All Things Will Unwind

Coming back from my non-blogging sojourn, I realized how neglected my little epiphanies on life have become. Stagnating at the bottom of my brain, decomposing hardly into anything that can be passed off as fertilizer to fuel more healthy, provocative thoughts.

I must admit, since the past year, I've encountered several turns in the wheel of life. Quite a handful of devastating, heart wreaking incidents have crippled me for some period, but somehow tempered by equally enriching and uplifting surprises from both friends and loved one, and on some occasions, from myself.

In the past few months, I guess I can be proud to profess that I've successfully cancelled out several items on my bucket list; gaining a few more though to hopefully slash out in the future. 

Despite how everything seems to be falling apart for myself at the moment, I believe that in due time, everything will fall into their right place. Incidentally, I've been hooked on to a particular song by My Brightest Diamond, an indie sort of band that have twisted opera, rock and maybe some cabaret music together into an interesting blend of sound that seems to give off a Bjork-like impression on my memory. All Things Will Unwind, so far, is my favorite. And as the chorus would beckon, "Everything is in line, all things will unwind".

I am optimistic that this post will be the first of many others since an almost year long disappearance from the blogging sphere. Giving a written body to my thoughts, with hopes of immortalizing them in the confines of my internet-based ramblings wall. Pray, this goal proves sustainable given my present conditions.

Love Language

Going through the state of our relationships, my friend and I began talking about how different people express their love and how people would like to be loved. I guess this is one of the causes of some misunderstandings among couples because one has unmet expectations of how he or she wants to be loved - whilst his or her partner assumes that he or she is giving his/her fullest love to him or her. Apparently, they might be speaking and expecting two very different love languages.

Gary Chapman writes a book that delves into the Five Love Languages - Acts of Service, Quality Time, Words of Affirmation, Receiving Gifts and Physical Touch. Curious, I searched it up and interestingly found this little assessment on one's love language.
So above is my love language. Quality Time.. and receiving gifts..

It's quite accurate with my friend's assessment of my love priorities. I talk, you drop everything and say, "Yes dear, I understand." Road trips, stupid gimmicks, making memories. I like it when my partner gives attention to minor details like how I don't like catsup and how I got a little scar from who knows where. Well maybe that and.. that he'd willingly cushion my atomic bomb when I'm in PMS Hulk mode and be my emotional punching bag.

Thoughts on Love

"I am someone else when I'm with you, someone more like myself."
-- Original Sin

Hey Daydreamer

"We're in this Make-Believe reality, and baby it's just you and me...
Coz when reality comes to play you realize you couldn't make her stay"

A friend posted this link ages ago in Facebook and he asked me what I thought of it. Honestly, I didn't really stay long enough through the song to hear it out. Today, I chanced upon this song on the radio and it got stuck in my head. Only when I tried to search it did I realize it was the song he was talking about. Pinoy Owl City.

This totally is a story in my mind.
The Tiger and The Night Owl.
Nuff said.

Nervous Breakdown

"You know me all to well but you never had the chance
To find out who I really am, who I really am
I'm spinning round, I'm calling out
I'm gonna have a breakdown

I'm spinning round coming out I'm falling down
I'm spinning round coming out I'm falling I'm falling
I don't care, I don't care what you think of me right now
Cause I'm gonna have a breakdown"

How Often Must We Say "I Love You" Part 2

Having given attention to his initial ramblings on love, I was introduced to the second installment of his "How Often Must We Say "I Love You"" thoughts. Once again, dear old Caesar-Édouard Perrin has taken to his computer and typed down his love-driven realizations.

This time, he delves even further into his romantic side and offers bits of advice on how to treat a lady. Admittedly, there were various circumstances when I felt the abject loss of hope that a man could understand the workings in a woman's mind - that men feel women's desires lean at times, towards the impractical and the illogical. How often do I hear men frustratedly exclaim the hopelessness of understanding women, and women quite conversely feel the same way.

"There's a lot of hooraw about how love can be quantified by how often you say "I love you," among other methods, but that's not the true measure of love. Saying "I love you" can become as routine as brushing your teeth, or as automatic as switching on your turn signal as you drive. A lot of people make the mistake of oversimplifying the concept of love, or dismissing it entirely as something capricious and sophomoric. The fact is, love is complex, it is formed through a complex series of emotions, and people are emotionally complex.

