i-potluck

We attended a potluck gathering at Momo to celebrate CNY. The host cooked many auspicious food like Shanghai Nian Gao, Hao Shi Fa Cai and more. Guest brought their specialties too. XM, bought his famous sesame braised chicken wings. Frank with his special roasted Char Siew! Both were yummy! To cut it short, there were abundance of food on the table!
I too made my small contribution with the Xi Yan’s Cold Tofu Pork Floss dish inspired by NIBBLE & SCRIBBLE. Reviews were good. I tried to be creative and change a bit of the ingredients. It turned out to be good and everyone enjoyed it. A comment from Chris was simply ‘Nice!’ and XW’s was ‘YUMMY!’, I would like to thank Nibble & Scribble for that inspired dish!

And for those who are keen, this is how it is done! Taken from Nibble & Scribble's website.

Ingredients:
1 block silken tofu
1 spring onion, chopped
1 tbsp fried shallots
2 salted egg yolks, chopped
1 tsp sesame seeds, toasted
50g pork floss
50ml store bought tempura sauce

Directions:
1. Use kitchen towels to pat dry the excess liquid from tofu.
2. Place tofu in a shallow bowl and top with a both salted egg yolk and fried shallots and carefully place pork floss on top of the other two ingredients.
3. Garnish with sesame seeds and spring onions.
4. Carefully pour tempura sauce around tofu and serve.

i-Yusheng

This was our dinner! Yusheng from Sakae Sushi. It was much better then I had expected. Nicely packed in a box, chopsticks and wet tissue included. 6 slice of thick salmon (abit too thick for my liking) Anyway... what more can you ask for only $13.80+! Totally worth it!

i-VienTai Kitchen

It’s the 2nd day of CNY. All the shops are still close! Everywhere is still deserted. But one of my favourite eating place was open! VienTai Kitchen. We were their 1st customer. Ordered my fav watermelon lime drink. I like the refreshing taste and it is very cooling. The lime taste was not too strong and the drink goes down well with the food.
We ordered Chicken Pineapple Laksa (above) and Seafood Green Curry with rice. Both dish was not up to our expectation this time rouond. The squids in the Seafood Green Curry were very soft. It somehow tasted like it was very jelly liked. I will not order this dish again. The Chicken Laksa (above) was too jalat for me!! I think i will stick to the Beef noodles the next time round!Side dish was the Prawn Patties (above) and Duck with Kailan. The kailan was full of flowers, not so much leaves. So it was not to my liking! The best dish was still the prawn patties. Always order it when I eat there as I like it very much. The patties is fried till golden brown yet it remains juicy inside. YUMMY!

i-reunion dinner

Reunion dinner:- Chicken-broth steamboat with Pacific Clams, Sea Asparagus, Tiger Prawns, fu-chow fish balls, pork ball, water chestnut dumplings, 3 different types of mushrooms and fish slice.

HAPPY LUNAR NEW YEAR EVERYONE!

GONG HEY FATT TAI CHOY!

i-dim sum

Had Dim Sum for breakfast at a nearby food court!

Fan Choy, Chee Cheong Fun, Spring roll and Yam Cake.

i-go hawker

We revisited the Redhill hawker centre today to check out its food after its recent renovation. Did not manage to find our favourite black carrot cake, but ordered the good old Satay Bee Hoon. Priced at $3 it was still good as it used to be, and the owner seemed friendlier! We even bought an additional pack of his Satay sauce to spice up a coming home-cooked CNY dinner.

After shopping at Ikea and Queensway Shopping Centre, the next choice to ABC Market (still under-going renovation) for dinner was Alexandra Market. There was plenty of food there while we settled for the popular Bak Kut Teh just to satisfy our sudden craving for it. I thought the meat was somewhat so-so only, although its soup should appeal to the herbal lovers. Sitting right in front of a chicken rice stall we conveniently ordered a plate of it to add on to the variety. The chicken meat was quite smooth and tender, however some parts were found to be not fully cooked. The verdict: still not comparable to our favourites at Chinatown Food Centre 2nd level and Tian Tian Chicken Rice at Maxwell Market.

