Super Brain and Immune Booster Pasta

It has been incredibly busy recently, hence for the lack of updates. Obviously, busy or not, duties as a mother continue. The dishes I have been preparing had to be more efficient.

Here is a super quick and nutritious meal I whipped up for the family last night.

Prep time: 10 mins, 5 mins before cooking and 5 mins there after.
Cook time: 12 mins

Ingredients:
-fresh cod fillet
-garlic
-spinach
-pasta
-kelp
-extra virgin olive oil
-fresh rosemary
-fresh English parsley
-fresh lemon thyme
-Broccoli Sprout powder
-Chia seeds
-sea salt

1. Dice up a head of garlic, pinch of sea salt, rosemary, English parsley and lemon thyme. Add these to olive oil to infuse and coat the cod.
2. Steam the cod, with spinach with the infused oil and its herbs.
3. Boil pasta simultaneously for 10 mins.
4. When pasta is cooked, drain the water. Add in a dollop of butter. My daughter and I love love love butter, hence why we go through copious amount of butter in the house. Stir in steamed spinach and the gravy from the cod (2).
5. Sprinkle on Chia seeds and Broccoli Sprout powder from the Super Sprout series. I prefer to serve cod on the side.

The beauty of this quick dish is that I was busy with the kids half the time it was cooking on his own. This was served to the entire family, including my almost 4 year old and 10 month old baby (salt was omitted for the baby).

It sure feels like spring around here

Living in Malaysia, there is really only one season, which is summer. It is hot all year round with variation in the amount of rainfall.

Having said that, it feels like spring in our house which has been on the receiving end of 'new births'. (Not mine, I should clarify.)

I became rather fond of gardening in recent months. It started with us moving into our new home and we thought some greenery would spruce up the bare balcony. Plus, I thought it would be a good idea to introduce DD to living things and instill the idea of responsibility (before we move on to pets).

I am rather green (haha, I can't help the pun) to plants and nature so the maiden trip to the nursery was an eye opener. I didn't know you can buy plants outside the florists and supermarkets. Haha. The uncle was particularly nice to me and offered plenty of advice. I think he was rather worried I was going to kill the plants eventually.

The plants were delivered to our home and got all set up. Weeks came and went, they didn't die. In fact, most of them seemed to be thriving. 

I got adventurous and planted some chilli (both chilli padi and big red chilli) and lime. I had a 10% hope of any positive outcome. Still, I got DD to water the pot daily.

When we returned home after Chinese New Year, I was delighted to see some green shoots. Real green shoots, not the Bernanke-imagined kind. 

I made the rookie mistake of planting both chilli and lime in the same pot. When the seedlings came out, I happily told DH we are going to get chilli lime. He shook his head and said that wasn't going to happen. Then I fret about not being able to tell which is chilli or lime. It has been weeks, the seedlings are now bigger and it's obvious from the leaves. And if I am really unsure, I can always wait till they fruit. :) 

It's great having all these plants. DD loves helping me with watering the plants. Every night before bed, she would say 'night night' to each one of them and pat them. Very cute.

And then our fish gave birth less than three days after we bought the three of them. 

I think the fly (baby fish) were born live, rather than hatched. We had to separate them, in case the mother fish eats them because she forgets those are her offspring. Yes, apparently goldfish memory is not limited to goldfish. I counted 30 initially but eventually only three survived. We bought 3 and ended up with 6, a pretty good buy if you ask me. Great fun for DD too. She went hysterical when she spot the teeny tiny fly for the very first time. They are now much bigger, probably at the toddler stage. Mother fish is pregnant again though. 

DD has to say 'morning' to the fishes before going to the school. She wants to dip her chubby hand in to 'sayang' them. Given her excitement, I think it could be a good idea to have some plants and pets at the school. Maybe more fishes or even rabbits. We will leave it to the kids to decide.

Then there was Valentine's Day. DH actually remembered without any reminders. On top of that, he bought me flowers (gasp!), making me a very happy mommy indeed.

P.S. The chilli lime plants have grown pretty big and more have sprung up since the picture was last taken. If you are interested to adopt some chilli babies, do let me know.