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Welcome

Welcome to Michelle's world of food. Why a blog? Simply because I love food and most of all, I love cooking. I contemplated calling this blog, "The skinny chef". However, on consultation with the bathroom scale, we both agreed that it was a bad idea. (We couldn't decide which was worse, the skinny part or the chef part...)



Wise men once said that music is the language of the world. I beg to differ. I say that food is the universal language of humankind!

Food transcends culture, geographical boundaries, time, race, ethnicity, social classes, religions and politics. Where else would you find two people with opposing viewpoints coexisting amicably? In a restaurant of course. 


I do not not profess to be a chef, except perhaps in my own kitchen! In fact, far from it. I just happen to be blessed with an innate ability to fry an egg without mucking up and most importantly, a wonderful husband and a neat group of friends who so obligingly put up with being guinea pigs in my cooking experiments. 


Hence, instead of keeping my gastronomic experiences in the big black suitcase collecting dust under my bed, I bravely decided to share them with the world.


Cooking is fun and like everything else, failure is just another learning experience. And, it does help to have a good sense of humour!





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Mini Chicken Curry Pies

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Guinness Beef Stew

There is a really neat legend about the humble origins of the Guinness beer. The Guinness beer is the brain child of Arthur Guinness. Back in the 1700s when medical science was in still in its infancy, people were getting illnesses and diseases just with drinking water. Ironically, they started turning to alcohol, mainly Gin which proved to be safer than their drinking water. Disheartened by the destitute caused by Gin which had plagued the city of Dublin, Arthur Guinness decided to brew a drink that not only the Irish would enjoy but will be nutritional to them. The beverage is none other than what is known today as the Guinness beer. It is supposed to be so full of nutrition that it is more like a meal! I had my first Guinness stew in an Irish pub; where else? And I absolutely fell in love with the rich, creamy texture and flavours the stew had to offer. Many years later, an Irish friend handed me a recipe for the stew and as with any good cook, I made changes to suit my taste. H

Coffee Spare Ribs

On our trip to Martinborough, I bought some spare ribs from Scotty. Like any good butcher, he asked what I was going to do with his produce. I think he was rather disappointed when I stared at him blankly and answered I had no idea. I think half of the world's population go grocery shopping with an idea in mind what they are going to cook. And the other half is probably like me, buy and decide what to do with the ingredients later. That is how I ended up with a freezer full of spare ribs until a bright idea came along. I recall savoring coffee spare ribs in a food court many years ago in Singapore. I thought it was the most intriguing idea; who would have imagine using coffee with meat. Perhaps it was one of those incidents where the cook mistakenly added coffee to the ribs thinking it was ground spice. Like the story of the Tatin sisters from France who "accidentally" invented the Tarte Tatin. The story goes that one of the sisters burnt an apple pie that she was makin