We had a family afternoon tea recently at my parents’ home. Jac and I contributed siew mai to the meal – we bought three or four serves from Fook Kee at Spencer Village International Food Hall (200 Spencer Road, Thornlie) and brought them along. Mum and I placed them in a dish to heat up in the rice cooker – it looked like an army of siew mai! We had gingery garlicky chilli sauce and sweet soy sauce to dip the siew mai in.
My younger sister Juji made a banana cake with a thick coating of sticky caramel icing.
The cake was still warm, moist and absolutely delicious. That icing was magnificent.
Mum invited us “kids” to eat this cake – it’s one of Mum’s favourite tricks, offloading leftover food to her hungry children whenever they visit. Do any of your parents do that too? :-P
My eldest sister CW made this fantastic fudge, with hazelnuts in it.
The banana cake and fudge were very sweet and delicious.
It was hard stopping at just one piece of fudge, and I didn’t! No, I didn’t eat every piece of fudge pictured here – I had three or so pieces. Jac and I took home more cake and fudge too, for later. Boy, it was goooooood. :-P
The week or so before, my eldest sister CW had mysteriously told everyone there was to be a little celebration at this afternoon tea. So what was the celebration for?
It was for ME!
My family surprised me with congratulations on the completion of my PhD! :-D They presented me with a gift – a LAMY pen and mechanical pencil set and a Rhodia notepad with a leather cover, and a second notepad. It was very sweet of them all. To be honest, I’ve been completely underwhelmed by the completion of my PhD. My family and friends have all been really excited and thrilled about it, which is nice.
I didn’t take photos of my presents, but the LAMY site has pictures of the pen and mechanical pencil: the LAMY AL-star graphit mechanical pencil and matching LAMY AL-star graphit Ballpoint pen (mine came presented in a gift box), and this is the Rhodia notepad with a leather cover. I’ve been using the pencil to doodle cartoons and the notepad is lovely to write in. I think I kind of feel like I’m spoiling the notepad with my messy scribbles!
I guess the celebration was a great excuse to eat lots of pork dumplings, cake and fudge! :)
My younger sister Juji had a surprise gift for me too, bought on her recent trip to Melbourne – here it is, my newest two-tiered bento box!
I love it! It has cats on it! Picking apples! Cute! I have used for bento lunch – there will be a post coming up soon featuring my “applecats” bento box (thanks, jetgirlart! LOL).
The moist, meaty, juicy siew mai was also enjoyed by all…
…but mostly, I think, by my little niece Ruby! She just sat there and mowed through the siew mai, eating about eight of them. She would’ve eaten more if there were any left! We’re all good eaters in the family, so we look on this with pride! :) Ruby loves eating most things – meat, fruit, vegetables… but I think like the rest of us, meaty savoury items are her favourite.
As she ate, she kept stopping and looking at the dish of siew mai, as if checking to make sure there would be still more left for her to eat. She didn’t look happy that her mum and dad, grandmother and aunties kept eating that army of siew mai. :) Oh well Ruby, like the rest of us happy gluttons in the family, you’ll just have to learn to share! Haha.
I'm TFP, a food blogger from Perth, Western Australia.
{ 30 comments… read them below or add one }
Oh my! I LOVE siew mai, I always try to get some when me and my family go to the chinese buffet, but when I get there, there’ll be only one or two left!
Being a lurker here for some time now, I can’t believe how much Ruby has grown! Haha, she reminds me of when I was younger, every time there would be a big plate of something, I would take as much as I can and stalk it with my eyes.
Well, keep up the lovely work! I adore your blog!
Ruby has definitely grown. Such a cutie. A girl after my own heart, eating all the siew mai!
“No, I didn’t eat every piece of fudge pictured here”
Suuuuure you didn’t. :P
That was very sweet of everyone to surprise you. I can’t wait to see the applecats bento used!
Wow, that is a LOT of siew mai! It’s my favorite dim sum dish of all time and I get so sad when some places don’t so it right. I hate it when the skin is too hard or there’s not enough meat! Those look absolutely perfect though.
Mmmmm siew mai… makes me want to go for dim sum all over again!
Congratulations Dr. TFP. You deserved it and of course the food too. ;)
I love dim sum and missed it a lot. Maybe I should learn to cook it.
Hi! I’m a big fan of your site! But I have a totally unrelated question. I’ve been trying to incorporate those smiley faces in my blog, but I don’t know how to work the html or whatever that I’m supposed to. I’m using blogspot, think you could help me out on this?
Congratulations on your PHD! Yuuum look at all that food. I suppose my Mum will invite me around to eat leftovers too except she’s not in Perth. T_T Miss her and my sisters terribly. And very cute bento box! Looking forward to a post on it.
That icing LOOKS magnificient! Well said :) What a lovely dinner, and I had to laugh at your little niece “as she ate, checking to make sure there would be more”. She sounds like my own niece, whom I’m traveling tomorrow to Washington (from California) to visit for the week. She is an excellent eater, eating twice as much as the adults! I love your little bento box, I can’t wait to see what fun you have packing it. All in all, this is one of your most enjoyable posts yet, right up there with your recent holiday ones.
aww congratulations! that’s very sweet of your family. i’m drooling over the caramel icing on the cakes! and army of siew mai! i have cravings for thai-style siew mai right now and i wish i were in thailand.
So, when is your family going to invite all us readers around for a meal? ;)
Congratulations on your PhD! Perhaps I should start dropping hints about such cool pressies to my family (although given how far away my completion date is, I probably shouldn’t start the hinting quite yet).
Siew mai is my favourite! in Indonesia it’s called siomay, the meat used is fish and it’s eaten with peanut sauce, a splash of sweet soy sauce and chili sauce. YUM.
