Tod’s, understated luxury

Published at July 1, 2009 in BAGS. 2 Comments

Tod\'s grained leather cornflower blue bag

Tod’s grained leather bag.
Photo © Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC, 2009

Tod’s is an Italian luxury label that offers a distinct laid back, understated style.

The Tod’s Group that owns brands such as Hogan, Fay and Roger Vivier (acquired in the mid 1990s) began in the late 1920s in Italy. Reminescent of Ingvar Kamprad’s story of humble sales beginnings right at home, Diego Della Valle, founder of Tod’s, began selling leather goods from his basement.

Today, Tod’s can be found in select outlets around the world, from Scandinavia to the USA and Asia. No doubt though, the most exciting place to visit for Tod’s products would be Italy’s factory outlets, where its friendly customer service personnel will take pride in showing you its range of products and where shoppers can get a Tod’s for a friendlier price.

Tods logo on blue grained leather bag

My first encounter with a Tod’s product was when a girlfriend of mine showed me her latest bag purchase. It was a pristine quality Tod’s bag, large enough for her daily needs, in the right colour palette to suit her wardrobe and her fair skin, and one that I thought was stunningly bland for a luxury item.

Tod\'s blue leather bag

But after a passionate affair with Louis Vuitton monograms and Chanel quilts, where such bags are immediately recognizable on the streets, I’m now discovering with interest and delight, the subtlety of a Tod’s make.

Tod’s is hardly bland. In fact, its magnetism for Tod’s fans is precisely the Zen and simplicity in their designs.

Tods drawstring blue leather bag, back of bag

This cornflower blue grained leather bag for example, has hardly any markings on the outside that would signal its brand name, save a silver toned tab with a capital T. What would give away the quality of a Tod’s make would be its signature thick threads, double-stitched at corners and neat trim finishes.

Beige canvas lining in Tod\'s bag

Generally, the insides of a Tod’s bag is decidedly simple - a neutral coloured canvas lining, without any monogram prints and certainly no flamboyantly coloured textiles like some Marc Jacobs bags.

Tods zipper

On this bag, the Tod’s name appears in two places, embossed with the logo under the zipper of the inner pocket and on the silvertone hardware lock that sits over the shoulder. Nothing too ostentatious.

Silver tone hardware on Tods bag

I’m loving this bag for all its characteristics of a Tod’s make and for its colour, and would recommend anyone who has tired of monogram prints to explore Tod’s as an alternative quality make.

A rich chocolate cake, to complement any event

Published at June 26, 2009 in Recipes. 1 Comment

Chocolate cake recipe

Chocolate cakes - heaven on earth.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson and Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2009

I love chocolate and with that, anything chocolate. In Singapore, it was a favourite past-time of mine to explore cafés, eateries and bakeries in search of very good chocolate cakes, chocolate desserts and that exceptionally rich, warm cup of hot chocolate to complement the events of the day.

I have specific chocolate cakes to fit specific moods and chocolate cakes to suit the weather or the time of day. And I went absolutely berserk when Marcel Desaulniers’ (2000) Death by Chocolate: an astonishing array of chocolate enchantments hit the bookstores in Singapore almost a decade ago.

In Sweden, I was crushed when I my first chocolate cake craving hit (which wasn’t too long into my stay in Sweden) and found that I had nowhere to go to, to buy that perfect chocolate cake.

I needed to bake one if I wanted one.

Chocolate cake recipe 2

The chocolate cake cooling in a spring-form tin.

In my lastest chocolate craving, I pulled up a chocolate cake recipe from Angela Nilsen. It isn’t difficult to follow and what you’ll have is a pretty rich chocolate cake to satisfy most anyone’s dessert rushes.

From Angela Nilsen’s recipe:

Ingredients

200g good quality dark chocolate , about 60% cocoa solids
200g butter , cut in pieces
1 tbsp instant coffee granules
85g self-raising flour
85g plain flour
1⁄4 tsp bicarbonate of soda
200g light muscovado sugar
200g golden caster sugar
25g cocoa powder
3 medium eggs
75ml buttermilk (5 tbsp)
grated chocolate or curls, to decorate

For the ganache
200g good-quality dark chocolate , as above
284ml carton double cream (pouring type)
2 tbsp golden caster sugar

The method is written in detail at BBC Good Food and you can also read the reviews of this cake from others who have tried this recipe, on that page. Some have even had this cake as their wedding cake, which I think is gorgeously sinful!

In this post are my pictures from the various stages of making the cake, beginning with the cooling of the baked cake (above) and followed by the slicing the cake into three layers.

Slicing chocolate cake into three

Slicing the cake into three layers.

The cake needs to preferably be completely cool before slicing it into three layers. And if the cake refuses to be cut into three, slicing it into two layers will do fine too since what it calls for is ganache in the middle of it to keep it moist and give it its fudgy consistency, even after a day or two of keeping it.

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French Onion Soup à la Provençal

Published at June 23, 2009 in Recipes. 4 Comments

French Onion Soup à la Provençal 1

French Onion Soup à la Provençal
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

One usually associates the summer heat with a cool ice-cream. But today, the heat utdoors triggered a nostalgia of growing up in the tropics and of having hot soup on a hot day. So I thought I’d look around for something nice and warm for lunch, something that would go nicely with a glass of red.

My choice fell on a traditional onion soup à la Provençal. This soup is different from the clear broths I grew up with, but it’s a fairly well-known dish in the West. It exists in numerous variations and hopefully nobody will mind if I add our version to what is already available on the internet. You’re most welcome to enjoy the recipe or take it as inspiration.

Ingredients:

4-5 Onions
1 – 1,5 liter of calf broth. Meat cubes might do instead.
1-2 cloves of garlic
10 All spices seeds
Bay leaves
Thyme
Basil
Sherry
Butter
Olive oil

Peeling onions in warm water

Onions in warm water

When handling onions, my favourite is to soak them in hot water, which also makes them easy to peel.

Stirfry the onions

Quarter the onions and stir fry them until golden brown.

At the end of the stirring I add the spices; some All Spice seeds, Bay leaves, a few cloves of garlic and a few branches of fresh thyme (nice, but you will need to pick them out later). Then I add the calf broth and a dash of sherry. Leave on medium heat until you feel it is done. 30 minutes should do but this soup actually gets better the longer it cooks. Tomorrow it will be even better.

