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Tomorrow is Mid-Autumn Festival which marks not only the end of the autumn harvest, but is also supposed to occur during full moon. However, contrary to popular belief, the Festival doesn’t always fall on that exact day (or moon). The date of the festival is always the 15th day of the 8th lunar month. Although there isn’t always a full moon, there will be one within two days of the festival.

"Moon Cakes" by misbehave - Moon CakesUploaded by Atlaslin. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Moon_Cakes.jpg#/media/File:Moon_Cakes.jpg

I use my salt to cook and gargle my mouth when I have an ulcer. Who knew there are so many more? Read this article from Popsugar to find out more.

Original source by Popsugar

1. Egg Checker: Add two teaspoons to one cup of water, and let dissolve. Fresh eggs will sink, and bad eggs will float.
2. Fruit Helper: Instead of reaching for citrus, sprinkle a dusting of salt over fruits to keep them from browning. And the hardly there salt actually accentuates the fruit's flavor.
3. Bad-Smell Eliminator: After chopping garlic or onions, rub your fingers with salt to get rid of any lingering smells.
4. Cheese-Life Extender: Extend the life of cheese by wrapping it in a cloth moistened with salt water.
5. Baked-On Mess Remover: If your casserole bubbles over, sprinkle the bottom of your oven with a handful of salt over the spill. It won't smoke and will bake into a crust that's easier to clean once things have cooled.
6. Ant Deterrer: No one likes ant infestations. Stop trails and deter ants by sprinkling salt in doorways and windowsills. And you can make this ant killer to really stop them fast.
7. Fire Extinguisher: Keeping salt in the kitchen for seasoning is so smart, but keeping a box next to your stove is a big helper. You can extinguish grease fires by covering them with salt.
8. Wall Hole Fixer: Repair wall holes with equal parts salt, cornstarch, and water by mixing into a thick paste. Spread over nail holes, let dry, and touch up with paint.
9. Snow Remover: Get rid of slippery, ice-covered sidewalks fast with a sprinkling of salt.
10. Drain Buster: Clean sink drains by pouring salt down the drain followed by hot water, which naturally keeps grease from building up and deodorizes pipes.
11. Coffee Cup Cleaner: Clean coffee-stained cups with salt and a little dish soap.
12. Laundry Booster: Add one cup of salt when washing brightly colored clothes. It naturally boosts colors and makes them vibrant again.
13. Blood Remover: Get rid of blood stains with salt! Here's how to bust through blood stains.
14. Rust Attacker: Tackle mildew and rust stains with a combo of equal parts salt and lemon juice.
15. Air Freshener: Have a musty corner? Salt naturally absorbs bad smells and makes rooms fresh again. Follow these directions for a homemade air freshener that really works.
16. Sore Feet Soother: If your tootsies are tired after a long day, give them an invigorating foot scrub. Mix salt with a few drops of lavender essential oil, and use to gently rub feet. Salt helps soothe sore muscles and also exfoliates skin.
17. Mouth-Sore Reliever: Gargle with salt water to relieve mouth sores.
18. Iron Cleaner: Clean your iron with basic table salt. Follow these directions for removing built-up stains on your iron.
19. Degreaser: For extra greasy pans, sprinkle with salt and then wipe with a paper towel. The salt naturally breaks down the grease and cleans pans fast.
20. Brass Buffer: Mix together equal parts salt, flour, and vinegar into a paste to use for cleaning brass. Cover the item, let sit for an hour, and then clean and buff with a soft cloth.
21. Frosty-Window Banisher: Keep windows frost-free by wiping the insides with a solution made with one tablespoon salt and one cup water. The windows won't frost during subfreezing temps.

As I was growing up, we were taught the concept that some food were considered 'heaty' and some 'cooling' and that our bodies need to be in balance so to stay healthy. So when me and my brother fell ill, my parents will say that we are too 'heaty' and my granny will cook some soup that is 'cooling' for us to bring back the balance. This theory is so ingrained in my culture and we all believed it and go along with it without much questioning nor understanding.

