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How to grow beansprouts

Sometime back I got a really thoughtful package from Kynne. Inside the box was a number of Asian food. One of the things inside was a pack of peanut sauce. I wasn’t sure what to do with it, until I thought of making gado-gado.

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The picture probably doesn’t look very appetizing. But believe me, it’s really tasty.

Gado-gado is an Indonesian dish mainly made of vegetables mixed with the peanut sauce. It’s quite easy to get the ingredients here such as eggs, cucumber and cabbage. Even Tempeh and Kangkung are easy to find.

But interestingly one of the ingredients, the bean sprouts, which is really cheap in Asia, can be quite expensive here. The only shop where I found it for sale costs about 3.50 euros for a small box. It may be organic and all, but I thought it was just too much.

So in the end, I thought that it would be much more satisfying to grow it myself. After searching a few supermarkets, we found a pack of “Fagioli Azuki” beans from Panorama and I got ready to grow it.

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It feels like I was doing a Primary 3 science experiment all over again and it’s really easy to do.

  1. Take a plastic container and line it with a wet tissue paper
  2. Sprinkle the seeds inside and leave it in a warm place
  3. In a few days the sprouts will be ready .

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It was quite therapeutic to see the sprouts grow bit by bit each day. As soon as the leaves come out it was ready for harvest. So it’s time to pull them out for a rinse and cleaning.

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And as sit down and clip the roots away, the familiar scent and rote reminds me a bit of how my sister, my mum and I would be doing the same thing together back in Singapore before we start cooking for a meal.

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There was something comforting in the thought.

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Happy Fat Tuesday!

Carnevale is a celebration where you basically have fun and it’s a great excuse to be silly.

rinaz.net Carnevale / Martedi Grasso

During this period in Italy, it is common to see a lot of children in adorable costumes, although adults can join in the fun too.

rinaz.net Carnevale / Martedi Grasso

A week ago while I was jogging at the laghetto, I saw a cheerful little girl dressed up as Mike Wazowski from Monster’s inc. She’s probably not more than 3 years old, and she waved at me, smiling as I ran past her. She was so cute! I wish I had a picture.

These time, you’d always see streets almost completely covered with paper confetti, called coriandoli. These are usually shaped in small, circular coloured paper or long strips. Kids would usually try to throw them on someone.

rinaz.net Carnevale / Martedi Grasso

Apart from costumes, during the carnevale, it’s common to see these pastries being sold :

Castagnole

rinaz.net Castagnola

The original kind is deep fried dough covered in sugar. Although nowadays you could also see other varieties such as the ones filled with chocolate or cream.

rinaz.net Castagnola

Frappe

rinaz.net Frape

Not to be mistaken for frappe’ which is a milkshake, this flat dough is usually flattened, crinkle cut then deep fried and covered with sugar.

While Carnevale starts after the Befana celebration all the way back in January, it becomes much more apparent during the final week leading up to Martedi Grasso, which is today! Happy Fat Tuesday!

One day I hope to see the Carnevale in Venice as it’s renowned to be the most festive one in Italy.

Carnevale Venezia

So today is the last day when you can be joyful and eat rich food, and are allowed do what you don’t normally do. After that, it will be the start of lent where Catholics are supposed to be solemn and eat simple food for 40 days till Easter.

Speaking of lent, I had a random thought to avoid eating meat for this duration. I’m not Catholic, but since I can fast during Ramadan, this would be an interesting experiment.

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Spring is almost here?

It’s been quite warm in Rome for about a week now, to the extent that you could start to wear lighter coats and even short sleeves.

Even trees are starting to bloom and you’d see daisies growing abundantly. It’s quite unusual considering it’s February and it’s still Winter. It didn’t seem that long ago when Rome was badly hit with floods.

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Nevertheless, it’s such a beautiful sight seeing all the new growth. I guess I’ll just enjoy this moment 🙂

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Your phone operator might be doing dirty tricks on you

In Italy, there are a number of mobile phone operators. Some of the famous ones are Wind, TIM and Vodafone.

I use my phone more for social media and internet, so Tre seemed to fit me the best with their  prepaid internet plan at 3GB at 5 euro a month. I’d usually top up with 10 euro a month so the rest would be more than sufficient for making phone calls.

Rinaz new italian sim card

Depending on some places, sometimes it’s hard to get a good reception, but most of the times it’s been satisfactory. The annoying part is, sometimes I get calls from the operator asking me to upgrade to a new plan, to which I’d usually answer, I’m not interested in. And sometimes I get promotional advertisement SMSes, but I get that with the operators in Singapore too, so I guess that’s common.

Anyway, last Saturday, first February, I recharged my phone with 10 euro as usual. But come Monday, I had a rude shock when I received an SMS notifying that I only had 50 cents left and that I should top up soon. Huh? How was that possible?

So I logged on the customer service website and looked through my history. Apparently, 7 euro was used to purchase a service called gocinema. But I don’t remember ever giving authorisation to make this purchase.

Gocinema might seem like a good deal, you could go to any cinema in Italy and watch any movies you like from Monday to Friday with a partner. BUT I didn’t ask for it. I didn’t want it in the first place.

Later on, doing some research online, I found out that phone operators in Italy has a premium SMS service that once you receive it, it might automatically open a website, which in turn allows the operator to claim that you’ve given them permission to sign up for additional services.

I’m extremely unhappy about this. To me, this is a dirty trick to cheating the customers into paying more without them even knowing it. Shame on you!

In the meanwhile, a way to protect yourself is to ignore all SMSes from your operator, activate barring SMS and block all services from Postemobile.

 

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An American girl in Italy

While watching Ballaro last evening, I saw an interesting illustration used as background image :

rinaz.net Ballaro American Girl Walking In Italy

As soon as I saw that, I excitedly told Cartcart, “Hey! I know that picture! That’s a homage to a famous photo. Here, let me show you!”

rinaz.net Ballaro American Girl Walking In Italy

An American girl in Italy is a photo taken by photographer, Ruth Orkin in the year 1951. This photo is one of her most memorable one as the subject, a lone woman walks down the streets of Florence with men leering and staring at her – one of them even grabbing his jewels.

That would have been a harrowing experience for any woman walking alone, but the odd thing, when interviewed, Ninalee Craig, the woman in the picture insists that, “It’s not a symbol of harassment. It’s a symbol of a woman having an absolutely wonderful time!”

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My uncle passed away recently. It was so sudden that it was a terrible shock to me. I always remember him as a kind and friendly person. Each time when us relatives would visit his house, he’d be busy cooking something and insist that we have a meal together and we’ll update each other about what’s going on with our lives.

It sucks so much to know the passing of someone that we love and I can only imagine what my cousins and aunt are going through right now. And frankly, this is one of my biggest fears I have living so far away from my family.

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Rain rain go away …

For almost the entirety of last week, there was continuous rain, and some parts of Rome was badly hit with flood to the point that some subway stations are closed due to the ponding .

rinaz.net Flooding in Rome

It was quite scary seeing the level of water rise at the Isola Tiberina and Ponte Milvio. Even the Colosseo wasn’t spared either.

Luckily for Cart and I, the flood didn’t hit us as bad as how it was about two years ago. Nevertheless, it was so demoralizing seeing all the rain and going out of the house felt eerie, especially after dusk but all the street-lights were not working.

Apart from the lights emanating from cars, the road was completely dark. It was as if a zombie apocalypse was going on. I had to drive slower than usual as some of the puddles on the road were so deep that my tyres were almost submerged while I was driving.

I just cross my fingers that the flooding situation goes better soon.