Chicken rice ginger sauce!!

Bank holiday weekend went by so quickly – it always does especially when you are having fun. I don't think a bank holiday weekend will go by quickly if I'm stuck in the office!

Anyway, as I mentioned before, we were in Northern Ireland for the bank holiday – it was a quick and cheap holiday! Flights were less than £100, car rental was £60 and accommodation was less than £200. It's kinda like the Brit version of our quick getaway to Genting. Anyway, the scenery was awesome! We could see similarities with Norway although the vegetation was definitely more luscious (I guess due to the high amount of rain it gets).We visited the Giant's causeway (which is a UNESCO world heritage site) and some other random tourist sites like the ropebridge and duclace castle. What I really liked were the scenic routes and driving next to the sea (apparently, the costal road is the 5th best costal drive in the world – whatever that is supposed to mean to me). Belfast was quite a grim place. The whole city looked like East London and it was pretty dreadful. Fortunately, we were in a car so we did it quite quickly by driving around. It also allowed us to have dinner at this happening restaurant situated in Belfast Castle which was quite nice. We couldn't bring ourselves to eat any of the Irish fare (such as stews etc.) so we just went for typical British. The history of Northern Ireland is pretty upsetting actually, with graffiti on the walls that depict the troubled times between the republicans and unionists. There were more union jacks flown around the city than I remember seeing in London (and even along the roads leading to Buckingham palace). Anyway, it was a good holiday and being part of the UK, there was absolutely no hassle in terms of customs, we landed at 10.05pm and were home by 11.30pm (which in the UK, especially for an airport almost 40 miles from home, is quite a feat).

Oh by the way!!! I "learned" to make chicken rice ginger sauce recently. The idea was planted by Sally during the cruise when I told her that I really missed the "Wee Nam Kee" or "Soup restaurant" ginger sauce. She said the most commonsense thing – "make it la! – pound the ginger and add some chicken essence sauce". So that's exactly what I did, but with some modifications. So here's the recipe – (1) use a spoon to scrape the outer skin of the ginger, cut the ginger into small pieces, (2) blend the ginger (with sesame oil) but not too much such that it becomes pureed (just chopped and grinded will do), (3) add some chopped spring onions to the blend, (4) boil your chicken for chicken rice – for the chicken essence, (5) heat a wok, fry some chopped garlic with sesame oil, add the blended ginger, a dash of pepper, soya sauce, salt, a little bit of sugar and fry the mixture, then add some chicken essence (3 tablespoon to a bowl of the ginger blend) and fry till it is dry. The result is yummy ginger sauce (now I can get unlimited wee nam kee replica sauce in London!!) If I'm in Singapore though, I'd just head to wee nam kee, pay $20 and eat there and save the trouble.