Dinner @ Garibaldi (No photo!)

This is one of the few occassions that I wish I have a PNS.  I know that I am going to Garibaldi for dinner, however, I am also out of office the whole day for client meeting, and it looked really stupid to carry my handbag, laptop bag and camera bag.  So in the end, I give up the idea of bringing the camera, and to enjoy my dinner.

The last time I went to Garibaldi was at least 5 years ago.  I organised a gathering with my Uni folks, and we decided on Garibaldi.  I couldn't remember how was the food, all i remembered was that we had a big group of us, including a baby.  My classmate did not know that it was a up market restaurant, and she brought her baby!  The waiters were staring at us for making so much noise, (12 people's laughter + 1 baby's cry) distrubing those people who are trying to enjoy their candlelight dinner!

We started the dinner with some sweet italian wine, which i thought tasted like Sparkling water.  We wanted to order the PROSCIUTTO (Finest "Pio Tosini" Parma Ham with Traditional Romagna Fried Dough) for starter, because V and I liked Parma Ham.  However, the waiter suggested to have the Parma Ham with Mozzarella Cheese instead, so we went with his suggestion.  Parma Ham was tender and frangant, and it went perfectly with the wild rocket, but the Mozzarella Cheese was normal.  The complimentary bread was soft and warm, but the pumpkin mash was too weird for my palatte.

Mains:
I had the CAPELLINI - Angel Hair Pasta with Half Spiny Lobster, Sweet Peas and Tomato Sauce and V had the SPAGHETTI - Spaghetti with Seasonal Seafood & Fresh Tomatoes.

I always like Angel Hair Pasta for its softness, it can absorb all the gravy, for those who love the crunchy feel, it may be a bit too soggy for them.

The speaghetti was very generous with the seafood, but V said that it was a bit too hard.

Desserts:
TIRAMISU’ - Tiramisu with Homemade Lady-Finger Biscuits, Licorice Scented Mascarpone Cream
SEMIFREDDO - Chocolate and Hazelnut Parfait “Piedmont” Style
Tiramisu was ok, just thought that not enough liquor.  The Semifreddo tasted like chocolate biscuits haha..We completed the dinner with coffee..

Overall:  7/10
Garibaldi Italian Restaurant & Bar

36 Purvis Street #01-02
Singapore 188613
Tel: (65) 6837 1468 Fax: (65) 6337 3770

Les Bouchons Rive Gauche - GT's birthday

We went to Les Bouchons Rive Gauche at Robertson Quay to celeebrate GT's birthday.  GT always talked aboout the fries of Les Bouchons, he said that they were made of real potatoes.  While I was checking it up at HGW, the rating was kind of low, main complaint was the service.  Nevertheless, we went there since GT likes the fries.

The reservation was at 7pm.  I reached there at 645pm, wanted to go in, and was stopped by the waitress.  She told me cooly, "Sorry, we are open at 7pm"  "Can i go in and wait?" "No! Maybe you can go to the wine cafe nearby?"  Alright, I gave up, so i went near the river to take a stroll, and went back to the restaurant at 7pm.  GT was already there when i reached, and to my surprise, he was allowed "entry" at 650pm!  Ahhh..so much about service..

One of the sauce to go with, the rest were mustards.

Salad

Look at the golden chunky fries!  They were really nice, crispy on the outside, and soft in the inside!

Creme Brulee, which doubled up as the birthday cake as they did not have any cakes.  The disadvantage was that the creme brulee was soft, such that the candle became wobbly, and you had to blow the candle really fast!  The birthday boy was really fast, before I could sing a sentence of the birthday song or take photo, he blew the candle!!  We finished with coffee, that was served with chocolate.  I would not return for the steaks, I found it normal for the price that I had to pay, the fries were good though.  But then again, would i return to pay $32.90 for fries?  The wine list was not extensive, and the price was on the high side.  Ambience was good though.  It was a very relaxing night to sit outdoor, facing the river.  The icing on the cake was the nice and cool weather.  Having said that, there were a couple of restaurants near the river that would have the same ambience.  I would recommend Aston for better value steak..

