Lady panda eyes - SLEEP 10PM PLEASE

Lady panda eyes tell you to sleep!

Everyone should get eight hours of sleep a night otherwise we will suffer the consequences aka a visit from LADY PANDA EYES

It's so obvious now - psychology of a disillusioned food blogger

I've been meaning to update my blog with a real food blog post for weeks.
Right (I said to myself) no more of this plane food or sushi education stuff, I want a post about an Actual Restaurant please

and oh happy coincidence! my mum decided she was too lazy to cook tonight and we ended up at the Japanese & Korean Juju's Cafe in Burwood. Right girl, this is your chance! Mister Blog, you are gonna get u-p-d-a-t-e-d tonight (that's rightt bitch)........ haha and it almost worked, I actually uploaded the photos when I got home. I knew what I wanted to write about. I was like, all systems go....

Then I saw my gay photos and it hit me. the reason I've been so terrible about food blogging this year (and kicking myself for it every week) is because I can't stand looking at sucky photos. When your photos are boring, it makes you think, why would I even bother uploading them. I mean yoou don't even like looking at them. Wouldn't you rather be ogling some pretty food photos here. or here. or here, oh man those cakes are so freakin gorgeous they should replace the victoria's secret model runway with a display cabinet of zumbo cakes instead


So for 2010, I think my new years resolution for foodchaser will be to, for the most part, give up on blogging boring-looking photos and spend more time finding & sharing the infinitely more delicious looking photos that already exist on the internet. yey =)

It's irresistably tasty! (trying to get the blogging mojo back)

(warning, text-to-picture ratio may exceed 10:1)

My hair is a fuzz of tangles
room smells like hairspray
bobby pins on the floor
If you pull together four young fashion designers, a month and a half of choreography, twenty young lads and ladies strutting their stuff (slash gliding ethereally) down the catwalk, and some really lovely dresses and suits, you have yourself the INNER WEST RUNWAY.

Over the last few weeks
I've been lucky enough to find out what a catwalk operation looks like from the inside. In a nutshell, it starts off with the call for designers (apparently like 50 chicks applied, and.. not so many dudes. four designers were picked, one of whom was our guy. his name is aidan and his work takes my breath away), then a day of auditions for models, then the fitting (think gorgeous purple dress with bunched sleeves and silver beads) and then a bunch of rehearsal walks. for these the models do a lot of sitting around waiting for your turn with the flamboyant choreographer dude, and there's lots of time to talk, with ambient catwalk soundtracks playing in the background. Interesting fact - out of the six models in our set, three of them are studying music (vocals)

Today I learnt that... my hair is a bitch to tease / put up / muss up
the groovy filo hairdresser chick called it "virgin hair" coz it hasn't been dyed, and it's pretty thick and straight. she put twenty something of her biggest bobby pins in my hair and then let loose with like three different cans of hair spray (my friend, whose hair ended up equally as stiff as mine, quipped - strong hold, super strong hold, extra super strong hold)
Actually I was secretly happy about it all because it meant she spent like half an hour with her hands in my hair, messing it around and pinning it up. ahah felt so pampered.

I can't even type in proper sentences anymore. thank you gossip girl. addicted to gossip girl. this brings with it side effects like a burning desire to go live in new york upper east side for six months. another (less cool) side effect is not getting enough sleep. oh panda eyes. Oh gossip girl. I now understand why people say GG when good things happen

Yeah
What else do I love? I love you guyses blogs
is the only reason I'm inspired enough to update my own poor neglected foodchaser (with random nonsense it seems BUT THAT'S WHY THERE IS A LINK LIST TO THE LEFT. WHICH I HAVE PARTIALLY UPDATED WITH MY NEW LOVES BY THE WAY =)

What else have I been up to
Work experiencing with my super smart super patient cousin
Surf and sunshine, nutella and crunchy nut cereal at Copacabana with my crazy baccs
Foodblogger's christmas picnic was awesome, shoutout to the organisers and the other awesome food bloggers I met there oh and everyone else who was not there =( I have photos but... they're.. somewhere... (story of my life)

These days I'm spending most of my time
Doodling pictures of icecubes to try and stay cool
Lying on the bed with the door closed pretending to be doing useful things (like drawing things besides icecubes) when really doing nothing (except drawing icecubes)
Eating nutrigrain with kimchi (wishing it was crunchy nut cereal with pineapple hahaha)
Drinking green milk (aka pandan soya milk)
sampling sushi, at various sushi shops around sydney