I wrote "How Often Must We Say 'I Love You?'" after I saw a question on my news feed that went, and I paraphrase, "How often do you say I love you?" The comments beneath this post was a feeding frenzy of posturing, one-upmanship, cynicism and abject ignorance. I was deeply affected and saddened by it.

A lot of people seem to lack the creative thinking to tell the difference between consistency and monotony. A man can kiss his wife in the morning, tell her he loves her while on the 7:30am ferry from New Jersey to New York City, have hothouse flowers delivered to her doorstep without fail at noon, dinner at Le Bernardin after work, spontaneous, passionate lovemaking in bed, and offer another I love you before falling asleep, and the wife can still feel empty and unfulfilled.

Crazy? Let's see what the woman might be thinking: She might be thinking that her husband sees her as nothing more than a living, breathing barbie doll. He cares not for her opinion on anything, she once tried to offer him a home cooked meal which he ate absently and without relish despite the fact that 1) she spent the entire afternoon preparing it, and 2) it actually was really good. She dissolves into bitter tears while scraping off the remnants of his dinner from his plate. He tries to make up for his insensitivity by inviting her to dine at an expensive restaurant, not knowing that he was actually adding further insult to injury. He has NEVER hand-delivered flowers to her. They're all sent from his office. (A man would ask, what's the difference? At least she gets her goddamn flowers.) And while their lovemaking is pleasurable, in the end she always feels like a nautilus machine, something he straddles, works out strenuously, and finishes by gloating over his own "maleness."

What kind of situation have we got here? We have a woman who feels that her husband isn't stimulating that part of her that makes her feel "womanly." She feels like a plant; watered, spritzed, and occasionally turned towards sunlight. She wants to be able to take care of him, be the source of happiness, to make him laugh, to make him smile, to hold his hand during times when he's vulnerable yet heartrendingly endearing.

We have a man who thinks he's doing his duty as a loving husband because he hasn't missed a box on the checklist. He thinks that by establishing a certain number of romantic gestures daily, and by being complacent to her material needs, should be sufficient for her to feel loved. He blindly refuses to see her as a living, breathing person, and believes that to ask for more than what he feels is his capacity for "generosity" is outright ungrateful.

Love is never simple. If it were, we could buy a jar of the stuff at Costco and gorge ourselves silly with love until we're just about sick of it, and that simply is never the case.

There are men who understand the gravity and responsibility behind committed love, and there are those who just want a woman to confirm their masculinity, and there those who just want a good time.

Each part of us sends us different signals of desire, whether you are a man or a woman. Each part of us desires and requires one form of nourishment or another. The mind requires synergy. The soul requires security. The heart requires compassion. The body requires physical contact. It is important not to isolate any of the signals of desire but to combine them to form a unified goal. The idea is not to find a perfect partner, but to find a partner who has enough wisdom, emotional and intellectual competence, and empathy to know what a woman needs. There are too many men who pursue women with the wrong goals in mind, and there are too many women who misrepresent men, either by refusing to acknowledge their base nature, or by translating their own desires for the purpose of sculpting the man they want into something he isn't.

Love is meant to be built. It doesn't sculpt, chisel or alter anything. Certainly it makes things different, but it is not meant to take away anything from anyone. This is one of the reasons why I don't say a woman is "unavailable," or "taken." Call me a pedant, but I do not consider women to be possessions. They still have free will. As man proposes and God disposes, a man must prove and a woman must decide. Once the bond is formed, there is no such thing as incompatibility. There is only compromise, cooperation and mutual understanding. Without it, it is only a lofty form of hypocrisy which cannot be described as love, only a poor imitation of it."

Leo Buscaglia, a reknowned writer and commonly known as Dr. Love has written, "I have a very strong feeling that the opposite of love is not hate - it's apathy. It's not giving a damn." Love is a constant giving of oneself, of being constantly thinking of the welfare of another more than of one's best interests. He adds, "Like any other living, growing thing, love requires effort to keep it healthy."

As an end note, Gloria Estefan sings, "Love on a Two-Way Street, Lost it on a lonely highway"."