There seemed to be much more other food to try out there, especially the roast duck stall that caught our eyes. Its charcoal-burnt ducks looked tasty from our distance, topped with the many accolades that further suggest it should be worth trying on our next round there. Meanwhile, we look forward to the re-opening of ABC Market...

i-chinatown again and again!

My third trip to Chinatown… accompanied J there to get the feel of CNY and with all the CNY decoration. I am sure he will!

We had desserts at JinJin 101 again as this was a decent quiet place in blustering Chinatown to get a seat and rest! We tried the Walnut Cream with Tang Yuen. It turned watery even before we could finish it. Lousy! We also ordered Wheatgrass jelly with dragon fruits. This is a weird combo. It has raisins in it, atap seeds, dried longan. I did not finish this. The taste did not compliment each other at all. We also tried the durian bread. It was just so so, the durian puree taste was lacking and the fragrant was not there! I would rate everything 2/5 today!

Dinner was at Bei Fang Feng Wei along smith street. We wanted to try the fried fish that they specialize in. We paid $18 instead of the publish rate of $15 due to the increase price in fish during CNY season. Felt slightly cheated on that! The fish came out looking nice. But after a few bites into it, I somehow got sick of it. I felt that I was taking in more flour den anything! We also ordered the silver fish with eggs. It turned out to be quite salty, perhaps due to the silver fish.

We left the place and do not think we will be back soon again!

i-long beach east cost

Today was my very early reunion dinner cum mum’s birthday! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM!

Long Beach Seafood Restaurant (East Cost Tennis Centre)

We had 2 tables, a private room. Started the night with Yusheng since it was a CNY reunion dinner! 1st Yusheng for the year and I believe will not be my last! Whenever I eat Yusheng, it somehow cheers me up because I know it is CNY again! Anyway, the dish came with an Ang Bao and the number was 3118. So wish you the best of luck!

We had plenty of dishes!

Their signature dish, Sri Lanka Black Pepper Crabs. I think the one along still road is still better!

Their renowned Crispy Duck! This is a must try dish! Their Honey Sauce Zuo Zong Tang chicken was also in our menu. However, my cousin said the vinegar taste was very strong!

When you go to Long Beach, ask for pepper crab and also ask for the chilli crab sauce with mantou without the crab! Just the sauce alone and they will be happy to whip up the sauce for the mantou specially for you. YUMMY!

i-chinatown again!

Went to chinatown again! This time round, was there to meet up some friend and to have lunch.



I ordered Chee Cheong Fun, Lo Mi Fan. XM commented that it looked like breakfast instead of lunch! Anyway, I enjoy any type of food anytime of the food as long as it is nice!

Anyway, we hit the streets again and they bought a few things. The 'kway chee' cost quite abit during this period of time. 500gm for $6 for the normal ones, and $8 for 500gms of the better quality ones! What is CNY without 'kway chee'.

i-bottle tree village

Yesterday night some friends organised a dinner at this very ulu place called the bottle tree village for dinner.

I do not drive, thus going to this place is a definitely no no for me unless someone drives! Bottle tree village is located in the rustic and serene corner of beautiful Sembawang. Of cos, i do not know how beautiful it is as by the time we reached, it was close to 8.30pm.

Anyway, here is the website which I found. http://www.bottletree.com.sg

The place was too dark, so I did not take any pics of the food we ate. Sorry about that! As I was not host, i did not order the food and honestly do not know what was the price like. Thanks to momo for the dinner treat!
We ordered Red Garoupa Steamboat, Roasted Chicken With Garlic (above picture from their website), Pork Ribs King, Omelette With Onions, Special Deep Fried "Tofu", Vegetarian Style Mix Vegetable, Mixed Vegetables, Seafood "Hor Fan" and 'Shang Mee".

I would not say the food was fantastic, but the place is cooling as it is near the beach. All of us ate like some hungry kids! I had been a pretty long day for many of us and it was total silence throughout the whole meal as all were concentrating on the food! The journey too was the cause of our hunger! So way out!

