Pre/Post-Natal Massage

With an aging achy body that found this last pregnancy too taxing, I found prenatal massage to be such a respite. Time-out for full-body massages were rare, and I only managed these a few times, and loved going to Aramsa for my Prenatal massage. The ambience was great, the service & the therapist were excellent. But what I indulged in mostly were prenatal foot massages. These, I managed to fit in almost every week, sneaking in the time when my elder ones were in classes. It was superb for a relaxing half-hour nap too, which was so needed, since woe ..... I'd only managed to sleep like 2 or 3 nights each week this whole pregnancy(!).

Soon after birth, I had a few days of home postnatal massage, which I looked forward to each morning, after a night of getting up for night feeds and having my joints aching. Using a belly binder (from pharmacies) helped lots in supporting my lower back and weaker abs while I moved around caring for the newborn and the older children.

I also tried a service that was newly introduced to me. Too bad that I hadn't known of this earlier! It's a TCM Postnatal Home service from Idylls TCM Professional (Tel: 67410369/96727422 Ms Chua for booking). It includes TCM consultation, postnatal confinement cooking, and TCM postnatal massage. I tried this TCM massage in my 3rd week after birth. It was really really good, working on pressure points and was very effective for my aching body. The pricing was really reasonable too!

Confinement Food

Having a full household, and being an experienced mother, we didn't need a confinement nanny this time around. I explored the options for confinement catering. There's really not all that many choices. I narrowed my choices down to Natal Essentials & NewBaby.

I toyed with the idea of ordering a week's food from each, but well, NewBaby's menu is just not what I'm used to. So it was Natal Essentials for 14days.

Natal Essentials - some hits & some misses. On the whole, acceptable. Food usually on time at 11am for lunch and 4 - 5pm for dinner. Food enough for 2 persons.

Here's one of my favourites: Red Wine Chicken


That day's lunch.


We had our own Red Dates Tea boiled for drinking the whole day, and some evenings I'd have my Quick Tonic. I am so dreaming of the Chicken "XO" Essence Tonic that my confinement nanny did for me last time. Maybe I'll try it one of these days now that the confinement catering has ended.

Here's some interesting Confinement Food Sites I found:
Yummy Confinement Foods
Chinese Confinement Foods
Chicken Rice Wine Recipe

Quick Tonic

An easy tonic for energy & blood circulation.

Simply have a little DOM heated up so that the alcoholic spirit evaporates, then add in a bottle of Chicken Essence. Then just "kan-pei!".

More Confinement Recipes at:
http://www.momsinmind.com.sg/confinementrecipes.html

Confinement Recipes

Have had confinement food on my mind this week because of a friend. Have cooked some simple dishes, so am sharing the recipes here.

Red Wine Chicken - it's simpler than I thought.


Marinate Chicken pieces with 2 TBS Fermented Rice Paste (Red) and 1 TBS Rice Wine.
Soak Wood Fungus (Mok Yee - I didn't use for this batch in the above photos)
A few Chinese Mushrooms (soaked), optional.
Leave for 30 minutes.
Prepare 2 TBS of Old Ginger (cut into thin strips).
Heat pot and put 1 TBS Sesame seed oil.
Fry Ginger strips until fragrant. Add wood fungus to fry.
Then add in the marinated chicken and fry.
Add in another TBS of fermented rice paste.
Put in a bottle of Chicken Essence.
Put in half a cup of Rice Wine or DOM.
When sizzling, add in another 3 cups of hot water.
Stir everything, then leave it to come to a boil, then simmer for awhile.
While waiting, use another pot to boil the mee sua, drain and dish out in a bowl. Pour the Chicken Rice Wine Soup over the Mee Sua.
Garnish with Spring Onions.

--
And if you prefer not to have Reddish Wine Soup for your meal, here's another Chicken Wine Recipe:
Heat saucepan and put 2 TBS Sesame Oil.
Fry 2 TBS Ginger Strips until fragrant and put in Wood Fungus(soaked).
Put in Chicken and stir fry until half cooked.
Pour in 3 Cups Hot Water into the saucepan and let it simmer for 30 minutes.
Bring it to boil and add in Mee Sua.
Then put in the 2TBS DOM/Rice Wine and stir.
--

And for all the ginger you wish to use, here's tip on how to have them in strips:

Use a potato-peeler to "peel" the ginger into very thin slices. Then use a pair of kitchen scissors to cut these thin slices into strips. Easy, eh? And they are so fun to fry into crispy strips!