Grill Beef Fillet with Small Aubergine

I brought a fantastic beautiful Scottish beef fillet from the market, and I really wanted to make it simple, but tasty. I cut it into small pieces, then cooked it each side for a minute in a hot grill pan with simple black pepper and salt. At the end, splashed a half lemon or lime juice on top, then add a little bit coriander and chilly (optional) Job done. Simple but true beauty! The beef was melt into your mouth and tasty incredible.

I chose Strawberry Ice Cream dessert for tonight, simple but fatty!!! Sometimes lady needed a special treat.

Jamie Oliver’s 30 minutes Meal

John bought me Jamie Oliver‘s 30 minutes Meal on this Friday as a present, and I absolutely love it. We followed the book, and tried the ‘oozy mushroom risotto, spinach salad, quick lemon & raspberry cheesecake‘. It was so professional and so tasty. I have to admit that was one of the best mushroom risotto I had tried, certainly better than a lot of restaurants. The dessert was so easy to make and tasted incredible. We were so happy for the results and everyone can do it. It took us 45 minutes and it was dead simple.

Prague Trip


After 2 years living in the UK, we haven’t had much time to travel anywhere, so we decided to have a smart trip to Prague. John had lived there for a year back to 2005, and he would love to show me Prague and of course it is famous for its own beautiful. John said, living in Prague, just like living in a fairy tale city.

We stayed in a Vintage Design Hotel called Hotel Sax, and it was a fantastic hotel. We booked a super deluxe room with two bathrooms and a little balcony and a long corridor. It had including breakfast and five o’clock afternoon tea as well. It was a really funky hotel, modern, clean and so stylish; beside, the location was next to all the embassies, so it was very quite and near to town. In order to spoil ourselves as well, we booked a private spa including Jacuzzi and sona with really reasonable price, it made our trip more romantic and enjoyable.

John took me to eat a lot of homely Czech food (including some Radost FX vegetarian, and the Pivovarský dům microbrewery, they were fantastic and high recommended if anyone travels to Prague). Prague is famous for their own beer, and it was cheaper to drink a beer in the cafe than ordering a soft drink.

Prague centre was quite small and normal took 20-30 minutes to walk and you properly could see everything. Before I went there, I thought Prague properly would be more outdated because its past history. However, some areas and some people were, but overall, Prague’s cafe or restaurants were quite stylish and modern. Prague was really pretty and sometimes I did imagine what life will be if I were living there. I really want to return when it’s winter snow time, and I can be a snow princess in the fairy tale story.

Back to London / Sally visited us

Sally from Guangzhou came to visit us for a week, and stayed with us in Leeds. Unfornately I had to work most of the time. We drove together to visit York in a morning, and Sally seems like York quite a lot. I took a friday off and we returned to London for three days to show Sally London.

I do miss London so much, and it’s so excited to return back to London. Everything seemed the same, and I felt like I have never left it. I know people living in North or outside London, they don’t really like London’s busy, the tubes, the tourists, and the rush. For me personally, London makes me feel alive. I absolutely love the vibrate movement, the cool trendy people, the arts, the varieties choices, and multicultural environment, thousands of shops, cafés, restaurants. It has too many to offer, that’s why I love about London, except one thing I don’t want to admit about London that living costs are very expensive.

It’s good experience to live in a different city rather and meet new people. I enjoy our life in Leeds, and certainly, we love living in London very much as well. Someday we shall retune to the most exciting city again!

Miwa Visiting Me


Miwa was so kindly to come to Leeds to keep me accompanied because she knew that John will be away to Florida for a week, and she was afraid that I will be lonely. Miwa arrived Saturday afternoon, then we went to town to have a walk with Melanie, and done some shopping. I took her to the restaurant called Thai Edge. It was absolutely delicious, authentic with reasonable price. I got my favourite curry crab. I missed it so much. It was 4.5 out of 5 definitely.

We decided to go to Manchester on Sunday, and just chilled out and ate food. Miwa and I didn’t do much research, and just booked the ticket to Manchester. Two little girls were in the big strange city, but we managed well. We went to Tai Hu Dimsum restaurant we went before with John, and we ordered 10 dishes dimsum and finished them all. The time when we finished lunch, all the shops were almost closed.