Anyway..... I would give it 3/5 for the food and a 5/5 for the company that was there!

i-ajisen nagomi

Ajisen Nagomi, Takashimaya. As usual, it's always a problem looking for dinner on a saturday night at Orchard, so my friends decided on the place and I joined them after my hair cut! Ok, Ajisen Nagomi is the high class version of Ajisen, there is another outlet at Bugis Junction. Anyway, this is suppose to be a sushi restaurant and the sushi are supposed to be hand-made so I guess you pay a price for it. Service wise is so so only. The salmon sushi was @$2 for 2 pieces. The salmon looked huge!

I ordered the BBQ pork belly! It was very tasty with abit of spicy taste. However, I thought the price was a little too steep. This dish cost about $10 and there were not many pieces to start with! Well, maybe it is the Orchard area thingy!
Wee had a type of clay pot rice thingy with beef and kim chi. I commented that it looked like a clay pot rice ala-japan way, but he said that it was weird as there was kim chi in it! He insisted it was Korean! And he also mentioned that Chinese clay pot rice tasted better too! Anyway, no matter, what! He finished his food as usual!

i-chinatown

Going to Chinatown now is atrocious. The crowd is all sweaty and people were just pushing one another! But then again, what is Chinese New Year without a visit to Chinatown! You see all the CNY decoration, Cai Sheng Ye, CNY goodies, the kam kat.

Jin Jin 101 desserts stall. I ordered the honeydew, soursop, chin chow with ice cream. A rather unique way to serve the dessert. The ingredient was presented in a frozen honeydew. Thus it was rock hard! It cost $7 for this and my friend thought it was quite expensive for something you can have it at a hawker center for say $2 max. Also tried the water chestnut cake. It was very tasty but I found it a bit too oily!

After that, we proceeded to the old Majestic Theater, Malan Noodles Fast-Food. Wee and myself had the pork rib la mian while XM had the cold la mian. XM's dish came with ice cubes! Alex had the Italian fried noodles which looked a bit too greasy! I could not remember what the others ate!


We ordered some other side dishes, Century Egg with Doufu & Treasure Pork Rib which cost $5.90 per piece.

We also ordered ‘Tang Bao’ (soup bun) which did not have a lot of ‘tang’, ‘xiao long bao’which I thought was not bad. Some cold cuts with lots of garlic and chillie oil! And ‘mei cai’ (preserved vegetable) with sticky rice. The whole dinner cost about $80 for 7 people. That is inclusive of drinks! So I would say price is reasonable!

Rating: I did not finish my la-mian, I felt the noodles were not that nicely done. It was very mushy and the noodles were not ‘la’ (pulled) very nicely. However, my friends thought it was not too bad! I only like the $5.90 ribs and the Xiao Long Bao.

Malan Noodles Fast-Food
80, Eu Tong Seng Street #02-01
Tel: 63278620

i-love letters

This is one of the typical Chinese new year goodies! Love Letters!

Actually I prefer the ones that are folded in a triangle! I bought some of the folded ones from KL before and I love it! It is so thin that it simply flakes in the mouth! I got it from one of the stalls in Sungei Wang supermarket. I know that it may not be the best, but I like it!

I have seen some with sesame seeds too. I bought a tin from a old bakery shop in Beach Road. Tried it and I thought it was quite fragrant. Maybe cos I like the smell of sesame!

Usual ingredients are flour, egg, coconut milk and sugar. I have seen some that adds chocolate chips in it too! Not my cup of tea!

Anyway, the one in this picture is from Indonesia! ‘Charcoal Baked’. Not as nice as the ones I had from KL though!

Just eating it to fill my hunger pangs!

Carrot Cake

Breakfast at Boon Keng Road market!

A matured estate! You hardly get to see any young couple here, lest for the screaming kids! Presumably grandchildren!

A hearty breakfast of carrot cake followed by a cup of Soya bean milk.

$1.50 for the carrot cake! Was wondering if I should add an additional egg and I did! It was superb! The additional eggs added the extra punch (not forgetting the cholesterol!) The chye poh was so crunchy!!

What a breakfast!

i-START

After reading so many Singapore Food blogs. I am inspired and thus, as the saying goes... this is how it all began!

Please note that I do not have a good command of english. These are all informal writings. There will be mistakes!! So please go through it with a cheerful heart!

Sun Yanzi Concert 2006 - Singapore

Thanks Kevin (unusual production) for the tickets!