Goodbye 2021, Hello 2022

Happy New Year 2022!

We had a simple home cooked dinner at home on New Year Eve. Too eager to start dinner that I forgot to snapshot the dishes I cooked. Nothing special. I cooked bbq pork belly (char siew), stewed chicken feet with dried shiitake mushrooms, blanched 1 green (choy fah) and stir fry beansprout. We will be having the leftover with noodle for lunch later.

New Year Eve Blessings from a friend who came to visit us.

We were blessed with fragrant biscuits or Heong Peah bought from Taiping,

and pandan layer cake from Klang.

Pandan layer cake is one of my favourite cake.

We enjoyed this cake because it is not very sweet, just nice for us.

It says here that the pandan layer cake has to be consumed within 3 days.

We need to finish the pandan layer cake before we can start to taste the fragrant biscuits.

Hubby bought some deep fried stinky glutinous rice cake (nian gao) for our friend to try.

He also bought a few pieces of deep fried taro slices.

This time I remembered to take a snapshot of the sticky, gluey glutinous rice cake sandwiched between thin slice of sweet potato on one side and thin slice of taro on the other side.

~~~~~

Breakfast on the 1st Day of New Year 2022.

Fish Noodle wine extra wine added,

plus some fried stuff,

and 2 bowls of herbal tea.

~~~~~

The following photos were taken a few months ago.

I heard dogs parking and when I looked out I saw these beautiful dogs passing by led by their owners.

The owners were taking their 3 dogs for a walk and when they walked past, other dogs were barking at them.

This was on another day.

The dogs caught sight of a cat which ran to hide under the truck parked by the roadside.

The dogs were restrained from going after the cat that was hiding under the truck.

Linking to Saturday's Critters.

A wise man restrains his anger and overlooks insults.

This is to his credit.

(Proverbs 19:11, The Living Bible-TLB)

Pork Noodle, Heong Peah, Claypot Chicken Rice

This was last Thursday. We had some things to do in town. After our morning walk, we got into the car and drove out to town.

Morning sky at 7:55am.

After having settled everything, we stopped at one coffee shop to buy breakfast.

We bought 2 portions of pork noodles. I ordered noodles with minced pork and sliced pork, without the innards. Mee sua for me and bihun+mee for hubby.

We received 2 packets of biscuits from my sister.

One packet is the fragrant biscuits (heong peah). The skin is flaky, crumbly pastry with sticky malt and shallot filling.

Heong Peah is best eaten when freshly baked.

The 2nd packet is the sesame puffs or sesame biscuits.

