欢迎
Welcome
Hansen’s
Online 大明互联
Updated/更新于 7 Feb
2004
About 关于 Gallery 片廊 Menu 菜单 Theatre 戏园子
Rescue Hunger express!
Problem:
Wah Piang. Ten in the morning hungry and feel like Jap
curry leh. Morning restaurant also haven’t open. Open I also got no money. How
ah? Cook myself lor. Wat to do? Me dun know why always hungry. Eat and eat
until no money. But how to cook Jap Curry ah?
Japanese curry is thick and muddy green in colour
I picked up cooking after discovering that I could eat
more for less than pigging out at the coffeshop. A packet of chicken rice cost
around $3.50 (with drum and extra rice). With the same price I could have a whole
chicken. In this update, we try our
hands on Japanese curry.
Urban residents are usually too busy to prepare hordes
of ingredients that come with a complicated dish like curry. Thankfully, chefs
are entering manufacturing plants to churn out all kinds of instance mixes for
grateful urbanites like me.
Mix: Golden
Curry (Japanese). 1 packet contains serving for
5. $3.30 from Fairprice.
Recommended
Ingredients: 3 chicken thigh, 8 beef cubes 2 fried fish cakes, 1 small
broccoli.
Cooking Time: 20
min
Japanese Curry, unlike Indian or Malay curry, is usually muddy green in colour. It is
thick, spicy and not at all hot. “Golden Curry” is available in 3 levels of
‘hotness’ – mild, medium or very hot. I picked the medium and it was not hot at
all. The most hot would perhaps be nicer. The packet of paste is supposed to
serve 5, but following the instructions, the curry amount could only barely
cover the recommended ingredients. It should serve 2 persons comfortably, or 1
if you are really hungry.
Instructions
Brown some garlic, shallots and optional chilli paste
to increase the hotness. Add 2 1/2
cups of water. Bring to a boil and add “Golden Curry Paste”. When the paste has
completely dissolved, lower the heat to medium and add the chicken and
broccoli. 10 minutes later add the beef and fish cakes. 5 minutes later, turn
off the heat and ready to serve.
Ratings: ***1/2 (max 5*)
Plus: Super convenient; Reasonable replication of
Japanese curry.
Minus: Fall short of stated serving quantity. Not hot
enough.
The Observer corner
The
Elite tumbles. (Part 1)
Who turned off the NUS aura machine? The name of our
national university has not descended into the mud yet and we could still hold
our own against many overseas universities. Yet its worth at home seems to be
declining. More and more are doubting the abilities of the ‘elites’ produced by
NUS. When put to the test in a stormy global economy or the sparring of
entrepreneur skills with others, whispers run amok that our NUS graduates are
woefully under-prepared for the ‘real’ environment outside textbooks. On the
other hand, a friend working in a bank mentioned that it is no longer a sight
to see matured Ah Bengs in their early adulthood from wealthy families taking
over the family business and its working relationship with the bank. What is
wisdom, one may ask? Street smart, or plain education? We may not know how to
correct the inadequacy of our local premiere tertiary education, but we do know
what is lacking.
One dozen how much ah?
I am a member of the forums at hardwarezone.com. I
laze out at the mobile communications forum where everyone is talking about
hand phones – a traditional Ah Beng forte. Then enters a newly registered NUS postgraduate student. How do we know? A
smart aleck noticed his email address which initially missed my eye. The
postgraduate opens up a thread – titled with some M1 special offer. It was a
rather long opening message, but what he essentially wrote was this – He is
offered a new line by M1. The line carries a 2 year contract. The plan is
essentially a heavily discounted M1 Prime Plan in which the user can save about
$200 over the 2 years. He could buy a hand phone at the normal discounted rate
for 2 years contract. Now, he is willing to offer the line to somebody else. The
condition was that this somebody else takes over the line but not the hand
phone. In this way, he benefits from having a hand phone bought at a discounted
rate, and that somebody benefits from a discounted line.
Immediately, the onslaught came. Some one called him
“Siao!” (Stupid). He couldn’t get it. He replied that he didn’t understand. Some jeered at his audacity of offering such an
impossible deal in the open. This was when that mentioned smart aleck noticed
his email address. “Are you sure you are from NUS?” he wrote. Others marvelled
at how NUS students could churn out “bright” ideas. Then someone observed that
his email belongs not to a mere undergraduate but a postgraduate! Many tsked
tsked and commented that standards are falling because junior students are
being taught by some of these postgraduates, which could be concluded with a
live example, that they weren’t very bright. They demanded the post be dumped
to the garage, others demanded him to top up with another $200 to restore some
dignity to the deal. Some were suggesting that he was a cheat. By that time,
this post graduate has long but fled. One member summed it up “This is the
standard of s'pore's grads?? God help us all!”
(Editor: Can you
tell what’s wrong with the deal? It doesn’t take much professional knowledge if
you have ever bought a phone.
Next update: the
drama at Hardwarezone.com takes a surprising twist.)