like wood ear fungus.  Snow fungus or silver ear, snow ear or white wood ear is known as Tremella fuciformis and yes, it is an edible fungus. The pleasanter term is mushroom if that makes you feel better. As most mushrooms go, they contain vitamin D, zinc, calcium, and folate.  Benefits of Snow Fungus Snow fungus is said to have anti-ageing effects due to the presence of superoxide dismutase , an enzyme that acts as a potent antioxidant throughout the body, particularly in the skin. It is best known in TCM for nourishing the lungs and we know how important this fact is right n...

  I made American ginseng soup with pork ribs over the weekend since I had recently bought some herbs from my favourite herbalist in town, Veng Tatt Soon.  Over the past few months, we have been making watercress soup with pork ribs and I was getting rather tired of that soup! However watercress soup is great for the lungs (especially if you are coughing, or a smoker or feeling heaty) and now what with the pandemic, it is simply one of the better ways to boost one's immunity. And unlike lotus root soup , you can freeze watercress soup without any change to the watercress texture.  I usually make about 8 servings of soup in my stock pot. This means I can freeze the other portions for other days. So making soup on the weekend means I get to drink soup over the next 3 days at least.  This packet of herbs consisted of:  American ginseng (3.8gm),  Bei Zi (12gm),  Dang Shen (12gm),  Solomon Seal or Yok Chok (19gm),  Goji (12gm),  Red Dates (38...

I've been growing my own mulberry trees and after a few times of pruning the branches and learning a secret gardener's tip, the tree or bush has been proliferating well.  In fact, the regular rain (it is quite rainy these days in Penang) and the humid, hot sun have helped the tree flourish well. I also use a lot of compost (from my own compost pots) on the tree, placing scoops of compost around the root and the base of the tree from time to time (or when I am feeling like a hardworking gardener).  As I write this, we're in our third lockdown phase in Malaysia (until 7 June or is it 10 June? I can't recall). So lots more pottering about at home and gardening I guess! Even Singapore (where my sis is) is also going back to a lockdown phase as virus variants are emerging. It seems you can't read any news without mention of the virus and how things are faring across the region. As someone who works in digital and mostly online , I am kept occupied with clients' proje...

I've been making this simple tea for a few times already. Not sure if I had shared this before but all it needs are 3 ingredients - dried goji berries, dried red dates and dried chrysanthemum bulbs. This sugar-less concoction is good for health especially if you want to maintain immunity. It's even more important these days what with the pandemic and Covid-19. But it is also a pleasant brew - no boiling needed. All you need is a handful of goji berries (washed and soaked for 5 minutes in water), 3-5 large dried red dates and a teaspoon of dried chrysanthemum flowers (these are the small heads of flowers, not the usual type for making chrysanthemum tea). Put all the ingredients in a teapot and pour in boiling water. Let it sit for 10 minutes and voila, you have made yourself a healthy tea without sugar. It has a natural sweetness from the red dates and goji berries. And once you have drunk all the tea, you can continue adding more boiling water for a second b...

We've been in partial lockdown due to Covid since 18 March in Malaysia. Nic and I were lucky as we had just got back in time from our trip to Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC). Meeting Uncle Ho at the HCMC Post Office which is still in use!  We had gone for a week to visit friends in Vietnam and just chill a bit. It was also my post-birthday travel - a little bit of me-time that I try to take once a year. Each year, I try to visit a new country that's one plane ride away. Nic and I went to the Reunification Palace or Independence Palace.  Inside, there were lots of old, stately furniture but nothing much. If you're in Saigon, just skip this.  More old furniture. A bit ghastly to me.  Food was great though! This was at a popular bistro named Propaganda. What a name.  I don't like transits and last year I did one major solo trip - Penang to Narita for a transit and then Narita to Honololu. It took me almost 30 hours each way including all tho...

I wanted to link to this article about a doctor named Dr Wu Lien Teh as not many Malaysians know about him and the tremendously significant work he has done in terms of medicine and fighting plagues. He is also Taishanese (or Toishan as I call it). I am proudly Toishan (though I haven't yet visited the ancestral village in Taishan). I speak Toishan even now with my 77 year old dad and my 15 year old nephew and 13 year old niece, in addition to speaking the language with my second sister when we want to say stuff in front of people! I first heard of Dr Wu when my uncle asked me about this man and I saw an entire book about Dr Wu at a local bookstore about 2 years ago. Dr Wu is definitely illustrious and accomplished. And we all need to know a little about history or our past. Especially when our past is so important to our understanding of the future! "Born in Penang in 1879 to a family of immigrants from Taishan, China, Dr Wu Lien-Teh received his primary and second...

Remember I wrote about trying out Joanne's fruit kefir and getting excited about making mine? Well, I did a batch of dried longan and dried red dates kefir just a week ago. I added them to my kefir for a second round of fermentation at room temperature for another 2 days (the first round is just the kefir, water and sugar for 2 days at room temperature). It tasted fabulous as fabulous can be. It had a light fizziness with a subtle hint of longan sweetness and red date fragrance. I also tried making a batch of pear kefir but pears aren't exactly a strong-tasting fruit so I couldn't detect much of a pear flavour. But definitely try out the dried longan and dried red date combination. I find that it's the most interesting taste for me.

