Feature Pic: The Little Coconuts having their standard afternoon tea, a smoothie. This time it’s a Mango Lassi + a wee bit of ginger and turmeric.
For a lifestyle blog that has a special emphasis and love for food, I’ve been neglecting this topic. How could I? Let me correct that wrong right now!
Given most of us are on #Coronaviruslockdown now, perhaps we are turning to the kitchen to whip up some tasty meals so this could serve as some inspiration to add some variety? If you see a dish that you would like to try out, I’ll be happy to provide you the recipe. I don’t usually have one handy but if you say please, I’ll write it out 😉
While we traveled, we ate a lot of local food. It was one of the main reasons we traveled to begin with! We did still cook though, because it serves us in 3 major ways and well, we like to cook. If there’s 2 life skills I think a person should have, it would be cooking and investing. Enjoy the visual feast <3
This meal was quite a staple at Cusco, Peru for us. Mr.C chanced across egg noodles and given the frigid temperatures we had every single day, there was nothing more comforting than a hearty chicken noodle soup. This was closely reminiscent of food we would eat back home but this had the goodness of a home-cooked meal and the generosity as well!Lunch times are Playa del Carmen tend to be simple food at food as we use our mornings to focus on ourselves and our passion projects while the kids are at school. I don’t consider home-made meatballs to be all that simple as it does take a lot of time to do it but well, I love to cook and I like making dishes myself. So here you have home-made meatballs with pasta and kale. In Playa del Carmen, our vegetable choices were more lush than South America but still quite limited to kale, chinese spinach, bell peppers, tomatoes and carrots.
When we first got to Playa del Carmen, we did have a lot of tacos and we even made tacos very often at home. This was before we discovered our favourite tacos truck called Garibaldi outside Mega supermarket by the street. Initially I was a bit skeptical on the hygiene and if we should chance it but then I remember we probably have eaten at more questionable places in South America. Best Decision Ever. Mind-blowing tacos. We stopped making tacos at home thereafter. While it was good, it was nothing compared to the tacos we were having at Garibaldi and certainly not one that I could re-create at home. Shown above in this picture is our vegetarian taco with mushrooms, bell peppers, carrots, avocado, onions. We have been making it a point to eat less meat and more whole foods of late. There’s a reason why this combination is so popular, it’s exceptionally tasty! The best part of Mexico for me was to get deliciously good avocados at a reasonable price. I liked the low carbon foot-print as well from eating locally produced fruits (yes, this is a fruit!). I would be able to get 3 avocadoes for SGD1.50 whereas the local price tag here is 3 fruits for SGD4.50? This would make an appearance for breakfast sometimes when I was trying to eliminate food that could cause inflammation (for e.g. refined flour, sugar, dairy). Sadly avocadoes are now deemed as the new blood diamond of the world. To quote a 2018 article on BBC ” “I think if you take any product to an industrial level, you put pressure on the environment.” Torn, very torn. Haven’t bought avocados since returning to Singapore though!Sometimes, breakfast was a lot more lush. Breakfast like a king, right? Although our lunches and dinners were often like a king as well. Sometimes I think we consume more calories than we actually burn so I try to be deliberate in food preparation to have more vegetables than meat and a reasonable amount of carbs and some healthy snacks along the day.
We shared our Saturday morning tradition on Instagram before and posting it here, since we are on the topic of breakfast!
Speaking of snacks, the folks in Mexico and South America take their juices and smoothies seriously. Most of the apartments we booked had a powerful blender so in Mexico, we decided to make our own smoothies almost every day for tea-time. I would throw in random fruits and the kids would love all of them. Coco#1 discovered that I sometimes throw in ginger sometimes (hey, it’s got such great health benefits!) and that would make him cringe a little. He had no idea there was turmeric in there as well till he started joining me in making the smoothies. Left: A berry mix smoothie with banana and some coconut on top. I think I threw in some dates as well! Right: Solo para adultos (only for adults), watermelon smoothie with tequila 😉
There few occasions we do cook meat at home, we were adventurous. I was experimenting with both these dishes and am pleased to report that it turned out so well and the kids loved it! On the left was a dry chicken leg curry with desiccated coconut (it wasn’t quite rendang but it was delish). In the middle was a mustard honey pork dish that I was trying to re-create from the amazing Isabel restaurant at El Calafate. A standard vegetable side dish to our meat dishes and served with rice. Yet another pasta day, this time with tuna, radish, bell peppers, spinach, black olives and sweet onions. Absolutely yummy, a true hit with the kids and adults. Grateful our kids are not picky eaters, or perhaps it was because we always spoke positively of all food? I don’t know for sure, am just glad it’s not a problem we have. When they may have shown they didn’t like a certain vegetable, they were told off and would be made to clean the plate. Well it worked, they eat everything! The 1 food Coco#1 consistently couldn’t stomach was aubergine / eggplant. This mama doesn’t take no for an answer, I made baba ganoush and oh he loved it 😉 Mama Ms.K – 1, Coco#1 – 0 in the food game.
Cold days make soups and curries just so much better. The classic chicken and potatoes with a view, with a side of intentionally burnt broccoli with garlic. This was cooked in our amazing apartment with an impressive view in Ushuaia, Argentina. So grateful for the years that I was made to help my mum in the kitchen when I was growing up, for there’s nothing quite like my mom’s cooking and while I do a decent job in replicating her meals, I’m nowhere close to the master herself. Ushuaia holds a very special place in our hearts. We were close to skipping it altogether since it was so far but decided it would be a cool place to usher in 2020 and oh boy, we were smitten. I felt like if I ever wanted to run away from the world and live a quiet life, Ushuaia would be it. We also had some drama with our apartment booking so we stayed in 3 places whilst we were there and this was the best, hands down. The view was just spectacular and being able to watch the sunrise and sunset from your home is just #magic.
Speaking of New Year’s, here’s the special New Year’s dish cooked by Mr.C and Ms.K.
Oven baked chilli-garlic fish, garlic bread and creamy pumpkin soup. All made from scratch and went down very well with cheap and good Argentine wine. Muy delicioso!
Well I sure hope you enjoyed today’s story-telling and a bit more of a personal snippet into our lives while on the road and I’ve left you with a stomach that’s rumbling?
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Author: Ms.K
Ms.K is everything that Mr.C is, without the natural interest in investing and company financials! The activity planner for the family, the driver of random ideas and soon to be ‘retiring’ in to full time motherhood – Ms.K has no idea what she’s in for but remains super excited!