Otherwise
Waiting to start full time work at EY... about 20 days of holidays left. Gotta head to the post office tomorrow to pick up my contract
Finale fashion walk tomorrow at fraser studios
Applying for international exchange! London! New york! San francisco! Paris! Vienna! FAR OUT I WANT TO GO EVERYWHERE. but london the most =) thank god my WAM did not drop too much

Although priority numero uno is
Find an evening/weekend job. need to start earning cash to start saving cash... so I can afford to eat when I go to london next year. 20 pounds for lunch means 40 australian dollars means grace might be living off a can of baked beans each day instead of discovering london's restaurant scene :[
plus a girl can't go to london and not go shopping in soho square
(soho square! do you see the stars in my eyes)
Also need to save up for an mp3 player coz nano broke down and can't survive without le music. Want an ipod touch but I think I'm a touch too pov... gonna have to wait til they drop to $100 (hey it can happen I saw harry potter 7 for $12.50 at the shops the other day)

Yeah
that's me. I hope you guys are all healthy hip hoppy and happy! You know, everyone should start a blog. coz really, I don't know much about what's happening with you unless we talk in real life OR you have a blog (anyone who mumbles twitter will be shot)

Okay 44 minutes should have passed so it's back to gossip girl
Time delays on streaming episodes are lame

Still can't type in proper sentences
COME BACK, BLOGGING MOJO

anyway here is a token photograph, yeah sorry for all the text

In the kitchen of our copabanana beach house, pictured with our most essential dietary staple

Kellogg's Crunchy Nut is so irresistably tasty!

Peanut Butter and Vegemite Sandwich Day

Next tuesday is the 3rd November ie. Peanut Butter and Vegemite Sandwich Day!
so we are bringing peanut butter vegemite sandwiches to uni for lunch.

Knowing how to make good sandwiches can help you hook up. Score your dream job. Make new friends. Make cool friends. Make any friends. Because really, your popularity can be measured by how well you make sandwiches
At the moment I have no friends. But this will all change Tuesday

Okay so why and what the hell. well yesterday I got a message from eden:
SIF NOT HAVE TRIED PEANUT BUTTER & VEGEMITE ?!
it is awesomely awesome :D oh so awesome especially on toast !!

so I'm like, SOUNDS GOOD. I'll have it for breakfast! with rice if there is no bread!

The next morning I wake up at 11am and realise I am going to be 4 hours late for class. Make that 5 hours if I miss the next bus, so I grab a banana to eat on the bus and leg it.

Then I remember my casual promise about breakfast. Oh crap. Run back to the kitchen and find a croissant. Grab a butter knife. Locate a tub of Vegemite, a tub of Kraft Crunchy Peanut Butter and on an impulse, the kaya, and start buttering at light speed


this is kaya, aka sweet green fragrant coconut jam

Ran down the hill with half the croissant in one hand, the other half sticking out of my mouth. Almost tripped over a sunbathing hobo, he looked at me strangely. Didn't really care, I was going to miss my bus, but damn this croissant was good! Peanut butter and vegemite really do go great together

I make the bus. At uni, I'm early for law!
hey eden, I say, I tried your peanut butter and vegemite combination! it was pretty sweet!
She looks up suspiciously. what? I said BUTTER and vegemite, what on earth is this peanut butter and vegemite
mee: are you serious
but as we can see SHE TYPED PEANUT BUTTER

Anyway, like french toast and pistachio icecream, a good peanut butter & vegemite sandwich is something that every person should try before they die. And to help support this experience we are all going to eat sandwiches at uni next week

Except for chris, who does not enjoy vegemite, peanut butter, bread, and being cool.
And raju, who cannot wake up at 5:30am.
and all the people who have exams, do not have uni, do not have facebook and do not know how to make sandwiches (whaat the hell)


The required ingredients for peanut butter vegemite avocado banana and kaya sandwiches

Don't worry we'll eat your share =)

Learning to Relax. and No Face Likes Moon Cake

Helloooo dear friends, non-friends and randoms!


Just the other day I got an email to join a Stress Management Group.

Stressed? It said. Finding it hard to cope, or can't relax?

No I'm fine, I thought, and my mouse moved to the delete button. Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw a stack of dusty textbooks teetering ominously... and for the first time in weeks I really noticed my room.
It was like someone had let off a bomb in the Reflex paper factory.
I don't usually go around quoting old dead people but.... einstein once said that a cluttered desk is the sign of a cluttered mind. and dude, looking around... the floor was littered with lecture slides and ukulele tabs. I couldn't see my bed for the newspaper clippings. Piles of half-read picture books towered next to an army of empty cups and decomposing banana skins. Even my sock drawer was stuffed with fliers for international exchange, unpaid bills and unfinished watercolour sketches

Hmm, I hummed, and kept reading

Unhealthy levels of stress can affect your University performance, lead to poor health, and stop you enjoying life. Come along to the Stress Management Group program and learn:

* Relaxation and coping strategies
* Dealing with procrastination
* Time-management and problem-solving

So in the end I signed up. Mondays, 12-2pm. Anyone interested, it's free to join :).