Carol gave this to me a few months ago and I had put it aside because I didn't have time to figure out what it was and I knew it was either some herbal tea or dessert. Finally, I had some time last weekend and decided to cook this - not the entire block of course. The brown block consists of 6 mini blocks. I just used one of the mini blocks just to test it out. Actually, no cooking was needed. It's so easy that even a child could make this. Top marks for extreme convenience! I was puzzled by the instructions nonetheless. Whoever who wrote this doesn't know what he or she is writing about. It needed some deciphering so I read it once and realized it's a jelly. It seemed simple enough except that the tip given was quite confusing. What does it mean - hot drink recommended? Does the company mean it's best taken warm? But how could the jelly be eaten warm when it had to be refrigerated? Anyway, this is what happens when the company pays no attention ...

UPDATE: Please see this post for the latest update as we are no longer practising PVH.  Just the other day, I suddenly thought how lucky Nic and I are that we got to know PVH (Prana Violet Healing). I am thankful that we learnt this healing method and have not only used it on ourselves to get rid of minor aches and pains but Nic has also used PVH for more than a year now to heal others. PVH is possibly the most effective healing modality I know. There's no touch involved and you don't need surgery or special exercises or diet. It is simply healing oneself using the divine energy that is transmitted through the PVH healing wand which looks like a plastic cocktail stirrer. The PVH healing wand has done many wonderful healings for people with physical afflictions and spiritual disturbances (ghosts or spirit entities). Don't be shocked or afraid of hearing about spiritual disturbances. They exist and yes, they do affect people's health. Side story and true one too:...

I was over at Joanne's apartment two weeks ago when she asked if I'd like some kefir. I make my own kefir too at home but mine is just regular water kefir without a second fermentation and without fruits. Nic is such a purist that he refuses to add any fruits to his kefir. Joanne, on the other hand, is one who loves fruits in her kefir. She served me a mug of water kefir with chopped apple and hawthorn. It tasted really fizzy and sweet and I loved the texture and crunch of the apple. She told me she makes all sorts of fruit kefir drinks. Sometimes she would take the time to chop up fruits she finds in her fridge; other times, she'd pop into Jusco nearing closing time and buy two bottles of their concentrated fruit juice (guava for instance) and add this into her water kefir and ferment it in the fridge. I thought it was a smart idea to buy ready juices - I can't imagine pulling out my juicer and juicing fruits only to spend the next 20 minutes washing out the...

This is a super easy soup for days when I have no herbs in my fridge. All you need are 4 vegetables that you can easily buy from the market or supermarket - burdock, radish (with the green tops), corn and carrot. You don't need to use all of the burdock which also goes by the name of gobo. Burdock is a long, dark brown root and you can use one foot of the root. The rest can cut up and kept in a zip lock bag in the vegetables section of your fridge. Slice burdock into small chunks.  For the daikon, just peel off the skin and chop up everything including the green leafy tops into chunks.  Break the corn up into 3 sections. Peel the carrot and chop into small chunks.  Into a large pot, put in 1.5 liters of water. Bring to boil. Add in blanched pork bones or half a chicken, with bones. Add in all these chopped up vegetables and bring to a rolling boil again. Once the soup is boiling briskly, cover the pot. Lower the fire to the smallest flame...

I have been making the same watercress soup each week whenever I get to buy fresh watercress in the Lip Sin wet market. In the wet market, it is either lotus root or watercress. While I like lotus root soup, it doesn't freeze well. I usually make a large pot of soup and freeze the leftover portions in individual containers. If you freeze lotus root, its texture crumbles. When you reheat the soup, the soup still tastes great but the lotus root won't be as lovely to bite into! That's why I stop myself from buying lotus root. But watercress is different. It keeps its texture and the soup tastes even better if kept in the freezer. My soup is usually drunk over the course of a week so that's the maximum I keep the frozen portions. Anyway, watercress soup is always a taste of familiarity. It is a taste of homemade goodness and it is a soup that keeps our lungs healthy with lots of Vitamin C. Nic and I have been kept busy with projects and now that he is a he...

I have been away for most of July. In fact, I think I spent only a week in Penang and the rest was out of Penang! I was attending a two-week programme in Honolulu, Hawaii and that itself was such an amazing experience. This is what happens when you take a chance on yourself. With some of my international friends from Asia Pacific at the East West Center in Hawaii I had applied for the programme and strangely, had a strong feeling that I would get into it. Perhaps it was the universe prompting me to go out there and get out of my comfort zone and explore the world. Long story short, I was accepted for the programme on scholarship and was the only person selected from Malaysia. That made me quite proud of myself! (For the whole story of how that happened, head on over to my other blog at Mayakirana.) To get to Hawaii, I had to do a few things - apply for my US visa, get my own air tickets and prepare my action plan . Yes, all of us 16 participants from all over the Asia ...

I was in Manila last December with my dad and sisters when I stumbled upon a herbal tea called Ashitaba. The pretty cabins in Baguio highlands with its pine trees  We were visiting my uncle who lived in Manila with his Filipina wife. He is already retired from corporate life (he used to work for the World Bank and had had work stints all over the world). He decided to retire in Manila instead of Penang as he wanted to be near his son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter but I also think he likes the easy accessibility of being able to fly east or west as he likes from The Philippines. The Baguio pine tree forest just outside our balcony - cool mornings with fresh air!  This uncle of ours had always asked us to visit him in Manila and finally after much coercion (and not that my dad or his brother are going to get any younger), my sister booked us all on a trip to visit this uncle. As part of the itinerary, Uncle Mike wanted to get us out of the humid city that...