Back on top of the League again !!!

Australia League (Rank: 111,469 / 122,975)

Overall August September

#	Team	Manager	GW	Total
1	ManPOWER	Adrian Han	55	232
2	Arsenalfan	Phannaree Disungnoen	35	216
3	New Plymouth Pinky	Keith Tan	44	214
4	VLFC	Kah Sang Goh	46	198
5	RhodesianSwans	Colin Swan	35	196
6	PePsY Team	Nopsakol Ampornjittikul	31	177
7	Pepsy's Brother	Nopchai Ampornjittikul	29	16

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Ras el hanout recipe

I saw one of the top chef using this ingredient where he uses it to smoke the beef. I must ry this on Wagyu beef... Smoked Wagyu.. mmmmm

This apparently is used in molecular gastronomy... which i think i would like to learn...mixing morrocan spice with Japan style cooking... should be interesting...


From wikipedia -

Ras el hanout (Arabic: رأس الحانوت) is a popular blend of herbs and spices that is used across the Middle East and North Africa. The name means "head of the shop" in Arabic, and refers to a mixture of the best spices a seller has to offer.

There is no definitive set combination of spices that makes up Ras el Hanout. Each shop, company, person would have their own secret combination containing over a dozen spices. Typically they would include cardamom, clove, cinnamon, ground chili peppers (also known as paprika), coriander, cumin, mace, nutmeg, peppercorn, and turmeric.

Some recipes include over one hundred ingredients, some quite unusual, such as ash berries, chufa, Grains of Paradise, orris root, Monk's pepper, cubebs, dried rosebud, and the potentially toxic belladonna and insects such as the beetle known as Spanish fly (however, the sale of Spanish fly was banned in the spice markets of Morocco in the 1990s). Usually all ingredients are toasted and then ground up together. Individual recipes are often improvised.

Ras el hanout is used in pastilla, the Moroccan squab/young pigeon and almond pastie, is sometimes rubbed on meats, and stirred into couscous or rice. It is often believed to be an aphrodisiac.

Ras el hanout

Ingredients

• 5 bay leaves
• 1 tbs za'atar*
• 1 tbs each of black peppercorns, ground nutmeg, ground cloves, ground cinnamon and coriander seeds
• 1/2 tsp mace
• 1 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp allspice berries* or ground allspice
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Method

1. Place all the ingredients in a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder and process to combine.
2. Keep in an airtight container for up to 2 months.

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LABOUR PAID MATERNITY -GOOD OR BAD

Good for Parents but BAD for business. This is my final conclusion, I hope the labour government will not be TOO short-sighted and bow to union pressure. Running the economy takes some finesse and wisdom.

As a would-be parent, i would certainly welcome such move, both for my wife and myself, but the question is to what cost the economy ?? Off hand i can already think of the consequence of such action.

If i am the employer, i would most likely prefer to employ men rather than women. even though we speak of equal right and opportunity. When it comes to business, it just makes more economical sense. Forget the GREENS, forget the LABOUR, the key fact is that every action has consequence to the economy. Great might the paid maternity be, it has to be drafted carefully and reviewed in more details. And big companies, might not want to invest in Australia for the alrady burdensome labour cost. Also it will blow the governement budget, unless a better scheme results.


I do think several ideas must be enforces to make this scheme work.

No 1. Pro-rata the paid maternity leave - trust me, i can think of many people who might work there for only 3 months and get 6 months paid maternity. Pro-rata means people cannot make use of the system, i pity the company that have to pay maternity leave 1 week after employing someone, and paying for 6 months maternity and then realizing that the mum-to-be have no intention to come back to work. Just as we need to protect and give mums a fair go, i think its important to protect tht businesses as well. Union don't realise that business drives the economy, unless you remain competitive, Australia as a country will never compete in the world market. Thank God for commodities that help boost our economy.

