Please support me in this Run for H2O!

Please support me in this Run for H2O! Event is on June 6th at Riverfront Park in Burnaby.

To sponsor me in this 10km run, please click on the link below!

http://my.hope-international.com/lovemungbean


I have decided to support the RunForH2O event on Saturday, June 6th 2015, a 5KM or 10KM run in South Vancouver to bring hope to poor families in Guatemala without access to clean water. The low availability of drinking water and sanitation is one of the biggest contributing factors to rural poverty in Guatemala. Farming families rely on rain to grow food, and there are long periods of drought each year without rain to water the soil. Women and children walk up to three or four hours each day to fetch scares water from streams for drinking, cooking, bathing, and cleaning. This water is dirty and causes frequent illness and death from waterborne disease. Children, especially girls, are unable to go to school because they need to fetch water each day. Life is a daily struggle for survival.

A different life and future is possible for the families. Each $100 helps provide one person with access to clean water for the rest of their life. I would like to help at least 2 people in Guatemala get access to clean water this year.

Your gift means a new life marked by hope for some of the most marginalized, vulnerable indigenous people in Guatemala. Would you consider helping to bring hope and life to a child, a mother, or a family in Guatemala by making a financial gift of $25, $50, $100, $250, or however much you may be able to give?

All donations go to HOPE International Development Agency, a locally-based charity with 95 cents of every dollar raised going directly to projects overseas. All contributions of $20 or more are tax deductible. Please make all cheques payable to HOPE International Development Agency.


To learn more, please visit www.runforh2o.ca. #gwatermala #runforh2o

Thank you for your generosity; it is greatly appreciated.


With much gratitude for your support,

lovemungbean


http://my.hope-international.com/lovemungbean

Fukuda Sushi

I like this place! Food is decent for sushi in Surrey. The portions are great and I have leftovers most of the time. The restaurant is Chinese owned so their kitchen food is very Chinese and less traditional Japanese. Today, I came with some coworkers for lunch. We usually pre-order and they have the food ready by the time we get there. The food is still piping hot! We also always ask for the spicy mayo sauce they have. The lunch hours here are usually very busy so try not to expect too much service during these times. Even though they are very busy, the service is still acceptable and the owner is nice.

Sashimi bento box

Dynamite and chopped scalloped rolls

Ambiance               3

Quality of food        3

Quantity of food      4

Price                      4

Service                   2.5

Overall                    3.3

The Twisted Fork - Dine Out Vancouver

Yay for Dine Out Vancouver! Super excited to try Twisted Fork Bistro! They are a well known Canadian and French cuisine restaurant. Honey, Veggie, and I decided to test it out. I tried to call in to make reservations, but the restaurant does not take reservations. Anyhow, we went to the restaurant and they took our number and called us when a table was ready. I think we waited about 30 minutes before the hosted called us for a table. 

They seated us at the table but the waitress still had to clean it before we could actually sit down. The dishes were served most elegantly and the presentation was beautiful. 

The Dine Out menu is $40 per person. The menu included one appetizer, entree and a dessert and there were 3 different options for each menu item.

 We all had the escargot as the appetizer and for myself, it was the best part of the Dine Out experience. The escargot was not fishy and definitely concealed a lot of flavours.

Escargot

 For the entree, Honey had the lamb and corn bread. Personally I don't eat lamb, so I have no comment on the tastes of this dish other than the corn bread which was dry.

Lamb with corn bread

I love chorizo! It definitely made the dish spicy but the ling cod was absolutely wonderful. I love sauce so I wish that the dish would have more sauce. Cous cous and chorizo made the dish different from normal west coast style foods.

Pan seared BC Ling Cod served with chorizo patty, french beans, cous cous, and rose sauce topped with corn relish

Honey and Veggie had the pecan pie and it was very chewy. The pie was not too sweet and the raspberry sauce added a tang to the dish.

Pecan pie

The carrot cake was moist and I like the caramel sauce. Even though I don't have a strong sweet tooth, this was an acceptable level of sweetness. I loved the powdered sugar icing design on the plate. It was so cute because it was in the shape of a twisted fork! It added a touch of art to the dish.

Carrot cake with caramel and cream

The restaurant also has a wall full of canned goodies for sale. So many different kinds of pickled vegetables and jams were on the display rack. I loved how it made the restaurant seem homey and comfortable.  

Twisted Fork jam for sale $8.00 a jar

Due to an open kitchen in this restaurant, the air was smoky which made my eyes water like crazy. In the end, I had to rush out of the restaurant and wolfed down my dessert. Service at this restaurant was a bit slow, but it could be due to the Dine Out Vancouver event which drew many people to try this bistro. I had asked for a paper napkin twice before I actually got one. Overall, it was a pleasant restaurant to dine in, but the fact that my eyes watered just put a sour taste to my experience. I am not sure if I would come back a second time.

Ambiance 4
Quality of food 4
Quantity of food 4
Price 3
Service 3
Overall 3.6

EXP Experience

Went to the famous video game restaurant in Vancouver today with my lovely coworkers.

The restaurant was located in a shady area on Pender St., but the inside of the restaurant was pretty neat to look at. They had many decorations on the walls with different popular video game characters and objects. There was also a big wall that played clips of video games which helped to entertain us as we tried to guess the characters in the clip.