Overall:  6.5/10

Les Bouchons Rive Gauche

41 Robertson Quay, #01-01.

Tel: 6733-4414

Opening Hours

Lunch: Noon – 2pm
Dinner: 7pm – 10pm
(Closed on Sun)

Brunch at Spruce

Polo & I met for brunch, and we decided to check out Spruce.  Ibanker was supposed to join us, and she was the one who gave us the date.  However, last minute, she stood us up again, said that she needed to go to Kluang with her bf.  Well, this was not the first time anyway, and we have decided that we would still go ahead without her :-)

Spruce is hidden at Tanglin Road, Phoenix Park and I took a taxi there so as to ensure that I could find the place.  The place was packed on a Saturday morning, and it was a bit noisy as there was a table of 6 beside us, chatting loudly.  It was better after they left.  There were indoor and outdoor seating, and we chose the indoor because of the weather, but the outdoor had nice atmosphere too.

We went for the Crab Cake Benny - Crabcake, Poached Egg, Smoked Bacon and Hollandaise, recommended by my Lao Si, and also the Spruce Big Brekkie, which consisted of Eggs (Scrambled, Poached or Sunny Side Up) Bacon, German Sausage, Roasted Tomato, Roasted Potato, Mushrooms and Foccacia Toast.  I asked for an over easy instead.  I enjoyed the Spruce Big Brekkie more than the European in Wild Honey, probably was because of the juicy German Sausage, which seems to be ideal match to the potato and mushrooms.

Crab Cake Benny

Polo was very cooperative, removed the greens so that I can close up on the bacons :-)

Spruce Big Brekkie

We had a lot of fun, catching up, admiring the photo from Polo's Europe trip.  It was a pity that she forgot to load her wedding photo into her lappy, but well, we can meet again :-)

We were fighting over the bill, and she won, said that it was her treat for my birthday, and the next one will be on me :-)  We will bring YY here when she is back ;-)

Spruce
320 Tanglin Road

Singapore 247980
Tel:  6836 5528
Open Weekdays 10:30am-10:30pm; Weekends 8:30am-10:30pm
http://www.spruce.com.sg/

Belated Birthday Dinner - Astons Specialisties

Please do not be alarm!  Yes, I am still having my birthday feast, though this it now belated.  This time, i checked out Aston Specialisties with my cell members.

We were supposed to be there at 7pm, but Auntie was 20 minutes late and plus the bad jam at PIE, we were 30 minutes late.  Poor Lena & Lynne had to endure people who were eyeing their table staring at them.  I chose the Aston at Katong, because this was the best out of all the Astons.  However, Auntie was not too happy with my choice, because Katong is notorious for parking.  We managed to find a lot, but she gave it up as she did not know how to parallel park.  So we parked at a private estate instead, and Auntie said that could save some money.  This was also why Auntie was called Auntie.  Though she was the youngest among us, she behaved like an auntie.  She haggled over 10 cents, lazy and favourite activity was to be a couch potato.  In summary, she did not behave at her age!

Wine for the night.  This was a strategic move to order wine, to prevent more stares!  So Lena ordered wine to buy some time..Aston's price was reasonable, $32 for a bottle of wine, quite reasonable.

We had the same dish, Ribeye Steak.  The only difference was the side dishes.  At $16.90 for Ribeye Prime Cut, you could choose 2 sides, either hot or cold.  The sides were the usual baked potato, baked beans, salad, greens, onion rings, french fries, mashed potatos.  Food was decent, given the price that we paid.  Total damage was $105.  Very reasonable.

We had a shock when we reached the car.  I saw a piece of paper sticked on the window, and when we walked closer, we saw that the car wheel was clamped!  A security guard came over to tell Auntie that she parked at private property, in order for him to unlock the clamp, she had to pay $100!!!    That was almost the price of the dinner!!!  From the summon, the car was clamped at 1950Hr, and we arrived at 1930Hr, they were really very viligant to clamp down the wheels!


119/121 East Coast Road
(Opposite Katong Mall)
Tel: 6247 7857

Shane's Wedding 16 July 2010

This was so far the most unique and interesting wedding dinner that I have attended.  There were surprises almost every part of the dinner, and most importantly, you could see that the couple enjoyed themselves, while entertained their guest.

Melvyn and i went for a beer at No.5 before going for the dinner, because I told him that we would not get to eat til 9pm.  This is the most irriating part of any wedding dinner, it never starts on time!  The drinks were on Melvyn, as I sold him a lens at "friend friend price".  Beer was fun, as Melvyn always have funny stories to tell about he & his girlfriend. 

