Starting from the beginning, haven't posted since Christmas and it's already almost new year! There's still Christmas cheer here and there though, and I know my restaurant game is still looking festive with all its Christmas trees and stockings. The bus I went on recently was brightly decorated in the Australian Christmas theme- green and gold tinsels everywhere and globes hanging from the ceiling.

From W

It's kind of impossible to take a non-blurry picture with my phone camera and the movement of the bus doesn't help. Apparently, many bus drivers and their families took part in decorating their buses to get donation for West Mead hospitals, so the kids can get some Christmas presents... =) Did anyone hop onto a nicely decorated bus and support them?

From W

Tt went and impulse bought a phone. It's a Sony Ericsson slidey phone!

From W

He was going to buy this white vodafone one =__= thank goodness someone stopped him. Instead now he's got this sleek T715, thanks to yours truly~ =D

From W

And we finally had the mont blanc from Azuma. It was... a bit weird, because it didn't really taste like chestnuts... When it comes to chestnut cakes, I think Savoy does a better job than Azuma, though their strawberry cakes are really good.

From W

Tt got us this~ but our Christmas tree is too tiny to put this on, it'll just collapse. Inside are chocolate truffles =D Very sweet, perfect for a sugar hit bright early in the morning =P Yea, I eat chocolate for "breakfast" if there's nothing else.

From W

Then there was Sunday, when I had to work. Brother and sister went out to enjoy themselves at Leichhardt and Strathfield while I was stuck at work =_= But they came home to cook for dinner and this is what they made.

From W

All ingredients in the pot, turn on the fire...

From W

When it boils, put the pot into the magic cooker... and leave for hours. The heat is retained and the food continues to cook inside the magic cooker. It really saves a lot of gas and gets the food cooked pretty fast too. This oxtail soup spent two hours inside the magic cooker before being placed back on the stove for a low simmer for another half an hour. Dinner is ready.

From W

Balsamic vinegar for the..

From W

freshly baked bread...

From W

Sliced and piled into a tall mountain...

From W

and with a drizzle of olive oil and a dash of balsamic vinegar, you get a form of bruschetta~ to be served with the oxtail soup.

From W

The oxtail soup is almost complete.

From W

Very healthy vegetable oxtail soup.

From W

Oxtail were taken out and put into a pasta sauce, served with pasta.

We haven't had oxtail for a long time. In the past, my dad used to make oxtail soup fairly often. Then it became a little too unhealthy for him, he had to go on diet pills and all that rubbish, so he stopped making oxtail. My brother apparently spent half an hour or so taking off all the fat from the oxtail ^^''

From W

Yesterday~! After finishing work, I met with my sister at the train station before heading off to Chatswood to meet my brother for dinner/movie. Went to Chatswood's branch of Takeru. My usual, haha, Kaisen Don.

From W

My sister's half size omelette rice with meat sauce.

From W

Ordered their soft shelled crab salad~

From W

My brother's rather ugly looking curry hamburg rice.

From W

They had the same touch screen for ordering as Wagaya. I have a feeling that because they're so similar, Takeru and Wagaya are actually working together.

The movie, which was "Bodyguards and Assassins", was due to start at 9:30pm and we had plenty of time to waste after dinner, so we headed over to a cafe called "Hello Happy" cafe. There's another branch of it at Strathfield, which my brother and sister went to on Sunday without me =P so that was my first time going into Hello Happy.

From W

The bakery/cafe had a warm and homely feel to it, with its interior furnishing mainly wood and lit with yellow incandescent lights.

From W

Their cafe was decorated in a style very similar to the Bald Man chocolate cafe with its weird looking cartoon characters, with a giant quote that's quite sweet =)

From W

We ordered a cake each, and I ordered a cup of Earl Grey. It came pretty much instantly because the cakes were on display and there weren't any additional decorations like cream or ice cream or chocolate drizzles. Not that I minded- the cakes were beautiful just on its own.

From W

My sister chose a chocolate tart, similar to the Excellence Tart that Lindt Cafe offers. It must have been about 75% dark chocolate because it was quite bitter.

From W

My brother's. I'm not too sure if this was pear or peach, though the top slice looks like a peach slice. He enjoyed it, I didn't try much of this though. Peach mousse with slices of peaches in between with the top slice slightly caramelised =D Flame torch usage there perhaps?

From W

My sister and brother had already tried this, but I ordered it anyway, cos I haven't =P It's a chocolate mousse- very chocolatey because of the ganache around the mousse cake, but the macaroon added a very nice touch to it, along with the nuts on top. Each cake was dotted with a little edible gold too, so they looked absolutely beautiful. We did go at around 8pm though, so it's kinda expected that most of the cakes have sold out. It would be really nice to see what other kind of cakes they have, because I suspect this cafe is like Azuma, with different selections each day- some prone to being sold out extremely quickly.

From W

The Earl Grey came in a very pretty pink flora cup with a sieve inside containing tea leaves. Must say, I'm glad they used real tea leaves as oppose to the cheaper alternative- tea bags.

From W

We also ordered these chunks of maccha-covered chocolate cubes. Came in a very cute small porcelain tray in the form of a teapot.

From W

Very bitter maccha with dark, dark chocolate. I was glad to have ordered the tea, or it would have just been an absolute overdose of chocolate. My brother proceeded to tell an extremely lame joke- that there's "maccha" in the "teapot"... =_= don't worry if you don't get it, too lame to be gotten =P

The movie itself was pretty good. Plenty of action, "shuai" hk actors galore- though they got killed one after another, there was English captions (my Chinese has grown very rusty) and the music was actually quite well done too. Would have enjoyed the movie a lot better if there weren't this super annoying couple from HK sitting behind us. First they brushed popcorn from their seats... all over my sister who was sitting directly in front of them. Then they talked non stop. And I do mean non-stop throughout the whole movie. You'd think because there are fighting scenes, the loud music would cover their voices, but no, they raise their voices accordingly as well. Three times, I turned around to express my annoyance, and they blatantly DO NOT get the hint! Seriously, people who cannot keep quiet in the cinema should just rent dvds, sit in their own living rooms and talk as loud as they want throughout. Was so tempted to turn around and take a flash photo of them to put up here with the captions "Avoid if sighted in cinema". Wished tt was there to tell them off =(

Anyway, won't be working for the next 3 days, so there's some time out to enjoy and spend some time with tt and my sister. Where should we go?~ ^^

On a random note~

From W

New pen given by my mum. Christmas is over, so she got it for quite cheap. I took it to work with me so people can sign their credit slips with it. =D Haven't lost it yet~ but it's so cute, I don't doubt it'll get stolen, so I'll be vigilant and keep an eye on it since it was given by my mum, haha~