long time no see

Why, hello there! :)

It's been ages, eons and light years since I've been to this space. If you haven't seen me in awhile, here's what I look like now.

Yes, my long hair has been chopped to a long bob - which means short hair that isn't thaaaaaat short. It's my first time having short hair since I was a wee child, when my hair was growing out. I'm actually digging this look cos it's so much easier to maintain, contrary to what I'd expected.

Am still too lazy to launch into another food post at the moment - I'm nursing a sore throat and slight fever right now - but I will be back when I'm all sprightly and well again!

way to start the day

I love brunches! To me, brunch is synonymous with eggs, and there's little I like better than well-done eggs, whether they're poached, scrambled or fried into a omelette. And I think I might have found one of the best eggs Benedict in Prive Bakery Cafe!

But first, the Big Omelette is a sizeable option, with your choice of two fillings (cheddar cheese, honey baked ham, button mushrooms, onions or tomatoes). Jing Xiu went for the cheese and mushrooms, if I don't remember wrongly.

Big Omelette ($15)

pretty little things

Finally getting to try these much-raved about cupcakes!

Heard so many superb reviews of Twelve Cupcakes, the newish cupcake store opened by celeb couple Daniel Ong and Jaime Teo, that I couldn't resist heading down to grab some for myself on Monday. Super eager beaver!

They welcome business starting at 11am everyday, and I suggest you visit before noon if you want to be able to choose from the entire of range of flavours available. As their name suggests, they offer 12 flavours on the menu, of which 11 are daily fixtures and the last being a special that changes everyday.

I reached the store at about 3.20pm and was utterly disappointed to see that they were only left with three flavours. Had to hang around for 40 minutes while they churned out fresh batches, and even after waiting, they'd only added three more flavours. Nevertheless, I snagged two of each flavour to make up a box of twelve!

Left from top to bottom: Chocolate Chocolate, Red Velvet, Rainbow Vanilla
Right from top to bottom: Strawberry Vanilla, Chocolate Vanilla, PB Chocolate

happy in hong kong (Part IV)

Yay! Finally reaching the end of my food adventures in Hong Kong!

We thought of looking for a cha chan teng so we could have po lo bao for breakfast, but so we walked all over Jordan looking for one. Surprisingly, there are super few cha chan teng in the Nathan Road area!

Chanced upon a stall selling street snacks and grabbed one of these super cute egg waffles. These pouffy things are fluffy, chewy and will put you in an immensely good mood. :)

And of course, how could I resist getting more of my favourite curry-soaked spheres? :D

In fact, I thought the curry fishballs here are even better than those that I had in Mongkok! This curry gravy packed more spice and punch while the fishballs were a tad crunchier. I don't have the specific directions, sadly, but you can walk around Jordan and search for it as there aren't many street food stalls there.

Instead of popping into a cha chan teng, we decided to look for Australia Dairy Co., this famous cafe that specialises in milk pudding!

Australia Dairy Co.

happy in hong kong (Part III)

Managed to wake up bright and early enough on Day 3 to make it down in good time for the hotel breakfast!
I noticed many girls in Hong Kong wearing tops with shoulder cut-outs, like the one I'm wearing here. 

The breakfast buffet was extremely blah and totally not worth coming back for again. Wouldn't have chosen to eat here if it hadn't been complimentary. But at least there was an eggs station!

Scrambled eggs for me, please!

So we had a light breakfast, kinda like a starter, since we wanted to look for this particular traditional Hong Kong dim sum restaurant we always visit when we're here. I've got all the directions you need!

The shop is actually located in Central, but the nearest MTR station is Sheung Wan, which is at the end of the dark blue line. 

happy in hong kong (Part II)

Moving on to Day 2 in Hong Kong, my mum and I wanted to wake up early for the hotel breakfast. But girls being girls, we ended up leaving the room at 10.15am, only 15 minutes before the breakfast buffet ended. So we decided to venture out and look for dim sum instead!

Headed to this restaurant across the road from our hotel, the Federal Palace!

It was quite funny, because in Hong Kong, the locals tend to order just one or two dishes for breakfast. But being the greedy Singaporeans we are, we ordered six!

We grabbed a basket of these pretty yam buns, which were highly recommended by the waitress. 

Don't these remind you of the Milk Pan at Provence? :)

happy in hong kong (Part I)

I'm baaaaaaaackkkkk!!!
Decided not to be lazy, so here's a post on the trip I made to Hong Kong a couple weeks back with my mum! I've got a couple of great eats to recommend, so stay tuned for this series!

On the bridge to Kowloon. Love the colour of the sky!