It’s nice of Miwa spending time with me because she will be back to Japan permanently and I won’t see her easily like she is in London now. I am so glad that I got Eileen, Miwa and Vicky as good friends in London.

Friends forever, no matter where they are!

Ho’s Best Dimsum in Leeds

I love Ho’s Chinese Restaurant in Leeds city centre. We have been there many times, and feel like that it is our regular dimsum place. I took all my friends there and they all said Ho’s dimsum is one of the best, even better in Guangzhou. Ho’s dimsum is certainly home-made Chinese with fresh ingredients and big portions as well. Most importantly, it is cheap and you will be satisfied when you walk out the restaurant.

My colleagues and I went there for dinner as well. The quality of the normal Chinese food was really authentic and I felt like I was in Guangzhou or Hong Kong. I will never feel home sick if we have good dimsum in Leeds. I gave 4.5 out of 5. If you like good quality of Chinese food in Leeds, go and try some.

My home-cooked Asparagus with Cod Fish

Normally we eat a lot of home-made good food at home. In the past few weekends, we bought fish and cooked them with simple recipes. Last night, I pan-fried cod fish with garlic asparagus, and mash sweet potato, add one roast big mushroom. It was so simple, but extremely tasty. Do you like it when you see the picture? It was so delicious.

Home-made Italian Salami Pizza

Since we bought the panasonic SD-257 bread machine, and used to make all kind of bread. It’s a good purchase because we eat bread so often. It is incredible to use and you can enjoy fresh bread every day. We wanted to try to make some pizza bread, then we made our own pizza with delicious Italian Ham and salami, and home-made tomato chilly sauce. It turned out so pretty and delicious.

It’s 100% home-made with fresh ingredients and it encouraged us to do it more in the future. I do like cooking and spoil myself with a lot of good food.

Haworth – The Brontë Sisters Home

It’s a beautiful sunny weekend, so we both decided to travel somewhere. Haworth is one of the famous pretty town in the Yorkshire because of the The Brontës Sisters. After 30 minutes driving, we arrived the town. It was small, but pretty and peaceful. The sisters, Charlotte (born 21 April 1816), Emily (born 30 July 1818), and Anne (born 17 January 1820), are well known as a trio of sibling poets and novelists. I remembered that when we were in the University, we used to read Bronte sister’s book in our literature classes.

It was nice to visit Haworth and we certainly will go back for hiking there. We picked a cafe where was home-baked bread and produced local meat for lunch. John ordered a really big roast beef with Yorkshire pudding, and I ordered a big breakfast with tea. It was reasonable price with big portion and quality tasty food. I do wish all the tourist places should be like that, not over-priced horrible normal food.

I really enjoy little trip like this.

Sia Concert in Shepherds Bush

I discovered Sia Furler while we watched last episode of the TV series “Six Feet Under” a year ago. The song “Breath Me” is unforgettable and wonderful ending for the TV series. Thereafter, I have been listening Sia’s since then. Sia was one of the vocals in Zero 7 previously and went solo in 2005.

In Shepherds Bush Empire night on 9 Oct, the concert set decorated with toys and fluorescent, I guess it matches her third album’s image – funky and cartoonish. At the beginning, surprisingly, Sia and her band members all dressed up in a halloween skeleton outfit approaching the stage. Sia sang the most from the album “Some People Have Real Problems”, including Destiny and The Pageant of the Bizarre wrote for Zero 7. Sia used her popular hit ” Breath Me” end the show. The fans were so enthusiast with big applauses and on-call, and Sia moved into tears in the end.

Sia has a gorgeous, dusky voice, sometimes it reminds me as a Jazz vocalist. I enjoyed the concert and so pleased to see her performance.

I recommend her best album “Some People Have Real Problems”to you, especial “Breath Me”, “Sunday”, “The Pageant of the Bizarre” and “Soon We’ll be Found” – they are my favorites.

Here is her amazing music video of this song in Youtube: Sia-Soon We will be Found

Go to see more pictures of the concert in Flickr by Preamble . The cover picture was taken by him too.