Tag Archives: Cake

Chhori turns 2 – Birthday Puja

One of the main reasons for our visit to Nepal this time was to celebrate Chhori 2nd birthday in Nepal with friends and family.

In Newari culture, for reasons unknown and out of tradition handed down from generation to generation, the first birthday of a child is not celebrated. When a child is born, we have chhaiti, nwaran then pasni. After pasni, the big celebration is second birthday, which is known as Nirbuni.

Time goes by so quickly and our little munchkin turned a BIG 2 on 20 Feb.

As we were in Nepal for the celebration, we followed Newari culture to perform her birthday puja.

In Newari culture, we make Yomari every even birthday 2, 4, 6, 8, and 12. Yomari is a delicacy of the Newars. It consists of an external covering of rice-flour and an inner content of sweet substances such as chaku (Molasses). Click here for the recipe.

We had planned things in advance for this and were happy that things came together as planned on the big day.

On her birthday, in the morning, MIL prepared for birthday puja with sagun (traditional plate typically consisting of a boiled egg, smoked fish, a “bara”, haku chhoila” and “aila” and “dhau”) .

We had other relatives who were invited for the occasion including my parents, uncles and aunts.

The puja started with tika and yomari mala (garland) from my MIL followed by ritual to pour bits of rice, radish, coins, and cucumber in a small container from her head. This is believed to drive any evil spirit.

Then it was followed by Sagun and gifts to her.She was really spoiled with gifts like dresses and jewelleries.

My parents had come with my relatives to celebrate Chhori’s birthday with lots of food which included rotis, fruits, sagun and gifts.

After my MIL my mum and aunt did similar puja. Tika and sagun was followed by gifts to Chhori, me, AS and to my in laws.

Chhori loved the whole process except when the yomari garland was put around her neck as the string annoyed her and she wanted to take it out. She was happy with so many people around us that day for the whole day. We really had a great time with all the relatives.

After all the puja was finished, we had cake smash for her too. What a difference a year can make. When we had done the cake smash on Chhori’s first birthday, she was happy to be messy and smashed the cake well, which gave us some amazing photos but this year she definitely has become a big girl.

At first she just used her finger to taste the cake and then asked for a knife to cut the cake when asked to smash it. Nevertheless we had a great time and she had a lot of fun sharing a piece with everyone.

The day was long but fun and exciting.

We had her birthday party on another day so I will write more about it in my next post.

Till then, take care everyone and happy Monday.

from nepaliaustralian

XOXO

Birth Week :)

Yap, you read it right, instead of just being my birthday on 28th Oct, it turned out to be a birthday week this year :).

I am sure I have mentioned here many times that Nepali people follow different calendars which means we have birthday in different days every year depending on what you are following, the Gregorian calendar, Nepalese Calendar or the tithi (birth chart and position of sun, moon and planets). Normally, I don’t care much as I don’t really know when my Nepali tithi birthday is. My mum normally does some puja in Nepal and that is it.

But as my parents are here, I celebrated my tithi birthday. It was on 21st Oct and my mum did a simple puja for me that day. As it was a weekday we didn’t do much but just tika and sagun to mark the day. It is always special to have your parents around as they make you feel special every day.

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Also after the puja, Chhori gave me a flower (thanks to AS) and a big hug and kisses to wish me on my birthday. I put a few of those photos taken during the puja on Facebook which led to many of my friends and family wishing me birthday as well. Thus the birthday week celebration officially started.

During the whole week, I had birthday wishes and Facebook posts which made me feel very special  🙂

On the 27th, my boss bought me flowers and they were lovely.

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On 28th, I work up early as normal and waited for Chhori and AS to wake up. As I was checking my phone, I saw a message from AS that he had send me before he went to bed so he was the first one to wish me :).

It said, “Happy Birthday to the one who has always been there for me. Whether rain or shine, I’m so happy and grateful that I can call you mine.”

He definitely made me happy and it was a great start of my special day.