So our cab pulled up at Nathan Hotel, which is situated at one end of Nathan Road, about a 5-10 minutes walk away from Jordan Station. It's recently renovated so the place is really clean and comfy.

Home for three nights!

devastated

I got to work earlier this morning and was informed of some tragic news.
Hua Ting Restaurant has apparently taken liu sha bao aka salted egg custard buns off their menu.

I is very sad. :(

But no fear! I've heard of another place that supposedly serves very good liu sha bao as well and I'm planning to head there for lunch next week.
Updates afterward!!

EPIC PIC

LOL just wanted to share an extremely hilarious picture taken on the Battlestar Galactica at Universal Studios Singapore. Just check out our epic expressions!!!

I know, this is terribly unglam and I hope my colleagues will forgive me if they ever see this, but I just have to put this up!

If you haven't spotted me, I'm in the red tee. Contrast my gleeful expression with that of Vanessa's, who is in white two seats away from me.

ROFL!!!!

excursion!

Paid a virgin visit to the Night Safari back in January! Was so excited cos I'd never been there before in all my 22 years of living in Singapore.

Wore a panda tee to match the animal theme of the night!

But dinner first! We convened at Joe's Kitchen, a humble, family-run Thai eatery in Alexandra. I shall give my conclusion first: Ah Loy is still #1 for affordable, delicious Thai grub in Singapore. I'd recommend Joe's only if you're in the area cos I don't think it's worth making a trip down otherwise.

But anyway, we ordered a number of dishes to share, the first being this Vermicelli Seafood Salad, a medley of crunchy tung hoon, prawns, chopped nuts, and a lot of other things...haha. Light, tangy and a little spicy, this makes a great appetiser for sharing, though I personally would have liked more glass noodles (because I love it!).

Vermicelli Seafood Salad ($8)

uh...happy belated new year?

Terribly backdated post, but I still want to put up some yummy pictures from Seb's birthday celebration last year.

His birthday falls on New Year's Eve, and since he's a huge fan of steak, I decided to give him a treat at Angus Steak House! They had a special 5-course set dinner menu for NYE, with your choice of main (prices started from about $70).

First up was the appetiser - slabs of foie gras and chicken stacked atop mashed potato and a piece of apple. I'm not a big fan of foie gras, but I must say this was excellently done, with a crisp exterior and soft, mushy insides. Great combination of sweet apple with the juicy fried chicken.

Appetiser

introducing...the BEST liu sha bao in Singapore!

I kid you not when I say "THE BEST". Seriously, I doubt you can get better steamed custard buns in Singapore than the ones I am about to show you! They are that awesome. (But if you have, please share!)

So anyway, where can these gems of liu sha bao be found? None other than Hua Ting Restaurant! Located at Orchard Hotel, it's definitely swankier than the less fussy Swee Choon or 126 Dim Sum, but with higher price tags to go along. That said, the extra dollars are definitely worth it, especially for the heavenly liu sha bao!

mouth exercise

I'm back for another long overdue post! Way back in December, I had a Girls' Day Out with Celly, Joyce and Vic for dim sum at Mouth Restaurant, followed by shopping at City Plaza (yay to cheap deals!). I am terribly sorry, I didn't take down the prices of the food, but I think we spent only about $16 per person or so.

Baked custard bun (liu sha bao)

If you've seen my post on Mouth@Work, these baked babies are the the same as those I blogged about there because Mouth@Work is obviously a subsidiary of Mouth Restaurant. I remember the ones at Mouth@Work being overly dry, albeit tasty, but the ones here at Mouth Restaurant are a bit better with slightly more fluid custard filling.

Yummy filling of sweet custard infused with grainy salted egg.

after party

Very mini post today!

Seb threw me the most awesome surprise birthday party last December, and it was an utter success!
I thought we were heading to Bugis for a steamboat dinner with the JC gang, but he turned into the Queenstown Macs instead. I was like, eh...what are we doing here??? LOL.

Went up and was super duper stunned to see my favourite friends from church, JC and NUS all gathered there in ambush, along with my family and Seb's parents! Sorry, I don't have piccas cos they're with Tim (my eldest bro). Will update again when I finally get them.

After the party, a bunch of us headed to Sentosa for our own mini after-party. Haha not uploading all the pictures here cos some are, well, private. LOL =X
But in short, here's a representation of how much fun we had that night. :)

foodnotes

I'm jealous that the relatively new Bedok Point within walking distance of Seb's place has eateries like Sushi Tei and Popeye's (by far my favourite fried chicken place). We went to check the little shopping mall out not long after it opened last December, and found ourselves patiently waiting in line for a table at Bishamon.

Ew...bad, bad, BAD hair!

