A Great Escape

The front desk
As I write this my body is already longing for another visit to this place. Don’t even let me have a whiff of their special massage oil or the aromatherapy scent that they burn!

I had the pleasure of being invited to experience Urban Retreat Spa’s barely one-month old new outlet at 1-Mont Kiara Mall. I happily accepted as I was already a fan of their spa. In January this year, I experienced a wonderfully relaxing experience at their Curve outlet that left me with feel-good vibes that lasted several days. It was their Honey Black Sesame Scrub Massage, which sadly, is no longer on their treatment menu.

The treatment I was invited to experience was the Hot Ginger Lemongrass Lymphatic massage (for detoxing) and a body scrub which was to take 120 minutes. As the shower was unavailable that day, I was given a slight variation on the body scrub treatment – it became a back scrub instead, which was what I really needed.

The lounge area
Urban Retreat Spa’s new premises in 1-Mont Kiara sports a smaller lounge area but no one really cares when anticipating what comes next! I felt wonderfully pampered when my masseuse came with a pair of slippers and invited me into the treatment area. First came the footwash where my masseuse Ung (I think that how it’s spelt? Pronounced ‘uung’) gently soaped my feet and washed it in a floor basin. Then it was off to the treatment room to prepare for the massage.

Everything in the treatment room is designed to slide you into this blissful state of relaxation – from the gently tinkling Thai instrumental music to the aromatherapy oil burners,to the muted lighting in a room painted in taupe/coffee colours.

Ung, my masseuse proceeded to work on every inch of my body starting with the toes. She used long sweeping strokes on my limbs ending with pressure on points at the top of the limb. In my mind’s eye it was as if she was encouraging the flow of lymph through my body towards the ultimate goal of detoxing. Ung explained to me that my right thigh muscles were very stiff after I winced in pain (that's me trying hard to be tough) when she was working on it. It made sense as I had been unconsciously using my right leg more due to a toe injury on my left foot. Throughout the massage, Ung was attentive, careful to remind me to let her know if anything she did hurt. Before working on my stomach area, she ensured that I had not eaten as recently as less than 2 hours before. So take note if you are thinking of going for a massage – try to go in only 2 hours after eating a meal.

The lymph drainage part of the treatment ended with Ung massaging my head, face with particular attention to the lymph node areas in my neck.

The back scrub I received was invigorating. I was informed that the house recipe scrub was made out of coffee and oatmeal. Another use for my daily breakfast! After the scrub, Ung carefully cleaned off the scrub with a warm towel. I dressed and tottered off to the lounge area where I was served this comforting and delicious Hot Ginger and Lemongrass Tea. Sipping the tea, I found myself suitably fortified to reenter the bustle of life again.

Take home the feel-good factor! More info at their website
Urban Retreat Spa
The Curve, Lot No. 157, First Floor, No 6, Jalan PJU 7/3,
Mutiara Damansara, 47800 Petaling Jaya, Selangor Malaysia
Tel + 603 77319829/77103239| Fax +603 7710 4240 | Mobile +6012 221 7820

1-Mont Kiara Mall, Lot 15, Second Floor, 1 Jalan Kiara,
Mont Kiara, 50480 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Tel + 6012 617 9509 | Mobile +6012 221 7820
www.urbanretreat-spa.com
www.facebook.com/UrbanRetreatSpa
www.twitter.com/urbanretreatmy

Do call ahead to make an appointment if you really want a particular time slot to avoid disappointment. I've noticed that the spa management is pretty generous, often offering freebies to Facebook fans and Twitter followers as part of their promotional efforts.

I have tried replicating this tea at home and here’s the recipe I came up with.

Hot Ginger and Lemongrass Tea


2 cups of water
3 stalks of lemongrass, white part only, bruised
1 inch to 1.5 inches of thumb-sized old ginger, sliced
2-3 tspn brown sugar or honey or according to taste
3 pandanus leaves

Put the water, lemongrass and ginger in a saucepan and bring it to boil. Let it simmer for about 5 minutes, then add the sugar/honey. Put in the pandanus leaves, simmer for about a minute with the lid on before removing the pan from heat.

Strain out the ginger, lemongrass and pandanus leaves. Serve hot.

A 60th Birthday!

chocolate fudge with vanilla buttercream frosting

This cake was requested by John's daughter - who together with her brother,threw a surprise 60th birthday party for their Dad. As you can guess, John loves to unwind in front of the telly after a hard day of work. He also loves to play the drums. I had such fun researching the possible designs for a cake (bleary eyes and all) and even more fun making the sugarpaste man with his teeny tiny flat screen telly. I'm not sure if anyone noticed but I also put some dimples on the man's face (as the birthday boy has a set!)...but they did notice the buttons on the remote control lol...We were also contemplating putting a full drum kit on the cake but figured it was not possible as the 'living room' would get too crowded!

A Wedding to Start the Year!

My niece and her new husband chose the last day of 2009 to get married and the first day of 2010 to celebrate their marriage. So fitting I thought, a new year, a new journey in life...all our best wishes go out to you S and H!



