Book Recommendation - ´Solitaire´

 Solitaire

Over the holidays I had finished a book, that I had actually started at the start of the year, which is honestly probably implausible. As it is a long duration from the start of the year till the end of the year. This is not because I am slow in reading, but itś rather because of when I changed my hurumanus/subjects. I had more things to do, we had more of a busy wananga, and I am busy at home. So I stopped reading it when it was about halfway through semester one. When I had the time I have would two periods each week to read. 

While reading this book I started to slowly fall in love with the book, I was so intrigued by the book, I felt like I could relate to it. The book is based on a teenage story, or as I could say a teenage life. That may be rather extraordinary, or rather ordinary for some people, I could say so for myself that this was an amazing book. 

I can't put how I feel about the book into words the drama, the emotions, the story. Maybe what you feel when watching a movie would be what you feel when reading this book. The author can really pull you into the book, making you slowly sink in and wanting to keep reading and reading. It's full of many surprises or revelations. Because at the start it is confusing, and could possibly be boring to a number of people. But then, in the end, it was amazing, for me. 

I recommend this teenage story for teenagers, maybe people who can relate to depression and things you would usually go through as a teenager. It also needs a mature audience as there is offensive language in the book. Honestly, I would have never thought that I would have been so attached to a book in this type of genre. I was sad at the end of the book, the sadness if feel when I finish a series. 

It may be like this for you, so if you have time you could read this book too!

Spoiler Alert: 

Although on the cover it says it's not a love story, be mentally prepared if you are into love stuff ;D.

Empanada - Home Economics

 Empanada 

What are you developing?    

We are making a healthy dish where there are a lot of nutrients you can get.

What healthy dishes have we made so far? 

• Stir fry 

• Smoothies 

• Frittata

• Mexican chicken

• Spring rolls

• Apple crumble

• Muffins

• Vegetarian nachos

• Open steak sandwich

• Mac n cheese 

• Nachos

Who is the product for? - The people in our class

Why are you making this product? - We are making this product to showcase the Mexican, Latin American, European and Filipino Culture. 

What flavours and colours go together? -

• Beef + Potato + Carrots + Cheese + Seasonings (Cayenne Pepper, Salt, Pepper)

• Capsicum + Mince Pork + Peas  + Corn +  Seasonings (Chilli Flakes)

• Chicken + Potato + Raisins + Seasonings (Salt and Pepper)

Vegetarian: 

• Potato + Capsicum + Peas + Seasonings (Salt and Pepper)

• Corn + Carrots + Raisins + Potato + Seasonings (Salt and Pepper) 

How to make your healthy dish appealing and attractive?

We are going to make this dish healthy by filling it with proteins such as chicken, fish, beef. Vitamins and minerals from vegetables such as corn, potatoes, etc. 

We will make it look more attractive, by adding colorful vegetables, maybe adding meat depending on the people who like meat as it looks more appetizing. We want to make the dough wrapping look more interesting or pretty. By using a fork on the edge creating a nice ridge or rim. 

What are the pros (good) and cons (bad) of these recipes?

Pros: 

• It has a lot of nutrients and benefits such as providing energy if we were to use potatoes since it has starch in it. 

• Because of the ingredients, this can be food that lasts long, as it has complex foods in it and macronutrients. 

Cons: 

• A classic way of making it is by adding meat into it so maybe some people might be vegetarians. 

• Depending on the ingredients it may not be so healthy.

Modifications - do you need to modify (change) anything? Add a healthier filling by putting vegetables together

What macro and micronutrients are in your dish?