A daughter chain of the more well-known Tampopo, Bishamon serves up ramen, specifically Sapporo ramen - the thick, chewy, curly type that I adore. Forgot to take note of the prices, but if I don't recall wrongly, the ramen dishes are priced at an average of $14 or so.

ONE THOUSAND!

Wheeeeeeee!! This marks 1000 posts on this blog! :D

Anyway, just dropping by for a teeny update on my crowning glory!
I've been wanting to get a haircut for the longest time ever because as you can see from my previous posts, my hair tends to get terribly frizzy and poofy especially at the ends. And my fringe always curls out like an ugly horn when it gets too long. Ick.

Didn't help that a couple haircuts ago, the hairdresser thinned my tresses too much (resulting in frizzier, poofier hair) and subsequent hairdressers couldn't fix it.

Anyway, I was casually strolling around Tampines 1 on Saturday and thought I might as well get a haircut at Twister (by Monsoon) since I had the time. I'm not fussy about hairdressers cos before this, I hadn't found one worthy of a return visit. But here, I did insist on getting the salon director to do my locks because it was only a few bucks more than getting the creative director or senior stylist instead.

So I found myself sitting in front of a floor-length mirror with Kason, the salon director recommending me to get a softening treatment done on my curls. The effect he promised? A softer (duh), straighter, more manageable mane with less frizz. (Sounds like a shampoo, hor?)

Literally steaming my head! My face is damn chubby, FML.

Only peeve is that Kason bluffed me about the treatment time. He said it'd take 20 minutes. I ended up spending THREE hours at the salon. Imagine: rinse, slather on treatment product, rinse, slather, rinse, steam, rinse, cut, blow, trim.

But hey, look at the (near) end result! Lustrous, healthier looking hair that frames my face better, and makes my mien look younger and slimmer too.

Of course, I can't get it to look as silky smooth and straight as immediately after the treatment, but I'm immensely pleased at how much healthier and manageable my hair seems now.

Yah, I better love it since I spent $160 (softening treatment) + $35.90 (haircut by salon director) = $195.90 on this! LOL.

But seriously, I think Kason's great and seeing how he understands my difficult hair, I'm definitely returning to him for future hair treatments!

mood for food

Ok, very brief post on the international buffet lunch I had a few months back at La Terrasse at Orchard Hotel! Ate for free cos my mum is a holder of the Ala Carte membership card, which entitles her to a whole bunch of dining vouchers at the various M Group hotels.

Was quite impressed at the spread available at the buffet - fresh seafood, salads, local dishes, Japanese munchies, finger food, pasta and a good selection of sweets.

I really liked the prawn noodles soup, which was ultra tasty and reeking of sweet, prawn stock. Couldn't resist downing spoonful after spoonful of the lovely broth!

Prawn noodles

visiting the neighbours (i.e. malaysia)

Can you buh-leeve that I haven't updated for over a month?! OMG wow! I spend a large amount of time at work writing (cos it's my job, duh) so that once I knock off, I'm more inclined to do other things that I enjoy - playing mahjong and watching brainless dramas in particular.

Huge "sorry" to those who have still been popping by regularly in hopes of seeing a new post. It's been a long time coming, but here it is!

Back in December, I took a road trip up north to Malacca, Malaysia with Seb and our friends for a one-night stay. Was really awesome, just eating and eating and enjoying each others' company!
I don't know how, but we reached Malacca in little more than two hours at a speed of 130km/h (not that fast by Malaysian standards). Headed straight for Holiday Inn where we had booked our rooms.

Pretty view outside our window!

Showered and rested for awhile before we headed out for an early dinner. This was probably the highlight of the entire trip - McQuek Satay Steamboat!!!

Taylor Swift Speak Now Tour 2011 - Live in Singapore

Will blog more on this later, but for now, enjoy some videos that I took at the concert! I'm sorry you can't see her face in them, but I was sitting too far back and the lights were too strong for my iPhone.

Happy Rabbit Year!

Been a real long time since I popped by this space cos I've been so busy with work! Now that it's Chinese New Year and I have a breather, I'm back for a tiny update. :)

Was really sad that I got whammied with fever, flu and a sore throat right on the day of CNY eve, so I was down and out of all the partying during my family reunion dinner and visiting on the chu yi. I've still got a terrible blocked nose and phlegmy cough, but I'm getting better quickly, thank God.

Anyway, just wanted to share some pics that have been stewing in my computer for a long time. These are from my cousin's wedding last December. Eons ago, I know!
His solemnisation and dinner were held at Capella, super posh place!

Gorgeous view of the sea beyond the window of the solemnisation room!

With the brother and mum

Mum and I before the ceremony began