Day 28: Another food entry

Hello hello!

I'm at four weeks now! Wheehee! And I can use a spoon now! Double wheehee! 

To celebrate that (I think, haha), my dad cooked some kuay teow fish soup. Mmmm delish! And since my jaw is beginning to be able to open slightly wider, I'm permanently eating with a spoon now! Ohh.

I need a moment to take in this memorable accomplishment. *teary eyed*

My four-week mark trophy: kuay teow fish soup cut in small pieces, with some potato and veggie bits

Okay, back.

Yesterday, I whipped up some mashed potatoes with an accompanying Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup for dinner for sis and I. To which the house commented: Why so ang moh jiak (eat)? Hahaha but the mashie was really good and like many other food posts, I'm going to share it!

I initially got the idea from this website. However, upon seeing that I had lacked many of the even more "ang moh" ingredients, I decided to adapt it and add my own stuff. Here's a picture of the dinner to first entice you:

Day 27 dinner: Caramalised onion mashed potatoes & Campbell's Cream of Mushroom. YUM.

You'll need:

• 1 russet potato (about the size of your hand)
• ½ small onion, finely chopped (about 2 inches in diameter)
• 30ml fresh milk
• A knob of butter
• ¼ tsp salt, or to taste
• A dash of black pepper, to taste

Serves: 2
(too much and you'll feel juh-laht)

Step 1: Shave and dice the potato into large 1 inch cubes. Place it in a pot of room temperature water very slightly salted. Water level should be just covering the single layer of potatoes comfortably. Watch over the pot and gently stir over medium flame. When the water starts boiling, cover and reduce to small flame for about 15 minutes.

Step 2: Chop onions finely, but not too fine! You should still be able to see each piece in all solidness. Fry the onions till it caramalises.

Step 3: Potatoes should be done by now. Test it and it should be super soft when you poke it with a fork. Strain the water and throw it into a bowl with a knob of butter. Make use of the heat from the potato to melt the butter. Start mashing!

Step 4: Add the caramalised onions. Then, salt and pepper to taste.

Step 5: Once the mash is of a homogeneous mixture (it should be really thick and sticky), add in 30ml of fresh milk, a little at a time.

Step 6: Serve and enjoy your work of art in your most comfortable eating position. And then after that, return to the stove :p

You'll probably need more nutrition (fibre, protein, etc) than just the carbos... This meal was kind of impromptu because I suddenly had to settle my own dinner, so I had to make do with what I had. But, you need a balanced meal, ya.

I've not made mashed potatoes many times,  but this tasted the best so far (even my sis said so!). Do you have an interesting variant of mashies? Let me know! I'll be most glad to try it too! :D

Day 27: Tsh, calories?

You know you're addicted to something when you go: Okay, just one more scoop, and you take another, and another. And another one.

I'm talking about ice cream.

Mom got me two pints of Ben & Jerry's (because it was on offer) and can I say, IT WAS HEAVENLYYY. I'm such a chocolate lover and it was my very first taste of Ben & Jerry's. Thanks mom! :DD

What can I say. I wished I had gotten some ice cream earlier. It's been less than 24 hours since the purchase and I've already finished off half the first pint! Good thing my diet right now is really low calorie, or there'd be war going on between my head and stomach this instant. 

There isn't a better time to freely slurp ice cream than now. I have no need to consider the calories!

Here's to wishing that time stands still for a while... so I can have chocolate ice cream to my fill.

P.s. I still haven't gotten sick of Ensure... probably because it's chocolate flavoured...... OH???

Day 25: Food again

Hello hello!

Yesterday, I had my first appointment with my orthodontist since the surgery. Nothing much really happened there, except that the tightened my braces and took out the surgical hooks. Oh, and he gave me a pack of 'cherry' rubberbands to change everyday, to ensure that my bite doesn't move. Dr Cheng was kind of rough with my mouth though. He pulled my lips out, pressed on my stitches (super ouch), and my teeth really hurt when he was putting on the coloured bands on the brackets, especially on my bottom teeth for some reason. But thank God the wire that was pulling on my inner left cheeks at the back of my mouth is gone! Now I can do my jaw exercises without restraint. Which reminds me, why does it seem like the dental doctors keep telling me to open my mouth wider (when I'm already opening my widest; have compassion!) and that I can chew cut up noodles...? Okay, I get it - just need to work even harder at it. :'/

(Author's note: Just to clarify, I might make Dr Cheng to be a scary orthodontist but really, he's just being efficient about his consultations. He's really professional and experienced, and things get done really fast. If the pain is unbearable, you just need to say ou..ou..ouchhh and he'll very graciously apologise... and then do it quicker so the (inevitable) pain will pass faster. Hahaha I likey my ortho.)

I just weighed myself today and happy to announce that I've gained about 1kg more since my 1.5 weeks post-op all-time low! Which means that I've lost about 2.5kg nett since pre-surgery. I actually hope that I don't put on to my original weight, but I also know that I'm not supposed to use this recovery period as an opportunity to lose weight. Hehehe shhh.

Whatever it is, I'm craving for sweet stuff all the time. If you would like to know, below is a list of what I consume everyday:

• 1 bowl per meal of blended vegetable soup, or rice porridge with fish fillet bits and carrots
• 2-3 packets of Ensure Plus
• 1 big cup of smoothie (either Avo-Nana or Berry-Nana-Oat)

On top of that, I sometimes also include some random drinks that I can't stop thinking about and must. drink. now. kind of stuff, like the recent Milo+milk ice blend. Sometimes, where rare fruit resources are available, I get to try some fruit drinks, like blending cempedak. If you consider what I've been eating drinking thus far, you'd understand when I say that IT WAS GLORIOUS SWEETNESS TO THE TONGUE (Ensure doesn't count because it's not like, naturally sweet). The cempedak fruit my dad bought from Malaysia was so thick and sweet that even adding 40ml of water per 5 seeds (of the flesh only, of course), it still tasted like the real thing! I could actually afford to add more water, but I was just spoilt by taste. :)) I actually took a picture of my 15 seeds + 120ml water + ice blend from the other night. It made 500ml of solid cempedak juice.

