The Cooking Ninja

Though I'm under the weather, we decided to come to Paris so that little one can spend some time with her grandparents. Now everyone is sick except her. Upon touching the ground of Paris, I was graced with a sandpaper throat which escalated to an irritating cough that gives me sleepless nights. On top of that, I found myself voiceless the day after, and woke up at 3 am yesterday morning with a piercing stuffed nose. It's kinda comic to discipline my 1 year old with a voice that goes on and off (well off most of the time). The road to recovery will be slow with this cold windy weather.

Yesterday was also the infamous strikes throughout France that crippled the public transport. Workers who don't own a vehicle and the poor tourists were and are still held hostage by this strike (today is the second day of the strike). The other big event of the day was the official divorce of the French President, N. Sarkozy and his first lady, Cecila. Well, this wasn't big news to the French since rumors have been showing up in the press for a while.

With my parents-in-law looking after little one, we decided to check out this restaurant, PDG, known to serve the best hamburger in Paris. With the transport being paralyzed, we had the option of going about town with one of those Vélib', a self-service bicycle rental network set up by the city of Paris in its effort to reduce pollution and motorcars in the city. Every 300 m, there are terminals and bike stands for you to station it - available 24 hours a day 7 days a week. A smart card allows you to pick up a bike, with the first 30 min being free. A pretty cool system to have in town when there is a strike.

Then again I'm too chicken to ride on the road with those crazy Parisian drivers... so we opted for leg workout - took us slightly more than an hour to get there.

Upon reaching there, we were surprised to find a small 2 storey restaurant that serves brunch on weekends and also sometimes live jazz music. Although small, it is still nicely done without you feeling cramped inside - it has a nice ambiance and the service is great. They have a menu that offers interesting combination of burgers, club sandwiches etc ... They even offer giant burgers with a 300 g patty for big eaters (common in US but very rare in Europe).

I ordered my Swiss cheese that comes with spinach and curry sauce (interesting I thought) while Pierre orderd a Bacon cheese burger. The platter is rather generous and the food is indeed good. Pierre loved his burger while I would have preferred the curry sauce to be more spicy and aromatic - guess I'm used to eat curry that takes your mouth by storm. I don't know if their hamburger is the best in Paris but by far they are the best I had in Paris.

It's kinda fun... being tagged by fellow food bloggers, especially a newbie like me. I was first tagged by Nora of Life's Smörgåsbord for 7 things about me, then by Little corner of mine for My Favourite Food (I'm still trying figure out what is my favourite food).

Hmm...so 7 random things about me... that should be so simple isn't it... not. The funny thing is that everything about you seem so natural that you can hardly think of anything worth mentioning. Here's some random stuff that I could came up with about myself:

I hate HATE spiders, even the smallest makes my skin crawl. It's so bad for me that even the thought or mention of it gives me the shivers. I think it must be that day that I walked home from school and out of nowhere dropped this huge spider onto my skirt (back then Singapore still had quite some jungle). I flipped my skirt several times in vain to get rid of it. I was scared to death and was jumping like a mad monkey on fire with no one to help me. Eventually, I managed to get it off, unfortunately the fear for spider is still well ingrained in my brain since then.

I got my driving licence in France. I surprised everyone including my driving school by getting my road code at the first sitting (given that I only learned French for about 2½ years and had limited vocabulary and understanding). I was told that this is the most difficult to pass than getting the licence itself because the questions in the test are very tricky and sometimes ambiguous and that some only got it after the 5th attempt (France has to got one of the toughest driving exam on this planet).

I was 9 months pregnant when I sat for my year-end exams, worrying about going into labour right in the middle of my paper. Apparently I was not the only one as all the professors and my fellow classmates were joking about me giving birth right there and then. Everything went well and our little girl came 4 days after my last paper. What a good timing!

I can fall asleep anywhere without a problem even with lights on. Once inside a nightclub, my friends came back from the dance floor and found me asleep on a couch. I used to have a tendency to fall asleep in front people if the conversation was too boring but I have since mastered the art of staying awake through an endless and senseless monologue.

I just got my Licence (bachelor's degree) in Langues Etrangères Appliquées (foreign languages) specialising in International Business.

I love gardening. I have a chilli padi plant, curry plant and Kamquat and some other flowery plants in my house. So far I haven't had any success in planting a pandan plant at home.

I almost won the first prize at 4D lottery (a Singaporian lottery where you have to pick 4 single-digit numbers). I had a sudden vision of the number '130' flashing in front of me when my mom told me she was going to buy 4D but for the life of me I couldn't figure out how to draw up the 4th number as I saw only 3. So I just picked the 4th at random to complete. When I told my sis and Pierre about it, they told me: Very simple just add a zero in front of 130. So simple yet I never thought of it. The very next day, I checked the papers and the winning number was 0130. Sadly since that day, I never had any of those flashes again.

So the game is I'm supposed to tag 7 other bloggers ... hmm ... who's the lucky ones ? Wwwwuaaahhahaaha! .... I pick :

Wok and Spoon
Cookie Baker Lynn
East Meets West Kitchen
La Mia Cucina
Nook and Pantry
Travels with a Gourmet
Tea and Cookies

Ladies, no obligations to participate ... only if you have time.