Pork Barbecue with Pineapple-Scallion Rice

Pork Barbecue with Pineapple-Scallion Rice

• This recipe is good for 4 Servings
• Preparation time is estimated at 20 minutes excluding the marinating time
• Cooking time is 20 minutes

Ingredients

• One 20-ounce can of pineapple chunks in their juice, drained and juice reserved
• 1 clove garlic, smashed
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons finely grated fresh ginger
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• Salt and pepper
• 1 1/4 pounds pork loin, cut into 1-inch cubes
• 4 scallions, cut into 1-inch pieces
• 1 1/2 cups long-grain white rice

Cooking Directions:

1. In a resealable plastic bag, combine the pineapple juice, garlic, soy sauce, ginger and oil; season with salt and pepper. Add the pork and scallions and marinate at room temperature for 30 minutes.

2. Preheat an outdoor grill or grill pan to medium-high. In a medium saucepan, bring 1 3/4 cups salted water to a boil. Add the rice, cover and cook over low heat for 18 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, thread the marinated pork and two-thirds of the pineapple chunks onto four 10-inch skewers and the marinated scallions onto one 10-inch skewer. Grill the kebabs, turning occasionally, until golden brown and cooked through, at least for 10 to 12 minutes.

4. Coarsely chop the remaining pineapple chunks and stir into the cooked rice. Remove the grilled scallions from the skewer and stir into the rice. Serve the pork kebabs with the pineapple-scallion rice.

 ***This recipe is not mine: I got this from Shine

 

The Risks and Dangers of Children Using Mobile Phones

Mobile phones are excellent tools to communicate with the outside world, a reality parents have little supervision over.

A phone is a two-way communication system, and where one can dial out, one can also receive.

The hard fact is this: there is no way to tell who is on the other end, and even though it may just be a very good classmate comparing homework assignments, it may also be a sex offender, well protected by anonymity, and most likely, pretending to be someone else.

This can be extremely dangerous when the mobile phone comes equipped with complete internet access, with web browsing capabilities, email, chat, and instant messaging – features which are harder to screen and control.

This is where parental control seems most vulnerable.

I hope parents are aware of all these …

 

Brush Your Teeth To Lose Weight!

Gotcha! I’m sure you’re reading this post now because of the title.

But it’s true: brushing your teeth has so much to do with weight loss, or losing weight!

Many people working on getting in shape find that they frequently crave food in between meals. If you’re trying to cut down on your in-between snacking, especially before going to bed, brush your teeth immediately after dinner. Do not wait until your actual bedtime to do just that. Moreover, nothing tastes good with toothpaste. And even if you think chocolates or candies tastes okay–something that is debatable, at best–regular flavored Listerine or some other medicine-tasting mouthwash will certainly make just about everything taste bad.

Another good reason to brush your teeth after a meal or snack is because doing so sends a signal to your body that you are finished eating.

 

Fave Five’s on Fridays: What’s Your Five Favorite Love Song and What Makes Them Special?

Thanks to Goldie’s inspiration, my Fave Five’s on Fridays in now back and active.

Let’s all look within and find the things, people, memories, and many others that are closest to our hearts.

Here’s mine:

1. Ikaw

2. One Friend

3. Till I Met You

4. I’ll Never Say Goodbye

5. Don’t Give Up On Us Baby

Now, it’s your turn to share what your Five Favorite Love Songs are ;D

 

Christmas Party Games for Children

Games during Christmas parties make children laugh. To make your parties memorable for the children, here are some Christmas games for you to choose from.

Have a very Merry Christmas!

1) Fill the Christmas Stocking

Supplies:
Stocking, spoon and bowl for each team.
Wrapped candy.

How To Play: Divide into teams. Have children line up at one end of the room. At the other end, hang a Christmas stocking for each team. Place a bowl of candy and a spoon in front of each team. Each child takes a turn taking a candy from the bowl with the spoon. They then carry the candy on the spoon to the stocking and drop the candy in the stocking. Race back to the next person in line, give them the spoon. First team to fill the stocking wins!

2) Christmas Memory Game

Supplies:
18 items in box

How To Play: Show the items in the box to the children. Remove one or more items out of the box (without children seeing you). Have the children guess what items are missing. For older children put items on large tray or cookie sheet. Cover. Remove cover for 20-30 seconds and then remove tray from room. On your mark, the children are to write down as many items that they can remember from the tray before you yell, “STOP”. Most correct answers wins.