French Onion Soup, serving

Serving

When it is ready to serve, pour the soup and add a slice of toasted white bread on top of the soup.

Cheese on top of the French Onion Soup

Cheese atop the toasted bread

Drizzle a mixture of grated soft cheese and Parmagiano on top of the bread, and give the bowls a quick toasting in the oven, set on barbeque. Around five minutes should do it.

French Onion Soup in oven

Soup and bowls into the oven, set on barbeque / grill only.

French Onion Soup with a glass of red

Serve with a glass of dry red

A few details: this soup will be quite sweet due to the onions. The wine will need to be quite dry. A cold beer might be just as nice with the soup. The flavour of the soup depends on the frying of the onions, that should be fried till a caramelized brown. Traditionally this soup is made with calf stock but meat cubes might work equally well. If you use a vegetable broth, this incidentally becomes a quite nice vegetarian dish.

Midsummer crustacean fare: Swedish crayfish

Published at June 20, 2009 in FOOD. 3 Comments

Swedish crayfish on plate to Midsummer 2009

Swedish crayfish
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson and Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2009

The season for these Swedish crayfish usually begins in early August, where the entire month of August is dedicated to crayfish parties around Sweden. But a neighbour had brought home a large catch of these and they thus made their way to our Midsummer table.

A significant difference in seafood sold in Sweden and in Singapore as I found out, is how most seafood in Sweden is sold pre-cooked in dill marinated brine, so that crayfish, prawns, crabs and lobsters often taste heavily salted with a hint of dill when you buy them off the shelves at the grocers. As such, cooking Singapore chilli crabs out of pre-cooked dill marinated crabs in brine, doesn’t quite give the desired results, as one can imagine.

Swedish crayfish in Kosta Boda glass bowl

Crown dill marinated and brine cooked crayfish.

Through the years though, I have found some use of brine boiled prawns bought off the shelves in Sweden, such as making quite good Hokkien prawn noodle soup from the peels. Just add butter, onion and sambal and you will have a broth that is reminescent of those sold at the Singapore hawker centers.

Swedish crayfish in Kosta Boda glass bowl 2

Crayfish bodies are usually 5 - 6 cm in length. These are shelled in the same manner as a large prawn.

Crayfish doesn’t need much to enhance its flavour. One of my favourite ways to have Swedish crayfish is to peel them and have a small pile of them with a little dollop of mayonnaise and a squeeze of lemon. Crayfish meat also makes a perfect topping on bread, and one or two crayfish sandwiches with a fresh blade of salad will make a most enjoyable meal!

And on the Swedish table, crayfish is often downed with snapps!

Midsummer’s Eve, between sunshine and rain, 2009

Published at June 19, 2009 in Cheryl's personal style and Crochet by Rita Cordeiro. 3 Comments

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson in black crochet sweater

Black crochet sweater made by my mother, Rita Cordeiro and silk tunic dress by Karen Millen.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

Not wanting to give false hopes for Midsummer in Sweden, the newspapers had, about two to three weeks ago, already begun forecasting a grey and soggy Midsummer for the west coast of Sweden.

Karen Millen silk floral 3

Floral print on black, ending in an asymmetrical hem.

Well, the day proved their forecasts accurate with some strange oscillations between sunshine and rain.

Boho beaded chandelier earrings

Boho bronze beaded chandelier earrings.

But regardless of weather conditions, it’s heartening to know that you’ll always find some die-hard Midsummer fans who’ll spread the festive cheer by setting up the Midsummer pole. I’ve seen how this is done and it’s no task for the faint hearted. The pole is decorated with flowers and blue and yellow streamers that trail beautifully in the wind. The hoisting of the pole and securing it into the ground takes nothing less than cooperative, physical strength. Then comes the sight of little children running around the grounds and that is enough to bring a smile on just about anyone’s face.

Swedish Flags on Midsummer\'s 2009

Swedish flags in celebration of Midsummer.

There were bouts of rain both before and after these pictures were taken, but I’m glad that the rain felt warm on the skin! I never understood how rain could be bitingly cold, almost painful, until I came to Sweden.

In Singapore, you have thick, clashing tropical thunderstorms and when the rain hits you, you’re covered in warm water from the equatorial sky. Rainstorms are almost delicious in the tropics!

Crochet sweater and Karen Millen silk top 1

When you can smell the rain before its caress of the skin.

As this is the celebration of the summer solstice, the days and nights during these days are long. And I’m all set to enjoy the festivities, preferably indoors this year!

Glad Midsommar to all!

In season - Swedish grown strawberries

Published at June 16, 2009 in FOOD. 6 Comments

Swedish grown strawberries

Fresh from a strawberry farm in Sweden.Photo © Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson and Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

I’ve always known strawberries to come bottled in sweet jams. In fact, ’strawberry’ as a flavour was so common when I was growing up in Singapore, where you have them in almost everything from milk to kiddy toothpaste, that I thought strawberry was common commodity even without actually having tasted the real fruit.

My very first encounter with a strawberry farm was in Genting Highlands, Malaysia when I was about eight years old. Genting Highlands is about an hour’s drive from Kuala Lumpur and I found it a scenic region with cooler temperatures than the tropical heat of the lowlands. I remember Genting Highlands because every morning, the grounds of the hotel where we stayed would be covered in thick condensation, a cool fog that made you feel as if you were walking in clouds.

I liked strawberry jam but the experience of visiting a strawberry farm in Genting Highlands, changed my understanding of strawberries completely! I remember my parents buying farm made strawberry jam from the farm we visited, and after one taste of what I thought was the most decadent strawberry jam, I never liked the highly processed versions found on the sheleves at the Singapore grocery stores.

Swedish grown strawberries in sink

The strawberries, just before they disappeared!

The digression on Genting Highlands strawberries is just because Midsummer weekend is around the corner here in Sweden and we’ve tried our best, in the past few days, to seek out freshly picked Swedish grown strawberries. And today, we found some!

These strawberries are smaller and a deeper red than the hydroponically grown strawberries that are also found at the local grocers. So for those in Sweden, home-grown Swedish strawberries are in season right now and it’s a recommended buy!

A light stew in sugar and they make a perfect topping to ice-cream or have them fresh atop some traditional strawberry fruit cake with cream!

