De-stress, Recharged~

Once in a while, having a good dinner is a great way to de-stress, provided that there's sufficient "big M" in the wallet and in moderation~ :p

Sushi Tei at Paragon Shopping Centre:

Mixed Veg Miso Soup-Yasai Misoshiru

Enoki mushrooms, tofu, cabbage, dried mushrooms, glass noodles and a little seaweed in miso soup. It's more satisfying then a regular bowl of miso soup.

Chocolate Wafer

Vanilla ice cream coated with chocolate followed by an outer wafer layer. (oops! Only 2 pieces left. i only remembered to take a picture of it after eating 3 pieces of chocolate wafer :p)

Chill-out at The Vila'ge:

Calamari Rings

Golden and crispy on the outside, tender on the inside.

Erdinger white

A great tasting beer that went pretty well with the calamari rings.

Mr Bean Ice Cream in a Cup~

Mr Bean's ice cream comes in 2 forms, either in a cone or cup. The cone ice cream costs $1.20 and $1.50 for the cup serving.

It's smooth, nutritious, yummie, reduced in sugar and fat content, high in calcium and makes me happy~ :)

p.s. A word of advice, you've got to like soya milk to like mr bean's ice cream :p

Tom's Palette~

Yet another amazing ice cream discover~

Tom's Palette traditional homemade ice-cream is simply wonderful ya~ It is a small ice cream shop that is located at Beach road, Shaw Leisure Gallery. They have a wide selection of unique ice cream flavours, such as lavender, chrysanthemum, longan and red date, rosemary apple, wasabi and lime...etc. As well as the usual all time favourites, rich chocolate, rum and raisins, summer berries... etc.

Summer berries and rum & raisins (small cup)

i love the rum & raisins, which was adequately creamy and not excessively sweet ya~ The raisins were perfectly soaked in rum and they were not too hard or too soft, perfect ya.

They come in 2 sizes, small ($2.80) and large ($4), with a choice of either 1 or 2 flavours for any of the 2 serving sizes ya. i like their friendly service and generous ice cream serving ya. It's a pity that their located at Shaw Leisure Gallery as it is quite out of the way for most people ya.

It is one of the few (eh...okok...many) ice cream parlours that i will visit again ya~

Tom's Palette (Traditional Homemade Ice-Cream)

100 Beach Road

#01-25

Shaw Leisure Gallery

Va Va Vroom~

Va Va vroom is a Vietnamese eating place located along Seah Street. They serve reasonably priced, all time vietnamese favourites from a selection of appetizers, main courses, soups, drinks and desserts ya.

Special silken tofu salad (large)

Summer fresh rolls with prawns & chicken

Sad to say, the food used to be taste much better in the past ya. Well, i guess the drop in standard may be due to a change of cooks ya. (May not be visiting the place ny time soon ya. *Haiz...)

QQ Sweet House Glutinous Rice Balls~

QQ Sweet House Glutinous rice ball and hot dessert stall is located at Beach Road Hawker center. It costs $1.50 for a bowl of 4 and $2 for 6 glutinous rice balls in peanut soup. They come in 4 flavours ya~ red bean, peanut, black sasame or yam. They also sell other hot desserts such as, almond cream, black sasame, peanut soup...etc.

The glutinous rice balls were chewy (kiu1~) with a generous amount of filling. The peanuts in the peanut soup (Hua1 Sheng1 Tang1) were large ya. However, the peanut soup was alittle too sweet for my liking ya.

So what is the verdict of my Ah balling challenge after savouring glutinous rice balls from 3 different stalls?

Food Street Ah balling is the best of the 3 ya! Followed by QQ sweet house then Hai Sing ah balling.

Hai Sing Ah Balling~

My latest craving have led me to try out the glutinous rice balls from Hai Sing's Ah balling stall, which is currently located at the temporary Chinatown market & food center near outram mrt station. A bowl of 6 glutinous rice balls served in pandan leave flavoured sweetened soup costs $2. They have 6 flavours in total ya, red bean, green bean, durian, black sasame, yam and peanut. The glutinous rice flour layer was sufficiently thin. However, they only served them in hot sweetened soup boiled with pandan leaves, their sizes were also rather small and odd shaped (they were not round, probably it's their way of differentiating the fillings inside ya) and they were not exactly generous with the fillings ya.

i've read quite a few good reviews regarding Hai Sing's Ah balling. But after tasting them today... i still preferred the Ah ballings from food street ya. For the same price, $2, i could enjoy a bowl of 6 yummie-licious ah ballings served in hot sweetened peanut soup/ ginger soup/almond milk ya.

Random Hot & Cold Desserts~

Food street's Glutinous rice balls (a.k.a tang yuan or ah boh leng) filled with green tea filling, served in hot ginger or sweetened peanut soup. A bowl of 4 "Ah Boh Leng" costs $1.50. Apart from green tea filling, there are also other choices such as, red bean, sasame, peanut and yam ya.

It's the first time i actually tasted green tea flavoured ah boh leng and i simply enjoy them ya~. The glutinous rice balls were just nice, not too hard or too soft ya. However, it will be much better if the glutinous rice flour wrapping was slightly thinner ya. (Hmmm... probably reduce the thickness by 2mm? keke... :p)

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Lau Pa Sat's Ice Kachang. It costs $1.50, about the same price for a bowl of ice kachang at most food courts ya. Check out the generous serving of red beans. Oh, i requested for lesser sugar syrup, that's why the ice kachang looked alittle pale ya~ :p Nevertheless, it was still sweet and satisfying ya~

Crepes Party II~

Keke... it's been a long time since the last crepes party ya. And what are the basic ingredients for the crepe wrap?