3) Christmas Twenty Questions

Teacher starts by choosing a Christmas related person, place, or thing. The teacher says, “I’m thinking of something”. The children try to guess what it is by asking no more than twenty questions that can be answered “YES”, “NO”, or I DON’T KNOW”. The student who guesses correctly is next up.

4) Clue

Teacher thinks of person, place, or thing. Teacher gives a clue. Begin at one end of the room and work your way around allowing each student to take a turn guessing until one student solves the case. The student who solves the case goes next.

Example: Frosty
Clue: I’m thinking of someone who wears a hat
Clue: He loves snow
Clue: He’ll melt if it gets too warm outside

Clues should be age appropriate for the children playing.

5) Pin The Nose On Frosty or Rudolph

Supplies:
Big Picture of Frosty or Rudolph
Red circle or orange carrot shape for each child, with adhesive on back and their name on the front
A blindfold

How To Play: Blindfold the player, spin ‘em around and let them try to stick the nose where it’s supposed to go. Give a prize for the player that gets the closest.

6) Tongue Twisters

Supplies:
Silly Christmas Phrases

How To Play: Say each phrase three times as fast as you can. Let kids practice on their own or take volunteers to come up and try their best for all to hear. A candy can prize for anyone who tries.

Chocolate cocoa cravings cure colds
Santa sings shining star songs
Sally skis super slow
Big bright bells banish boredom
Grumpy Grinch goes grizzly gus
Pretty packages perfectly packed
Tip-top tiny tot toys
Sally’s striped stocking’s stuffed slightly
Santa’s super souped sleigh swiftly slides sideways
Cheery cute caroling Christmas critters
Candy cane cookies keep kids coming

7) Gift Unwrap Relay

Supplies:
Empty boxes wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper

How To Play: Divide the class into teams. Put a stack of presents at the end of each team’s course. The first child in each team runs to the presents, unwraps one, and races back to the next person in line. First team finished unwrapping wins! Note: To make cleaning a little easier, parents may wish to adapt this game to where the child unwraps, throws away the paper, then runs back!

8) Word Find

Take a Christmas related word such as: Christmas, Poinsettia, Candy cane, etc. and find as many smaller words from it as possible before the timer runs out.

Example: Christmas
Words: sit, is, his, miss, rat, tar, this, math, chair, rim…

Example: Candy cane
Words: candy, cane, and, dance, day, nay, can, dye, an, any…

9) Rudolph Dash

Supplies:
Vaseline
Cut circles out of red construction paper

How To Play: Have child put Vaseline on their nose and then put the red circles on their nose. Relay race to the finish with each new person adding their red nose. If nose falls, go back to bowl and add more Vaseline and reapply nose.

 

Christmas Potato Salad

Christmas celebration will never be complete without this: the good old Potato Salad. So for your Christmas party, here’s a tried and tested recipe to make your party meal complete and hearty!

Christmas Potato Salad

Potato Salad

Ingredients:

• 1 kilo potatoes
• 1 big chicken breast
• 3 pieces medium sized carrots
• 500 ml mayonnaise
• 1 can (836 g) pineapple tidbits or chunks
• 1/2 cup sweet pickle relish
• 1 cup cheddar cheese, diced (optional)
• 3 tablespoons of chopped spring onions (optional)
• Iodized salt to taste (pepper, optional)

How to Cook:

• In a big pot, place potatoes and carrots
• put enough water to cover
• Bring to a boil and boil for about 15 to 20 minutes (or until cracks on the potato skin appears). To check if the potatoes are cooked, pierce using a toothpick. If it you can pierce it with minimal resistance and the toothpick comes out clean, the potatoes & carrots are cooked.
• Drain potatoes and carrots and let them cool.
• Once cooled, pealed the skin by hand.
• Dice the potatoes and carrots, about 1×1 cm

To prepare the chicken:

• Boil the chicken breast in water with some salt. Let cool.
• Shred the chicken meat in into 1 inch lengths.

To prepare:

• Drain the pineapple chunks or tidbits.
• In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients – potatoes, chicken meat, pineapple, carrots, pickle relish, and mayonnaise.
• Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Refrigerate ti chill before serving.