No 2. Bring in maids that will certainly help. The biggest problem with Australia is their non-existant family unit. There are a few laws which i do think the australia govenment should take a leaf out of singapore's book. I do think the smartest form of government is one that can adapt and pick up good policies that are tried and tested in other countries. Currently the reason mums stay at home because there is no strong family unit in Australia. The western culture often does not promote family unity unlike the asian culture which stress on strong family unit across all generations, with no strong family support, then the next best thing is to open up the market to allow employment of maids to help in domestic chores.

No 3. Change the social of Australia. We should not punish people for having children, but we cannot punish the company as well. The social and culture environment will certainly take time. Focus on education children on good family values, create better access to child carer. In singapore, the government actually provide incentive if the sons or daughter stay close to their dad and mum after marriage to help foster closer relationship.

Running the economy is a find art of balance. Going to either extremes will kill the robust Australia economy created by the Liberal govt. Anyway i have attached the article for a good read.






Business won't back paid maternity leave plan

Posted 2 hours 55 minutes ago

The Productivity Commission has recommended the Government pay 18 weeks' maternity leave. (abc)

• Audio: Commission releases paid maternity leave draft (The World Today)
• Related Story: Govt urged to fund 18 weeks' maternity leave
• Related Link: Paid Parental Leave: Support for Parents with Newborn Children

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) does not support the Productivity Commission's recommendation of 20 weeks' paid parental leave, claiming it would put excessive burdens on businesses.

The Productivity Commission today recommended that the Government fund 18 weeks' leave to be paid to mothers and two weeks to fathers at the minimum wage rate of $544 a week.

Businesses will be required to pay the entitlement before being reimbursed by the Government and employers must also pay a worker's superannuation.

ACCI chief executive Peter Anderson says administering the scheme will place higher administrative costs on businesses.

"All of these costs flow from the recommendation that employers become the paymaster of the scheme," he said.

"Employers are already concerned at being the tax collector for Government on issues like the GST and they will not respond well to being the paymaster of government social payments.

"ACCI and business support a government-funded scheme of 14 weeks provided that it is affordable to the Budget and does not increase employer costs."

ACTU president Sharan Burrow has welcomed the plan but says it is only the first step.

"Working women right across Australia will be smiling today," she said.

"Eighteen weeks of paid maternity leave and indeed two weeks of paternity leave, allowing fathers or partners to be part of the birth process, this is terrific news."

The ACTU was pushing for 14 weeks of paid leave to be jointly funded by government and business.

The Federal Government will not be releasing a policy until the Commission's final report is released next February, but Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard says it is inevitable that there will be a Government-funded scheme.

"The important thing here is that we have moved from a question of if this nation will ever have a paid parental leave scheme to how we're going to do this scheme," she said.

"We are moving forward on paid parental leave and receiving this draft report today is part of that process of moving forward."

However, the Government has not committed to the inclusion of a scheme in next year's Federal Budget.

The Greens say they will keep pushing for a six-month minimum Government-funded paid maternity leave scheme.

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young says the Government should ensure there is a paid maternity leave scheme in the next Budget.

She says with a $22 billion surplus, it can afford it.

The scheme would cost taxpayers around $450 million a year and employees around $70 million a year.

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My doggy

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Update for the week - Power director

This week was an especially tiring week. Did not have chance to update my blog because, my good friend Kah Sang was getting married and i wanted to do a video montage for him and vivien. Alas my housemate did not have a good programme to do video editing. I found both the free editing software like Windows Movie maker and also Apple software lacking in alot of effects, so after watching the prelimary video, i decided to try my hand at doing the video editing.

I did some research and decided to buy Powerdirector. voted in PC mag as one of the better editing suite. One thign cool about it is it has a member forum where people can post the new effects and obejects, so i can download and use the templates which was definitely a great bonus.

I plan to use this software to start my youtube... video.. posting on cooking tips... should be fun....

There are alot of features which i still have to learn but i think it will be fun when the next video editing assignment comes along.



