updates...

I haven't been blogging for quite some time, coz of laziness ckckck... since i'm waiting for my turn to so i better do sth about wat happening recently....

Tonite, we had a department dinner (each of us are entitled to $90 budget per year), a session where we're supposed to team bonding where it always ended up in food in our department practice. We finally decided to go to The Line @ Shangrila. Thursday is a special promo nite comes with free flow of drinks at $88/person. The total bill was $12xx+ and we got 32% disc due to staff reward cards (yes, it's our client) and final cost is $84x+ so it's quite a good deal and worth.

I should say The Line is worth every single cent with the standard and quality of the food. The seafood bar itself already more worthed than anything. The number of times i visited, it has never failed to satisfy my stomach ckckck.... They serve the best passion fruit sorbet where you can taste real passion fruit in every single bit.

I have been eating out quite a lot, the rally started since last Friday where we were out for mussels dinner on Friday @ Brussel Sprouts

followed up with walking to Liang Court for Starbucks (some pics).

Then on Saturday, we attended Summer fairytale's wedding @ The Regent. I should say that i'm quite impressed with the wedding where the couple actually compose their own song and even when for recording and sing it live. The song is pretty good and soothing. The couple is a perfect match where they drink, party, sing, and etc together. Best wishes for Summer and Xavier. Have fun in Sweden....

Last nite as i left office quite early, so my parents and I went for dinner @ Imperial Treasure Nanbei. Initially, our objective is to order something different from our regular order, however we ended up eating the same dishes. We did try the beef mushroom. It's yummy, the beef was so soft.

By the way, the latest movies i watch recently is Dark Knight which i watch a sneak on Wed 16th Jul. The movie is quite good and Christopher Nolan shot windy city till very nice (reflected the gotham city quite well) with the small alley. i give ****/5

I was offered a chance to catch gala premier of The Cliff but i skipped it due to the late nite opening and not strategic location - Vivo. :(

Well, recently i won 52 tickets from Cineleisure from the lucky draw i participated and share it with my colleagues. So i am starting to pick which movie i should watch now for the remaining tix...

Trick or treats ?!?

Well, Halloween is a total reverse of Chinese Ghost Festival where you are encouraged to limited excursion means to stay home. As all the ghosts are wandering around on the streets.

Halloween in SG is purely on clubbing and another drinking session. If you are not a clubbers nor fond of drinking, basically it is just another regular day. Despite the idea of Halloween in the states where aside to party, we practice trick or treats ?!?! visit to haunted house and carving pumpkins... ^.^

Yeah, Halloween Day is my birthday .... so my gangs always said that i'm a ghost ckckck.....

The week before the birthday was welcomed with visiting of my college buddies, Lili and Sherry. We had a great weekend gathering after our graduation back in 2003. Finally, i'm able to forego all the disputes happened among us. We rekindled our friendship and cherish more as we get older, quality time is what we are pursuing. I was also happy for Sherry on her engagement news and her health is actually getting better. The day before their departure, 30th Oct, we were having lunch at Palm Beach for Chilli Crab and dinner at Peach garden

My department mates celebrated with a treat of lunch @ Billy Bombers w/ Lychee Martini cake.
For dinner, I celebrated w/ my college buddies Mon and Nad @ Shimbashi Soba.

On Friday, my foodie gangs celebrated it @ La Forketta @ Dempsey


The dinner is part of our Friday outings in exploring new places, however the restaurant is below our expectations. The food presentation is nice. The appetizer is good but the main dishes is only okay. The restaurant ambience is quite nice. If craving for Italian, i still prefer Pasta Brava where is brings the authentic flavor. I rated ***/5 stars.

Indeed it's still another great outing we enjoyed!

Happy Halloween and wish for more pumpkins next year. ^.^ I'll aim for pumpkin soup and cake next year ckckck....

Friday Gourmet outings & JT farewell

As Saturday is my teammate, Mrs. World's birthday. Thus, we were celebrating her b-day during friday lunchtime at Tampopo where it's famous for its ramen and kurobuta (black pork) followed by cutting cake session during tea time. She was amazing and fabulous as early in the morning she fashion paraded for us and she was quite high that day. Happy life and wellness to her.

On Fri nite, we had our regular gatherings. Even though it's not end of the month, but we still gathered as we haven't dined for about 2 months due to everyone busy schedule. Main reason being also to hang out with JT before she leaves for Beijing next week.

