Thien Huong Food (Fish flavour instant porridge & Chicken flavour instant porridge)

Anyone of you remember the MCO (Movement control order) that started in March 18 2020? Well, I still remembered it vividly, after some rumours that the prime minister would announce lock down, almost everyone in my office were talking about stocking up on food items, I even overheard my big boss talking about buying meat and fish (so not fit with his image!), initially I was not fazed by that because I planned to go back to hometown and there's two grocery stores behind my house and 3 small supermarket within the radius of 1km. However, people kept talking about this, and during that time, Philippines already started lock down and the images of empty shelves filled the FB walls. My brother was in Philippines that time and he showed us the photos of the long queue in supermarket, anyway, finally I caved in after friends posted the crowd in supermarket and right after work, I went to the nearest 99 Speedmart to buy some food items. Another reason was there were rumours (again) that we might have to work during MCO. 

To my horror, even the normally quiet 99 Speedmart was full with customers queueing up. Well, queue is normal, but normally people only have 1 or 2 items on their hands. During that time, even the trolleys were used up. Well, normally not many people use trolley when buying in Speedmart. It's more like a grab and go store. Seeing this, I also fell into the panic buying frenzy. My target was dry food items, like instant noodles, oats and biscuits. 

However, my normal staples of instant noodle brands were out of stock. How can Maggi Mee be out of stock! Horror! Well, not just Maggi, even the normal sized Mee Sedaap and Indomie was nowhere to be seen. Finally, I bought the Jumbo sized Mee Sedaap! Portion too big though. Well, I felt that it's not enough, so finally I bought the instant porridge that I wouldn't touch normally. I have seen it on the shelves in 99 Speedmart for a long time, however, I didn't even have slight interest on it previously. But the empty racks caused me to think otherwise, I bought 2. I mentally calculated that all the food that I bought would be enough for 2 weeks. 

Anyway, on the day before the MCO started, up until 4.30pm, there's no news whether we were allowed to continue operation or not. So, I decided to go back home, during that time, I didn't know that to cross state, had to go police station to get permit. Anyway, after work, I drove home, actually it's just a 70km distance. After I reached home, boss sent messages asking all of us to come to work on alternate days, me and my teammates discussed and I decided to work on the next week. But before I had the chance to back to work, government imposed more rules, and my company is not allowed to operate. After it was allowed to operate, to make sure there's a social distancing and crowd control, only skeletal crews were allowed. So, I work from home for couple of weeks. It was difficult, my job nature requires me to be in front of the machine 50 to 60% of the time, and actually I just started work for less than 2 months then. Sitting in front of the computer from 8am to 5pm was a struggle for me. But I managed to finish all the compulsory online training classes that I couldn't find time to do during the normal working days. And I now remember that I still have more trainings that I haven't do after I back to work!

Well the instant porridge that I bought was left in the rack for a long time until recently. I worked late and have no energy to cook anything. For me, anything that involves pot and heat is considered cooking. So, I turned my eyes to the instant porridge. 

Thien Huong Chicken flavour instant porridge

I ate the chicken flavour instant porridge first. The grain and the flavouring were packed into a small plastic bag. I felt that the porridge is made of oat, not really sure, but it doesn't taste like rice. In my mind, I thought that porridge is made of rice, now only I knew that it could be made of any grains. Anyway, I couldn't taste even a hint of chicken, the whole bowl only has the smell of pepper. 

the grain before add hot water

Below is the appearance of the instant porridge after adding hot water for 5 minutes. The portion is not big, suitable for supper though.

Another late night work, and I ate the fish flavour instant porridge.

Thien Huong Fish flavour instant porridge

Well, from my memory, it tasted like the chicken flavour instant porridge with a hit of fishy smell. Hahaha!

Appearances after add hot water for 5 minutes (Thien Huong fish flavour instant porridge)

Conclusion, instant noodle and instant porridge are a different breed. Or maybe it's from Vietnam and I am not used to the taste and texture. I think if I am gonna to buy instant porridge in the future, I would check reviews first. In the mean time, I would stick with instant noodles, instant bihun, instant mee sua, instant ramen, instant udon, etc. There are so many flavours out there, by the way, I had Mee Sedaap Korean spicy soup lately, and it's very good!