Chanel Review: Chanel’s East West travel line flap bag

Published at June 13, 2009 in BAGS. 1 Comment

Chanel Travel Line flap bag 1

Chanel Travel Line flap bag
Photo © Cheryl Marie Cordeiro for CMC, 2009

Chanel Travel Line bags first appeared in 2002, a range of bags that are made in lightweight material for the purposes of light travel.

Chanel Travel Line flap bag 1

Square quilting covers both front and back of the bag.

This East West travel line version with a flap and twistlock closure measures 10″ L x 4″ H x 1.5″ W, so this is not a very large bag though it can hold your daily essentials such as wallet, phone and perhaps even a slim foldable umbrella.

Chanel travel line flap bag 3

Chanel bags come with their ID numbers on a sticker on the inside of the bag and on an accompanying card.

ID number in Chanel east west travel line bag

One way to tell an authentic Chanel from a fake is to try to remove the ID sticker on the inside of the bag. An authentic sticker generally resists being removed in one piece, and will come away in parts in the process of removing. Fake stickers generally come away easily in one piece. In this bag, the ID sticker was dislocated in the process of use.

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Swedish designers and one label’s take on the nautical theme

Published at June 9, 2009 in Cheryl's personal style. 3 Comments

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson, Filippa K nautical dress with pearls

Standing in the wind, in a Filippa K dress.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson and Cheryl M Cordeiro-Nilsson for CMC 2009

I’m beginning to appreciate what I now recognize as Swedish and Danish designs. Not that the two are the same but there is a strong sense of clean cut lines, simple yet sturdy styles that come through labels such as Baum und Pferdgarten (Danish), Tiger of Sweden (Swedish) and Filippa K. In fact, Tiger of Sweden has such fantastically cut jackets for men that I can’t help but want one for myself!

Filippa K dress with Marc Jacobs denim and leather lined shoes

Filippa K dress with Marc Jacobs shoes.

There’s something always understated in Swedish design and this black and white striped dress from Filippa K is as loud as the label gets. It’s a superb Swedish take on the nautical theme, that’s very subtle compared to the nautically themed designs of Gaultier or Dolce & Gabbana.

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Summer along the Swedish west coast

Published at June 6, 2009 in Sweden and TRAVELS. 2 Comments

Swedish westcoast 1

An inviting view of the sea at the southern archipelago of Gothenburg.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

If you’re headed to Gothenburg this summer, consider putting aside a day or two for exploring the southern archipelago that lies just outside of the city. It takes about half an hour by tram to the ferry terminal and another half an hour by ferry from the mainland to the islands. The rewards of being on the islands on a warm clear skied summer’s day are without limits, where you can experience the pleasures of the islands first hand.

Swedish westcoast 2

Small wooden piers line the water’s edge, dotted with red painted wharves.

Being out on the islands along the Swedish west coast is as close to kampong you would ever get when visiting Sweden. Located about 15 km from the city of Gothenburg, the southern archipelago even has slightly different weather conditions than from the mainland. Coupled with the deep sapphire blues of the surrounding seas, it wouldn’t be difficult to believe that you’re in Viking paradise.

Swedish westcoast 3

The many piers around the islands offer people a place to sit, relax and enjoy a view of the ocean.

On the islands, the water’s edge is lined tangent with wooden planked piers, most of which are private docking areas for boats belonging to the houses not far from shore. The houses in themselves are a beautiful, rustic sight. Most of the houses that look like cozy cottages are constructed with heavy interlocking logs and are painted red, red and blue or yellow. I especially love the tone of the deep red used on these houses, as I’ve come to identify them as a Swedish-red, associated with Swedish culture, design and style.

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Hellenistic lunch with lamb and tzatziki

Published at June 3, 2009 in FOOD and Recipes. 4 Comments

Grilled lamb with feta cheese salad and tsatsiki

Serve with some full flavoured red wine and a few slices of fresh bread to wipe up those last drops of olive oil with.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

There is something with the Swedish early summer that makes me crave for the specific Greek blend of flavors that goes so well with the smell of outdoor barbequing, a drop of red wine and a comfortable chair.

Greek Salad

For a Greek Salad you just need some feta cheese, some fresh and flavourful tomatoes, some crisp and fresh onions, some large black ‘Kalamata’ olives and some olive oil. Slice, dice and give it a quick stir. I love kalamatas for their taste and often think I should have them in as many salad dishes as possible, Greek or otherwise.

Feta cheese greek salad with olive oil

Serve with some full flavoured red wine and a few slices of fresh bread to wipe up those last drops of olive oil with. A full lunch does not need to be more complicated then that but the possible combinations are endless.

Tzatziki

A superbly simple dressing that goes well with this salad or as a side dish to barbecued lamb, is the Greek yogurt based tzatziki.

Yoghurt based tzatziki

To make, start with some shredded cucumber, drizzled with a teaspoon of salt and let it drain for some 20 minutes. Flavour some thickened yoghurt with 2 crushed cloves of garlic, 1 tbs white wine vinegar and 1 dash of olive oil. Stir, mix and serve. It gets even better after being refrigerated overnight.

Draining

Sprinkle the shredded cucumber with a teaspoon of salt and let it sit for about 20 minutes to drain.

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Blue jewel tone dress with a hint of tribal

Published at May 30, 2009 in Cheryl's personal style. 7 Comments

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro, Tods blue bag, Love Label dress

A sapphire blue dress with tribal collar motif by Love Label.
Photo © Jan-Erik Nilsson for CMC 2009

The safari theme, like the nautical theme, comes up almost every summer. And with the jewel toned dresses of autumn of 2007 and 2008, it was a delight to come across this dress from Love Label in a design that juxtaposed the two themes - jewel tone and tribal. An odd combination of themes, but something I found intriguing and don’t mind wearing.

The dress is cut like a shift, almost straight down the sides, with a slight swing out on the hips. I’m using the dress with an aubergine-brown patent leather belt that I purchased in Singapore during my last trip back there. There were gold tone accents in the fabric of the collar of the dress that I picked up and emphasized with a vintage silvery gold cuff bracelet.

Love label, blue jewel tone dress with tribal motif collar

Large wooden buttons with beads line the collar of this dress, and calls to mind a large wooden bead necklace hung around the neck.