If you plan to get a video editing suite and a value for money software - this can be one of your choices.

Well hopefully i can back to writing my blogs and posting some more stuff on the web....

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Dinner special

We had one of those nights again. Simple Asian food. I decided to try a local Chinese dish called Water boiled fish with Sezhuan Pepper corn which i learned from Joanne. Its a local dish they eat in china during the cold of winter. I love this dish because it is really spicy You could say it is the Thai equivalent of Tom Yum Soup. I gave some to Taishi my "son", he kept licking his tongue... but i am sure he enjoyed it.

Below are the pictures of the dishes




I think it will come as no surprise that this soup is very spicy.. but i really love it. It simple to do and all you need is sezquan pepper corn, chilli oil and nice fish stock.




This is ginger fried chicken. I had a sudden craving to cook some of my childhood food, so i recreated this fried chicken using ginger as the base. Its actually very tasty. You can also use garlic.





And of course sizzling japanese beancurd ... the perenial favourite in our house.




This dish is what my wife ordered so i had to make it. Paw Paw salad... i think i am getting good at it, it was hard to get the mix of the sauce right - the key ingredients are : lemon, palm sugar, chilli, fish sauce.




It was an enjoyable meal.... finally get to cook water boiled fish.....

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I am still at top of the league

Australia League (Rank: 109,909 / 119,246)

Overall August September

#	Team	Manager	GW	Total
1	ManPOWER	Adrian Han	35	149
2	Arsenalfan	Phannaree Disungnoen	32	144
3	New Plymouth Pinky	Keith Tan	22	130
4	VLFC	Kah Sang Goh	36	122
5	PePsY Team	Nopsakol Ampornjittikul	37	120
6	RhodesianSwans	Colin Swan	28	119
7	Pepsy's Brother	Nopchai Ampornjittikul	48	114

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SOME INTERESTING KNOWLEDGE

This really is interesting.......

Enlighten your worldly knowledge


'Stewardesses'

is the longest word typed with only the left hand


And 'lollipop'
is the longest word typed with your right hand.
(Bet you tried this out mentally, didn't you?)


No word in the English language rhymes with
month, orange, silver, or purple.




'Dreamt' is the only English word that ends in the letters 'mt'.
(Are you doubting this?)



Our eyes are always the same size from birth,

but our nose and ears


never stop growing.



The sentence:
'The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog'
uses every letter of the alphabet.
(Now, you KNOW you're going to try this out for accuracy, right?




The words 'racecar,'
'kayak'
and 'level'
are the same whether they are read
left to right or right to left (palindromes).
(Yep, I knew you were going to 'do' this one.)



There are only four words in the English language which end in 'dous':
tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.
(You're not doubting this, are you?)



There are two words in the English language that have all five vowels in order: 'abstemious' and 'facetious.' (Yes, admit it, you are going to say, a e i o u)

TYPEWRITER is the longest word
that can be made using the letters only on one row of the keyboard.
(All you typists are going to test this out)



A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.



A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.
(Some days that's about what my memory span is.)



A 'jiffy' is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second.



A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.



A snail can sleep for three years.
(I know some people that could do this too.!)




Almonds are a member of the peach family.



An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
(I know some people like that also)




Babies are born without kneecaps.
They don't appear until the child reaches 2 to 6 years of age.

February 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon.






In the last 4,000 years, no new animals have been domesticated.





If the population of China walked past you, 8 abreast,
the line would never end because of the rate of reproduction.




Leonardo Da Vinci invented the scissors





Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite!






Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.



The average person's left hand does 56% of the typing.





The cruise liner, QE 2

moves only six inches for each gallon of diesel that it burns.




The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.
(Good thing he did that.)




The winter of 1932 was so cold that Niagara Falls


froze completely solid.




There are more chickens than people in the world.




Winston Churchill

was born in a ladies' room during a dance.




Women blink nearly twice as much as men.




Now you know more than you did before!!

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