1. Crepes (Available at Cold storage & Carrefour)

2. Buttercup

3. Tomatoes, Romaine lettuce & button mushrooms

4. Sausages (Over-baked)

5. Seasoned Scallop wings

6. Sauces & dressing (e.g. mayonnaise, chilli sauce, seasoned vinegar cider, thousand island sauce, tobasco sauce, chilli flakes, sweet sauce...)

There are many different ingredients that can be incoporated in a crepe wrap to satisfy your taste buds ya~ So what are you waiting for? Enjoy a crepes party today~

Billy Bombers~

The newly opened Shopping mall, The Central, is conveniently located directly above clarke quay Mrt station, directly opposite Clarke Quay. There's a wide selection of fine restaurants to dine in ya~ Some of these places have seats by the window, whereby you can enjoy the view of the Singapore river and the night life at Clarke Quay while you dine ya.

The service at Billy bombers (The Central) was really good ya. The ambience was good, the service crew were friendly, service was prompt and efficient, and the food was satisfying ya~

Check these out~

Honey stung crispy fried chicken served with coleslaw, honey mustard sauce and a choice of either potato salad or french fries.

Seafood paradise (spaghetti), tomato based spaghetti with dory, squid and mussel.

There's also an Azabu Sabo Hokkaido Ice cream shop ya~ There's no other better way than to have a nice, refreshing. Matcha(green tea) & vanilla soft ice cream after dinner ya.

p.s. and if ice cream is not satisfying enough... can always conveniently cross over to Clarke quay to chill and relax ya~ keke... =p

Oreo Cheesecake~

This is a simple, no-bake oreo cheese cake ~

i forgot to take a picture of the actual cake before delivering it ya, so this sample mini oreo cheesecake was the best i could capture ya :p

Oreo cheese cake recipe:

Ingredients:

Biscuit base:

• 2 packs of 150 g Oreo cookies
• 50 g Butter

Cream cheese mousse:

• 500 g Cream Cheese
• 1cup fine sugar
• 250 mL whipping cream
• 1/4 cup lemon juice (~ 1 medium size lemon)
• 3 tsp of gelatin powder
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

Biscuit Base:

1. Microwave the butter for 40 to 60 seconds to melt butter and leave it to cool to room temperature.
2. Remove the cream from the oreo cookies and crush them using a food processor. Add melted butter and mix well.
3. Transfer and distribute the biscuit mixture evenly onto an 8 inch round spring pan (pan base lined with aluminium foil for easy removal), press firmly to pack the biscuit mixture together before refrigerating it for 30 minutes.

Cream cheese mousse:

1. Cut the cream cheese block into smaller pieces and microwave for 3 minutes to melt the cream cheese. Leave it aside to cool.
2. Dissolve the gelatin powder in water over low heat, add in the lemon juice and stir well to mix. Leave it aside to cool for 15 minutes.
3. Whip up the whipping cream till soft peaks are formed.
4. Whip the melted cream cheese with the sugar till creamy and slightly pale.
5. Add in the whipped cream and continue whipping for another 2 minutes.
6. Add in the lemon juice and gently stir to blend well.
7. Pour the cream cheese mousse over the biscuit base and refrigerate for 5 hours of oven night. Serve chilled.

Enjoy~

Yuan Xiao Jie~

Time flies, it's already the 15th day of CNY. i had my 4th Yu sheng in 2 weeks during dinner just now. This time there was an overwhelming amount of sliced carrot ya (erh... which is embedded under the mountain of sesame seeds and puffed crackers :p).

Mum prepared a fast and easy one dish meal. All she did was boil a pot of water, stir in a cube of ikan bilis stock, throw in ALL the ingredients, stir gently to mix and let it cook slowly on medium to low heat.

Make a wild guess on the number of ingredients added...

Eh... actually i'm not too sure myself ya~ Hmmm... let's see... there are Green vegetables, carrots, lotus seeds, tofu, minced pork, 1 century egg, enoiki mushrooms, red dates, dried scallops, mock cuttlefish roll, "kia4", spring onions, leek, a tubular root (don't know its actual name), wolfberries (Gou Qi Zi)... that's all... i guess.

Woah~ 15 items in total... keke~

Waraku...once again~

My second visit to Waraku this week! This time it's the outlet at Marina square ya. The food standard is as good however their service is not as vibrant as the outlet at The Central.

Salmon sashimi: 3 slices of fresh salmon

Gyu yanagawa wazen: Beef set with udon, rice, fantastic potato salad, and pickled veg Nagoya miso nikomi kishimen: Claypot noodle (Jap version kway teow) soup with fried ebi, tau pok, chicken, mushroom, cabbage & vegetablesCheck out their sauce tray and the cute sasame seed container (2nd from left)
It's been a really long time since i last patronised Starbucks ya. i had a green tea frappuccino and it's really good ya, ice blended green tea with low fat milk~ a refreshing and fantastic blend ya~

Dark Chocolate Brownie Muffin~

Have been super busy this week but i just couldn't resist trying out this Brownie muffin recipe from Yochana's cake delight. i reduced the sugar by one-third to change it to dark chocolate brownie muffin instead ya.

Waraku~

Waraku restaurant rocs ya! Not only do they serve great tasting and well presented food, the service is good too ya! They have an extensive menu with great looking pictures of every single one of 'em ya. There is even a choice of serving size, mini (if you're not TAT hungry) or regular (for a fuller meal).

~*Tofu salad*~

~*Hotate Kaminabe*~

(the scallops were fresh and succulent ya =p...)

p.s. keke... i'm not so much a rice or udon-eater, so i went for soup based and salad dishes ya~

Wanna find out more bout WARAKU? Click here~