Packing for something that you don't know how long its' going to be was a little crazy! I wanted to bring along everything I could. 'This will be useful, that would be useful, ooh and this too!' Gosh, it just started piling up and looking at it, I was going 'Is this going to be enough? OK maybe too much! Wait, I can't take that out, I NEED IT!' the whole time I just continued fighting with myself trying to pack!
As I packed, I realise I needed more things and out I go to shop for more clothes, shoes, make up, toiletries, etc. More things going into the luggage. From time to time I would just ignore packing and go to the kitchen and cook. This is where my habit comes in, cooking in my new bought heels to expand it. Old folks always say 'Bite the shoe before it bites you' and yeah, I would do that, bite it, put it on and start cooking. It does actually work. Anyway, back to the kitchen.
My weakness has always been local cuisines. My palette all this while has been chinese and western. It's hard to find really good western food or rare national dishes of different countries. Just need to try hard to find it. Chinese, you don't need to go far, my mom cooks chinese everyday but to go out and dine, it's much harder especially to find the Halal ones. But nowadays it's quite abundant!
Decided to cook a few local dishes, one of my favorite dish that I would always get at pasar malam would buy is mee sup/soto. Extra chicken or beef chunk. I would drool every time I smell the spices in the soup. Every week I would get it and it was all for myself. I tried making it but not having enough time to research, I bought the ready made spices for it! Success in cooking but still doesn't taste as good as I expected but this is how it looks like.
My grandma came down from hometown and my dad told me to try cooking rendang for her. It was during puasa, I cooked and I myself salivate just smelling it, it smells like rendang alright, but taste had to wait till breaking fast time. Opah was drooling looking at the rendang and it made me smiled. Everyone enjoyed it, unfortunately, I didn't cook it long enough for the chicken meat to tenderize, it was cooked with 'Ayam Tua' which apparently needs at least 2 to 3 hours of cooking time to soften the meat. Tough time chewing it though.
All I did for the next few weeks was shop, cook and pack. New shoes, new clothes, new recipe books, a whole lot of new things. At the same time, the production people scheduled the background story shoot. The background shoot was where they tell our story of who we are. I had 2 scenes to do, one was at home cooking and having a meal and another at my dad's stall. First one was at the house, at that time, my house was being renovated so I had to ask a big favour from my family friend to use their house and they agree to it. I have cooked countless time at their house and it was a beautiful set up for it.
More pictures at Azlina MasterChef
Thank you to the Logans for letting me use the house for the shoot! It was lots of fun! Now on to the next shoot. My dad's stall in the pasar malam. Traffic was nuts as it was rush hour but we made it in time to shoot before it got dark. Unfortunately there's no pictures as it was hectic during the shooting with the customers coming and going. For those who are interested, my dad has a stall selling Putu Perak, originally called Putu Cawan from Perak. When we first moved back to KL after living in Kuala Terengganu for 6 years, my dad wasn't really that happy with the job and decided to quit. Hence, he started his own business selling this local delicacy from Perak, his hometown. And since then, he has being selling it. More items were added to the menu, now Putu Perak and Soya Milk is a permanent feature at the stall. For more information and location of the pasar malam, Check out Putu Perak.
And so I continued packing and getting myself ready for the big day. Day by day, I got even more nervous. I really don't know what to expect. Honestly, I didn't even expect to get through in the auditions. I just went to try it out for fun, just to gain experiences and see what the Chefs would say about my cooking. I guess they believed in me enough to put me through. Alhamdullilah
I ended up with 3 trolley bags and my handbag for the whole thing. I hope it's enough to last me, excited mode on, going on the best adventure of my life!
Love,
Leena
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