One of my favourite things to do at the moment is to pile on similar colours of clothing and accessories, in varying hues, shades and tones. So here, I’ve paired a medium sized Tod’s cornflower blue, grained leather bag with the outfit.

Cornflower, periwinkle blue Tod\'s bag

Blue on blue. A cornflower blue Tod’s bag to complement the outfit.

Love Label is a fairly inexpensive brand of clothing that caters to a younger crowd. You can check out the team behind the brand at their blog, where they’ve just launched their sassy new collection. If you’re in the UK, but can’t find your way to a shop, you can try purchasing Love Label clothing online at Additions Direct or Littlewoods.

The mystique of Chanel Rouge Noir no. 18

Published at May 28, 2009 in Accessories: bags, scarves etc. and FASHION. 4 Comments

Chanel Travel Line flap bag in linen, Chanel no. 18 Rouge Noir and no. 453 Magnolia Rose nail polish

Chanel nail lacquer in no. 18, Rouge Noir and no. 453, Magnolia Rose. In the background, a Chanel Travel Line bag with a twist lock flap, in a lgiht latte colour and silvertone chain.
Photo © Cheryl Marie Cordeiro for CMC 2009

If I ever had to choose a favourite nail colour of all time, beyond the whims of trends and seasons, it’ll be Chanel’s Rouge Noir no. 18.

As far as I can recall, dark nail colours have been around since the 60s and 70s. My mother’s favourite nail varnish colour when I was growing up, was a dark brown, similar to the colour of dark soya sauce. She would wear that to work, to parties and on evenings out. I suppose the colour literally grew on me and I’ve now adopted a variation of that - with lashings of deep red - as a signature nail colour. It’s a colour for nails that I feel perfectly comfortable in, whether in high summer with clear skies, or in the middle of winter close to the festive Christmas season.

Chanel Rouge Noir no. 18 and Chanel no. 453 Magnolia Rose nail varnish

A close girl friend of mine figured out that I just adored Chanel Rouge Noir no. 18 and she sent this yin yang pair of nail varnish bottles, the vampish colour of no. 18 complemented by Chanel no. 453, Magnolia Rose, which is a shimmery light baby pink.

The very light shade of Magnolia Rose is superb for days when you don’t wish to call attention to your nails in particular. I used that shade of shimmery pink at my PhD viva recently and thought the understatedness of it all fitted well with the ocassion. It’s probably a colour I could wear to boardroom meetings too.

When it comes to technicalities on nail varnish, I would highly recommend Chanel because of the ease in which the lacquer goes on and the very short time it takes for it to dry. In my own use, I’ve hardly experienced any streaking with Chanel nail lacquers and love their staying power. Often enough, I find I’m taking them off without them having chipped with wear.

Old school canvas shoes with a twist: La Agrade, Lacoste

Published at May 27, 2009 in SHOES. 1 Comment

La Agrade hot pink canvas ballerinas, Lacoste

La Agrade cerise canvas flats from Lacoste.
Photo for CMC: Cheryl Marie Cordeiro © 2009

White canvas shoes from Bata designed in a similar fashion to the ones shown above, were a staple in the school uniform when I was growing up. Admittedly not as elegant or sleek as the ones above from Lacoste, the canvas shoes from Bata twenty to thirty years ago were heavier soled and came in an all white canvas top that we had blancoed every weekend to get them pristine looking again for the following week at school. The front of the white canvas school shoes were also cut deeper and were known as ‘boat shoes’ because of their shape. I appreciated those shoes for their design because of how I could easily slip into them in a hurry - a practical detail for the days when I just could not get out of bed early enough for school.

La Agrade Lacoste, hot pink, cerise canvas flats

Pink shoes albeit in canvas, are still not part of the Singapore school uniform code today, where white canvas shoes are preferred.

I’ve been through many pairs of shoes through the years, both casual and formal in function and many of them for everyday office wear. And if I had to pick out the more comfortable types of shoes to wear, I would have to say that flat canvas shoes rank high on that list of shoes that are kind to your feet.

I once read that the idea of ‘breaking in’ to a pair of new shoes is a myth - the shoes either fit you and are comfortable from the moment you put them on, or they blister your feet and will continue to do so even after several occasions of use. These pink canvas flats from Lacoste were perfect first time around!

Patterns, La Agrade Lacoste, hot pink, cerise canvas shoes

Leaf patterns on the inner soles are reflected embossed on the outside and on the soles of the shoes.

What I’m loving about the twist on these canvas shoes from Lacoste is not just the pop of colour they add to your outfit when you wear them, but its details - the white leaf pattern imprint runs on the insoles and is reflected embossed on the front and undersides of the shoes.

These shoes give a perfect spring / summer holiday feel, with the knowledge that school days are long gone and you can well go ahead and buy whatever canvas shoes you like, in whatever rainbow colour you prefer.

Reflections 10 years on, at being Miss Singapore Universe 1999

Published at May 24, 2009 in TRAVELS and Trinidad and Tobago. 9 Comments

The following interview was done by Valerie Wang Jia Yu, journalist with the Singapore Straits Times, a selection of which was published in the print edition of the Sunday Life! section Sunday, 24th May 2009. The article features interviews with several past winners of the Miss Singapore Universe pageant.

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro in blackPhoto © J E Nilsson for CMC 2009

Questions:

How old were you when you joined Miss Singapore?

In 1999 when I won the Miss Singapore Universe title, I was 24.

What were you doing then?

I had just graduated with Honours from NUS, and was pursuing two separate Masters degrees. One was a Master of Arts in English Language with NUS and the second was a part-time Master of Science course in Information Technology with NTU. I subsequently graduated with both in 2000 and 2001 respectively.

Why did you join Miss Singapore in 1999?

I suppose there could be many small reasons why I chose to join the Miss Singapore pageant back then, but it comes down to a combination of curiosity and ambition.

The first reason is that I’m always one to look to expand my repertoire of experiences. Up until my university days, I’ve always prioritized education and academic training. I also noted that I tended to be rather nervous and shy during presentations at tutorials. In that sense, being in a pageant presented a new challenge to me. It would be an event where I will need to be able to present myself on stage, in front of a large audience, overcoming stage fright. I decided to take up that challenge and overcome my fear of presenting myself in front of many people. I even joked about this at my recent Doctoral graduation dinner celebration: after parading in a bikini in front of Donald Trump and millions of viewers, there’ll be nothing more frightful thereafter in terms of public appearances.