Well, we didn't manage to book Margarita's, thus we ended up at Pete's Place - Italian restaurant which recently had been revamped and highly recommended by one of our colleagues. I'll make sure to my gang the next stop is margarita's. I'm dying and craving for mexicans......

The place has a nice atmosphere and the dishes are quite good but still it's incomparable to the one in the states. I prefer Pasta Brava at Tanjung Pagar. Well, the restaurant manager was quite attentive. Service was consider ok compared to other places.

We ordered quite a lot of appetizer and there are free flow of breads.


Main Course - ***1/2 out of *****
Appetizer - **** out of ******
Pizza - *** out of ***** (even though it's wood grilled but i think they could be better)


I had a fusili in pesto and olive oil which were quite good and something different.



Lasagna was a bit disappointed as it's too meaty and cheesy.






Steak was quite good as well.




As usual, we chatted a lot on the what's happening and share gossips hot from oven. There are total of 6 of us in this round gathering exclude Rina. As she is happily enjoying her honeymoon in Europe. Indeed Jessica was with us ^^ After dinner, we headed to her house to continue the session and she made us this plum choya with soda water. We didn't leave until 1:30am.

By here, i wish JT all the best with the new start and gan ba de in Beijing. She will survive for sure. We'll always be here when you need us.... hehhehe.....

Jakarta

After 6 or 7 years not visiting the city, there wasn't much changes as it is more jam. It's maybe due to the fasting season as well. Aside to that, there are more malls built, int'l hotels, better transportation.

Surprisingly, i found the city has improved a lot except for the traffic jam. The malls are even better than SG, probably because of newly built. Basically, you can find all the stuffs from fashion to restaurants in sg as well as in jkt. Some of them, they even had it before sg started with it. The interior, ambiance, atmosphere of the restaurants are better than sg. My cousin told me that ambiance has taken a crucial role recently, those who are actually in interior business has earned a lot ^^ She mentioned as long as there is a nice atmosphere, people won't care whether the food is tasty or not.

So far, i found the services are way much better than the ones in sg. I think they're the worst i had encounter so far.

The visit was quite memorable coz aside to visit Rina's wedding. The other highlights are i got to meet my granny and friends. My granny has aged a lot since the last time i saw her. She is really getting old and weaker. Somemore, i think it's quite hard in her position due to the family feud. Sometimes, i am even wondering if all of these are the results of big family. I could tell that she is very happy to see me again. I wish I could spend more time with her. I could feel her peaceful mind by just having me accompany at her side. I wish her well being and longevity.

Aside to that i got to meet few of my high school friends and catch up with them. 8 years after our graduation, a lot of things had changed. Some of us are married and even with kids. Within this year itself, i think there are at least 5-6 couples who are getting married.

Of course, i would not forget to mention about the food i had while i'm jkt. You'd amaze of the food i ate on the next day once i arrived. I had nasi uduk as breakfast, nasi padang as lunch, and padang food as dinner. heheheehehe...... For the rest of two days, of course i was having delicious food and good time.

On our returned journey, we arrived airport quite early coz afraid of stucked in jam. Thus, we're fooling around in the airport which my colleagues think that the airport looks more like ferry terminal. ckckck......

Friday 21st Sep

Well, it seemed that it's hard to not mention about food when you're surrounded by a group of people who just adore and appreciate food. Well, i'm glad to be part of the member.

On Friday, my colleague Elvina was suddenly in a very good mood on having a nice lunch. Probably it's a friday and she started to get relaxed. At 11+ am, she started msn me to ask me where we should go for lunch and even said she would like to eat something nice other than our regular places.

I told her we got to travel a bit for a nice food and she said she didn't mind as long as it's not too expensive. My regular lunch buddies went down to town (Orchard) for Kyushu fair and i decided not to join them. So i told Elvina, there is one western restaurant with affordable set lunch we could try out at Tanjung Pagar but i couldn't recall the name but it's always featured in 8Days. Not that i trusted 8Days review as usually it's inaccurate. However, i don't mind trying.

Unfortunately, none of us could recall the name nor finding the magazine, so 7 of us ended up at New Harbor which is also a western along the stretch of Tj Pagar (bridal salons). Well, it's affordable and the food portion was quite huge. The food was quite delicious and nice and also because we're hungry. The best is there is no GST and service charge ckckck....