Famous chicken wings from No.5

We slowly made our way to the dinner at 745pm, and to our surprise, many people were still hanging outside the ballroom, and it seems like the ballroom was half filled.  We were finally seated at about 2030Hr, and waiting for the couple to march in. 

Pre wedding dinner

For all the wedding I have attended, the couple would march in, then went up to the stage together. However for Shane & Spencer, their march on were special. Before they reached the stage, the couple splitted! Spencer marched to the left side, while Shane to the right. I was shocked by Spencer marching towards me, and had to step back! And right after the marched in, they danced! Wow

The second march in was very unique too.  We heard a very rock music, and we thought it was quite special, and were looking eagerly towards the main door, waiting for the couple.  Suddenly, the side door swinged opened, and we saw Shane in her dancing dress, danced into the ballroom alone.  Hey, where's the groom?!  The next moment, Spencer appeared on the stage with a mic, and they started to sing & dance! 

The cold platter

The guys on our table.  While the couple entertained themselves and the guests, we also enteratined ourselves. 

Our table.  The 2 gentlemen on the left kept talking non stop, and we had to save some food for VK.

The ladies

The people from the next table.  Shane had 2 tables for Mercer, and ex-Mercer, and when we asked her about the seating, she said, "Oh, one young table and one old table"  I wondered which was which! Haha  I supposed mine was the "Young Table" since Callista was at my table!

Ladies in red

It was a very enjoyable night.  The couple enjoyed themselves, entertained themselves and at the same time, entertained the guests.  A lot of thoughts were put in to plan the wedding.  In addition, I had a lot of fun catching up with the Mercer, ex-Mercer folks.  We left around 2330Hr, and the dinner was still not "officially" over.  Congratulations to Shane & Spencer.

High Tea at Wild Honey

This is not a birthday celebration!  I want to catch up with Tracy, whom I have not met for a while, and Thank God that I called her this week, because she is going back to HK next week.

As she was teaching, we could only have a late lunch, and she left it to me to decide on which swanky restaurant I wanted to go, and we finally settled for Wild Honey at Mandarin Gallery.  We reached there abotu 1430Hr, and to our surprise, there was a queue!!!  I thought it was a weekday!?!  Maybe it was a Friday afternoon, and people were in the mood for high tea?

I liked the concept of Wild Honey.  There was not menu, and you had to order at the counter.  They described it on a chalk board, and they had the food photo on a ipod touch!  Cool

We settled for a European and a Salad to share.

Hazelnut Latte

European, somewhat like your Eggs Benedict

Pan Fried Goat Cheese Salad

Overall:  8/10
Wild Honey has a very relax and homly feeling.  The tag line of Wild Honey is "All about Beautiful Breakfast, All Day, Everday"  Though the breakfast was not exactly cheap, ie $18 for poach eggs, the ambience made up for it.  Definitely a nice place to have breakfast, brunch, high tea or simply catching up with friends.

Address: #03-02, Mandarin Gallery,
Orchard Road, Singapore.
Telephone: +65 62353900

Mala HotPot @ Chong Qing Hotpot - Round X of Birthday Celebration

Alright, I confessed that I was a bit overboard in celebrating my birthday! Well, since I am not going anywhere this year, might as well eat all I can here! 

I had a craving for Hotpot, so decided to check out the The Chinese Feast - Chong Qing Hot Pot @ Suntec with Cheekit.  We went to the one at Tanglin Mall some years back, and I thought that Suntec would be more convenient.  The dinner was also to celebrate CK's birthday, which was 4 days after me.  Usually I would buy a cake or even a slice of cake, but this year he requested not to buy anything, just to have dinner.  He said that he was too old to celebrate birthday, and wanted to remain low profile.  Maybe that's the mentality of a happy and contended family man with 2 kids??!!  Anyway, I was happy to proceed with our usual tradition of celebrating our birthday together, with or without cakes.  :-)

This was the Mala Hotpot.  The red side was the spicy (x 100) side.  I did not take a lot of pictures this time, as most of the food were raw (Of course they were, since it was steamboat!)

My favourite fish paste.