Wow! What a feast. Beautiful pictures of your niece too. My nieces also share the love of food and they tend to enjoy most the foods we do. Holidays are great as I can take them out and it’s a great excuse to go on food adventures! They love anything with chicken and rice, so I’m considering taurus hawker as a must do over the holidays…
I never leave my parents house with some sort of food parcel, even though I’m 32! It’s great:-)
ruby is such, such a gem. so adorable, i cant take it!! just too cute for words.
i understand what u mean by stalking w her eyes..i do that. even now.. :( hahahahah
Oh my!!
Congrats Doctor. Love your blog. Just so you know: you’ve got a fan from Mauritius.
Congratulations! And Ruby is so adorable!
Congratulations Dr.Pornographer :P
That siew mai looks great! Where can I get the recipe for it ?
Congrats on your PhD! The icing on the banana cake looks divine and so tasty… I think the more siew mai on a plate looks better than just the regular 4/5 in a dim sum restaurant haha~ Thanks for sharing all the pics and making me love food even more :)
wow Ruby is getting big! ohhh the fudge looked devine…
What a fantastic way to celebrate! Congratulations!
Oh no what are you doing to me now!? It’s 1am now and I have the midnight munchies thanks to TFP again! And where will I find siew mai and banana cake at this time? torture. haha. Congrats on the PhD!!! Dr TFP!!! Claim it!
What a cutie Ruby is! That’s what I want: a child with an appetite.
CONGRATS!
Thanks, everyone!
Ellie,
Every time I see Ruby she has grown even more! Her little sister Zoe is the same! I hope to share a photo or two of Zoe soon too.
Melissa,
Hahahaha, if the pieces of fudge were roast pork instead, then I would’ve DEFINITELY eaten them all, and not even tried to deny it! LOL.
Cookie,
Fook Kee’s dim sum are some of the best I’ve ever eaten. I’ve yet to eat a bad or even ordinary batch from them!
Charlene,
Maybe we should do dim sum some time – that’s one thing we haven’t done together yet. What do you reckon?
Thanks, flower. Maybe you can find a suitable pork substitute to make halal siew mai.
Wyn,
The smileys are part of the WordPress template I’ve used. I type in the smiley characters and they’re converted into the matching smiley face. Not sure if Blogspot has a similar feature – you may need to do a little googling to see if you find anything.
PinkPaperPlane,
Thank you! Yes, I love the bento box – and there should be a post featuring it within the next week or so.
Mary,
She is very cute, always wanting more, especially if it’s savoury or meaty! She definitely takes after her dad, aunties and grandma! It was afternoon tea rather than dinner… and I must admit I went home and had dinner that evening after all that! :-P
kat,
That icing was good enough to eat on its own!
Hahaha Conor,
Sorry, no invite yet! :-P I’m sure pressie hints won’t be necessary when the time comes!
bella,
That sounds interesting. Hopefully I’ll get to try it one day.
emma,
Went to my folks’ today, and mum gave me two crumpets! She had a pack of crumpets that needed to be eaten up and I was there, perfect! :) I can’t wait to eat sushi with Ruby and Zoe. That will be so much fun!
hy,
Hahaha, she is always stalking food with her eyes, the meatier the better!
Peky,
:-D
Thanks, karishma! And I am thrilled to know I have a reader in Mauritius!
Thanks, blur ting!
Mathai,
Have you tried googling for it? I don’t have a recipe for it, as we don’t tend to make it – we just buy.
Thanks, Ling. It is totally my pleasure!
Bryan,
It was fantastic fudge! My favourite bit was the hazelnuts – they’re my favourite nut.
Thanks, Su-Lin!
Thanks, Amycat! Hope you got to eat something good and put the cravings to rest.
Thanks, Pielette. Yes, if I had a child, I’d like that too! :) For now, a couple of hungry nieces and a couple of hungry cats will suffice.
I was wondering if it’s possible to find out where your sister got your bento box? I live in Melbourne and, despite looking, haven’t found anything near as cute as the one she bought you.
i’m a bit late, but it’s awfully sweet of your family to celebrate the completion of your PhD! sweet, as in literally sweet. the fudge and cake look awesome, but like ruby, i’m all about the siew mai. :)
Allie,
I’ve sent her an email and asked. Will let you know when I get an answer!
dea,
Oh yeah. Priority is always for the meat / savoury!:-P We had mum’s homemade wantan recently (a post to come), and Ruby ate the porky bits and gave all the pastry bits to her dad. And she’d ask for another wantan each time. It was funny to watch.
My husband and I get siew mai every time we eat at our favorite chinese buffet. We never knew what they were called until today. I’m so glad I found this post. (btw…the new blog layout looks fabulous!)
Cool, Marcie! See, this blog is not only food porny, it’s educational as well. :D Thanks – glad you like the new layout.
WOW I love your site!
CONGRATULATIONS to you on your PHD also :)
I have to ask …..Spencer Village food hall…..they have been in alot of trouble with the health department. There was a list not long ago in the Sunday Times say how bad they were for hygiene and food prep and how much they had been fined. Alot of them also had not improved since the previous visit from the HD either!
Have you ever been sick from eating here??
ps. the banana n fudge cake look simply delicious!!
Thanks for great info on your site x
Hi Pinne,
Thanks, glad you like the site.
No, I have never been sick from eating there. Maybe we’re lucky, I don’t know. My favourite stall, Fook Kee, hasn’t been fined or appeared on the name and shame food outlets list (as far as I know anyway). To be honest, despite all the bad publicity, we still eat at Spencer Village. We were there recently, and I had my favourites from Fook Kee – chee cheong fun and yong tow foo.