Monday, April 25, 2011

Review: Guu SakaBar

Overall Rating: 4/5

Guu has opened a 2nd restaurant on Bloor.
When I was there, there were so many people there and people just kept coming in.

Guu is a Japanese Bar, but I don't see a lot of people drinking and I do see kids.  I guess it's because of the time.  I went there during dinner time.  If I go there on Sat night, it's most likely that most people will be drinking.

Guu sells Japanese Tapas and most of them you won't find in other Japanese restaurant. 

Here were the food that I had tried:

- Oshi Zushi (torched marinated mackerel pressed sushi)
     -- It's hard to find pressed sushi in Toronto.  This might be the only place left.  In terms of the sushi, it's ok but not excellent. The rice and the fish felt apart when I picked up the sushi using chopsticks.

- Salmon Natto Yukke (chopped salmon sashimi w/ 5 friends wrap in seaweed)
     -- This was very good.  We first mixed the salmon sashimi with Natto (fermented soybeans), shibazuke (purple pickles), wonton chips, green onion, and raw quail egg.  Then, we wrapped the mixture in seaweed.  

- Temari Zushi (torched salmon, cream cheese sushi balls)
     -- Good sushi... I guess it's the closest I'll get to sushi balls in Toronto.  I won't be able to find the sushi balls in tvb series 魚躍在花見.

- Assorted oden (taro jelly, puffed fish cake, deep fried tofu, fish cake, daikon radish, egg)
     -- The puffed fish cake is interesting... kind of like tofu...
     -- You can find similar dish in other Japanese restaurants/stores.

- Assorted Kushi Age (deep fried kebab: ham, bacon, quail egg, lotus root, potato)
     -- The bacon kebab was good.  It's not too oily.
     -- You can find similar dish in other Japanese restaurants/stores as well. 

- Okonomiyaki (deep fried pancake with yakisoba noodles)
     -- Good pancake!  I was actually expecting the noodles to be inside the pancake.

- Buta-don (BBQ pork on rice)
   -- The rice had a mustard mayo sauce.  It made the rice not too heavy and made me want to eat more.

- Gindara (miso marinated black cod)
     -- You can find this dish in other Japanese restaurants/stores.  May be I can make this dish at home.  ;)

- Hiza-nan (Deep fried chicken knee)
     -- You'll sometimes find this dish in Chinese congee/noodle restaurants.

Dessert:
- Sake tiramisu
     -- Lots of Sake taste but not enough coffee taste.  It's still very good.

- Green tea cheese cake 
    -- Good cake... very green tea but it's not green in colour...  There were some tea leaves inside the cake.  Guu probably used green tea leaves instead of powder to make the cake.


Photos of the food


Guu SakaBar
555 Bloor St. West, Toronto, Ontario

Free PDUs from Webinars

Well... In order to renew PMP status, we need to get 60 PDUs.
Since I don't want to spend money attending courses, I try to find free webinars to satisfy the PDUs.
Here are some sites that I found are good.  I'll add more to this list when I find them.

[Last updated: 2012-03-15]

Recorded Webinars - free all the time:

Recorded Webinars - free for limited time:



Live Webinars:

Note:
  • Some sites may appear more than once because it has recorded and live webinars.
  • I only included sites where it is easy for users to claim PDUs.  The sites where it claims the webinars can claim PDU but claiming info is not easily available.  I did not include them.
  • I also did not include sites that only offer one or two free webinars.

    Wednesday, April 13, 2011

    KinnowLS Orange

    Scientists at the University of California at Riverside has developed a new orange: KinnowLS (the LS stands for low seeded)

    The orange has been developed by mutation breeding of the mandarin variety Kinnow. It is slightly larger than a mandarin, with a thin, extremely smooth rind.

    Professor Mikeal Roose, head of the Department of Botany and Plant Sciences and part of the team which developed the new fruit, said: 'People who like very sweet fruit are going to find ‘KinnowLS’ to be very appealing.

    It is estimated the fruit could be on supermarket shelves in five years.


    I am one of those who doesn't like orange as much due to the sour taste. 
    I am not sure this is a good news or scary news...  The good part is that the new orange is sweet...  :9   The scary part is that it's a mutation...  What are the generic side effect of eating such orange? 
    I am not sure the difference between "mutation" and "genetically engineered".  To me, both sounds bad for human health.

    Source:
    DailyMail

    Kingdom Tower

    The current world's highest tower "Burj Khalifa" in Dubai will soon be replaced by another higher tower.  The new tower "Kingdom Tower" in Saudi Arabia will be 1.6km high.  It will have 275 floors and be twice the height of Burj Khalifa.

    Kingdom Tower is expected to cost £12billion to construct and it will take 12 minutes to reach the top in a lift.  It will be financed by the Saudi royal family-owned Kingdom Holding Company which is chaired by Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal and is the nation’s largest company.


