[alan lim]

Thx Boon Boon and Abby for the host and also many thx to Matthew for your kind contribution .
It was great to meet everyone and the yummy dinner.
Hope to see everyone again .

have a wonderful 2012...

[alan lim]

Il Pirata, on 30 December 2011 - 09:11 AM, said:

Nevermind. Next time (if mother plant survives! hehe).

Hi Wei Yang and vernon,

thx for the impatients... they have such lovely colour.

[Il Pirata]

dinosaurr, on 30 December 2011 - 09:37 PM, said:

Hi all,
yes I really enjoyed myself! Thank u Abby, Matthew, Boon for making this happen, and everyone else for contributing good food and conversation! yes Ben, do share your yummy dessert recipe if possible!

thank u! and lets have another gathering soon!
Happy 2012!!!!

Yes. Yes. I echo whatever Dinosaurr and others said above! ......

[Abby Lim]

Thanks everyone for the wonderful evening, especially those who help to carry tables, chairs up and down, washing and clean up, without everyone help ogether, we can't have a gathering like this.

Thanks our VIP Guest Matthew and Linda share with us all the goodies and one of our forum C & S gang Fred for contribute his collection for us to share, if our gang here like it to have another gathering at my messy garden, I will ask for boss permission to host again, I forgot to ask how to let her 2 big 'Golden cactis' bloom! if I can boost her that 2 giant bloom, she sure have no objection for is to gather again and again!

Let see I hard work last night here

Real Mini rose for Vernon, I have split it ino 4 pots
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0650-1.jpg

The lovely roses removed from the cutting
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0652-1.jpg

http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0651-1.jpg

Here are Begonia from WeiYang
]http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0659-1.jpg


http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0658-1.jpg

Don't know what happen to this beauty, turn all soft, hope to see it stand up by today, I have cover it up after potting.
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0657-1.jpg

Let have a group photo, smile :flowers:/>
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0656-1.jpg

This one have a special bloom so lovely
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0655-1.jpg

Here come with my girl and my lucky C & S, include 1 I offer to babysit.
http://i1110.photobucket.com/albums/h457/AbbyGohab/IMG_0654-1.jpg

[derelor]

Hi all,

it was a nice gathering, let's look forward to the GCS gathering soon.

For the recipe, its no secret, just that my recipe is not from book, but copied from restaurant and modified, so need some time to write it out, cos I everything is agar-agar one.

cheers,
Ben

[derelor]

Honey Osmanthus with Aloe Vera, White Fungus and Wolfberries recipe
(10 pax)

Osmanthus flowers (dried) 10 tsp
Honey 15 tbsp (estimated quantity, pls taste and adjust)
Aloe Vera 1 pc (Medium Size)
White Fungus 1 pc (Medium Size)
Wolfberries 10 tbsp (Recommended quantity for benefits, or 2 tbsp is okay)
Water 2.5 L
Choya Black Sugar 10 tsp

Preparation
Soak the White fungus in water for 10-20 minutes, or refer to packaging. After the fungus has softened, remove any visible dirt, and cut of the base of the fungus, or simply the yellowish-orangy part. Set aside for later use.
Remove the skin of the aloe vera. From my personal experience, remove more skin, as the skin is rather bitter and may affect the final taste. Dice the aloe into 1cm cubes. It is okay if the cubes are bigger and of different sizes, the reason is simply for aesthetic purposes. Rinse the aloe especially the sap and set aside for later use.
Lightly rinse your wolfberries. Set aside for later use.

Cooking
Boil the 2.5L of water and simmer the white fungus in it for 1 hour using small fire. Remove the white fungus, and put it into a small container of ice cold water. Put it into the coldest part of the fridge.
Set aside 500ml of water to cool for a while.
Put the aloe in the rest of the boiling water and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove the aloe and run it under water to cool the aloe. Put the osmanthus in the boiling water and turn off the fire after a minute. Keep the osmanthus in the water for another 5 minutes and then sieve out all the osmanthus IMMEDIATELY. (Theoretically, overboiled flower teas have a bitter aftertaste.) Set this osmanthus tea aside to cool.

Now take the warm 500ml of water set aside earlier on to make the honey syrup. Pour all the honey in and dissolve it completely. (You can heat up this syrup using a pot, but remember you must NEVER let the syrup boil as boiling will spoil the honey.) Now you have 500ml of honey syrup. Separate it into 2 portions, a larger portion to soak the aloe and a smaller portion to soak the wolfberries.

Put osmanthus tea, honey aloe and honey wolfberries into the fridge to chill.

To Serve
Mix the osmanthus tea together with the honey aloe and honey wolfberries. Taste and adjust the final sweetness accordingly, by adding water or honey. Take the white fungus, cut it into small bits and add it to the dessert. Each portion should be about 200ml, or thereabout a small bowl. Add a tsp of the choya to each serving.

The above is my description of the recipe, feel free to ask me questions.