The second reason that drew me to the pageant was the platform of opportunities that the event presented for the young women who chose to be in it. Contrary to what some might think, that pageants are demeaning to women, personally, I think pageants provide an excellent arena in which young women are given a voice, or at least, they are given the chance to find their voice. Being on stage, these young women are not only encouraged to polish their self-presentation skills but they are encouraged to have their say in the pageant’s related portfolio, voicing their thoughts on women’s issues for example or lending their services to humanitarian efforts.

My portfolio as Miss Singapore Universe for example, was quite broad. Part of my work as Miss Singapore Universe entailed efforts on the humanitarian front, such as heightening awareness on AIDS in Singapore, spending time with the elderly living in elderly care homes. Other aspects of my portfolio included working with the Singapore Tourism Board in promoting Singapore as a choice country of destination for tourism, especially within the regions of Southeast-Asia and Asia-Pacific.

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Dinner party at Matsmak: the PhD disputationsfest

Published at May 23, 2009 in FOOD and INVITATION. 1 Comment

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro-Nilsson, PhD disputationsfest, Gothenburg

Standing at the set tables to the dinner party at Matsmak; I wore a pink pleated Tadashi gown with vintage gold tone jewellery.
Photo © J E Nilsson, David Neikter Nilsson for CMC 2009

The public defense of my doctoral thesis was followed by a dinner celebration held at Matsmak with Mikael Sande as Chef de Cuisine.

The evening event was surreal in the sense that Mikael’s restaurant had just moved to its new location at Drakegatan 1 in Gothenburg, and we were able to book the entire restaurant on a Saturday evening for ourselves. The restaurant, being located in a building with mainly offices, also meant that our guests had the entire building to themselves to enjoy that evening.

We had our seating outside of the restaurant, in the inner courtyard of the building that had white marble floors and a skylight roof that allowed the evening Scandinavian summer sun to stream through to the tables, where the light reflected pretty prisms off the rims of the wine glasses. Tall potted palm trees turned the inner courtyard into a cozy garden, so that you felt as if you were dining outdoors on a languid summer’s evening.

Jan-Erik Nilsson, disputationsfest, Göteborg

My husband, Jan-Erik Nilsson, during the cocktail session before dinner.

We had a cocktail mingle session with sparkling white wine before the actual dinner. This gave our guests time to acquaint themselves with each other if they had not already done so earlier on during the day. I was most happy to see a few friends and colleagues who had already graduated from the university, present at this dinner. It was like a reunion of sorts where you could catch up with what was going on in their lives.

Getting seated and making new acquaintances. Disputationsfest.

Getting seated and making new acquaintances.

The theme of the dinner continued in its French-Italian theme from the lunch buffé, though in this event, it was Mikael Sande who was in charge. Menus were printed for each guest with their names, according to their mother tongue and placed at their respective seating places.

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The public defense of my Doctoral Thesis

Published at May 17, 2009 in INVITATION. 22 Comments

Disputation Göteborgs Universitet. Cheryl Marie Cordeiro, Kirsten Jaeger, Aalborg

Waiting for the public defence session to begin. The Opponent and main examiner was Associate Professor Kirsten Jaeger from Aalborg Univeristy, Denmark.
Photo for CMC: J E Nilsson and David Neikter Nilsson © 2009

One of the things that have dawned on me during the years I have spent working on my thesis is that writing a doctoral thesis and having it approved are done for various reasons, and thus approached in many different ways around the world.

One reason for people to pursue a PhD is to obtain a final, formal confirmation of their status as an expert in their own lifelong field of work. In northern Europe, you can research and write a PhD thesis alongside your full-time occupation, and there is no real rush to it. If it takes ten years or more, it does not really matter. That the time taken to write a PhD thesis is secondary to the quality of the thesis is very much emphasized here in Sweden, and these values are reflected in the average time to complete a PhD in Scandinavia, which is 10 to 14 years, without anyone batting an eyelid.

A more common reason for pursuing a PhD is in preparation to your academic career in your particular field of interest. This is mostly done at the university where you’ve received your basic training, by adding a research education on top of what you have already done in your undergraduate days. This is a quicker way and you follow the methods of the professor you have already been studying under.

Personally, I have a passion for research and pursued a PhD because I wanted to become a research specialist in a field of my own choice and one that I have pioneered myself out of pure interest, which is to study Scandinavian management / leadership in Asia, in particular in Singapore. I also wanted to use the two qualitative methods of grounded theory and systemics linguistics as analysis tools on business administration matters, while most other studies on management have thus far favoured quantitative methods.

Having come from a mostly Anglo-Saxon education background, I have also sped through, the best I could, the Nordic education system with 6 years doing my PhD, that included a year as a ‘visiting student’, the time spent learning Swedish as a third language, the sporadically offered compulsory PhD courses for all doctoral students and the writing of the thesis.

I actually saw this entire process as something quite enjoyable. To be able to dig into tens and thousands of words and numbers, get them into order and eventually start seeing them form into patterns of meaning and information, is actually fun. I realize this might finally position me as a true blue ‘nerd’, but so be it.

PhD Public Defence session

Protocols for PhD public defence sessions in Scandinavia vary according to which traditions the institution follows. Some universities in Finland are amusingly conservative, so much so that one can almost see how doctoral public defences were conducted during the Medieval times, while universities in Denmark can be quite modern and informal. Swedish traditions are somewhere in-between.

Disputation, Arkeologen, G&teborgs Universitet.

All in all, around thirty persons made it to the event last Saturday. Considering this was during a spring weekend, I was impressed and happy to see so many attending the disputation instead of setting up barbecue in their gardens or pretty much doing anything else at all.

The procedure during my defence session in Sweden began with the Chairman opening the session by introducing the participants, which were the Candidate (myself) and the Opponent, in this case, Associate Professor Kirsten Jaeger from Aalborg University, Denmark, who was also the main examiner in the examination committee.

Next step was for the Chairman to ask the Candidate if there were any additions or corrections to the text. Most candidates will have an “errata” list that would now be added to the thesis. This is important if there are any significant mistakes in the paper, for example, if the word ”not” was left out in the main conclusion.