How Often Must We Say "I Love You"

I was mindlessly wandering through my friends' profile pages when I chanced upon this interesting piece of reading that a friend of mine, Mr. Caesar-Édouard Perrin had composed. It caught my attention, as I feel there seems to be a scarcity of sensitivity and trivial sentimentality in the masculine psyche. His little mind adventure into the female emotional tendencies sparked an admiration on my end, for at times I find it rare that a man would bother himself with a woman's obsession over little, at times, inexplainably complicated way of perceiving things.

Thus, I requested his permission to export his Facebook note into my blog - perhaps for my reading convenience and also perhaps to aid propagate his epiphany.

"I feel that love is not necessarily best expressed in words. While it is most heartening to hear someone tell you that they love you, I feel that love should not be comprised of passing encounters or random fancies, but instead love should either be the cloud that you float upon, the pedestal that supports you, the blanket that comforts you. Love should be as constant and as all-encompassing as possible, and is best expressed not by three words, but by two: commitment, and consistency.

You wake. She sleeps. Kiss her eyelids. She may not know you did it, but her heart will remain warm for the rest of the day.

Got time to spare? Make her breakfast. Doesn't have to be fancy. Simple, sinful, the way she likes it. Butter. Maple syrup. Leave a rose on the tray.

You don't have to text her every five minutes, giving her the minutiae of your daily routine. You don't have to tack a poem on her fridge everyday before you walk out the door (although that would be nice once in a while). But you can be considerate. Try to be home when you say you will. If she asks you to pick something up on the way back from work, don't forget to come back with it. As often as possible you should make her feel like she is a part of your life. That she is important to you. Be considerate. Know her, understand her, feel for her. You're at the supermarket. Do you remember whether she likes dill or sweet pickles? Little things like these matter to a woman. If you remember what she likes, if you pay attention. Committed, consistent.

You don't have to bury her in balloons, greeting cards, roses, teddy bears and chocolates every time you return home. (Although now and then it would be very sweet of you to do so.) Instead, kiss her on the mouth, linger, and tell her with your eyes and your smile that you are glad to be home, that her arms around your shoulders are the solace that makes even the most tiresome day at work seem worthwhile.

Dinner. Ask her how her day was. Tell her how yours was. She cares for you, she wants to know how you've been. Be happy for her successes, concerned for her troubles, and be ready to defend her when you must. You are her knight, she is your princess; perhaps not in the lofty horse-drawn carriage castle-in-the-clouds Cinderella type way, but in the more prosaic 21st century concrete jungle manner, but that doesn't make knighthood any less romantic, or any less necessary. When a man loves a woman, the man means so much more to a woman than a man could ever hope to fully understand. When a woman loves, she remains a foundation of strength, a core of compassion and empathy. It is not so much that she wears her heart on her sleeve, but rather that she entrusts to her man the keystone of her foundation. For a man to fail a woman is to witness her collapse, and while she can indeed be rebuilt, for a woman is strong, what emerges from the detritus may not be the same woman.

Bed. Be her lover. Be her protector. As you take, so should you give. When you are both spent, don't let her go right away. The thin sheen of sweat that glistens upon your bodies will quickly grow cold, clammy and uncomfortable. Hold her. Do not abandon her to the soul-stabbing chill of isolation. Allow her to savor the afterglow of your mutual pleasures. And when she finally begins to drift into the land of dreams, whisper softly in her ear, "I love you." You may have only said it once today, but you will mean it, and she will believe you. Yours will be a love without uncertainty or trepidation. Hers will be a trust that will be founded upon your promise of commitment and consistency. You are her keystone.

She sleeps. She might not have heard you say you love her, but her heart will remain warm for the rest of the night."

As another dear friend of mine has oh-so-often, quite wisely expresses, "God is in the details".

It is in the minute and often discarded trimmings that bring a bit of meaning in certain acts. People have often bothered with packages more than the content. To me, specifically, an expensive store-purchased bouquet weighs exaggeratedly less in my heart next to a simple hand picked flower chosen specifically because of an underlying story between two people. As Anubis would weigh your heart against the feather of justice, it best be said that women tend to weigh a man's heart against the feather of sincerity and thoughtfulness.

