The sun has already set by the time I finished decorating the cake.  I had to take photos in the living room, of all places.

I used chocolate buttercream icing for the brown stars.  I’ll post the recipe on my next entry.

Both hubby and my little girl liked how the cake turned out.  But I shouldn’t do this star technique too often or else, I might end up with carpal tunnel syndrome! :)

Here’s Abby, who is turning out to be a big sports fan like her dad.  She always  begs hubby to carry her upside down, much to my disapproval!  It doesn’t seem too long ago when we were looking for baby beddings for her! *sigh*

I’ve now recovered from the Cardinals’ loss…I think.  *another big sigh*

I have another Weekend Snapshot:  Superbowl Sunday

Have a great week ahead, y’all!  Cheers!

Chinese New Year is on January 26th, just a couple of hours away on our part of the world.  Back in the Philippines, we make it a point to join the Chinese New Year festivities even if we are not Chinese.  Once or twice, we even paid good money so we could take part in the “prosperity banquet” and other activities meant to attract good fortune at the Mandarin Oriental.   Two years ago, we even feng shui-fied our home!

This year, we thought we should celebrate by having Chinese food for lunch.  I was actually looking for a place that had a Chinese New Year banquet special of sorts but wasn’t very successful.  I probably just didn’t look hard enough.  And since feng shui is all about signs and symbols, I thought one of the better signs of plenty is, what else but  a Chinese buffet! :)  We had a couple friend of ours and their two kids join us for lunch.  It’s best to pig out in the company of good friends, you know!

We chose Fujian Grand China Buffet for our Chinese New Year lunch rendezvous.  Why?  Because I am a very gullible person. TV commercials for this buffet place has gotten me curious big time.  Hubby and I know very well that Chinese food is best enjoyed at little places that are run by a family, where there isn’t too much tinkering with the dishes to suit the American taste.  That’s why we don’t eat at so-called fusion restaurants very often.  But we are suckered (please excuse the term) into eating at buffet places every now and then.  Go figure!

For my first plate, I headed to the sushi counter.  That’s always my first stop.

The sushi was edible, that much I can tell you. Buffets don’t have the best sushi but I still get my fill if only to satisfy my sushi cravings.

My second plate…

I had Stir Fried Shrimps, Barbecue Spareribs, Mushrooms in Oyster Sauce, Siomai, Seafood with Vegetables and Mongolian Beef. I had but a few bites of the spareribs.  Hubby liked the siomai but I thought I made better siomai.  Haha! :)  The rest were, buffet-ok.

My third plate which I had next to my second plate because I couldn’t find a bowl to put my rice in…

That’s chicken terriyaki on a stick, fried chicken wings, and ground meat with crab stick wrapped in eggroll wrapper (I don’t know the exact name).  Nothing special really.

Should I even tell you about my dessert?  I know I should eat fruits but I didn’t. :)  I had mini cakes and pastries…

The best tasting from this lot are the cake rolls.  They’re not moist but they taste better than the other three that I got.  I just ate the whipped cream from the cream puff.

Here’s Hubby’s first plate…

He had a Mongolian bowl, too…noodles for long life. :)

At $10.99 per adult on weekends, you get a huge variety of dishes.  This is the 4th Chinese buffet place we’ve tried so far and this, by far, is the biggest!  There were about 10 buffet counters, if I’m not mistaken.  They had 3 kinds of soup, noodles, fried rice, beef, chicken and seafood dishes cooked in a variety of ways (yet tasting quite similar to each other!), salads, fruits, mini cakes and pastries, sushi, a Mongolian counter.  There’s even pizza and pasta…don’t even ask me why.

You’ll have to fall in line twice.  First, to pay and second to get seated.  There are plenty of seats so the wait isn’t that long.  The place was packed earlier.  Dishes at the buffet counters were replenished right away.  The servers were efficient and quick to clear the table.

The food is mediocre, edible at best.  Will I come back?  Yes, specially if we’ll be in good company again and because that’s just how I am…crazy.

Fujian Grand China Buffet
8709 North Interstate 35
Austin, TX 78753
(512) 977-8822

My other Weekend Snapshot entry: Tantalizing Tulips

Have a great week ahead, y’all!

It was quite a learning experience for us – unfamiliar food names and unfamiliar tastes.  I wanted so much to try as much of the food as I possibly can so I have more to share with you.  But there’s only so much food I can handle at a given time. Hee hee.

My first plate had the following…

Tandoori Chicken

Makluba – rice, chicken, potatoes, corn, flower and eggplant with sprinkled nuts.

Biryani and Baked Tilapia

Biryani, according to Wikipedia “is from a family of primarily South Asian rice dishes made with spices, rice (usually basmati) and meat/vegetables.  The spices and condiments used in biryani may include but are not limited to: cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, bay leaves, coriander and mint leaves, apart from ghee, ginger, onions, garlic and yoghurt. The premium varieties include saffron.”

The tilapia was baked in lemon, pepper, sauce, veggies and spices.

Before I move on to my second plate, let me just say that I didn’t eat all the rice…just in case you’re concerned that there was way too much carbs on my first plate.  Haha.