Macronutrients: 

• Potatoes

• Carrots

• Eggs  

• Peas

• Butchery NZ Premium Beef Mince

• Butchery NZ Pork Mince 

• Butchery NZ Chicken Tenderloins 

• Produced Red Capsicum 

• Value Whole Kernel Corn 

• Meadow Fresh Traditional Sour Cream

• Mainland Tasty Grated Cheese 

Micronutrients:

• Salt & Pepper & Cayenne Pepper

• Chilli Flakes 

• Value Raisins 

• Trident Sweet and Chilli Sauce 

Shopping list  -  Pak n Save

• Farmer Brown Size 7 Eggs - 12pk ($3.29) 

• Produce Carrots - 100g ($0.27)  = ($0.81)

• Value Potatoes - 3kg ($4.99)

• Value Garden Peas - 1kg ($2.09)

• Butchery NZ Premium Beef Mince - 100g ($1.40)

• Butchery NZ Pork Mince - 100g ($1.60)

• Butchery NZ Chicken Tenderloins - 100g ($1.80) 

• Produced Red Capsicum - ($0.95)

• Value Whole Kernel Corn - 410g ($0.95)

• Chilli Flakes - 20g ($2.09)

• Value Raisins - 400g ($3.09)

• Meadow Fresh Traditional Sour Cream - 250g ($2.79) for Dip-In-Sauce

• Trident Sweet and Chilli Sauce - 285g ($1.99) for Dip-In-Sauce

• Mainland Tasty Grated Cheese - 375g ($7.29)

Total: $35.45

                                                                     Evaluation

Appearance:

The appearance of the Empanadas didn't look the best they actually didn't look like Empanadas at all, this is because of 'thoughts'. I think it was because of the puff pastry, I think it wasn't compatible with our fillings. Maybe because it was too hot that's why they had sort of pelted or became really soft. While we were putting in the filling the puff pastry became very soft and stringy. The pastry became very slippery making it hard for us to create the form. As there were many holes in it so the food didn't stay in, that meant we had to compromise. So my teammate Skyler sort of made them like dumplings by squishing the pastry over. I had decided to cut two decent sized rectangles, and I put the filling on it I placed the other rectangles over. I then used a fork to close it up on the sides, it even adds style, making it look a BIT better.

Taste:

I think it actually tasted really nice, although it didn't look very pretty and neat, it tasted very nice. I liked everything about it, but I do think it should've been cooked a bit longer. But everything else tasted really good. I liked everything about it, I definitely would've added more cheese because I really like cheese, I like how there was a balance of flavor between the meat and vegetables. The carrots were sweet the meat was nice and seasoned. I have tasted things better in my home ec classes but would label this the 2nd most delicious food I have made in home ec.

Smell:

The smell was very nice, I like how the puff pastry smelt because that kind of smell is genuinely delicious, the mince also smelt very nice.

Texture:

The texture was very good, crispy on the outside sort of crunchy on the inside but it was nice and warm.

Here is a photo of what our empanada looked like:

Mortgage Loans - Business Studies

What is a mortgage?: 

I mortgage is a loan that you would usually take out for buying property or land. 

Positives of a mortgage:

• The interest rates are lower than other types of borrowing.
• Long-term mortgages can give you more time to pay.
• No security risk.
• A stable rate of interest.
• Less documentary charge.

Negatives of a mortgage:

• You pay more than what you borrowed.
• The loan amount is larger than with a conventional, fixed-rate mortgage.
• Debt

Why would you use this loan?:

It is a good example of good debt because it comes with low interest.

We can use it to be able to buy a house. 

Mexican Chicken Wrap - Home Economics

In our home economics class, we made a 'Mexican chicken wrap'  which isn't what we usually do, because we usually make the sort of delicate meals. 

Ingredients: 

• Capsicum
• Carrot
• Lettuce
• Cheese
• Chicken
• Bread Crumbs
• Tortilla 
• Sour cream
• Salsa

Appearance:

I thought it looked really appetizing because it had lots of colors, and the chicken actually had a very vibrant orange color. Due to the flavor of the bread crumbs, it looked nice and spicy, I actually like spicy things. The vegetables are what gave the wrap colors, and what made it look more appetizing was the cheese and sour cream. Probably I would've considered cream cheese instead.  But it looked really delicious!

