Royal Blue

I was wearing a blue blouse I got from Oasis today. It is a royal blue color. Thinking about it, why does it call royal blue? Why royal? Anything special about this blue? And I remembered, it was the color of the dress Kate Middleton wore on her famous engagement photos!

And Madam J did my hair today! She braid my hair from 2 sides. But bigger braid from one side and smaller from the other and combine into 1 braid in the end. Such a pretty hairdo! I wish I can do it by myself.

Wednesday pamper treat

I usually have a ladies bible study at church every fortnightly on Wednesday. But on this Wednesday, our leader invited us to her home for a coffee and relax time. I didn't expect anything, until I came and saw a wonderful treat in the living room. It was so amazing and so girly things to do. I love it so much! Each of us, have our own foot spa machine with bubbly soap and towel!

Summer garden party

Initially we planned to have a seafood party, unfortunately like almost all the shop we knew didn't sell any lobster or crab. It must be because of Aberdeen weather that wasn't to friendly in this time. It is summer, but most of the time it was rainy and windy. Guess that all the sea creatures prefer a warmer ocean rather than cold ocean in Aberdeen. The fishermen said that they couldn't catch any lobster or crab. Even oyster!

We have a very long open discussion in facebook, so we decided just to continue the party without any seafood, just eat and cook whatever available. The party was held in the same place as before, at our friend's place near to university of Aberdeen. It is a huge mansion. I put more photos for the pretty house.

The real hiking

After spent around 5 days in Skye, the real hiking would only start on the last day, with such a great weather. So this time our trip started and ended with good weather, but not in between. Before we went back to Aberdeen, we decided to have a famous boat trip in Skye, called a Bella Jane boat trip. Our cottage owner said it is very beautiful, since we will visit the most amazing place, they called it the navel of the earth. Since there is a beautiful lake surrounded by mountains. So off we go!

Making your own salmon chirashi don!

I always love sashimi, especially salmon sashimi. But when we moved to Aberdeen, it is very difficult to find a delicious and cheap sashimi. We can count that there are only 3 Japanese restaurant that serve sashimi, and now became 2 ( 1 restaurant closes down), and that one is an overpriced Korean restaurant and a fast food sushi chain called Sushi Yo. The later one provides cheaper price, and we think it is quite ok for a conveyer belt sashimi. 

So, solution? Make your own sashimi. But still can't get a high grade salmon sashimi or even a very sharp Japanese knife. Then we have smoke salmon! Say hooraayyy .... This smoke salmon can replace salmon sashimi, but just don't eat it as a sashimi. We can make a salmon avocado sushi or even a don with it. With mixing it with avocado and mayonnaise, it will taste almost the same. We are talking about the half raw smoke salmon, not the cook. So texture wise, it still look like a sashimi.

I always make a handroll or maki using this salmon and avocado. But now, I found a great recipe for making a chirashi don from ekiblog! She used s high grade tuna sashimi, but I changed it to smoke salmon, and it tastes as great! Thanks Eki for the sharing!