Then again, I wish I can generalize for all - yet, women in current surveys have proven that money has increasingly improved a man's desirability in their eyes contrasted against that of love. Practicality comes into the picture and then love becomes quite an anomaly, perhaps a secondary and optional add-on to a successful relationship. This I would like to merely state, and leave hanging for the time being - best left for another day's discussion.

My Life Would Suck Without You

I know that I've got issues
But you're pretty messed up too
Either way, I found out I'm nothing without you

My 2011 Birthday Conversation

A: Happy Birthday, enjoying so far?
Kat: What's there to enjoy?

A: I dunno, gifts and greetings?
Kat: Hardly exceptional. It's just like all other days in the year.
You know that feeling when you're waiting for those big fireworks to happen on your special day...Newsflash, its a dud.

A: That's kinda sad.
Kat: There's nothing worth celebrating anyway.

A: Well, your life is something, I'm kinda glad this day came. It's a nice reminder that u were born and exist.
Kat: Nice try, thanks.

A: Hey, my life would suck without u, I'm sure.

.. And all was better.

2011 New Year Resolutions

With 2010 melted away like gel slithering stickily in our brains (okay, I don't know where that comparison came from) and 2011 giving a big yawn of salutations. It has become customary to pen down some long desired goals in the hope that the new year would provide the venue for one to put them into action. To begin, I'd like to list down my 2010 goals first and cross out the ones I accomplished.

2010 Goals
1. Get driver's license

Yes, it's official. Be afraid because I can legally drive around the streets. To those who personally know me, I think you know what this means.

2. Go on a photoshoot

Had two of these this year, so not bad. A and B

3. Go to Tagaytay with friends

Not exactly the group I had in mind, but I was still able to go with my GFAPY friends.

4. Backpacking adventure

Technically, this was the Antipolo trip with Marjorie. It's not a backpacking adventure but I guess it would do.

5. Go on a Visayas trip with Charley
This didn't push through due to financial and time constraints.

6. Lose weight.
Apparently I gained them all back.

7. Go out of the country

The He Hui Po Association decided to go to Taiwan for 2010 and boy that really helped me meet this goal.

8. Try my hand at photography again.


Visitations of the Past album. Yes!

Now for 2011.

I've decided to make my goals more specific and segregate them into five different categories to have a holistic sense of what I aim to do namely: (A) Lifestyle, Religious and Health, (B) Finances, (C) Family and Friends, (D) Leisure and (E) Personal/ Miscellenous goals. In general, I will be plotting out primary dates in my organizers as a reminder of these goals.

How to make sure I will follow my 2011 Goals
In order to make this year's goals more challenging, I decided to make a point system for myself in determining how well I will meet my goals and round all these up at the end of the year. Total score aimed for is 1000 pts.

My ratings will be as follows:
750 + It is a year well spent
500 - 750 Turn over resolutions to 2012. Try a little more.
250 - 500 It's like you didn't try. Average rating.
250 - A complete waste. Failure

So without further ado, let's welcome in my new set of goals for 2011.

2011 Goals

A. Lifestyle, Religious and Health:
1. Get back into Sports. Make it a weekly religion. (3 pt for every session)
2. Go to confession at least once per month. (5 pts for every session)
3. Reach and maintain a weight of 125 lbs. (15 pts)
4. Join a charity association or group. (10 pts)

B. Finances:
1. Deposit X amount per payday in personal savings account. (5 pts for every deposit)
2. Fill up the old and new KFC bucket coin bank. (15 pts per coin bank)
3. Save up to 10,000 Php of crispy bills. (10 pts per 10,000 Php)
4. Do not overspend.
5. Learn and invest in the stock market.(15 pts)

C. Family and Friends:
1. Treat the family out to a personally discovered restaurant. (5 pts)
2. Make a potluck/ picnic get together with friends.(5 pts)
3. In certain circumstances, when possible, drop everything and help someone in need.
4. Try to go to a people-skills related seminar. (10 pts)
5. Do something extra-ordinary for people that matter. (5 pts each)
6. Organize a whole family (with extended family) trip. Can be connected with Leisure 1 or 2. (10 pts)
7. Make peace with...