- If you are extra hardworking, or you are trying to impress, you may do the extra following steps.
- You may replace the white fungus with bird's nest, but the preparation for the bird's nest is entirely different.
- You may take 1/3 of the final dessert fluid and freeze into a sorbert. So the dessert will be served with this sorbert.
- You may cut up the white fungus and quick freeze it for 15 minutes before serving for the extra icy crunch.
- You may prechill the dessert serving containers to maintain the temperature of the dessert.
- If any of your guests isn't feeling well, you may serve a WARM version as well. No boiling as it will destroy some of the benefits. So warm up the fliud without the ingredients, add the ingredients in after warming up the fluid.

The benefits of the dessert. Osmanthus is good for complexion, honey is antioxidant, aloe lowers high chlestrol, wolfberry is good for eyes and white fungus is the poor man's bird's nest.

cheers,
Ben

This post has been edited by derelor: 31 December 2011 - 08:45 PM

[crazyjellie]

Ben, what's choya black sugar? Where to get it?

[Il Pirata]

crazyjellie, on 31 December 2011 - 09:41 PM, said:

Ben, what's choya black sugar? Where to get it?

http://www.lamtc.com/plum/images/8.jpg

[nature lover]

Many thanks to Mathew, Linda (first time that I managed to bring so many lucky prizes home). Abby, Boonboon and everyone who contributed to a lovely evening. Wishing all of you a Happy New Year!

[derelor]

Hi,

I got mine in DFS.

cheers,
Ben

[Abby Lim]

Today I took out the fish head curry from the fridge to share with my colleague, it is so nice, Taurine should share with us her recipe, that night I ate a bit and feel it was nice, so I kept the balance in the fridge, today defrost and heat it up, it is still very good!

Just wonder why no photos for that night, and don't remember we have any group photo, to much to talk and eat, clean up and washing for that short time, next time we should have it in the afternoon from tea to dinner.

[Abby Lim]

crazyjellie, on 31 December 2011 - 09:41 PM, said:

Ben, what's choya black sugar? Where to get it?

Dear Ben, your bottle still in my fridge, next round you can just bring your other stuff and mix it on spot with the choya, My Lynn so bad, how can she chope the whole bottle, she can only allow to taste a table spoon neat just for the feel.

[Kingfisher]

Abby Lim, on 03 January 2012 - 01:49 PM, said:

Today I took out the fish head curry from the fridge to share with my colleague, it is so nice, Taurine should share with us her recipe, that night I ate a bit and feel it was nice, so I kept the balance in the fridge, today defrost and heat it up, it is still very good!

Just wonder why no photos for that night, and don't remember we have any group photo, to much to talk and eat, clean up and washing for that short time, next time we should have it in the afternoon from tea to dinner.

I have some photo mainly of the foods. :D/> Also I don't want to expose the pictures of members here without their permissions.

[leck]

Abby Lim, on 03 January 2012 - 01:49 PM, said:

Today I took out the fish head curry from the fridge to share with my colleague, it is so nice, Taurine should share with us her recipe, that night I ate a bit and feel it was nice, so I kept the balance in the fridge, today defrost and heat it up, it is still very good!

Just wonder why no photos for that night, and don't remember we have any group photo, to much to talk and eat, clean up and washing for that short time, next time we should have it in the afternoon from tea to dinner.

"
Yes Abby i agreed with you the curry fish-head is really nice.. look plain and simple but taste very 'Oishii desu.' Thanks Taurine for cooking..

[taurine]

leck, on 03 January 2012 - 02:33 PM, said:

"
Yes Abby i agreed with you the curry fish-head is really nice.. look plain and simple but taste very 'Oishii desu.' Thanks Taurine for cooking..

I bought it. I did not cook it but I added more fish!

[Abby Lim]

taurine, on 03 January 2012 - 03:35 PM, said:

I bought it. I did not cook it but I added more fish!

Haha, Taurine, I heard your told me that you added in additional fish, I all blur and assumed that you added more fish meat than just fish head!

Leck's Jap curry are good too, now I missed it as I have not keep some for next day to try again, that night too many thing, too much talking, have not really appreciate the details of each dish.

Gel12's black rice dessert always good too, especially with the right Ice cream!

Don't forget all the friuts, the cut friut platters left were send over to my site staff to share the next day, thanks again.

Kingfisher, I think you can post those photos you have taken, even GCS annual gathering photos always tag with the ID nowaday.

Wilson lost his way may be, didn't appear that night, he is one of those has not come to my office garden before.

[alan lim]

The food and lucky draw prizes were so attractive and tempting that we forgot abt photo taking .. hahaa
Some of us were busy with the cleaning too ..

[Kingfisher]

Abby Lim, on 03 January 2012 - 06:18 PM, said:

Kingfisher, I think you can post those photos you have taken, even GCS annual gathering photos always tag with the ID nowaday.

I will try to upload the pictures this coming weekday.

[Kingfisher]

Here are the pictures of that night.

http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering01.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering02.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering03.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering04.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering05.jpg

This post has been edited by Kingfisher: 07 January 2012 - 03:49 PM

[Kingfisher]

Lets go to Abby 2nd floor to peek at her plants. :D/>

http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering06.jpg

Her famous CnS condo.

http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering07.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering08.jpg
http://forums.vr-zone.com/photopost/data/1150/medium/CnSGathering09.jpg