The cliff note condensed story of how one day I was soaking in the mountain air, and the next I was wondering if all people here in Singapore sweat this much :)

"Has it hit you yet that you are in Singapore ?" says the tattooed master working on a perfectly chilled glass of moscato.  As I watched the condensation congregate on his glass, I simply smiled, "no". Little did he know that, that smile was the gateway to the mini stroke, heart attack, seizure, I had been having since we met up for dinner 2 hours earlier.

5 years ago my mom and I dined on foie gras burgers on the terrace of the Park Hyatt in Chicago. I was in pastry school. The burger was great, but what followed was a life altering flight of desserts created by Andres Lara. He presented each one, 5 in total, each one as artistically breathtaking as the next. Then he offered me a stage on his restaurant. I went, I was blown away, my life was quite literally altered. 5 years later I have a few weeks off, turns out he is teaching a 3 day class, no hesitation there, booked the flight, took the class,and at the end invited myself to his restaurant in Singapore... 6 months later...I've quit my job, given Kenza to my mom {knowing full well mom will try to teach her, but Kenza will never be half the scrabble opponent I am!}, packed up my life again this time into 2 red suitcases, and I am getting off a plane in Singapore after accepting an offer to chef at Andres' restaurant. Make no mistake, I am not his replacement, there isn't one!, but he is moving to Hong Kong so I get to play with him in the wonderland he has created, collaborating from across the pond. Talk about a golden ticket, eat that Willie Wonka.

(I am pointing to where you kind find me..although in Asia, finding a tall caucasian women, is a lot easier than finding Waldo. We stand out in the crowd, and there aren't that many of us)