Overall 8/10.  One of my favourite steamboat other than Coca.  Expect very hot, hot, very very mala soup!  Service was efficient and friendly.

The Chinese Feast - Chong Qing Hot Pot @ Suntec

3 Temasek Boulevard #B1-061 Suntec City Mall Singapore

Tel: +65 6337 6921

A walk down the Memory Lane

Another birthday celebration, but this was a special one.  The theme was "A walk down the memory lane" with Lilian, nothing fanciful, nothing atas, just Lilian spending time with me.  :-)

I had 2 options for dinner:  Pagi Sore or Chiang Mai Palace.  These were the 2 places that we frequent when our offices were near to one another some years back.  We had lunch almost every other day, and the regular routine was to have lunch, followed by coffee at either Ya Kun or Mr Teh Terik.  We were such as a regular that the owner there knew us, and we named them XLG ;-))

Having coffee at Ya Kun is a different experience compared to have it at other places.  Other than you can order coffee at a wave of your hand, you can also determine uncle's mood by the coffee. It was a pity that they closed at 6pm, if not we could have go there after dinner.

I chose Chiang Mai Palace, because I thought she just had Pagi a month back on her birthday.  Chiang Mai Palace was usually packed during lunch time, but for dinner, it was quiet, and to attract crowd, they have all you can eat ala carte buffet at $18.90+++, very reasonable price.  So we went ahead with the buffet.

Lilian bought another new toy- Canon S90.  So instead of concentrating on the food, we had a lot of fun taking photography!  One signs to show that you are too addicted into photography is how you describe your food.  When the dessert mango pudding was served, she said that the colour was just right, and i said that the White Balance was correct! Haha

The toy:

Here we go for Round 1:

We started with the Green Mango Salad.  I found it a bit too sour, but Lilian liked it, she said that it was a good apertiser.

Spicy tom Yum Soup.  Not the clear type, comes with chicken and mushrooms.

Thai Green Curry

Pineapple Fried Rice.  We were deciding between the Black Olive Rice and this, so I chose this instead as this was something that we used to eat :-)

Thai Fish Cake.  One of the best dishes for tonight, crunchy and can taste the spices used in the fish cake.

Fried Kang Kong.  (No Balachan Version).  Lilian cancelled the balachan on the order list, and the chef was smart enough to understand.

Spicy Chicken Wings.  A big portion for just the 2 of us, I was expecting 4 pieces.  And we could not taste any spiciness in the wings.  Maybe they should change the name to Fried Chicken Wings.

Tofu with Thai Sauce.

This was the most disappointing dish, fried long beans.  The beans were very tough, tooo crunchy, felt like they were not cooked.  We finished the mushrooms & carrots though.

The woman playing with toy when she should be eating.  This is a bad habit!

We stressed the waitress when I asked her to take photo of us.  She looked intimidated by Tom (My Canon 450D)

Trying out with different colour.  Somehow because of the background, it looked grainy.

After round 1, we proceeded to Round 2!!! 

Round 2 was at our usual hunt, at the eateries near Kovan MRT.  We started with the Jie Bread.  It was surprising crowded, and we thought that youngster hang out in pubs, not bread place!  At first, we ordered only the white bread with jam, but someone ordered the french toast, and we could not resist the aroma of the french toast, so we added french toast too!

 Bread with Jam..This is a comfort, magical food, can bring back all your childhood memories.

Playing with toy again.  Since bread would not turn cold, we played for quite a while..heehee

Once we finished Round 2, we went for Round 3- Evil Beancurd.  We can eat, can't we?

Evil beancurd is a very interesting place.  Whenever we go there, we will grow "horns" and turn very evil.  Other times, we are such such kind and lovable people.. ;-)

Evil beancurd is also well known for its extremely slow service, and once again, there was a long queue at the Evil Beancurd place.  There were at least 8 people in front of us.  Today I had the privilege of playing with the toy while she went to queue.  I love birthday heehee :-)

And Round 4 is....No more round 4, ate so much, super duper full!  No fine dining, no expensive wine, no nice table setting, but it was a very nice evening.  There was a very nostalgic feel, brought back a lot of memory, both bitter and sweet, the good times and the bad times.  Tonight will be a night that adds to the memories of our bond through these years, and definitely will be marked as a sweet one.

Thank you Lilian, for the wonderful evening.