Another highlight is one of the restaurant owner (i guess), said if one of us are Mediacorp artiste hehehe..... (then we we giggling we don't want to be recognized MCS artistes but HK actress ckckck....)

Aside to that, Elvina had even planned for the tea. Starhub happened to give each of us a chinese cup with fruit tea for the midautumn festival. So Elvina came up with having a tea with mooncake during our tea time.
By the time we finished our lunch, it's almost 2:30pm so she said let's postpone the tea ceremony to 5pm. She obliged us to join her hehehehe.......

Because some of us had to attend SMA (sg media awards) @ Ritz Carlton and all of us know the food are suck, so they said they might want to eat sth before they headed to the event.
Side track - The highlight of the event is we won the media agency of the year woohooo....... hurray......

At 5pm, Elvina started to take all the cups to wash and made tea. After that she started to offer all varieties of mooncakes hehehee.... Well i didn't eat the mooncake but i drank the tea which is not that fancy. The taste of the tea was even worst when it's cold. ckckck....

Elvina and Joey did mention that we should light up some lanterns next Wednesday. I think this idea is because we received numerous email said that HK & TW offices will be closed on Wed and Thu to celebrate the mid-autumn festival while we have to work here......

Well, it's just a nice relaxing friday.

betray my principle...

A few days ago, i just blogged of not to eat so much food after so many dining out for the past few weeks. Last Wednesday, we bought a farewell lunch for our colleague who is leaving for Beijing. However, it ended only 3 of us were available that day so we ended up having lunch for 3 instead of 7. Well, we went to her fave restaurant 'Warung Lele'. Actually for the past months, we have been visiting quite a few times, i should say it's one of most authentic indonesia restaurant in SG. Somemore, it's affordable ^^. We always go there during lunch time.

Reason behind we chose the restaurant, b/c our colleague, JT afraid she won't have such a nice lunch in Beijing (You haven't heard all the things she has to gone through in Beijing plus wicked us who always scared her about the stuff in Beijing... ckckck.....)

Unlike other restaurants, Warung Lele has never failed its quality of food. It's still the best. We ordered 4 dishes, and whenever we are there, it's always ala carte instead of their set menu. The food presentation is not something that will amaze, but the taste is just delicious....

You could check out their website @ Warung Lele

My recommendation: kankung tauco, sambal kankung, cumi bakar, pecer lele, gurami goreng, lele bakar, ayam bakar santan.

Feasting in a-non-festive-season

Recent continuous visits of buddies had resulted in a non-stop feasting for me. Well, there is nothing much to do in sg beside the gourmet parade. Most of the times, there are too many food to try and gobble down yet too little time and limited space for your stomach.

Reminded me of our last company incentive trip in Tokyo. As some of us were not extend due to some circumstances, thus we had a food and shopping tour within one day. Thinking of the amount of food we had eaten was just amazed. Moreover, the meal just continue one after another within a day.

Well despite the food we ate in Tokyo, i never regretted it as i have tasted the freshest sashimi ever in my life. It just melted in your mouth and yet sashimi is so cheap @ tsukiji market. Another highlight is the aburi (broil sashimi). Maybe someday, i should blog about the restaurants we visited. I thought i won't be doing the same thing again till my next visit in Tokyo. However, history repeat by itself.

Now, to talk about the food, i really feel sick. I just wish that i can have sandwich or salad for the next few weeks. I have eaten too much of local fare and slightly felt sick on it even though i know they're delicious. Suddenly, i just lost my appetite. For the past few weeks, i have visited so many outlets to hunt for food non stop.

Here are the outlets that i have been visited for the past 2 weeks. I bet after reading you will understand what i am trying to say though: Garuda @ Vivo and Cairnhill, Warung Lele, Boon Tong Kee, Brussel Sprouts, Food Republic @ Wisma, Jumbo @ Riverside Point, Chinatown food street market, Sun with Moon, Tiong Bahru Cze Char, Modesto, Ajishan ramen, Jalan Sultan Prawn Mee, East Ocean Teo Chew Restaurant.

Somemore, next week i am going to jakarta to attend my colleague's wedding. I will fly there on Thurs aft and return on Sunday. That mean i will hunt some javanese food to eat while i'm in town. ckckck......

I have decided to readjust my diets once i return from there.

Afterall, despite all the feasting, i will still continue to eat all of the food again once i recuperate.... I just love the chemistry and fusion of the food created.