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Spaghetti al Salsa di Pomodoro Crudo

Published at May 5, 2009 in FOOD and Recipes. 2 Comments

Mixing the cherry tomaroes with the tagliatelle. At Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Cherry tomatoes marinated in olive oil and garlic, going on top of some tagliatelle.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC 2009

It was during our trip to Italy late last year when we stepped into a genuine Tuscan house where the old housewife continued to uphold the family cooking traditions that stemmed from generations back. We sat down and settled for Aqua and a pasta dish that seemed nice, and walked straight into a new world of flavours as unexpected as unforgettable.

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro, Florence, Italy 2008

Standing outside a fantastic eating place with a beautiful view, about one hours drive from Florence.

This restaurant is located about one hour’s drive from Florence, a small monastery that serves food. I don’t even remember the name of it but it’s somewhere along the A1 when heading from the Gucci factory outlet, towards the vinyard cooperatives around San Giminiano. This is where I got introduced to this dish.

It’s very simple to prepare, as are many Tuscan dishes. The only things you need to be very careful with are the ingredients or the whole thing is hopelessly lost before you start and you will just be disappointed.

To make Spaghetti al Salsa di Pomodoro Crudo, you just cut, crush and mix into a bowl and let it sit in a warm room from morning to about lunch.

For about four persons, I took about 20 small sweet, flavour filled and sun ripened tomatoes, a generous handful of fresh basil and one fair sized clove of garlic.

Cherry tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and basicl. At Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Ingredients to this tagliatelle dish.

Crush the garlic clove, slice the tomatoes directly into the bowl so that the juices are not lost along the way; shred the basil leafs into the bowl using fingers and top up the bowl with fresh, green and fruity first class olive oil.

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My new cooking buddy, the Grill Pan

Published at May 3, 2009 in FOOD. 0 Comments

Fillet of beef on an iron grill pan. At Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

To fry a few pieces of Couer de Filet of Beef to perfection,
sprinkle with sea salt, let the beef rest in room temperature for about 40 minutes. Fry one side until brown in a grill pan, flip once and fry until done. Let the beef rest for 5-10 minutes before serving.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC

There are a million good reasons to go out and buy a new pot or pan to the kitchen if you really try to come up with some. But what it eventually boils down to (excuse the pun) is that it makes cooking more fun. Sometimes, having a new utensil might even improve the results of your efforts.

On my part, I often find myself buying something that looks nice, figuring out later what to use it for. Eventually I will show you a very nice Italian milk-foamer and yes, a perfectly useless high-tech electric juicer that currently eats up half a cabinet of shelf space and we can’t throw it away because it was too expensive to buy in the first place. And is there anyone who actually even knows what a raquelette is?

However, our latest toy was not improvised but something that we decided to make do with, after we decided that a separate grill section to the stove would not be practical after all. After some shopping around we simply chose the heaviest cast iron grill pan we could find, which turned out to be an 11″ AGA with black enamel coating inside and out. The very look of the pan sitting snug in the shop was enough to get us all excited about it, conjuring up dishes to cook in it!

AGA cast iron grill pan. At Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Our new toy, 2.9 kgs worth of cast iron AGA grill pan makes frying in barbeque style a breeze. The heat source does not matter as long as it can make the grill pan sizzling hot.

What to cook and not
I have understood that many don’t know how to use a grill pan or even what’s the point with it, or if it’s actually any good. The argument pro is that it makes food taste better and yes it does (after trying it out ourselves) if you choose a good one and fry the right things in it.

The idea with it is to fry barbecue style where the food is heated by just being close to a heat source, working as a toaster would, and without direct contact with the flat bottom surface of a skillet.

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Pasta and Chicken liver sauté, just XO good …

Published at May 1, 2009 in FOOD and Recipes. 1 Comment

Pasta with chicken liver and a dash of XO

Tagliatelle pasta served with chicken liver sauté, bacon, shallots and fresh parsley.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC

In my view chicken liver is a true delicatess. Its mild flavour and fine texture is likely to appeal even to those who normally are not that enthusiastic about liver. It is inexpensive and the health aspect is overwhelmingly positive.

It is also tender and usually quite fail-proof to cook, since it is done in about 3-5 minutes in a dollop of butter.

However, liver can’t be combined with everything and if you want to go beyond butter things can get ugly pretty fast.

Some additional ingredients might not go well with liver, others might be too dominating and kill off the liver flavour, making the dish pointless. Too much onion or meat cubes for example, are mortal enemies to the sophisticated aroma of tender chicken liver.

In general, safe combinations are cream and herbal spices, but here we have tried to be a bit more adventurous than that.

This dish is one of my favourites since besides containing a few surprises that makes it interesting, it shows off chicken liver from its very best side.

To serve four persons, we will need about 500 grams of pasta to this dish.

Ingredients
400 grams of chicken liver
3-4 medium sized shallots
150 grams of bacon
1 tbs dried marjory
1 handful of fresh parsley
1 cup of cream
White pepper
Salt

Preparations
Tidy up and cut each chicken liver in three parts.
Slice and dice the bacon into small pieces.
Chop the shallots
Grind the dried marjory finely in a mortar

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Maggie of London dress with those Roberto Cavalli heels!

Published at April 30, 2009 in Cheryl's personal style and SHOES. 4 Comments

Roberto Cavalli patent leather stiletto heels

Roberto Cavalli black patent leather stilettos.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC

At 11 cm high, these skinny stilettos are not the most comfortable to move about in, calling for quite some stamina and that masochist in you to wear them. But some things can’t be rationalized in life and I love them just because they are so impractical, so elegant and sleek in lines - like a drawing on paper that was once fantasy, now turned into reality.

These shoes have a personality all of their own, their tiger striped insoles echoing the sharp look it carries on the outside.

Black dress from Maggie of London, at Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Draped black dress from Maggie of London. Vintage silvertone jewellery from Lisner and Trifari. Thick banded white gold ring from Cartier.

Depending on your imagination and what you pair with the shoes, it can take you from classy to trashy in an instant!

Cheryl Marie Cordeiro in Roberto Cavalli stiletto heels, shoes

I’m not over my fever on draped clothing, so I thought I’d pair the shoes with this black Maggie of London jersey dress that is draped around the collar and ruched down the sides.