After hubby had finished setting up a bricks boundary for my vegetable patch, he went out to the nearby food court to buy ice kacang with extra ice shaving.

~~~~~

The cook was lazy and not in the mood to cook.

Hubby went out to buy claypot chicken rice and stewed duck.

We didn't finish the stewed duck. The leftover was kept in the fridge and used to served with instant noodle for hubby's next day lunch.

Jesus told them,

"In this world the kings and great men order their slaves around,

and the slaves have no choice but to like it!

But among you, the one who serves you best will be your leader.

(Luke 22:P25-26, The Living Bible-TLB)

Black Charcoal Heong Peah At 189, Gunung Rapat, Ipoh

I received a Whatsapp message on my mobile phone from my foodie friend. She invited me to join her for some afternoon snacks and at the same time to accompany her to buy some biscuits from Gunung Rapat. She needed to buy some 'Heong Peah' biscuits for her Sibu friend.

I hopped into her car and off we went to Gunung Rapat. I have my favourite homemade 'Heong Peah' biscuits but since someone recommended this shop, we were interested to give it a try.

The moment we entered the shop, we could smell the fragrance of the freshly baked biscuits.

I bought a packet just for trial taste.

The freshly baked biscuits are very crispy and flaky.

Usually, as a gift, one would buy the package with the biscuits individually packed.

Traditional method of making 'Heong Peah' biscuits.

These freshly baked biscuits are different from the original biscuits which are brown in colour. These are Black Charcoal 'Heong Peah' biscuits. Both my friend and I like these black biscuits, more crispy than the original ones.

Using modern technology to have the biscuits individually packed.

This way is definitely cleaner and more hygenic.

Trays of freshly baked biscuits.

Individually packed biscuits are dropped into the paper box.
Hope to visit this shop again for more of the Black Charcoal biscuits.

Address: Yat Pat Gao Enterprise (189 Enterprise in Cantonese)

Jalan Gunung Rapat (Opposite the Gunung Rapat wet market).

Look here, you people who say,

"Today or tomorrow we are going to such and such a town,

stay there a year, and open up a profitable business."

How do you know what is going to happen tomorrow?

For the length of your lives is as uncertain as the morning fog

- now you see it; soon it is gone. What you ought to say is,

"If the Lord wants us to, we shall live and do this or that."

Otherwise you will be bragging about your own plans,

and such self-confidence never pleases God.

(James 4:13-16, TLB)

Delicious Laksa At Gunung Rapat, Ipoh

On Friday, my friend and I were on our way to visit another friend. Half way through our journey, we received a message from the friend to apologize that she had something urgent to look into and will not be available.

Since we have nowhere else to go and it was raining, my friend suggested we go for a bowl of laksa noodle. I agreed because I can never refuse a bowl of delicious laksa, especially on a rainy day. We agreed to try out a place we both have not been to yet. A friend recommended this place to us.

From the main road Jalan Gunung Rapat, we drove straight past the market, until we reached Dewan Orang Ramai Gunung Rapat (community hall) on the left and SJK(C) Gunung Rapat (Chinese school) on the right. We turned right just immediately after the school and drove straight on until we reached the Dewan Tokong Fook Tat Chee (temple hall).

The temple hall is on the right. After the hall is the drink stall. After the drink stall is the laksa noodle stall. 

A black and white photo of the drink stall. The laksa noodle boss recommended us to try the special lemon drink from this stall. We tried and it was really good!

This is the laksa noodle stall. Under the 2 big shady trees!

The rain was no longer heavy but still drizzling lightly when we arrived at the stall.

Furnished with very simple wooden tables and chairs.

So many choices to choose from here,

and here also! These are covered and the flies are kept away!

These were our orders for my friend and I.

2 bowls of very delicious laksa. The laksa soup is thick and there were many pieces of fish in the soup. Besides laksa, there is also plain soup noodle, dry stirred noodle and curry noodle.

We picked some deep fried goodies or 'liew'.

The owner and others highly recommended this silky soft tofu.

We couldn't resist, so ordered 2 pieces just to taste and they were indeed silky soft inside. My friend bought some of this tofu and other fish balls home for dinner.

Tofu tasting session!

After the laksa lunch, we stopped here to buy some 'heong piah' biscuits. The brand name is 463. It was our first time here. We didn't know there was another side door for customers.

We each bought a packet @ RM8.50 (individually packed).

There are a few flavours but we chose the original flavour.

"What good is salt that has lost its saltiness?

Flavourless salt is fit for nothing - not even for fertilizer.

It is worthless and must be thrown out.

Listen well if you would understand my meaning."

(Luke 14:34-35, TLB)

Buying Heong Piah Or Heong Peng Biscuits As Gifts

Hi, my blogger friends and readers! It is good to be back again and I really missed you all! I have taken a short break of 8 days from blogging and it seemed like a long time. Do give me some time and I will be visiting your blogs soon.

It all started with teasing and pulling each other's leg ... and it led to the booking of air tickets to Hong Kong! My hubby was on Whatsapp chatting and joking with his group of friends and later when he informed me that we were going to Hong Kong, I thought it was a joke.

Anyway to cut the story short, we were on a short holiday in Hong Kong from 24th to 28th June, 2015. And a friend requested we stayed back in Semenyih after our Hong Kong trip from 29th June to 1st July. While we were there, we visited Sekinchan on the 30th June and came back to Ipoh on the 1st July.

On the 23rd June, the eve of our flight to Hong Kong, my assignment was to buy Heong Piah or Heong Peng biscuits, etc. as our gifts for our Hong Kong hosts and friends. I went to our favourite and regular place in Gunung Rapat to get the biscuits.

Our regular place is a house. These are home made biscuits. The place is clean and spacious. When we reached the house, the baking of the biscuits were in progress. I had the chance to snap some photographs.

The boss was already baking the biscuits in the earthen ovens, protected with an outer layer of wooden planks tied around the ovens. There are 4 ovens in the photo.

As we went closer to the oven, we get to see the freshly baked biscuits still sticking to the sides of the oven, waiting to be removed.

As you can see, the biscuits dough are stuck on to the sides of the oven. At the bottom of the oven, the empty coconut shells are burnt as fuel.

This is how the baked biscuits are being removed from the oven using a metal scrapper and container.

The whole place was filled with a nice scent of freshly baked Heong Piah biscuits.

Preparing the oven for the next batch of biscuits dough. Coconut shells are used as fuel. They are placed at the base of the oven.

Biscuits are being baked inside the oven.

Bags of scrapped coconut shells used as fuel or charcoal.

The freshly baked and piping hot biscuits are then placed on a big tray to cool down before packing.

One bagi is approximately 0.5 kg in weight.

Besides the Heong Piah or Heong Peng biscuits, there are other biscuits on sale.

If you are interested, the address is at No 177, Lorong 3, Gunung Rapat.
Contact number is 05-312 0972.
Business opens from Monday to Saturday. Off day is on Sunday.

Linking to Good Fences.

God has given each of you a gift from His great variety

of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.

(1 Peter 4:10, New Living Translation-NLT)