We shared the deep fried pickles and it was amazing! I found it a bit salty but the sourness made it sooooo yummy. I don't know if I will order this again as I feel like I can make this at home....

For the entree, I ordered the GanonPork Sandwich ($13) pictured below. Described as "slow roasted pulled pork with deep fried avacado, bacon chive sour cream, and gerudo nacho chips."

The sandwich came and it turned out looking like a burger. To my taste, I think the "sandwich" sour cream sauce and deep fried avacadoes were too much for me as the pulled pork was already pretty greasy. The nachos in the sandwich was a nice touch to make the overall flavours less greasy and oily, but I still prefer to have lettuce instead. The fries I added $3 to make it into a poutine. This was a bit more on the salty side, but it was pretty tasty. I liked the fries very much because the cut reminded me of McDonald's fries. Another thing I liked about this was the jalapenos on the side. I LOVE jalapenos!!

For a drink, I had the virgin Shirley Templar ($7.50) which was bottomless. Described as "orange juice, sprite, and grenadine. I finished my first one and got a refill. When the waitress came back with my drink, my coworkers and mine got swapped. My coworker was sick! My pet peeve is that I don't like to share things that have direct contact with anybody's saliva.... That was sooooo bad on the waitress' part. She should have given us new straws when she did the refill. I had to ask for a new straw even though I wasn't sure if the cup was mine originally.  Not sure if the waitress was new or that's just the way they serve it here.

Overall experience was good, but it did make me wonder about the quality of food and the people that were handling it. The price was pretty high for a burger place. Not sure if I would go back again....

Ambiance               4

Quality of food        3

Quantity of food      4

Price                      3

Service                   2.5

Overall                    3.3

www.expbar.ca

309 West Pender St. Vancouver

http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/14/1702130/restaurant/Downtown/EXP-Restaurant-Bar-Vancouver

Lest we forget

On this day it is a time for us to remember those that have sacriced for us. 

They gave us peace and hope for new lives. Let us remember.

Please pray for those survivors and the fallen soldiers' families. May you have peace in your heart and know that you are worthy of our prayers.

Thank you for things you have done. You will be remembered. 

Pray that God will protect us and your survivors.

Happy Halloween!

So this Hallow's Eve was interesting.. its the first time I dressed up for it on a work day. Yup! You guessed it! I am a minion!! And yes I am one in a minion! :) I got the minion goggles from watching the movie in theatres in 3D! Best movie ever!! I can't wait for the Minion movie to come out in 2015! My friend Saya even sent me a vocab list to learn.... trust me its hard! Good luck to you if you wanted to become a true minion! It is definately fun for kids to learn though!




This was a great lazy costume! I didn't have to put on any eye make up as the goggles covered my eyes the entire time anyway! it felt like I was wearing PJ's the whole day. So comfy! I got the minion shirt from Ardenes for $10! It was a steal :) The dress I already had from years ago which I bought from the Aritzia warehouse sale for $20. Then with my dollar store gloves, the look is complete.

My coworkers were awesome and many of them dressup too! We had so much fun just looking at each other. There was also a pumpkin carving contest! Check out the carving design on my jack-o-lantern! I just got it from Google (aka my best friend). :P



I also made mint Oreo cheesecake for my family halloween party :) Just a regular cheesecake recipe that i added mint Oreos to in the batter.

You just need sour cream, cream cheese, and a crust.








I added the melted chocolate for a spider web effect. When you cut open the cheesecake, the green from the mint Oreos will make it look like mold for extra creepy effects. I didn't bake it very well. As you can see the top cracked which means I overcooked them. I will not give up! Next time I want to make it with a different ingredient which I have yet to think about. Any ideas?

Dim Sum at Pink Pearl

Dim sum on a weekend is the best time to spend with family and loved ones! This is my second time at Pink Pearl for dim sum. There was a line to get a table as it was Sunday fun day. Many families were there for dim sum. I was pretty surprised about it because the prices here are not that cheap just average. 

At first the dim sum came slowly which I do appreciate because I like to savor my food and when it comes out too quickly from the kitchen, the dumplings get cold and the skin starts sticking together. 

 The dumplings are good. I really enjoyed the chewy dumpling skin. We ordered the spinach, squash, scallop and beef dumplings. All were decent sized dumplings.

At first bite the Chen's Village noodles were really good, but later I bit into a metal thread. It could possibly be from washing the wok and the chef didn't notice. Regardless, we returned the plate of noodles and didn't order anything else from the Chef's choices menu selection. I think if I didn't find the metal thread, I would have really enjoyed the noodles. There was a decent amount of shrimp, bean sprouts, eggs, and veggies.

This is the 3 kinds of mushroom rice noodle wrap. I'm not that fond of this noodle wrap because the noodle was too soft. After the first bite, the noodle wrap turned into mush. 

The beef rice noodle wrap was needless to say the same as the mushroom rice noodle wrap.
Service here was so-so. It was hard to wave down a waiter because it was so busy.


Ambiance 3
Quality of food 3
Quantity of food 3
Price 3
Service 3
Overall 3