Grilled Chicken

Chicken Kabob – chicken marinated with oregano, green pepper, tomatoes, and onion and salt

Kafta Kabob – a grilled mixture of ground beef, parsely, onion, garlic, pepper and salt

Falafel – a ball of chick peas,  parsley, cilantro,  onions, all spices.

Soft Pita Bread and Manquish (hard pita bread)

Hommus – roasted chick peas mixed with tahini suce, garlic, lemon juice, served with olive oil.

My daughter loved the soft pita and the Homuus!  I’m glad she’s very open to new tastes.  I definitely have a future foodie in the person of my 4-year old daughter. ;)

For dessert, I especially loved the Rice Pudding…

It is made with rice, milk, rose water, orange water and pistacchio.  I tell you, it did taste flowery…like a mild perfume!  Haha!  This dessert didn’t quite appeal to my husband.  But it scored major points from Abby and me. ;)

The rest of desserts were pastries, which were too sweet…

Semolina Cake (made with semlina flour, sugar and yogurt)

Baklava (made with filo, walnuts, sugar and flour)

Jam Cookie

We’ve been to enough buffet places here in Texas to know that when it comes to interiors and ambiance, we shouldn’t set too high a standard.  That’s not to say that buffet places here are just plain hideous.  They are just, well, lacking…in more ways than one.  Some exert a little more effort than the others though, to come up with a more pleasant dining environment.  It can’t be said, however, that Dimassi’s is one of those that exerted that extra effort.

Dimassi’s dining area had a cafeteria-ish feel to it, what with the fluorescent lighting and the not so attractive chairs and tables.  It is easy to forgive restaurants for these little things if the food is good enough to make you forget.  And for a buffet price of $12.00 per head including drinks, one can’t really complain about floor tiles, wall decors and furniture.  Oh, our 4-year old ate for free by the way!

If you tend to go for food that are visually appealing when choosing which food lands on your plate, then you probably won’t be able to make the most out of your $12.  In fact, there were teen-aged kids who couldn’t behave themselves and were making fun of the food and how they looked right there at the buffet line!  Food presentation just isn’t one of Dimassi’s stronger points.

Vegetarians will love Dimassi’s because they offer quite a number of vegetarian dishes.

It may be a while before we go back to Dimassi’s.  We simply don’t crave meditteranean food as often as we do Asian food, Japanese most specially. :D

Dimassi’s Mediterranean Buffet
12636 Research Blvd
Austin, Tx 78759
Tel: 512-258-0395

* This is entry #35 for *

It depends on how bad the service was.  If the restaurant staff was rude, and if the food was spoiled or has a fly or cockroach in it, I will definitely have to talk to the manager…or ask Hubby to do it.  Hee hee.  Tip will definitely be small…if none at all!  And then I’ll spread the word of how service in that restaurant is really really bad by writing about it HERE! That ought to teach them! ;)

That’s my answer.

I have a lot of favorites!  I specially like chewy chocolate chips (Chips Ahoy or Keebler).  Oooh, and I also love the Pepperidge Farm cookies.  I like all their cookies but if I have to choose a favorite, it would be Milano and the Soft-Baked ones (anything with chocolate!).  From the Philippines, my favorite would be the melt in your mouth Lengua de Gato!  (That’s a hint to family and friends coming to visit us! ;) ) Yummy!  My list just goes on and on and on. :)

That’s my answer.

It’s going to be a fun 3-day weekend for us!  Tomorrow, Abby is invited to a classmate’s birthday party.  In the evening, we’re going to Chuck E. Cheese’s (again!) with a friend and her kids, who are moving out of state next week.  And then, there’s the 3-day Labor Day sale at Ikea!  It might interest you to know they’re serving free breakfast and coffee until 10:30am!  Hee hee.  We’ll probably go to the park and the pool.  We’ll be busy, that’s for sure!

That’s my answer.

This is a difficult question in that I can think of a long list of food items that are, in my opinion, better than peanut butter jelly.  Sushi is one. :D  Chocolate in all forms, shapes and sizes is two. ;)  Turkey sandwich is three.  Pasta is four.  And I could just go on and on and on. :D

That’s my answer.

Last Saturday, we celebrated my daughter’s 4th birthday with a party, which her classmates and our close friends attended.  Sunday, we went to Sea World to catch the Backyardigans, which was no more than a 5-10 minute live appearance plus a 20-minute video.  Sunday evening, we had dinner at Kim Phung, a Vietnamese/Chinese restaurant.

That’s my answer.

This weekend, we drove off to Dallas for a weekend rendezvous with a high school friend and his family.  For two days, we feasted on home-cooked Filipino dishes: pancit (bijon and luglug), dinuguan (Don’t make me translate this one, please!), puto, lumpiang shanghai, caldereta, leche flan, fruit salad, and lechon de leche. :) We also managed to squeeze in some sight seeing.  Definitely my kind of weekend! :D

That’s my answer.

It depends.  For baking, I used regular white sugar or brown sugar, depending on which of the two the recipe calls for.  For coffee, I use Splenda but I do prefer regular sugar.  I will have to train myself to start liking and using honey more often as a sweetener.  I hear that’s a healthier alternative.  But I could be wrong. :)

That’s my answer.