There were a few more messages in my Facebook and inbox as well as sms which were flowing the whole day.

When both my sweethearts were awake, AS got Chhori to give me a card and flowers and gifts.

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The flowers were lovely and loved my wallet, sunnies and umbrella. AS has always been so thoughtful and Chhori was too cute hugging and kissing me. I have to admit it was one of the best days I have ever had.

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Since Chhori came into our life, our life has changed for the better and I love being a mum to such a cutie pie.

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It was the first day of Tihar that day so we did Kag Puja and went out for breakfast. I had egg Florentine and AS had the Big Breakfast. The food was yummy and we were stuffed by the end of it.

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The plan for the afternoon was lunch and movie as mum was looking after Chhori and we didn’t want to come home late. I think when you have a baby, you change things so you can be with your kids more and I was more than happy to come home early to be with Chhori.

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First we went to watch a movie. We choose to watch “The Girl on the Train”. I had heard good reviews about it so AS got tickets to it.

The movie was OK. I loved the drama and suspense but at times I found it very slow.

For lunch AS chose a nice Japanese contemporary restaurant called Sorenzo.  When we walked into the restaurant, as it was afternoon, there were not many people. The ambiance of the place was good but the food is what I am still thinking about.

We went there for lunch so we thought we would order a set menu to make it easy as it had a wide range of dishes.

We thought we were getting 5 different dishes and dessert as there was slash in the menu between two items. We thought that we could easily handle much of food as Japanese food is small in portion generally but we realised later that we were getting everything in the set menu.

So we started with our favourite edamame with salt sprinkled on the top. It was warm just like I liked it.

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It was followed by fresh pacific oysters. Both AS and I are not a big fan of oysters but we loved them as they were tasty and full of flavour and surprisingly they didn’t have a fishy aftertaste .

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Then came Kingfish carpaccio which was amazing and we finish them in a few seconds as it was delicious.

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It was followed by the most interesting dish of the day, sashimi platter. But the interesting part of this was the presentation.  The dish came with oozing Nitrogen and a skull making it really interesting. As it was close to Halloween it was a great idea. The platter contained various cuts of Salmon, Kingfish, Tuna and Scallops which were fresh and perfect. We were really impressed at this point and AS was really happy about his pick of restaurants.

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Following the sashimi platter, there was a chef’s selection of sushi which was light and perfectly seasoned.

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Then came the pan fried scallops with white miso sabayon which was one of the most delicious platters on the menu. The presentation was awesome as well.

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Next was tempura platter that included prawns, mushrooms, eggplant and sweet potato. It was fresh and crunchy and very yummy but we couldn’t finish it as we were already so stuffed with the sushi and the sashimi.

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The last and main dish was smoked salmon with sweet and spicy miso sauce. The dish was very delicious and flavoursome but we couldn’t finish it as out tummy was screaming to stop as it couldn’t handle the amount of food we were eating 🙂

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Finally, it was time for dessert and we both choose ice cream. I had lime sorbet and AS had passionfruit and chilli sorbet. The presentation of the dish was great but unfortunately we couldn’t finish them either.

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I think we ate 3 times more than what we normally have for lunch but it was a great experience and loved all the dishes.

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After lunch we headed home where our munchkin was eagerly waiting for us. I had invited my brother’s family for dinner that night.

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So in the evening when everyone was at my place, we had a cake for my birthday which was an amazing rainbow colourful cake.

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The cream was delicious and I loved it so, so much. And thus 28th Oct concluded :).

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The next day a friend of my visited and brought a nice dress for my birthday and the following day, some of our friends invited us over for dinner and I got a nice hand bag for a birthday gift.

I am so happy that there are so many people in my life who have made my birthday into a birth-week with their love, blessing and wishes.

Take care everyone,

M from nepaliaustralian

XOXO

Nepaliaustralian turns 5!!!

Nepaliaustralian is not a baby anymore; it is turning BIG 5 years today.

