Grilled Flounder with Roe!

Popped in to Mikoto with some friends for a casual dinner and some highballs. Didn't go overboard with the drinks. I just had two easy glasses of highballs. The rest had giant mugs of beer. We wisely skipped having a bottle of sake. All of us had an early start the next day, and it wouldn't do to nurse any hangovers.

I love its steamed pork with cabbage. The izakaya does it in a lovely almost mille-feuille nabe style, without the dashi and without salt. That's exactly what I like about it. It's not the thinly-sliced pork belly I care about. They give you salt and shoyu on the side to dip if you need more sodium. I also ordered shogayaki. They're a little heavy on the ginger, but not too bad. Went great with the rice. I would have finished all of it except that I gave a little space to the rather tasty mentaiko pasta. 

The table ordered so many things. There wasn't much yakitori — this is an izakaya. So they had many deep fried items. Although I wondered why they needed to deep-fry the quail eggs after they have already boiled it. Hahaha. They had a small and cute flounder. Had that grilled and we scored some roe within. It was quite a fair bit of roe! Yay. Absolutely delicious. 

I love it that we can take Choya everywhere now. I freely admit it — I rarely go to dinners without her. Many friends indulge me and opt for al fresco venues that will take her. Now, they're 'rewarded' with many more delicious choices of menus, as long as we have portable fans, we are cool. LOL 

I don't even mind the monsoon surges and rains. It means cooler weather. We'll simply deal with it. Meanwhile, we'll just enjoy this 23dC weather in the evenings before the monsoon peters off.

Lots of Spices at Pongal

When Pongal rolled around, the man and I were separately invited to a number of feasts held by the various grassroots committees and migrant groups. So we went separately, and also together to a few Pongal events. 

The choices of vegetarian food at these buffets were wonderful. For various reasons, I didn't take photos of the food. I simply paid attention to the conversation and kept the phone away. There were meat dishes at some of these lunches and dinners, but I tend to prefer the vegetarian items. 

I'd take a bite of the traditional ven pongal, but not the whole thing. CANNOT LAH. It's rice and dal, and ghee. Sometimes with coconut, cashew nuts and black pepper. It's spiced and savoury, but it's not my thing. Luckily only small portions were allocated to me, so it wasn't too embarrassing that I couldn't finish a whole bowl.

I didn't know how I'd still have cravings for Indian spices, and I ended up at the too-convenient Nalan for a few more lunches. I somehow don't turn up there for dinner. Only lunches, and this week, some friends joined me too, at the last minute since they wanted food, and we all happened to be in town near one another, and near Capitol Piazza.

The South Indian thali set is usually too much for me. What I prefer is to order an uttapam, then add on another dish. Opted for mushroom masala that day, and today, I had bhindi masala. I love okra only when it's done in masala or with sambal. Heh. Today's mix went well with my usual onion and tomato uttapam. Absolutely satisfying.

A Monsoon Surge

Our national weather forecast got this absolutely right when they warned about the four-day monsoon surge over the weekend. We love the 22dC weather and lower humidity, but that comes with unrelenting rains. 

These flash floods are really annoying and real. So we do watch the news on flooding sites and not schedule any meets that requires us to be in these areas over the weekend. A few residential buildings and landed homes got their power and electricity knocked out. Acccck. 

The monsoon season is always wet, but a surge means relentless rain non-stop. I've got out all my rain gear and cleared the patio to air them. Laundry is an issue since the clothes can't dry and when they eventually do, there's this stink since there isn't sun. No, I don't have that fancy self-heating laundry rack. 

My Smol Girl is upset at having to pee and poop on wet grass. She is fine with the rain and all, but she hates wet paws and doesn't like her fur staying wet. I need to wipe her face and paws dry before she gets to them. In case of leptospirosis and all sorts of horrible bacteria lurking in the rain water, and soil remnants. 

Extreme weather conditions. It's wild, isn't it? Bangkok is having a super cool two weeks at about 18dC; Hong Kong hit its 11dC winter. It's a full-on monsoon surge here while LA is burning up with unceasing Santa Ana winds, and zero precipitation forecasted for 15 days.