    I do agree with Rory Olcayto (deputy editor of The Architects’ Journal) that “The race to build the highest skyscraper is quite futile – where do you stop?"

    With the earthquake that happened not too long ago in Japan, it makes me wonder what will happen if disaster happens to these high towers...  For some reasons, this reminds me of the Tower of Babel in Bible...  The money could have much better use than to show off.


    Source:
    Mirror

    Tuesday, April 12, 2011

    QR Code

    I recently got an email at work with QR code as part of the email signature.
    It made me wanting to have my own QR code too.
    I've tried numerous free online QR code generating site.
    I find this one to be the best:
    http://www.qrstuff.com/
    First of all, it has a lot of templates...
    And the most important part for me... I can change the colour of the QR code to match my current email signature.  :D

    Here is the QR code for this site:


    What is QR code?
    A QR code (short for Quick Response) is a specific matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code), readable by dedicated QR barcode readers and camera phones.

    Thursday, April 7, 2011

    Nice Photo Accessories

    I came across a photo gear site today: Photojojo
    It has some pretty nice stuff.  :)

    A tiny replica of the Leica M3

    It's a workable digital camera... nice!


    The Wide Angle & Macro Lens Adapter

    Interesting... Not sure how well it'll work...
    I wonder whether it's worth buying?


    Mini Model Camera - A 1/6 scale model camera with 3 detachable lenses.

    They are soooo cute! 
    I probably would buy them if they are not expensive.


    4GB Camera USB Drive

    It's more for display... Too big for any real use...


    Photo-opoly

    Personally, I don't like this version of monopoly...
    Since each "place" in the game in a photo, why would I want to buy a person or a moment in life?

    Monday, April 4, 2011

    愛心無國界311燭光晚會

    無懼風雨 - 愛心無國界311燭光晚會 主題曲





    Please pray for Japan!

    First portrait of Jesus?

    70 books, each with between five and 15 cast lead pages bound by lead rings, were found in a cave in a remote village in Jordan overlooking the Sea of Galilee. One of the lead booklet, slightly smaller than a credit card, had a portrait of Jesus.

    Bible historians are investigating whether the picture, which can still just about be seen to depict a man wearing a crown of thorns, was created in Jesus’s lifetime by those who knew him.


    It's hard to tell what Jesus looked like from the booklet.

    But it would be really funny if in future, we find out that Jesus doesn't look like what we've always thought he would look like. :P


    Source:
    DailyMail

    Sunday, April 3, 2011

    Review: Kyu Shou Japanese Noodle House (九州生拉麵)

    Overall Rating: 2/5

    As time goes by, a restaurant evolves... for better or worst. 
    For Kyu Shou, I had decided to give it one more try after I had a bad experience several months ago.  Why one more try?  Well, this restaurant used to be my favorite ramen place to go.

    The service is still not as good compared to when it was first opened.  Now, customers are getting similar to fast food place type of service.  Menu has changed drastically... more focus on bento and Korean dish.  It is so sad to see that the restaurant has lost its own image of an authentic ramen place and has turned into a typical Japanese / Korean restaurant.  It used to have different types of ramen, but now it only kept the pork bone soup ramen.

    I had ordered Pork Cartilage Ramen (豬軟骨拉麵) and Wen ordered KyuShou Ramen (九州拉麵).

    When the ramen arrived, I was shocked to see my pork cartilage ramen (豬軟骨拉麵) had turned into a Korean/Chinese dish.  The pork cartilage was held separately from the ramen bowl.  The pork cartilage was cooked in some soya sauce with green onion and had bones in it. It was over cooked and too salty. The pork cartilage completely didn't match the pork bone soup ramen.  As for the ramen, the soup and noodle are ok. But you could not tell that it had any Japanese feel. The half egg on top was still cold from fridge. I remembered that the egg used to be soft-boiled (溏心) egg, not hard-boiled egg.   The Japanese BBQ Pork (日式叉燒) in Wen's ramen was just thin pieces of pork. They were definitely not Japanese BBQ Pork.

    The food gave me the feeling that the chef did not know what is Japanese ramen... Not to mention a good Japanese ramen.

    If you want food court Japanese food, this would be the place to go.
    If you are looking for something with quality, you'll have better luck finding elsewhere.

    I guess this restaurant would better position itself as a cheap fast food type Japanese restaurant.  This way, at least I would have no expectations when eating there.

    Overall Rating: 2/5

    Friday, April 1, 2011

    twin baby boys have a conversation

    Take a look at the video...
    It seems that they can communicate using a single word... "DA" or "打"...
    The whole conversation is "打打打打打打打打打打打打".... hahaha.... :D