Today is 13 September and there is something special on this date. Exactly 5 years ago, on this day I hit the button “Publish” for the first time and today after 5 years, I am still here writing this post. I really thought I wouldn’t last this long but at the same time I am so glad I am still here.

This 5 year time period was a learning phase for me. I had bad times where I was really slow in posting and I had good ones when I posted almost every day.

They have been fantastic years and a great learning experience and of course my life has changed so much in these 5 years. From a just-married person, I am a mother now and I am so happy to share my motherhood journey through this blog.

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Today the blog has 908 posts, 77 pages, 9518 comments with 1,331,800 page views, 4078 followers and 678,912 readers from 222 countries visiting my blog. :).

Also Nepaliaustralian blog award has been part of this blog.

So, Thank you!!!

I would like to thank all my blog followers; supporters who continue to show their love towards my blog by liking my posts as well as providing comments on my post.  Thank you to those who email me with words of encouragement and making me realise that my blog has helped them in some way. I feel blessed to be in the company of all the wonderful human beings who have helped to make my blog what it is today. Your support always encourages me to write more.

I have a virtual cake for all to hand around! Cheers!!!

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Take care everyone,

M from nepaliaustralian

XOXO

Simple Sponge cake with strawberry jam and cream

A few weeks ago, one my colleagues had his birthday and instead of a fancy store bought cake, he requested that he would like a simple sponge cake with strawberry jam and cream.

So we decided that we would make one for him. I was surprised at how good it turned out so I did it again and it is so easy.

Ingredients

  • 2 sponge cakes (I bought readymade ones, you could make your own)
  • 300ml thickened cream
  • Icing sugar, for dusting
  • 250g strawberry jam

Method

  • Beat cream using an electric mixer for 8 to 10 minutes or until thick and creamy. If you like extra sweet, add icing sugar.

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  • Place 1 sponge cake on a plate and top it with jam and then the cream. Then put the remaining sponge on top.

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  • I made two different versions depending on the topping on the sponge cake on the top.

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  • One I dusted with icing sugar on the top while on the second one I spread with jam and cream and added cherry as topping.

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  • Both the cakes turned out to be quite yummy and I loved it.

Enjoy.

M from nepaliaustralian

XOXO

Happy 1st birthday Chhori!!!

If you have been reading my blog, you know that my parents have returned back to Sydney after 6 months in Nepal and I just stared work again (after a yearlong maternity leave) but the biggest news is that my munchkin, my heart, my life, is growing up so fast that she is turning ONE today.

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This post is dedicated to the very special person in my life, my beautiful daughter.

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It feels like it was just a few months ago that I announced here that I was pregnant. Then she came into our world making our life so colourful and lively.

The first time I saw her, I learned what unconditional love meant. I had never seen anyone or anything more beautiful. Since her arrival, she has brought so much happiness into our life that I will would never have it any other way.

Each day has been better than the day before and I know that the future will be even better.

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Her first touch, her first word, her first smile, her first crawl, her first laugh, and her first step, everything is so special.

Her laugh has become our new favourite sound in life.

When she calls me “Mama”, I am the happiest person in this world.

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“Happy 1st birthday to the child who stole our heart. You are the best gift that we have ever received and thank you for giving us a thousand reasons to smile every day.

Your birth brought happiness and joys. It reminds us of how lucky we are to have a cutie like you in our family. You are the most amazing little thing we have ever seen. Our little angel, may your special day and every day hence bring you as much happiness as you are bringing to all of us. (And please stop growing up so fast. :))

¸¸.•*¨*•♫♪

░H░A░P░P░Y░

(¯”•.¸*♥♥♥* ¸.•”¯)

░B░I░R░T░H░D░A░Y░ ♪♫•*¨*•.¸¸♫♪

Chhori”

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To mark her special day, we did a cake smash. I’m sharing some of the photos with you all.

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Take care everyone

from nepaliaustralian

XOXO