Roberto Cavalli black patent stilettos, shoes. At Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

But then again, you could also forget about walking in these. Some shoes are made to look just gorgeous, strewn carelessly on the bedroom floor, and this pair of Roberto Cavalli stilettos is one of them.

The Opéra Garnier in Paris, France

Published at April 30, 2009 in France and TRAVELS. 2 Comments

Opera Garnier in Paris, France

The Paris Opera house, also known as Opéra de Paris or Opéra Garnier.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC

If there is something that makes the French French, I think that is a certain spirit - they just don’t do boring. It’s in the fashion, women in skyscraper skinny stilettos in the Metro in the morning, their passion for life and, in their architecture. Take this Opera Garnier for example. It’s an orgy in marble and gilt, exudes a love of life and is a grand example of how to do things with panache!

Just consider that they started to plan this building with its surrealistic grandiosity less than half a century after the French Revolution in 1793, when Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette had been publicly beheaded because of their opulent life style.

The realisation that there actually is an indoor lake under the basement make you half and half believe that there probably is a phantom somewhere in there too. All sets the stage in our minds for a great theatre play. You just need to step inside and the grand entrance staircase will within the blink of an eyelid place you in the spotlight, on stage in the theatre of life, cast as the star.

Top of the Opera Garnier or Palais Garnier in Paris, France

On the roof are sculptures of Apollo, Poetry and Music by Aimé Millet and Liberty by Charles Gumery.

The grandeur strikes you already when you set your eyes on it from across Place de l’Opéra. Above the golden frilly edge of the roof are statues of Apollo, ‘Poetry’ and ‘Music’. This is the ideal setting and one can think that Gaston Leroux’s Le Fantôme de l’Opéra (1909) must have basically written itself. This was also the story that was later adapted by Andrew Lloyd Webber to the musical, The Phantom of the Opera in 1986 and became one of Broadway’s longest running musicals of all time. I can’t even write the title without hearing the theme in my mind.

Palais Garnier, Opera Garnier, columns, Paris, France

Bronze busts of Beethoven and Mozart on the front façade of the Opéra Garnier in Paris.

The very aura of the building invites dramatic stories to be told and enacted.

Opera Garnier sculptures, Paris, France

Sculpture of dancers entitled, The Dance by Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux.

Charles Garnier was also the architect of Le Grand Casino in Monte Carlo that opened in 1879.

Le Grand Casino, housed together with the Opéra de Monte-Carlo, is a smaller version of the Paris opera, scaled down to a quarter of the size of the former but still in a league of its own, since it was originally also Prince Charles III’s private theatre.

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Vanilla ice-cream served with apple cinnamon sauté

Published at April 29, 2009 in FOOD, INVITATION and Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Vanilla gelato, ice-cream served with apple cinnamon marmalade

A summery dessert.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC, 2009

One scoop of vanilla ice-cream. On the side, one small apple sliced, diced and fried in butter, sugar, cinnamon and some breadcrumbs. Decorate with a quick drizzle of dark syrup and top off with a small leaf of mint.

By the end of last autumn, we received a large number of apples from a neighbour who had a spacious garden filled with old apple trees. Apple will store and keep over the winter if kept reasonably cold and dry. Now however, we were down to our last batch and looking at our very last three apples and we decided to celebrate them by transforming them into this wonderfully sweet and temperature cooling dessert. And besides, if looking for something Italian inspired, what could be more Italian than gelato?

A buffé with a French-Italian theme

Published at April 27, 2009 in FOOD and INVITATION. 4 Comments

Caprice salad with buffalo milk mozzarella, olive oil and fresh basil

Caprice salad: sun ripened tomatoes with buffalo milk mozzarella cheese
with olive oil, basil, black pepper and salt.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC, 2009

Planning is a big part of the fun to holding events. It’s a phase that allows you to be creative and fantasize the possibilities!

In a few weeks, we’ll be holding a dinner for friends with a French-Italian theme and thought that a lunch buffé the same day should set the stage for the evening event.

So far, we have thought that the following should be in there somehow:

Pictured above, a Caprice salad with tomatoes, buffalo milk mozzarella cheese from Campania, southern Italy, topped with fresh basil, a tasty low-acid virgin olive oil and marine salt. This salad is filling with the olive oil and cheese but it’s generally a light dish.

Bread, olive oil, balsamic vinegar with fresh basil and sea salt at Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Dark bread served with sweet virgin olive oil and
balsamic vinegar and natural sea salt.

Camambert with calvados and plain crackers

Un-pasteurised camembert with some calvados flavoured apple marmalade on the side, if we can manage that.

Melon topped with sun dried prosciutto, Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

One of the best combinations ever, sweet and salty: sun dried prosciutto on a small slice of honey melon

Parmigiano reggiano with honey

Slices of Italian parmigiano-reggiano hard cheese, with acacia honey and
maybe some roasted walnuts on the side.

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Rösti - turning raw potatoes into culinarian delight

Published at April 26, 2009 in FOOD and Recipes. 1 Comment

Rösti, made with potatoes and carrots

Grate fresh potatoes, flavour with garlic and some Italian hard cheese. Fry until golden brown in a generous dollop of butter. Done.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC, 2009

There are many aspects to cooking, from nutrition to economy, to pure lucullian joy. Ideally I try to combine all these aspects into all that we cook.

One of my favourite things to do is to take something simple and then add a twist and a half to it and see it turn into something both delicious and fun, that might even render you a couple of surprised looks at the table.

Today we needed something to go with a mouthwatering piece of beef, and we didn’t want to spend all day preparing the side dishes, so we settled for the Swiss staple, rösti. In a world of rice, pasta and french fries, rösti is not always ranked amongst our first choices.

Rösti was originally a breakfast dish, slightly related to the fried carrot cake or chai tao kway we find in Singapore, but one that will fit splendidly together with anything that benefits from the company of potatoes.

If you haven’t got around to actually cook this before, the basic recipe is pretty uncomplicated: grate fresh potatoes. Add salt and pepper. Fry. Done.

Depending on what kind of dinner you are planning rösti lends itself to many variations. Adding different ingredients such as garlic, onions, carrots, bacon or apple can turn this dish into something different, interesting and one that is to your liking.

Chef’s secret; How to flip it so that the nicely browned side is upwards when served? Use two pans. When the rösti is half done, put a similar sized pan on top of the first one as a lid, flip the whole thing, and fry until done in the second pan. Or just fry one side and do the flipp onto the serving dish.