---

In other news, here is No Face from Spirited Away.
No Face likes gold coins, eating frogs, and double yolk lotus seed moon cake. And yes, long walks on the beach too

Coloured him in the other day night morning



This semester I have learnt that sleep is for the weak.
and homework is for the conscientious

From this I suppose we can conclude that I am neither

My Rainbow Freckle Cookie! Kids Arts & Craft at Carriageworks Children's Festival (SUPER LONG BLOG POST! with lack of photos)

---

warning: EXTREME TEXT ZONE. please skip to here or here if you require a food photo fix before proceeding

'Sorry little boy, that's MY cardboard.'

Nothing transforms you into a Mister Selfish Monster faster than looking after a kids craft workshop. We spent an afternoon teaching kids how to make beetles, butterflies and other creepy crawlies using cardboard. Or at least that was the job description - I spent most of my time chasing crayons, and smacking hands as they reached for the pile of coloured cardboard

Still, after a while I started to get the hang of things, and found myself parroting reliable sentences like

'hello miss! would you like to make a bug bracelet?'

'what colour would you like your bug to be?'

'Sorry guys, we're all out of blue cardboard. and orange. And yellow. Yeah there's only pink left... (I said this to one poor little boy and his face took on quite a disgusted look)

'No more glittery sequins for you! Come back when you run out please'

'here Mum, you hold the scissors'

'Everyone step back from the cardboard please :)'

'There are no more glue sticks. sorry'

'Hi, if you stick out your wrist I will make sure your cardboard bracelet fits!'

as well as, 'you're a good kid, aren't you? And you're going to put all those crayons back in their proper places, aren't you?' (they usually smile and nod proudly)

and, 'Don't touch that cardboard!'

---

Some of the kids were really cute too. There was one little girl with big grey eyes who kept coming back to the supplies table to look for rogue crayons and help me sort them back into their correct colour compartments. And everytime she found a red crayon in the blue box she'd say in a really surprised way, 'Ooh look a red crayon. that's not supposed to be THERE! I'm going to put you back where you belong' and then she would look at me and grin expectantly. haha I praised that kid to high heaven =] I know you shouldn't pick favourites with kids but I totally did (you would have too)

I remember there was this one little boy with black hair who drew a big black fruitbat for his bracelet. Our table only had bug templates, so most kids just went with what was there. Even when I was making my display bracelet, I took the cheap way out and traced a worm template (because worms are as easy as you can get) instead of drawing up a new one (....a new worm?) So it was only natural that I paid special attention to the little genius kids who drew their own treefrogs, monkeys, rainclouds (yep) and well, FRUITBATS.

And what colour would you like for your bracelet? I asked him.

He looked up at me with a huge megawatt smile and oh look, there goes my heart trickling down my jeans into a puddle of golden goo. I noticed he had two gaps in his teeth when he smiled too.... SO ADORABLE.

Anyway he didn't say anything so I continued,
'There is pink, and uh -'

'I want Black!' he announced loudly.

'Uh, there's no -' I started. His face fell.
That is to say, I changed tack hastily, here's our last sheet of white paper! And here you take this black crayon, I stuck a crayon in his hand, and you can make black paper!

The megawatt smile returned and he ran off waving his black crayon in the air
...and all was right with the world

Haha I am a sucker for smiley little kids

At this point the boyfriend sends a text that goes something like
"haha you sound like you're having fun with the kids BACK OFF LITTLE PUNKS SHE'S MINE"
to which I of course reply
"SORRY MATE i have already fallen for a little guy with missing teeth we're getting married in december"
and the reply
"HAH so what i'll just win you back off him!"
lool there was more but can't remember the rest

Actually all the kids were great, it was only some of the parents that could get bratty. There was one big, frizzy-haired mum who took about twenty crayons (angryface!) for her kid to colour in ONE BUG. and then after I finished making the bracelet for her son she hurriedly shoves all the crayons in my hand and runs off shouting 'can you do those for me there's a darling, We have to go to a show!'

Nah but most of the parents and grandparents were lovely. I don't think I've ever been smiled at and appreciated so much in one day. and just for teaching them how to cut out bug shapes! hehe I'm going to start teaching everyone I know how to cut out bug shapes. Yes I am.

