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This review has been a long time coming! I have been using this for nearly one year and can’t say enough good things about it. Enough time has passed for me to have something to say!

Description

A cleanser for all skin-types, and part of The Face Shop’s “Rice Water” line. It claims to not only cleanse your skin but brighten it as well. “Brighten”, in this case, does NOT mean it makes your skin white! It means it makes you look fresh and vibrant. This is a foaming cleanser, so it comes out as sort of a gel or goo and then bubbles in to foam, by itself, while on your skin.

Why Use Rice-Based Products?

Rice-based skin products go hand-in-hand with “brightening”. There’s a lot of people who will wash their rice and save the milky water that accrues; this can be used to splash on your face or as a mask at night. The starch acts as a moisturizer….I don’t want to preach a bunch of “science” here, however. If you want to know more about whether rice starch truly, scientifically, measurably improves skin (I saw some articles online talking about how it benefits those with eczema), research it on your own and decide. But personally I like them, they work well with my skin, and I see “rice” or “rice bran” as the ingredient in many face-related products.

How to Use

Step 1: Begin with a dry face. Very important!
Step 2: Pump the cleanser in to your hand. It will be in its “goo” state.
Step 3: Spread evenly over your face; you may want to do this rather quickly, before it bubbles too much. You may also need more than one pump, so do your face in sections. Personally it takes me 2-3 pumps to cover my face. Try not to pull on your skin too much as you spread it around.
Step 4: Wait for everything to bubble up!
Step 5: (Optional but recommended) Let it bubble itself away; this may take a few minutes of waiting.
Step 6: Rinse it off with water and a washcloth! You’re going to want the washcloth, definitely, to pat dry and remove any residue.

I would wash my face with this once or twice a week. Doing more than that with any cleanser seems to irritate my skin and cause me to break out. This is probably why it’s lasted me for so long, otherwise the saleslady had told me it lasts her about six months of daily use, twice a day.

Results

Nearly a year of use and still has a good amount of cleanser inside.

Amazing!! There are few skincare products I actually like…I have sensitive skin and have tried many brands that just did nothing or made things worse. After washing off this cleanser and patting dry, my skin instantly looks fresh and bright. Again, that doesn’t mean “paler”, I mean youthful and vibrant. My skin is also baby-soft! Immediate results are something I didn’t think skincare products would do. And the bubbling feels strange, tingly, and wonderful. Also, if you have “sebaceous filaments” on your nose that get filled up with oil and turn dark….as in this picture (don’t worry, it’s not nasty looking like Google Image Search!)…it’s not blackheads, but it IS something that just happens to certain people (like me). It’s a genetic thing. More info on that on this site if you need more explanation. This Rice Water cleanser has been able to eliminate that for over a day, with 1 cleansing. Usually for me, these would reappear in a few hours after cleansing with a normal face wash, like Cetaphil, Neutrogena, Clearasil, whatever. AHA’s and BHA’s usually help with minimizing the appearance.

The one half-point I would deduct from this cleanser is that while it doesn’t feel or look like it’s dried out my skin, my cheeks tend to feel a little stiff. I don’t know if this is due to drying or – more probably? – due to the rice ingredient. Starches can totally do that to your skin; try it with some of the milky water you get after you wash some rice for dinner. This is easily remedied once I put on my moisturizer. And everyone should really be moisturizing already anyway :)

This cleanser definitely works on makeup as well, but don’t expect it to clear everything away. Honestly…I don’t get why people want to combine everything and have face cleansers that are also make up removers. Especially since it’s the oil-based make-up removers that really get everything off your skin, and you don’t necessarily want a face cleanser to have that type of ingredient in it. Don’t be lazy! Tugging and scrubbing your skin isn’t great for future elasticity and wrinkle prevention, just use a real make up remover, then let this cleanser clean up any residuals you accidentally smeared across your face. What, I know that happens to me :P You know what other kind of two-in-one product doesn’t work as well as separates? Shampoo-and-Conditioners!

The price is a little steep on this product. I can’t quite remember, but it was over $20. $26 perhaps? Close to $30, but not quite. The Face Shop in Chinatown gives student discounts at least! However, I’ve had such good results with this cleanser, I’m willing to pony up the cash for it. It’s been nearly a year and I haven’t had to buy a new bottle yet!

Royal Seafood [ Dim Sum ]

Dessert at dim sum [流沙包子] in NYC’s Chinatown.

After an unnecessarily difficult period of scheduling and rescheduling, the brunt of which my sister had to deal with, we had a family dim sum lunch in Chinatown on Saturday. Royal Seafood is alright as far as Manhattan dim sum goes, and it’s not terribly hard to get a spot there. The location is easy to get to – very close to the 6 train – the interior is a vast hall that seats over a hundred, surely, and the waiters are actually pretty attentive! If you don’t see a food you know they serve on the roaming carts of food, you can easily ask any worker for help and they hunt it down for you. But I’m not convinced it’s as good as some of the seafood dim sum places in Flushing, which I think have a bit more variety….and none of these are as good as the variety and freshness you can get in Hong Kong! I suppose it depends on what you order though!! I really liked the fried radish cakes here. Okay, maybe my uncle just kept picking stuff I didn’t like, and that is why I’d give Royal Seafood 3 stars. But the siew mai （燒賣） tasted a little old to me. Bad batch, perhaps? My uncle refused to order it because it’s “common food”….but as I’ve learned over the years, I love common food!!! You can also order actual meals from a menu, like noodles or a plate of vegetables, meat over rice, etc. The prices are good here and the portions are HUGE. You probably want like 6 adults with you to finish it all if you order a meal-type dish.

Kinda gross looking, but the inside of this dessert is filled with a very sugary, golden egg yolk! Tastes really great.