Smaklig måltid!

Nautical stripes, a Swedish summer staple

Published at April 25, 2009 in Cheryl's personal style and FASHION. 5 Comments

Black and white striped top, black Warehouse shorts, Marc Jacobs shoes

By the road, in nautical, flower picking.
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC, 2009

It took me years to get over my loathe of horizontally striped clothes, to see them as chic or flattering after a girl friend of mine once commented that a red and white striped t-shirt I had on was the ugliest thing she had ever seen.

It also didn’t help that one of the first fashion basics that we learnt in school was that horizontally striped clothes tended to make the body look broader whilst vertically striped clothes tended to lengthen the body.

But growing up, you often learn to unlearn what others have taught you or have impressed upon you through the years and these days, I don’t think much about wearing horizontal stripes. In fact, I think these nautically themed tops such as this black and white striped jumper from H&M can look effortlessly chic, depending on what you choose to pair it with.

While nautical is all the season’s rage on the runways, from Armani in Italy to Ralph Lauren in the USA in both menswear and womenswear, Gothenburg is a harbour city where come summer, you’ll find more nautically inspired clothing out on the streets as staples than perhaps any other city in Sweden. People often throw over a sailing jacket in white and navy or red and navy, that is both wind and waterproof when out shopping, paired with leather docksides. Here, nautically themed clothes are an indication of the city’s history and heritage as a trading port and home to the Swedish East Indiaman company and its ships some 300 years ago.

While April doesn’t usually allow for bare legs and shorts, Sweden seems to be experiencing a warm spell these weeks, with summer weather already here in the middle of spring. The clear blue skies are encouraging people to take to their hobby in sailing, and a view of several sailing boats at sea is exactly what you’ll find in the archipelago region along the Swedish west coast.

In this post, I’ll be sharing a few different looks with a single striped top.

For something casual (shown in the first picture above), I’ve paired the striped top with a pair of black woollen shorts from Warehouse and a pair of patent leather ballerina shoes from Marc Jacobs, as an alternative to docksides.

Marc Jacobs red patent leather shoes with pink bow

By the shadow of a picket fence: Marc Jacobs ballerinas in red patent leather with contrasting pink bows.

Keeping the red patent, pink bowed shoes, the top also works when worn with white shorts for another casual look (pictured below). These white cotton shorts are from Bay Trading from the UK, a company that sell quality items at affordable prices. I like how these shorts tend to look like a mini-skirt from the way it has been cut and sewn.

For something more dressed up, shorts are good to pair with heels, the trend being seen on the runways since 2006 with Luella and Gucci both having their own renditions of shorts with heels.

L\'Autre Chose brogue mules with tie front detail

L’Autre Chose brogue mules with tie front detail.

In my own ensemble, I’ve paired the black and white top with white shorts and a pair of L’Autre Chose brogue detailed mules. I find mules, even stilettoed ones, less dressy than courts and quite common a shoe form in more tropical climates, which make them perfect for a smart casual do with shorts. Espadrilles are another favourite of mine to pair with shorts.

Nautical black and white top with white shorts

Nautical black and white top with white shorts, paired with the L’Autre Chose shoes.

An inspirational multimedia clip from Bill Cunningham, On the Street: a show of legs in Paris (22 March 2009) shows in pictures, how wonderful it is to have legs as a fashion feature, be it in early spring or summer. And I think here, shorts have also gained in popularity as an item to be worn paired with dark leggings and heels; a look that elongates your legs without the use of vertical stripes.

In my ensemble, I’ve paired the black wool shorts with a pair of black patent leather, pointed toe stilettos from Roberto Cavalli. No leggings necessary in this weather, if it keeps up. Cavalli is one of my favourite designers because he never loses sight of what is feminine in a woman, and puts that theme consciously into his designs in women’s clothes, shoes and bags.

Black and white top with black Warehouse shorts and Roberto Cavalli heels

Black and white top with black Warehouse shorts and Roberto Cavalli heels.

Roberto Cavalli black patent leather stilettos

Roberto Cavalli black patent leather stilettos.

As an indication of the warm weather, here’s a happy bunch of Easter lilies, basking in the warmth of the summer temperatures in spring.

Spring lilies with a summer feel, Cheryl Marie Cordeiro

Yellow Easter lilies basking in the early summer warmth.

Enjoy the warm weather upcoming!

Quality of life, with some homemade aïoli on the side

Published at April 23, 2009 in DEBATE, FOOD and Recipes. 3 Comments

Aioli with some fresh basil and rosemary as decoration

A mild aïoli made entirely with natural ingredients,
topped with fresh rosemary and some basil
Photo © J E Nilsson for CMC, 2009

I grew up in Singapore with the assumption that good cooking based on fresh and natural ingredients was something that would never change. I assumed that there would always be someone there who took fresh fruits and newly harvested vegetables, flipping fishes, and fresh meat into their pots and pans to serve well cooked dishes at affordable prices.

The hawker centre concept in Singapore to me was equivalent to well-made home cooked food at very modest prices. For perhaps $1-2 USD you could sit down at a table and have a dish that would have taken hours of preparation to make yourself. Granted, the table was not your own and sometimes a bit wobbly and more often than not you would be seated outdoors, but that was a small price to pay compared to the returns of a local delicacy from the hands of someone who loved doing what they knew best.

Even simple things such as your daily coffee and tea from a coffee shop in Singapore rivals the choices of the mega coffee chain Starbucks, coming in a variety of servings such as kopi, kopi-O, kopi-si etc and teh, teh-O, teh-si, teh tarik etc. This philosophy and lifestyle towards affordable food made with fresh raw ingredients and a passion for a select dish, reflects what I think is quality of life in a modest setting.

Today however, Singapore is seeing the commercialisation and franchising of the hawker centre concept, Food Republic is one such concept where recipes are standardized and foods pre-processed before serving. It’s a concept that is a far cry from the traditional food hawkers I grew up with, even though they equip the interior of these franchise outlets with old style kopitiam (breakfast coffee house) furniture and tea cups. These days, the real food hawkers’ fare can be found in for example, Bangkok, Thailand where food hawkers cook along the streets right next to the wet markets.

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A touch of whimsical at Radley

Published at April 21, 2009 in BAGS. 2 Comments