Texture:

The texture was nice, it was fine if it wasn't heated up, because the chicken made it warm, it had a nice texture it was chewy and crunchy. 

Taste:

This was probably the best thing we made in our home economics this semester, I think it tasted really nice. The chicken was really good, the cheese made it a lot better, and also the sour cream and salsa. It just tasted really delicious!

Evaluation:

10/10 will eat again :)

Challenges Chart - Coraline - Film Study

What am I learning:

We are learning to effectively know and identify the problems of the film and the character. Also knowing how to make a challenges chart. 

How does this work show my learning:

This shows my work by the questions I answered with lots of information and that's how it showed my learning.

What am I wondering:

Next time I watch a movie I am able to use this information again. 

Here is my presentation :)

PTSD and ASPD project - Health

Hello Everyone!

Today I'm going to be talking about my health project, which is related to my assessment. We needed to research a chosen topic in the health genre, and present it in a creative way. 

For me, I had chosen to research PTSD, PTSD stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, it happens when you experience a very traumatic event. When that scene or moment scars your brain and is the scariest thing that has occurred to you. 

Throughout my journey of researching PTSD I have learned a lot of things about it, I actually knew about somethings before-hand. But I wasn't so certain if they were true or over-exaggerated as it was the info from movies.  

When I really thought about how someone suffers so much when they go through this illness is really heart-aching. They have to go through that pain and are so afraid thinking they have no one. If we are empathetic towards the people who are diagnosed or not, we can see how painful their lives are. 

My tasks were to create my own questions and research about them and answer them myself. There was a color difficulty category for the questions, so some there were three colors and we needed to pick the questions out of the options. We were given a variety of questions and they were different colors. Green meant 'rookie' yellow meant 'pro' and red means 'legend' you were allowed to pick out a combo. 

For 'rookie' it would be 2 green questions, 3 yellow questions, and 0 red questions. 

For 'pro' it was 2 green questions, 2 yellow questions, and 1 red question. 

For 'legend' it was 1 green question, 2 yellow questions, and 2 red questions. 

I had decided to go with 'pro' I wanted it to be hard but not too challenging, as I was working by myself. Because you were allowed to have a buddy, I was fine with being alone, and I was able to get it done. 

These were my questions: 

Why is PTSD harmful?

What happens to your well being when you are affected by PTSD?

Who can/can’t be severely mentally damaged by PTSD?

How does it affect the brain when someone has PTSD?

What other issues does this link with PTSD?

If you would like to see the answers here they are, just click on the questions :)

After that, we needed to come up with strategies and how we would take action in those strategies if you had the illness. 

For the presentation, we needed to be creative and make sure we use our imagination by creating it. I decided to move with my friends and do the presentation together because our topics were related. We just needed to make sure we can bring out the aspect of our topic and make them visible. 

We decided on a short film, it was a really cool idea! I came up with a lot of ideas for it as I used movies as references. We had different roles in the film, as characters.

Shiela - Therapist

Skyler - Psychopath/Main character

Me - News reporter

I hope you enjoy the film here it is!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KLqZ2dIEOevzdvP6VBSt2as89VvebF3h/view?usp=sharing

Budgeting Dinner - Business Studies

Hello Everyone!

For our business studies class, we need to budget and make our own dinner!

I had decided on 'honey soy chicken with cheesed broccoli' 

Budget: $20 

Requirements: 

Needs to be yummy and nutritious 

At least 2 vegetables.

Grocery list:

(We already have - milk, salt, and pepper, cooking oil.)

For honey soy chicken stir-fry:

Skinless chicken breast

Stir-fry frozen vegetables

Stir-fry sauce

For cheese broccoli as a side:

Parmesan cheese

Broccoli

flour/corn starch

Receipt:

Skinless chicken breast - $6.99

Stir-fry frozen vegetables - $2.99

Stir-fry honey and soy sauce - $2.09

Parmesan cheese - $3.79

Broccoli - $0.99

Flour - $1.98

Total:

$18.83