I know, it looks like just a yellow blob of.. thing. But that's because it was so thick! It was just awesome, for serious lack of a better word!

To fellow jaw surgery mates, I think this drink is a really good one to try if you're in Malaysia or Singapore or wherever you can get a good cempedak fruit. I imagine that it will really boost your appetite, especially in the early weeks of recovery. And it's not that difficult to make!

Day 22: I call it, minced eggs.

Hello everybody!

As I type, I'm eating (albeit with great difficulty) scrambled minced eggs.

Lunch was supposed to be pumpkin soup, but since dad wasn't back from his marketing yet, I decided to cook some eggs. I was so (so, so, so, so, so, sooo) deprived of eggs the past three weeks, I couldn't take it anymore!

It was meant to be scrambled eggs, which wasn't so successful seeing it was my first attempt at it. Nonetheless, eggs scrambled are still eggs. I would have slurped it all up in less than a few minutes, if not for this current predicament. My brain obviously forgot that my mouth could only open not more than a finger's width, and I instinctively arrowed the fork into my mouth, only to be halted at the gates. Now I'm just eating the eggs which are finely mooshed by the fork. Visually not very appetizing. Can't taste it very well either. It's too stressful eating with these kinds of dining contraptions! Now, where is my straw..

Eggs before mincing. Something looks wrong with the scrambling :O

Day 17: My liquid gold

Last night, the refrigerator was stocked up with three punnets of blueberries, which doesn't happen very often. So though I was free to use it, I was a little apprehensive of using them because, well, I'd be drinking it instead of savouring it in each bite. That was like, gulping down liquid gold to me!

But I decided to use them anyway. And I don't regret it because what I made was JUST. SO. GOOD. that I have to share it with you now, or else I wouldn't be able to concentrate on my work :p

Here is another smoothie, especially for you fellow post-op recovery mates, to try - the Blueberry Banana Oatmeal Smoothie! Yum!

You'll need:

• ½ cup blueberries (if you don't have a cup, it's about a generous handful estimated)
• ½ medium banana
• ¼ cup rolled oats, cooked (it's about two heaped tablespoons of raw oats)
• 150ml fresh cow's milk
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 10 cubes of ice

(Note: this makes about 600ml of smoothie)

In the original recipe, they blend the oats raw. But because I'm drinking through a straw, I decided to cook them because I was worried that the ol' blender at home wouldn't be able to pick up the oat bits for slicin'. It's a personal choice. Oh, and don't put in too much bananas! Don't want it to turn into a banana smoothie!

Blend away and be berried in it's glorious sweetness! 

Day 16: That sweet tooth of mine

Hello everybirdy!

The days of increased comfort are here now! I don't struggle to finish a bowl of soup or a packet of Ensure.

But I now face problems of a different nature now.

My appetite is too good for my mind to handle and control now. Though my stomach may be already full from blended soup, THERE'S ALWAYS SPACE FOR A PACKET OF CHOCOLATE ENSURE. I drink it like there's no tomorrow. It's so goooooooooodd! Rather, there's always space for anything sweet, be it yakult, juice or whatever shakes there are.

Am I not supposed to lose weight over this surgery.....?? Hmm.

Another review with Dr Wee prompted the Return of the Latexes, because my bite was deviating (slightly) again. Sigh. Although, this one no kick leh, because the bands are not the thick ones which Dr Tan used on me last week. WHAT DO YOU WANT, GIRL. No pain, not happy. Pain, not happy. I don't know, I'm not in a right state of mind right now because my stomach is screaming for me to quickly finish this post and EAT. Or drink, for that matter.

On a side note, I made an effort to greet Dr Wee more extrovertedly (in my sense) when I entered the room today. And he remarked: "You seem much happier today leh. Is it less uncomfortable already ah?" HAHA no not really. I was just experimenting with outwardly expressing myself 3 times amplified of what I was feeling inwardly. But I replied: "Ya, because I can eat more food now!" anyway. Heehee. Well, at least he's not commenting on my unhappy countenance anymore :))

My lifeline. It's probably the second carton.

Day 8: Straw upgrade!

Hello I'm posting again. Time passes so slowly that I feel like I've not posted in a few days.

Today I went out for a walk around the mall and grocery mart. The journey was arduous! I was already panting just walking from the bus stop to the mall, with my heart rate measuring 115 bpm. Lots of patience needed to work my stamina back.

I drank my Yakult through a straw today! Honestly, I didn't fancy the idea of fructose liquid swishing around my teeth when Dr Wee suggested this as part of my diet, BUT I was in such a dire state of need for food that I didn't care anymore. And guess what, it tastes even more delicious when you're in this state of lack. 

I found that since I could close my lips together, I should be able to drink through the Yakult straw now. Although, I have to be super careful not to choke on it because it's really difficult to measure how much water I've sipped because of the air that resides in the mouth. To make things easier, I used cold water to help gauge the amount of water :)

I have this really hard spot under my lower left jaw near the joint. It seems really hard and I'm hoping it's not some early sign of infection or anything. Also, the from upper jaw tissue inside my mouth feels more swollen as it should be (comparing it to the other side of my mouth). I'm slightly worried? Need to check with Dr Tan during my review tomorrow.

Till then!