D. Leisure:
1. Go to a non-work related, non-association related trip out of Metro Manila. (10 pts)
2. Go to a non-work related, non-association related trip out of the country. (12 pts)
3. Go to Sagada and Banawe. This is not included in Leisure No. 1. (10 pts)
4. Optional: Go to Boracay, Palawan or Cebu. (BONUS: 5 pts for every location visited)

E. Personal/ Miscellaneous:
1. Drive to work and eventually, to Cavite. (10 pts)
2. Finish at least 1 book per month. (5 pts per book)
3. Enroll in a Chinese proficiency class. (10 pts)
4. Try to join a choir or take singing lessons. (1 pt per session)
5. Allot one day to relax and rejuvenate every month. (3 pts)
6. Join in a contest. (5 pts per contest, additional 10 if won)
7. Get 6-8 hours of sleep. Anything less is a deduction of 5 pts to the total score.
8. Get more practice in photography.
9. Join a fun run. (5 pts for every run)
8. Bonus: Cook Charley's gumbo and make Charley's mom's special ham. (5 pts each)

It seems like a hectic and goal laden year, but I am optimistic this will push me further into becoming better. I do hope I'd be able to stick with the point system though. It might be a struggle at first, but they do say, it takes 16 to 21 times of repeating an act to make it a habit.

Have you penned down your goals and resolutions yet?

Bitter Heart of Mine

Loving this song.. for a very particular reason.

Zee Avi - Bitter Heart

Sun rays come down as seen when they hit the ground,
Children spinning around till they fall down down down.
I wait for you: it's been two hours now,
You're still somewhere in town,
Your dinners getting cold.
I rest my case you are always this late,
And you know how much I hate waiting around 'round 'round.

Bitter heart, bitter heart tries to keep it all inside,
Bitter heart, bitter heart shadows will help you try to hide,
Bitter heart, my bitter heart is gettin' just a little fragile,
Bitter heart, bitter heart of mine.

And then you come and tell me the same reason as you did yesterday,
So tell me whats her name.
Doo doo da dum, doo doo da dum, doo doo doo doo doo doo da da dum dum, da da da da dum, da da da da dum, da da da da dum.

Bitter heart, bitter heart tries to keep it all inside
Bitter heart, bitter heart shadows will help you try to hide,
Bitter heart, my bitter heart is just getting a little fragile,
Bitter heart, bitter heart of mine, of mine, of mine, of mine, of mine, of mine.

New Year's Day - Garlic Chicken in Olive Oil

New Year's day. I got out of bed and jumped right in front of my laptop to check if there are any updates in my Facebook, when the tempting smell of garlic began to float into my room. Our neighbors apparently were cooking something olfactorily drool worthy.

Resolved not to let this garlic jealousy let me down (especially on New Year's day), I quickly Skype-d my boyfriend and asked if he knew the garlic chicken recipe his sister used when I hung out at his place a couple of months ago. He said his sister just made it from scratch and didn't follow any recipe. That was not enough to sway me from my garlicky desire.

I went to the kitchen and began to take out the garlic and chicken from the fridge. I absolutely had no idea what to do, I just wanted my garlic chicken.

Like I would always say though, I don't have a specific recipe and would just follow whatever hits me. I was inspired by two things, first by my boyfriend's sister's cooking and second was a dish I tried in Puerto Galera when my friends and I went there half a decade back. It was an Italian chicken dish swimming in olive oil with tomatoes, if I can recall correctly.

So below is the product of my garlic envy - which tasted pretty awesome, in my opinion. And I don't think my siblings can contest that since we pretty much wiped out the dish this lunch.

Garlic Chicken in Olive Oil

1. Marinate chicken strips with olive oil, chopped garlic, Italian seasoning, dried rosemary, salt and pepper.
2. In a deep pan, melt some butter (just enough to make sure the ingredients won't stick) then add some sliced onions. I used a head of onion, we only had the small red variety available at the moment. Cook until onions have softened, take out of the pan and set aside.
3. In the same pan, add olive oil. This time, be a little generous. Fry some more chopped garlic, then throw in the marinated chicken. Cook until chicken has turned white - no more pinkish color.
4. I added around a cup of warm water into the mixture, threw in three cloves of crushed garlic and then covered the pan. I think chicken stock would've been better, but since we didn't have any ready - warm water would just have to do. Leave for a few minutes, around 30, just for the liquid to reduce. I added the onions back in, midway.
5. In a frying pan, cook some bacon bits until crispy. Set aside. This is an optional bit, but I like the idea of throwing in a strong flavor to give the dish a little kick.
6. Once the chicken mixture has reduced considerably and you're left with more or less what you started with, you can now plate the garlic chicken. I added the olive oil sauce on the plate and topped the whole thing with the bacon bits. Some sliced olives would've been a nice addition too, but we didn't have any at the moment.