When I moved to Amsterdam 4 years ago, I was trying to explain to my colleagues this concept. But I couldn't really. It was not just the fact that this theory is not based on western medicine, but myself was not really clear what is heaty or cooling and how do we label them?

So I started to do a little digging. According to this website Ren Xing Tang, it is the sensation or effect caused by the food in our body that is labelled heaty or cooling or neutral. They had a very good example using tea. Although a cup of tea is hot, the energy it generates is cold and it is therefore considered a 'cooling' beverage.

Well if you are interested to know more, here is a list of common foods and it's related energy quoted from the website. Remember it is the balance. Good to know is that beer is cooling!

	Dairy / Beans / Nuts	Vegetables	Fruits	Meat	Seasoning	Seafood
	Heaty Food
	Glutinous rice Sorghum	Ginger Garlic Onion Parsley Chives Coriander	Pumpkin Papaya Mango Bergamot Longan Apricot Cherry Pomegranate Lychee Walnut Chestnut Citron Cherry Ebony	Deer meat Chicken Mutton Pig (stomach)	Mustard Pepper Chili	Eel Mussels Salmon Shrimp Clams Sea cucumbers Multi-spring fish Trout Sea urchins
	Neutral Food
	Oats Milk White rice Brown rice Corn Red beans Green beans Black beans Soya beans Broad beans Black-eye beans Adzuki beans Cashew nuts Peanuts Lentils Peas Snow peas Pistachios Black sesame Eggs Quail eggs Lentils	Sweet potato Lily Spinach Mushrooms Cabbage Carrot Broccoli Black fungus White fungus Crown daisy Eggplant Olive Ginkgo Lotus root	Grapes Strawberry Blueberry Avocado Guava Fig Pumpkin seeds White melon	Pig (meat, lung, meat, kidney, hoof) Beef Duck Quail meat Pigeon meat		Fish Cod fish Tuna Octopus Turtle meat Pomfret fish Yellow croakers Dace Carp
	Cooling Food
	Barley Wheat Tofu Millet Mung Beans	Cucumber Lettuce Sugar cane Seaweed Water chestnuts Bamboo shoots White radish Asparagus Spinach Celery Watercress Bamboo fungus Arrowhead Kudzu Trickle Vegetables Bracken Nostoc	Banana Watermelon Honeydew Lemon Oranges Mangosteen Pineapple Melon Kiwi Star fruit Grapefruit Dragon fruit Bitter melon Persimmon Mulberry	Pork Duck Egg Rabbit meat Frog meat		Raw fish Crab Escargot Kelp

Recently I read an article about eggs and I realised that I don't actually know the difference between the labels. What's the difference between free-range eggs and organic eggs or biological eggs. What do all these label means? If you are just as clueless as me, read on!

Disclaimer: There are maybe some other labels in other countries which I am not aware of. The references I made here are to the eggs sold in The Netherlands.

Cage eggs

These are probably the cheapest eggs. The hens are confined in cages where they can't even move an inch. They are usually fed with the cheapest food. This is really a production line rather than a farm.

Created by cheesenbiscuits.blogspot.com

Well I know my blog is about food, but I thought this deserves to be shared. A while ago, my boyfriend was really sweet and painted the frame of my cheap Ikea mirror red to match the rest of our furniture. So he started on the task with the paint and everything, but had forgotten to buy some of gloves or paint removal.

So after 10 minutes with the brush, he found his hands smudged with paint as if he just killed someone. Without knowing where to get paint removal at 6.30pm on a Sunday, I turned to google and guess what, butter!

So as I found out, butter is not just an ingredient for cooking and baking, it is also a natural method to remove oil based paint from your skin. Just massage a little bit of butter onto the dried paint and wash it off!

The lesson is always keep some butter in your fridge. It comes in handy in many ways.