Potato Salad

Optional Ingredients:

• For variety and added flavor, you may add other optional ingredients such as diced cheese, chopped onions, spring onions, or raisins.

To serve, garnish with sliced apples on top.

 

Fave Five’s on Friday … Five Childhood Christmas Traditions You Would Like to Pass On to Your Children …

Surely, way back when, and even until now, we all have Christmas traditions unique to each of our families.

Name five of these traditions that you would like your children to continue when they will have their own families …

 

 

Or if you didn’t have Christmas traditions when you were young, what five Christmas traditions would you like to start, for your family today, and your posterity tomorrow?

 

The Gift of Christmas ♥

The gift of Christmas isn’t wrapped up in presents or parties. The gift of Christmas is Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten of the Father, the Son of God. As you follow Him, you put people first. You may spend less time in lines and more time serving others. You may spend less money on – and more time with – the people you love. You may lose yourself and you may find everything else that matters.

 

How to Have a More Worshipful Christmas!

(From http://lds.org/topic/christmas/christmas-ideas.html)

Here’s some practical advice to help you find your ideal Christmas.

Simplify the season and you may find that for every minute you spend here, you’ll get 10 minutes back to enjoy this holiday more fully.

• Replace some holiday decorations in your home with reminders of Jesus Christ.
• Politely decline requests that will take you away from family.
• Play more Christmas music.
• Donate gently used items to a thrift store.
• Go Christmas caroling.
• Avoid “mad rush” shopping times.
• Say thank you as often as possible.
• Schedule a night to help another person or family.
• Call someone you normally wouldn’t to wish him or her a Merry        Christmas.
• Delegate some holiday preparations to children or other family         members.
• Trim the gift list.
• Simplify a traditional activity.
• Find quiet time to pray.
• Write down great memories as they happen.
• Set and stick to a holiday budget.
• Forgive a grudge.

 

 

Christmas Shopping Tips that Will Make You Happy … Not Sad!

By this time, you’re probably just like any other normal person on this earth – worried about what Christmas presents to give to your love ones, friends, officemates, classmates, and even associates.

But why? What seems to be problem?

Definitely not the lack of nice things to give.

The stores and Malls are brimming with shiny, nice, colorful, exciting things fit for the occasion of gift giving.

It’s more on the dilemma of “insufficiency of funds” … to put it more nicely.

And so you tell yourself, with or without gifts, Christmas will still come, and you’ll still be here, even after Christmas! And so you try hard to convince yourself not to worry so much. You console yourself with the thought that they will understand!

Hey! Worry no more! Christmas shopping can still be fun! And with a lot of planning, it need not be expensive either! Remember the line: “It’s the thought that counts”?

So to go about it, here are a few Christmas shopping tips that will make your Christmas shopping happy … not sad!

1. Make a list by writing down all the people that you normally give holiday gifts to. And then include in the list, after their names, what you think they would like this Christmas.

2. Remember that Christmas gifts do not necessarily have to be bought from the stores. Think out of the box! Be creative!

3.  Do a “Price-Check” days before you actually shop and make price comparisons from store to store. Hunt for discounts and good packages.

4.  Prepare a budget. Do this after accomplishing numbers 1 and 3 in this list. Having a budget will help you “stay in the course” and avoid overspending.

5. When buying gifts, try “small and special”.

6. Make your own personally designed wrapping paper. Be creative. Put a personal touch. Recycle!

7. If your budget is really tight, give Christmas cards instead. Write a sincere personal message inside and you’ve got for yourself a memorable gift that will be more appreciated.

8. Shop round for the best bargains. Try the “Tiangge”, or go to smaller stores rather than the Mall. Try buying from the market. You see, items in these outlets are cheaper because their operational costs are smaller (meaning, the mark-up is not as big) compared to items found in malls or exclusive boutiques.

9.  You can create a CD, DVD, or MP3 compilation of tracks for a family member or friend who loves music.

10. If you have the talent and the passion, get crafty and make fashion jewelries for gifts. This is nice because you can actually make each piece unique and fitting just for the person you have in mind.

There! These are just few ways to save money during this Christmas holiday.

Happy shopping!

and

Merry Christmas!