My uncle just thought I used a bit too much olive oil, but liked the way the dish tasted. YUM! :D He recommended that rather than making strips (which looked like chopped tuna or something), I should making it using breast fillets. He added that I should try grilling the chicken than just pan frying. I said I'll consider it - maybe in the future I would. I'm not really a big fan of grilling though.

As work would recommence Monday, I fear that the kitchen would once again, be a rather alien section of the house for me, in the upcoming months. Oh well, it was good while it lasted.

Our Last 2010 Supper - Shrooms Bruschetta

We were a few hours away from dinner time. Mom and I still haven't got a clue what would work as a special appetizer. We had wanted to try the Jewish Baked Tomatoes with Mozarella which my friend, Lynda, had prepared during our get together pot-luck. Unfortunately, we couldn't find those big beefy tomatoes in the market places.

While we were preparing the ingredients for the other dishes, mom goes "I have an idea what we can cook", and writes a list of ingredients to ask the maid to buy. I kept asking mom what the dish is called, but she couldn't provide me with a name since there wasn't any.

She first tried it in the United States of America when she visited her brother's family. Her sister in law was at a buffet luncheon and chanced upon this tasty appetizer. Curious, she asked the chef for the recipe and tried it for her family. It apparently, was a hit.

Rather than naming it "The Untitled Dish", as was the case, I decided to baptize it Shrooms Bruschetta. Of course as always, we have tweaked the recipe a bit to suit our taste.

Shrooms Bruschetta

Ingredients:
2 packs of oyster mushrooms, sliced*
1 sweet white onion, sliced into rings
3 tablespoon butter
1 1/2 tablespoon of sugar
salt and pepper
french bread, sliced
olive oil
Italian seasoning
grated cheese
Bacon bits (optional)**

*You can use any mushroom you like. My mom recommends Portobello mushrooms, but if that is unavailable, you can opt for button mushrooms or oyster mushrooms as a substitute.

**We opted to use bacon bits as they were convenient for us, but you can use other meat like ground beef or pork if you like. You can also discard adding any meat products and go vegan.

How to:
1. In a skillet, heat the butter until it melts. Toss in the onion rings and cook until onion has softened.
2. Add the mushrooms and mix. Add in sugar, salt and pepper to taste. Cook until mushrooms have browned.
3. Rub some olive oil onto bread slices. Put mushroom mixture over the bread slice and sprinkle a bit of Italian seasoning on top of each slice. Top with bacon and grated cheese.
4. Pop in the oven and leave there until cheese begins to melt. Serve immediately.
We were able to make around 12 slices.

It was interesting. During dinner, my grandfather who rarely says anything about the food except when it's inedible, commended that he enjoyed this little appetizer. I guess that scores some real mean points for this baby.

We hope to be seeing more of this in the weeks to follow.

Our Last 2010 Supper - Lasagna ala Agoo

After almost a year of no cooking, I've found the perfect opportunity to use my kitchen skills. Having work for most part of the year, I would usually drag myself home and slump unto my bed into sweet repose. The kitchen was hardly a place of rejuvenation, for me. As 2010 comes to a close, I decided that a week long vacation would do me good. With time, I volunteered to take part of our last 2010 supper with my version of the all favorite, Lasagna.

I never really had a specific recipe for most of what I cook, and would only follow the biddings of my instincts at that moment. The recipe below is generally a mental calculation of the ingredients I used. In the end though, everything boils down to personal taste and preference.

