Ratatouille

Has anyone seen this movie? I have not. May be this weekend. How to pronounce this word anyway? Yes.. Rat-a-too-ee.

Ratatouille is a vegetable stew, usually made with eggplant, tomatoes, zucchini, peppers, and onions, seasoned with herbs and garlic.

Aah… zucchini. Whenever I heard of this vege name, or see this word, or even see this vege in the market, I feel disgusting. I just cannot get rid of the taste of zucchini in my mouth whenever I think of it. It is not because it tastes horrible, just because I had too much of it the last time I prepared it. Ehh... I think I will decline ratatouille for a long while, but I don mind watching the movie.

5+ A Day. Have you practice that?

5+ A Day was a campaign launched in NZ in 1994 by the non-profit organization United Fresh NZ Inc to encourage all New Zealanders to eat and enjoy eating 5 or more servings of fruit and vegetables every day for health, taste and variety.

There was similar campaign launched in Singapore as well but it was called 2+2 - "Eat two servings of fruit and two servings of vegetables daily".

I like serving portion image shown on United Fresh NZ Inc website (as shown below):

“A serving is about a handful – this is why we have a hand in our logo to measure servings. Everyone uses their own hand to measure their servings. This means a serving for an adult is a lot bigger than a serving for a small child.”

BUT… how many of us really practice it? I doubt, even myself. Hehe..

Why said so? The facts are...

• Many people do not eat breakfast
  
  May be they do not have time? Some people do have the habit of having breakfast. Yesss… I ever heard one of the ladies in the office saying “Oh.. I usually don eat breakfast. I don have the habit of eating breakfast la…”. Alamak!

• Carbo and protein breakfast

What breakfast would you have? Beehon/fried noodle with egg, nasi lemak, currypuff, sausage with egg, chicken porridge or yao za guai?

• Lunch without fruits and vege
  

What lunch you usually have? Prawn noodle, fried fish noodle, cha siew rice, chicken rice, noddles? Some people eat 2 vege + 1 meat rice. Some people will have fruits after lunch. The number of fruit and vegetable serving could be just 3 servings or less after all.

• Dinner? How many serving of fruit and vege you mange to take?

I had a jumbo fruit set with my daughter yesterday evening. She was so excited to see so many fruits on the plate. Haha...we ate everything on the plate... feeling great.

Hmm…I gotto really put the 5+ A Day in practice. How about you, my friends?

肠燥便秘? 勿食莲子

莲子 (Lotus Seed)

<<性味>>甘涩，平。

<<功用主治>>养心益肾，补脾。涩肠 (se4 chang2)。治夜寐多梦，遗精，*淋浊，久痢，虚泻，妇人崩漏带下。石莲子并能止呕、开胃，常用治*噤口痢 (jin4 kou3 li4)。

莲子功用多多，但是什么时候不宜使用呢? 肠燥便秘患者。

我所找到的资料就提到 - 肠燥便秘者应该润下通肠，忌收涩固肠。 莲子有收涩的作用， 所以如果患者食用莲子，会使病情加重。 反而是对脾虚便溏、腹泻者较适宜。

以上资料是取于药品资讯网。 他们的资料也是取于《本草经集注》。

所以呢 。。。当你或你的孩子有肠燥便秘的情况时，就应该避免食用莲子，比如莲子粥、莲子羹等等。

*淋浊 - 指小便滴沥涩痛，尿出混浊的病证
*噤口痢 - 指患痢疾而见饮食不进，食入即吐，或呕不能食

The english version of the lotus seed's uses, application and contrainditions (in brief) can be found at Sen - traditional Chinese medicine (tcm) website.

肠燥便秘? 勿食莲子

肠燥便秘? jishi

Children's Song - Baby Bumblebee

My kid was mumbling this song to 2 months ago which I do not know how to sing. I decided to find out the song lyric to sing along with her. Hmmm... now I know what was she singing.

Baby Bumblebee

I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee,
Won't my mommy be so proud of me,
I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee,
Ouch! It stung me!

I'm squishing up the baby bumblebee,
Won't my mommy be so proud of me,
I'm squishing up a baby bumblebee,
Ooh! It's yucky!

I'm wiping off the baby bumblebee,
Won't my mommy be so proud of me,
I'm wiping off the baby bumblebee,
Now my mommy won't be mad at me!

Watch the Baby Bumblebee from one of the Barney episode on YouTube.