Hello again! I know it has been awhile. This year’s had a pretty insane start—with the LA fires, the new administration, and just life as usual. But I’m back! I had a lovely start to summer and now it’s already almost over. Visited my family in Boston, saw Hozier in concert at Fenway Park, road-tripped to Newport, Rhode Island, and bopped around Europe to places that hadn’t been on my radar before. So let’s recap. Proceed with caution. This will be a very long post.
Every year, I travel for my birthday. I started this tradition in 2018 because I just didn’t feel like hosting dinners anymore. Not that there’s anything wrong with hosting dinners, but it was starting to feel awkward as I got older because of combining different friend groups who don’t really mesh and not wanting to leave anyone out. In those situations, it’s difficult as a guest to mingle when you’re seated at a big table, stuck talking to the stranger sitting next to you. My new tradition has been more fun because I get to pick a different destination every year.
I know it has been almost a year since I’ve written. It has been weighing heavily on me and I had been mentally beating myself up for having taken this long to write again. I got a new contract/work client and that has consumed most of my year, and sadly, it has taken me away from my passion project. Such is life. Gotta make money to live. But also, I really needed to take a mental health break and do some internal healing.
France has been a huge part of my life. I studied abroad in the French countryside when I was 19. I visited my French cousins who grew up there. My first job in fashion sent me to France and other parts of Europe. After my mother’s marriage to my stepfather, I also gained three French stepbrothers who grew up in France. But it has been awhile since I’ve visited.
What is car-camping you ask? It’s camping, but instead of sleeping in a tent, you sleep in a car. It was a first for me this past weekend and will probably be my LAST time as well! Lol. It wasn’t my idea. But I do love adventure, road-trips, nature, and new experiences, so I was completely open to the idea. It was also my first time in the mountains of Idyllwild.
Ever since my mother’s brain injury last year, I’ve been visiting Boston more often to check in on her. Things are different and will never be the same. A fact of life I have to accept. Life is short and I want to take advantage of the time I have with my mother. I thought it would be nice to take her and my stepdad on a road trip, to change up their environment and do something new, especially since the last year has been challenging for them. For all of us really.
Even though it’s June in Los Angeles, it doesn’t quite feel like summer yet. The days have been gloomy and chilly still. But just because the weather doesn’t cooperate, it doesn’t mean you can’t get yourself in the mood with some light summery food! I love fruit and any salads that incorporate it in some way. I’ve been making this Mango Quinoa Salad for the last decade but have never taken the time to write down the recipe. It’s light and refreshing.
It has been awhile since I have written. Life can be so confusing. I think I’m going through a mid-life crisis. Is that possible? Something had been feeling off and it had been difficult to pinpoint. But I knew, I needed to change my environment, even if temporarily, to change my energy, flow, and focus.
It has been freezing in Los Angeles lately. Hard to believe that we got hit with so much rain, a hail storm, and snow! Fortunately, the sun has started to show this week but the air is still quite cold. It has been hard to get out of my apartment and out of my sweat pants. I got my fireplace on and I just want to curl up on my couch underneath a big blanket. This is the time for comfort food and Beef Bourguignon is on my menu. It gives me all the cozy feels. I got leftovers. No need to leave my apartment for the next few days.
Happy New Year! I know I’m over a month late but so much has happened since the holidays. Once November hit, the rest of the year became a blur. December was very busy with lots of holiday parties, dates, and family time. Unlike the previous two lonely pandemic years, I had a fun holiday season. Things were going really well and I had a very active social calendar, which I think contributed to me getting mildly sick at the beginning of December. Not Covid though, thankfully.
I love to travel every year for my birthday and this year was no different. I decided to do a Yoga Retreat in Panama, which allowed me to check off another country from my list. My birthday was back in November but time has flown by since! Spent one and a half weeks in Panama, then returned to several of my own birthday celebrations, then Thanksgiving, and now suddenly we’re deep into December holiday parties. And this is the reason for my super late post.
Contrary to what most people outside of southern California believe, Los Angeles does get cold in the winter. I can already feel the temperature begin to drop in the evening. It’s even a bit chilly during the day in the shade. The breeze is cooler. The morning air smells different. I can feel myself beginning to sink into hibernation mode.
When I dip, you dip, we dip. I love dips, condiments, sauces. Just give me more so I can smother my food in it. I created this sauce originally to eat with my air-fryer wings and then I ended up eating it with everything and anything I could dip into it. I love the combination of spicy, sweet, and sour with herbs. My love of herbs comes from Cambodian food. The more, the better! Sharing with you the recipe and I hope you like it!
So August came and went and somehow we’re in October already! I spent most of August trying to pick myself back up again post-Covid isolation. Being social helped bit by bit. I even did some retail therapy and ya know what? It worked! Lol. I hadn’t really shopped all year but treating myself to some new outfits, expensive French perfume, and a fancy facial made me feel brand new again.