Lasagna ala Agoo

1 pack of Lasagna noodles
Bacon bits
Grated Cheese

Red Sauce

3 tablespoon olive oil
1 head of garlic, chopped
1 medium sized onion, chopped
1/4 kilo ground beef
1 pack of 750 g Del Monte Gourmet Beef and Mushroom
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1/2 cup of cubed cheese
Salt and pepper to taste
Dried Herbs

White Sauce

bacon bits and edges
1 tablespoon margarine (optional)
1 head of garlic, chopped
1 medium sized onion, chopped
1 can of sliced button mushrooms
2 tetrapacks of all purposed cream
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
1/2 can of evaporated milk
1 can of cream of mushroom
1 tablespoon of brown sugar
Dried herbs
salt and pepper to taste

Red Sauce
1. In a sauce pot, heat olive oil then add in chopped garlic and onion. Once onion starts to become translucent, put in the ground beef. (Note: We have some red wine going a little vinegar-y after air exposure and I decided to add two to three drizzles on the beef while cooking it).
2. Add in the pasta sauce and sugar. Mix. Throw in some dried basil and tarragon.
3. I was feeling a bit adventurous so I added a few dashes of turmeric, curry and Spanish paprika. Salt and pepper to taste.
4. Add in the cubed cheese to make mixture more creamy. I just really love adding cheese to my tomato based sauce. Simmer until reduced slightly. Set aside.

White Sauce
1. In a new sauce pot, fry bacon until crispy. I usually like using Purefood's Bits and Edges since it's cheaper and I don't need my bacon to be uniform anyway. I just try to slice them into bite sized bits though. They tend to have big chunks of fat which I use especially for this purpose. Strain bacon bits and leave bacon fat in the pot.
2. I know it's a bit fatty but when I think the bacon fat is not sufficient, I tend to add in a tablespoon of margarine. This is optional though. Once heated, I add in my garlic and onion and cook until onions turn translucent.
3. Add in sliced mushrooms and mix until mushrooms have browned.
4. Add in the all purpose cream to the mixture and mix. In low heat, wait until mixture begins to simmer. Once simmering, add in mayonnaise and evaporated milk, mixing until well incorporated.
5. Slowly, add in the cream of mushroom and mix until there aren't any chunks of mushroom soup left
6. According to taste, add in sugar, salt and pepper. Throw in part of the fried bacon bits.
7. Once again, I play with my herbs - mostly I added dried basil and a pinch of curry powder. I want my white sauce to be rich, but not too strong as to overpower the tomato based sauce.
8. Let this simmer until reduced. Set aside.

Lasagna
1. Cook lasagna noodles according to package instructions. Usually add a pinch of salt and oil to prevent them from sticking to the pot. Once al dente, take them out of the pot and rinse in cold water to stop cooking.
2. In a baking pan, spread the meat sauce at the bottom of the pan then top with lasagna noodles. Then spread the white sauce over the noodles and sandwich this with another layer of lasagna. Keep alternating sauces and noodles. Make sure the topmost layer is sauce - either white or red.
Note: I had my sister help me out on this.

3. I left our lasagna in the fridge for a day since I prepared the lasagna ahead of time. (Make sure lasanga has already cooled off before popping in the refrigerator) I'm not particularly sure if it has an effect, but mom says it's better to wait it out a few hours before serving.
4. Top lasagna generously with grated cheese and remaining bacon bits.
5. Bake in oven until cheese melts. Serve.

Conclusion:
I received quite a lot of commendations for the lasagna, which I am very proud to announce. It is a rather heavy and rich viand though, that I don't recommend partaking too much. Browsing through the ingredients list, I bet you can already compute how much calories a slice of this baby contains. Winks.

Acknowledgements:
For the white sauce, I'd like to thank Marie Ong for getting the recipe. We first tasted the Carbonara Alfredo at Rommel's birthday bash back in college and were very much impressed. Apparently, it was Rommel's mom's recipe. Marie requested for it and eventually passed it on to me. I just tweaked it a bit to suit my taste. My Alfredo experience has never been the same after.

Looking Back - 2010

As firecrackers begin to simultaneously thunder and the skies start getting polluted with a magnificent show of dancing colors and smoke, everyone seems to be abuzz with New Year preparations. With the first decade of the 21'st century creeping to a close, dying to a new year of promises - I'd like to take this occasion to appreciate the many things that have made 2010 a memorable year for me.
“Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” - Robert Brault