---

Lunch break happened at the Carriageworks Cafe, where in honour of the festival there were special kids lunch packs on sale! I got the 'Goin' Dotty' lunch pack, where for five fifty you get a vegemite-butter sandwich (wtf butter with vegemite), an apple juice popper (omg primary school days) and a big RAINBOW FRECKLE COOKIE =D

Yay special Kids Lunch Pack! my cookie is the size of my sandwich

I say cookie because that's what they called it but it was more like a round slab of milk chocolate. Milk chocolate isn't really my thing but the novelty value of eating a "FRECKLE COOKIE" with heaps of rainbow hundreds and thousands on it was too much. Perfect food for a children's festival=]

When you volunteer as a floater, that means you get shuttled around to different sections... so apart from the bug section I also rendezvoused at the 'Sustainable Towns' table (where kids make eco-friendly cardboard houses, complete with water tanks and solar panels fashioned from bubble warp) and a digital photography workshop (learn how to take pictures of the ceiling, take pictures of your friend, and We forced one kid to stand next to an arch window for fifteen minutes so everyone could practise taking silhouette photos. haha until I felt sorry for her and sacrificed myself to stand in her place so she could try taking photos too)

It just sucked that my bag was locked away in the giant metal cage for most of the day, so I couldn't take any photos of the adorable kids. Although I'm not entirely sure taking random photos of the children wouldn't have seen me sent home in a large white van with 'pedophile' stamped on my forehead

---

Carriageworks Children's Festival
5-17th October 2009 (school holidays)
Majority of festival is free! except for some activities like MasterChef cooking, yay
http://www.sydneychildrensfestival.com

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs!!

'Cloudy with a chance of meatballs' is a movie about a town where hamburgers, waffles, icecream and cookies fall from the sky as rain.

I'm sure there's more to it than that but WHO CARES I'M SOLD.
It's already my favourite movie and I haven't even seen it yet

'When my town fell on hard times, all anyone could afford to eat was sardines. And because sardines are super gross, this was my chance to show everyone what I was made of
... Conversion of water into food.'

'You are about to be crushed by a giant corn'

[giant corn cob drops from the sky]

LOL

But seriously, ladies and gentlemen according to all reviews this meatballs movie promises to be smashingly delicious! even googling "cloudy with.." with words like "terrible" and "overrated" doesn't chuck up a single legit hit :]

so go watch it! and then have dinner at a nice Sydney restaurant afterwards haha (Norita has refurbished their 'real food' menu! which I have yet to order from but from memory they still had unagi don/takoyaki on the menu, and they do a lovely sweet hot taro drink, ooooh I crave)




Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
In cinemas in Sydney in 3D, September 18th

How To Kill Your Food Blog

"yeah I guess it's been a while since I last blogged...
how many days? er.... about...... *runs out of fingers* ;;


...and now we have a guide on how to kill your food blog ---->

1. Eat out five times more often than you blog so that you have a massive backlog of photos to post

2. Make sure you do NO homework for the entire uni semester so you have six months worth of lectures to learn leading up to exams

3. During exams put your laptop in your cupboard. Don't make it easy to access - bury it deep under your old clothes and broken tennis racquets

4. Go on an extended overseas holiday. don't take your laptop. whilst overseas, avoid internet cafes like the plague

5. Bring back half a suitcase of PS2 games and magazines, all of which have nothing to do with food (EDIT omg except for the one about kaya toast and teh tarik in singapore mmmm)

6. Stay at home. Exist on bananas and muffins. Do not check your email, do not find out about interesting new restaurants in Sydney, this could excite you into writing up a new post



heh lots to blog about!
<3 hot weather in malaysia

About Foodchaser

everything on foodchaser is written by Grace CKT, a sydney-sider who loves gloopy fried eggs, durian, lazing around and free stuff. Click for how to make a rice face, to ogle pretty asian buns, hungarian strudels by the seaside, or macarons at zumbo's.

foodchaser is currently on semi-hiatus ie. sitting on the backburner - site navigation is via the dropdown menus to the left. For those who are feeling peckish, here's a sampler menu ~ banana bread, dessert yoghurt, mango cheesecake, pineapple fried rice and a pinch of procrastination.

this is Grace

Contact me at foodchaser(at)gmail.com
and if you follow a lot of blogs, bloglovin is pretty good at collecting them all in one place. and it sends you emails when people update, this link will hook you up to FC.

Food Porn Goes Here
Hot Chocolate, Cheese Pastries and Beard Papas Cream Puffs
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Donuts Too Delicious To Be Allowed