Chinese Egg + Tomato Stir-fry. Easiest thing to make when you’ve run out of most of your groceries and don’t know what to make. So yummy!
Whenever I return from a trip, all I want is a hot bowl of soup. As you may know from following my Instagram account, I love all types of soup. One that I started making more regularly recently is the Chinese Hot and Sour Soup. It’s so flavorful. There’s something about the sourness, saltiness, and the spice that just hits the spot. I love the crunchy textures of the bamboo and water chestnuts as well as the softness of the tofu and egg ribbons. So yummy.
Whenever I’ve had Chicken Marsala out at restaurants, it’s usually not that good. It’s always too creamy. They never use enough mushrooms and that is my favorite part of the dish! I decided to make the dish myself minus the chicken, so basically a Mushroom Marsala.
Oh my goodness. I cannot believe I have not written a blog post since April! It has been awhile. I guess I just needed to take a little time (or a lot of time) for my mental health. After having a breakdown in March/April, it took awhile for me to pick myself up again. It’s not something that happens in a day. Or even a week or a month. There’s not one thing that makes it go away. And sometimes the things that have worked before don’t work anymore. It’s a process. A journey.
Who loves garlic butter shrimp? I do! It’s also a super easy dish to make with few ingredients. I always have frozen shrimp in my freezer so this was an easy go-to meal to make, especially after not having been to the grocery store in almost a week!
Sometimes you need to break down to build up and heal. It has been the worst last two months. With everything that happened with my mom, life has been so stressful. Now that she’s home from the hospital and on the mend, and I’m back in LA, I thought the pressure that had been building up inside of me was going to subside. But it didn’t. It continued to build and build and there was no escape.
You can't buy time, turn back time, stop time, speed up time, or slow down time. When it comes to the people you love, there is never enough time. Life is strange and things can change in a matter of seconds. To say that the last two weeks have been tough is an understatement. It has been one of the scariest and most challenging moments in my life. My mom is my most favorite person in the world and to see her in pain, in critical condition, broke my heart.
Chinese / Lunar New Year is tomorrow! I celebrated with my friends by going out for Peking Duck at Ji Rong in San Gabriel Valley. This dish from Beijing is characterized by its crispy, thin skin, served with spring onion, cucumber, and plum sauce, wrapped in a warm, soft, thin pancake like a tortilla. It was so delish and such a special treat!
I’m not a huge baker, but lately I’ve been enjoying trying new dessert recipes. Maybe it was the holiday season that got me in the mood. Desserts can sometimes be challenging to get right but they are pretty simple to make. It’s always nice to have a sweet treat throughout the week that you made yourself!
Happy New Year! I’m a little late writing my first post of 2022 because…frankly, I’m still processing lol. The month of December was such a fog. I caught a cold from, I think, the one night I chose to go out with a big group of people for Santa Pub Crawl. It wasn’t Omicron, but who knows anymore with all this talk of false negatives.
Typically, pie is not my favorite dessert with the exception of pumpkin pie. A pumpkin tart is even better because it has the perfect ratio of filling and crust. Most pumpkin pies or tarts tend to be a little too sweet for me. Because it’s the holiday season, I thought I’d try making it myself. And it was so easy and so good!
Each year, I try to plan a new adventure for my birthday. Usually international with the exception of last year, pre-vaccine. It softens the blow of getting older and helps me reframe the occasion to be a more joyous one. Once September hits, I get that back-to-school fall feeling even though I have not been in school in years. That nervousness of starting a new chapter, not knowing what to expect.
I love tacos and living in Los Angeles has allowed me to taste a variety of amazing tacos—from taco trucks, to obscure taco stands, to night markets. My favorite would have to be Al Pastor tacos, mainly because it usually comes with fresh pineapple slices and I just love pineapple on everything (including pizza!).
Since I moved back to Los Angeles after my two-year stint living in Hong Kong, my parents have not visited me and it has been almost a decade! This past Labor Day weekend, my mother and stepfather finally came to town, and everything that could go wrong went wrong. No running water, racist attack, and my car died in the middle of Hollywood—all within the first two days of their visit.
I can sometimes be a sensitive little bunny. I overanalyze things, replay stuff in my head, and sometimes create stories that don’t exist. I can be histrionic, melancholic, empathetic, and deeply affected by my surroundings. I sometimes need reassurance and validation from others. So you can imagine giving up on corporate life and pursuing a personal dream has not been easy for me!
I can’t believe it has been over a year since I last wrote on the blog. Sometimes you need to take some time off screens and social media for your mental health (and existential or midlife crisis) even if it costs you some social media engagement. What a modern-day conundrum.