We actually wanted to order the red bean filling version of this, but someone made a mistake! Egg yolk instead! Imagine a chicken that is about to die of diabetes, but before it does it lays a single egg. You then put that diabetes egg yolk in to a dessert, and VOILA…you have this yummy treat! Okay, that might have grossed you out even more. But trust me, it tasted great.

Cha Chan Tang

Cha Chan Tang – Pork chops, fried egg over rice, sausage, and Hong Kong style milk tea.

My boyfriend came down from the Bronx to meet me after my Mandarin class in Chinatown, and we went to another restaurant I like called Cha Chan Tang. It’s a cute place, very trendy – flatscreen TVs on the left-hand wall show live feeds of Hong Kong, so during the daytime it is night time there. There’s a wall of tea cups and saucers, each stacked one on top of the other, that reaches from waist-height up to the ceiling. I tested it a little – they appear glued together. The service is not that great…the waiters are not very attentive and it can be difficult to flag them down for service, including ordering and getting the check. I had to ask for the check twice today actually, and no, it doesn’t matter if you use English or Chinese. The space between tables is also extremely cramped, but once you’re in I don’t mind one bit! The seats are cushiony and I still had enough space for me and my boyfriend’s bags and coats. Despite the lackluster service, I have and will be coming back again and again…the food is pretty damn good!!! And the distinct fusiony mix of Western and Chinese influences on this type of food reminds me of childhood and the food my dad used to cook. Pork chop anything is good, go ahead and order it, hahaha! Instant noodles with pork chop, pork chop over rice (as seen in the photo), anything…I have yet to try the baked spaghetti with pork chop, but I bet it’s good too.

I wanted to eat that actually, but accidentally ordered “fried spaghetti” with BBQ pork instead. I totally thought this meant it would still be, you know…spaghetti in tomato sauce, just deep fried. There’s a now-closed restaurant that I used to frequent that had really good spaghetti and fried chicken, and I got that a little mixed up! Anyway, it was just stir fried noodles with scallions and bean sprouts…the kind you can get from street vendors for $1 on Canal St. The kind I used to buy on my way home from high school, haha. But at least it was VERY tasty, so I was not disappointed for long. Didn’t take a picture because it resembles pig slop. But it tasted great.

Hong Kong style milk tea – cold.

The Hong Kong style milk tea is hit or miss. The first time I went, I got it cold, and it came in this ice bucket with a charming glass bottle. It tasted great, with the perfect amount of condensed milk in there. But this weekend, I dunno. I got the hot version and it tasted like yuck. Not enough condensed milk flavor…and for just 25 cents more I could have had the yummy cold one again! Maybe it was just a bad day for whoever mixed it. Ah well….I’ll be back again. Can’t help myself. Also I’m quite happy that my boyfriend likes it too! This style of food is all new to him, and sometimes I worry that he won’t like it….as seen in the next and final restaurant review.

Ugly Kitchen [ Filipino Night, Sunday ]

Ugly Kitchen appetizers – fried fish balls and fried tripe.

A brief story before the review….! My boyfriend hasn’t seen his college roommate and the roommate’s girlfriend for close to half a year, so we all agreed to have a double date this Sunday night! I had my heart set on taking them all to Umi no Ie, which is a GREAT spot for Japanese comfort food. I can go on and on about it, but I’ll save that for when I actually visit again with my camera in a later post! Sadly, we arrived at Umi no Ie and it’s actually closed on Sundays….huge oversight on my part. But this is the Lower East Side, there’s tons of restaurants in the area! My back up plan was to eat at Ugly Kitchen, which I have been wanting to do for a very long time. I think they mostly have modern Korean food.

Surprise #1: It’s Filipino night on Sundays!!!! The roommate’s girlfriend is also Chinese from the Philippines, like my family is, so we were both excited to eat Filipino food. Happily, we ordered.

Surprise #2: Some free appetizers come to our table. Turns out, a good friend of mine from a while back works as the chef! I have no idea HOW he knew I was there, I’m extremely impressed that he recognized me after all these years. But I honestly think he is the best chef ever; anything he cooks I WILL EAT. He used to work at my best friend’s Filipino restaurant a few blocks north, but quit a few years ago. It was really really great seeing him again, and of course I’ll be back now that I know he’s cooking there on Sundays!

My boyfriend saw the appetizers, and after a moment of confusion he said, “Why do you seem to get free things wherever you go….?”

Hahaha. It’s not everywhere. It’s just sometimes, and I happen to tell him. I don’t tell him about the 1000 times inbetween where I get nothing. Also I think he’s referring to how sometimes people throw in a little extra food when you order at deli’s and stuff.

The food we ordered, with description of each dish in the captions, below. FYI, pork knuckles may sound weird to some, but it is one of the most tender parts of the pig. The other most tender part is pork belly! Order these 2 types of meat anywhere and you have a 99% chance your meal will be amazing.

Crispy Pata – Deep fried pork knuckles.

Crispy Pata again … so good, it deserved two pictures! I love that it’s fried yet NOT greasy. Perfectly golden and crispy.

Lechon Kawali – deep fried pork belly, the other tender and tasty part of the pig, perfectly fried and not greasy.

Laing – not too sure how to describe this but…it’s sorta curry-like, a little spicy, with coconut milk that makes it incredibly yummy. With taro leaves, and some meat.

Not only was the food 100% delicious, the prices were really good too. Entrees ranged from $8-15, and totally worth every penny. I suppose I could be biased, since I love Filipino food…but doesn’t that mean I know good Filipino food? ;D I’ll be the first one to tell you, finding a Filipino restaurant that is both great tasting AND affordable is really freaking hard. I don’t know why, it’s hard to get both those traits here in NYC. But Ugly Kitchen is that restaurant, on Sunday nights!