I was honoured (and somewhat nervous at various times!) to have been asked to bake the wedding cake. After a few emails, the design was decided on - who knew there were so many different shades of Tiffany blue and aqua colors out there? But when in doubt, always present the bride with a couple of options before proceeding... The topper was chosen after a popular vote - which topper elicited the most 'ooohs' and 'ahs' - yup - the rings definitely had the immediate wow factor.

The cake's bottom tier was vanilla butter cake, the middle tier was chocolate fudge and the top tier was orange poppyseed cake.


if you like it then you shoulda put a ring on it..uh-ohoh-uh-ohoh

Calamansi Lime Cordial

limes...lots of limes...

This very simple recipe for Calamansi Lime Cordial was shared with me by my bff's MIL Aunty C...the nicest lady around with the most soothing presence...sigh. The resulting drink mixed from the cordial is most refreshing on a scorching day and it's even good for you throat to boot!



Lovely!




Calamansi Lime Cordial
(yields approximately 600ml of cordial)

Ingredients
1 kg of Calamansi Limes (yields approximately 1 1/3 cups of juice)
750g of Rock Sugar (honeycomb type) (or known in Malay as "Madu Batu")

available at Chinese Medicine shops/medical halls


honeycomb rock sugar

1. Squeeze the juice from all the limes(be prepared for sore thumbs!)
2. Sieve the juice for any pulp or errant seeds.
3. Pour juice into a non-reactive saucepan.
4. Put all of the rock sugar into juice in pan.
5. Boil on medium heat until sugar is melted. Do not close pan as the liquid foams
up as it heats and could very well boil over.
6. Cool and decant into a clean jar of suitable size.
7. To enjoy a refreshing lime drink - mix to taste - very roughly about 2 tbspns of
cordial,to 200ml of iced water.


et voila!

A castle fit for a princess...

This cake was requested by a princess who was turning seven. It was a hulking beast of a cake! But figuring out how to 'construct' the cake was loads of fun...as always :) The party was held at Jungle Gym and I experienced some difficulty carrying (read: wrestling) the cake up from the basement carpark of BSC lol...

The bottom tier of the cake was chocolate fudge and the top tier was vanilla. The entire cake was covered with sugarpaste. The towers were not edible - being made from kitchen towel rolls covered in sugarpaste. The princess doll (Princess Rayla from Barbie Pegasus) was a McDonald's Happy Meal toy that I saved for this occasion. Now I'm just waiting for the good folks at Maccas to churn out more princess dolls with their Happy Meals!

Japanese Curry Rice

Bento Kare Raisu

Japanese Curry Rice. The name of the dish will without fail invoke shudders in my younger sister. Strong feelings akin to disgust... What terrible experience could she have gone through to have such an aversion to this dish? Well, once upon a time, a young secondary school student was sent off as an exchange student to Japan. While she enjoyed all types of Japanese food, having been there before with the family, she just could not stomach 'Kare Raisu' (Curry Rice) as it was NOTHING like the curries she was used to back home. She lived to tell the cautionary tale : NEVER eat Kare Raisu if you can help it, if you can do so without insulting any Japanese hosts who ply you with it.

Fast forward to today... or at least early this year. One of my son's kindy teachers told me he ate curry at school lunch. I was startled, as my kids have hardly any tolerance for spicy food to date.(Bad, bad Malaysian mother! Fail!) Then she quickly explained that it was not chilli hot as it was Japanese curry to which I automatically recoiled on the inside remembering my sister's experience. After that I was so intrigued that I had to buy a box of the stuff to try - hey, anything to add to the list of foods that your kids will eat right?

Vermont Curry Sauce (MILD) mix -

with a smidgen of honey & apple they say

Well, let me put on record that Japanese curry is quite delicious. My daughter, who is usually a small eater will put away 3 times her normal portion when having this for lunch. Can you imagine my delight when she asked for seconds and thirds... It smells like curry due to the usual spices used in the mix like coriander, turmeric, cumin and fennel but without the usual heat when you use the Mild mix. I'd say it may be good 'training wheels' for those wanting to initiate their kids to curry?

The directions are at the back of the box - very simple and straightforward - exactly like making a meat stew with usual onions, carrots and potatoes except that you 'break curry sauce mix into pieces and add to saucepan' towards the end. I think it's great to keep a box of mix in the pantry for when you've come to the bottom of the list of stuff to serve up.

Ah! Japanese attention to packaging details - the pack is divided into segments to help you break the sauce cube up easily

The Surprise

Two-tier cake covered in Chocolate Fondant

with a sugarpaste monogram topper

This cake was baked for my BFF's surprise birthday party. It was my first attempt at chocolate fondant (yes, the cake is completely covered in chocolate flavoured sugarpaste, made from scratch by lil ol me). I was intrigued by the idea of sugarpaste that would appeal to chocolate addicts and also be more edible (as in less sweet). It actually tastes like a slightly sweeter than usual brownie. The lower tier was vanilla and the upper tier was chocolate fudge (death by chocolate!).

isn't she beautiful?