Archive for April 2009
some seaweed with your pretzel?
I like seeing how big food chains try to localize their food for each market. Auntie Anne’s in Singapore has a few local flavors – one of them being seaweed.
It was alright. Tastes just like you would think. Like seaweed on a pretzel. Who knew.
ichiban boshi, suntec city
I pass this restaurant nearly every Saturday since it’s en route from my bus stop to the gym that I go to. After class I’m usually in a hurry to get somewhere or do something or blah blah blah that I end up eating a granola bar instead of having a real meal. This time I stopped to smell the sushi and had a lazy, late Saturday afternoon lunch.
I was halfway through the meal before I realized that this place is a chain and I’ve been to the same restaurant’s Esplanade location. This time around I opted to change up my usual unagi-negitoro-spicy tuna trifecta that is my go-to sushi meal.
May I present to you… tuna and cucumber with chicken floss.
ji de chi – remember to eat!
Cute name for a shop, huh? As you can see I had Hong Kong style dessert two nights in a row. Oink oink to you too. This one was after Yum Cha with Kwan and Pui. Kwan said her favorite dessert place was nearby so after some wandering we rolled ourselves into Ji De Chi, which according to the wall decorations, is a favorite of local celebs and has garnered itself a few awards.
aw chew desserts
This place is always, always busy. I’ve even seen it in a few guide books as *the* place for Chinese/Hong Kong style desserts. We saw this place before dinner so we made sure to leave some room in our bellies for a visit.
The verdict: good but not life changing. The most popular stuff on the menu is the mango sago which I wasn’t in the mood for due to my scratchy throat. I picked the sweet potato with sago while Steph got the milk custard. We were lucky enough to grab a table outside which gave us some breathing room from the durian specials of the day.
arirang, liang seah street
Friday night started off questionably since neither myself nor Steph had any good ideas of what to eat. I was slaving away at work while Steph was drying herself off after having lost a battle with one of Singapore’s rainstorms (that of the sideways rain variety). Undaunted by or indecisiveness, I suggested Liang Seah Street which Steph had never been to and has tons of places to choose from.
After one quick promenade up and down to survey the scene, we decided on Korean food and had two choices: Arirang or Mario’s. We choose Arirang. Why? Do you know a Korean person named Mario? I don’t. Also, Mario’s was pretty empty while Arirang was bustling with people. We set our sights on the bbq buffet which costs about SGD23 per person. Not a bad deal if you ask me.
We started off with the requisited banchan parade which I forget how much I miss. These banchan paled in comparison to that of the Korean restos (or even groceries) in the Bay Area but they were not half bad. My faves were the kimchi and the bean sprouts. The squash (foreground) and the radish (towards the front right) were lacking in the heat department and that mound of green stuff was steamed but lacked any real flavor.
oh yes i did
I had bought a bag of flour to deal with my pancake cravings and had also sprung for some scallions for the cha soba dish that I made. So here we are. Bag of flour. Bunch of scallions. Can you guess what happens next?
Scallion pancakes that’s what. I looked far and wide for an easy how-to and found one here. After a brief pep talk to ready myself for the task, I got down to business and ended up with these.
yummy yum cha
My post titles are always so boring.
We took advantage of the office’s walking distance proximity to Chinatown on Thursday night on a mission to get some hot pot. Alas, when we got to the place it was no longer in business. Undeterred we opted for yum cha aka dim sum at the aptly named Yum Cha Restaurant. The dim sum menu here is shorter at night but still has a decent selection of twenty or so choices that you have to order from the kitchen (no trollies on the night shift).
The food was good but I think we ordered things that were too similar to each other so there wasn’t enough of a variety in the flavors.
what to do with cha soba
True confession time again.
I’ve been to Daiso 4 times in the last 4 weeks. Obscene right? It all started off because I need a plastic bowl for my morning cereal. It has now morphed into a weekly, mostly innocent visit to pick up a peeler, a bottle opener, some tupperware. Whatevah. Then I started venturing into the food section at Daiso and it was all downhill from there.
Sometimes I buy things and have no idea what I’m going to do with them when I get home. Such was the case when I spotted some green tea soba at Daiso. For two dollahs I figured I didn’t have much to lose. I perused the internet (as is what often happens, you go to Google for life’s answers) and found two recipes that served as inspiration. One is from superfamous food blog Chocolate & Zucchini and the other from the Aussie mag The Gourmet Traveller.
adobo fried rice
I’ve been on a cooking spree lately. It’s a bit more ’spency (too much slang? read: expensive) but it’s nice to know what’s going into your food sometimes. Plus it’s kind of a nice way to unwind. I’m not doing anything too complicated in the kitchen. After all, I have exactly 1 pot, 1 pan, and 2 burners at my disposal. This past week I made chicken adobo using chicken wings that I picked up at the supermarket.
In a moment of genius I opted to use the leftovers to make some adobo fried rice. Not quite as fancy as the adobo fried rice omelettes of Las Vegas fame ( it was a moment of genius coupled with laziness) but still a nice way to wrap up a day of Sunday housecleaning.
Ingredients:
- rice (I used brown but white rice is a-ok)
- garlic, minced
- chicken adobo leftovers (shred the chicken, pick out the peppercorns)
- green onion, chopped (just for looks really
)
No measurements for the rice and adobo. I made one medium sized bowl of it and used the meat of 2 chicken wings, 3 tablespoons full of adobo sauce, and a heaping scoop of rice. Fried rice is pretty forgiving so do whatchu want in whatever proportions you want.
Method:
- Add a little oil to a hot pan and throw in the minced garlic (I used 1 tsp).
- Add the chicken and adobo juices. It might be a bit watery so let the juices cook down a bit (stir constantly to avoid burning).
- Throw in the rice and mix like you mean it.
- When its heated through and mixed well, take it off the heat.
- Throw on the green onions and take a picture.
- Enjoy.
If you’re not lazy, you could make this into a Japanese style omelet (aka omurice) with the rice in the middle and an omelet wrapper. If you’re only moderately lazy you can add scrambled eggs to the mix (cook beforehand and add unless you want to eat brown eggs).
jaggi’s northern indian cuisine
I’m watching a show about that crazy huge Mormon family that has 17 kids. They have found another couple that also has a ridiculous number of kids and shares the same fashion sense. How nice.
A few weeks ago we had a team event (good segue, eh?) that involved running all over Mt Emily Park and shooting each other with 2.5 kilo laser tag guns. As could be expected, 3 hours of non mortal combat can really give a girl an appetite. Since we were in Little India we shlepped over to Jaggi’s which, unbeknownest to me, is a Singapore institution.
First of all, the place is immaculate. Very clean. Even the bathrooms are sparkly. They really took the government sponsored ‘Singapore-let’s-have-clean-bathrooms’ initiative seriously. I can respect that. Nags, Chandra, Pearl and the rest of the crew did all of the ordering while I busied myself with taking pictures.
Feed your reader! 
