Coffee addict

Are you a coffee addict? I know I am and I know I need minimum 1 cup of coffee per day to stay sane at time, hahaha. Any type of coffee works for me. Latte, long black, cappuccino, flat white, kopi-o, kopi-c, AS LONG AS it's not 3-in-1. In my opinion, 3-in-1 is the worst type of coffee ever because the amount of sugar and creamer in that small sachet spoils the real taste of coffee.

The best coffee I tried so far is in Australia. Trust me when I say you can walk to ANY place in Australia and you can get GOOD coffee. Even the coffee is my office in Australia disperse coffee that is way better than the coffee we get in Starbuck, TCC etc etc. But guess what, just as I was scrolling through my photo album to find pictures of the nice coffees I tried so far, I realise I did not take any pictures of the fantastic coffees I had in Australia!!! OMG...... this is crap.

Anyways, there are some of the coffee pictures that I would like to share in this posting just to prove my point of a coffee addict. Haha.

Cooking healthy lunch in office with electic lunch box

Ever since I shifted out from my parents' place, it's common for me to eat my meals outside in coffee shops, food courts and restaurant because of the time constraint I have to cook my own meals after work. As for weekends, I also find it a chore to cook and wash up (basically, I am just lazy, haha). When I saw some of my colleagues buying electric lunch box and cooking simple lunches in office, I was seriously intrigued by how simple it is to cook a meal that is healthy and delicious so here I am jumping on the bandwagon to cooking with electric lunchbox!

I opt for the bigger capacity with the option of single or double tier. It's always a good idea to have the flexibility of expansion :)

So here you can see that it basically comes with 2 bowls. 1 slightly bigger suitable to cook soups, porridge, stews etc and a smaller bowl that u can use to steam smaller items or even rice for a single portion.

The concept behind the electric lunch box is basically steaming. All you need to do is pour water (I usually use hot water) at the lowest compartment of the lunch box and it will create steam to cook the raw food ingredients. Yes, your ingredients can be raw and the steam will cook it till it's fully cooked! In general, I noticed that 20 - 30 mins is all it takes to fully cook the ingredients. For soups (especially if I want it to be more flavourful, I will cook up to an hour. As long as there is water in the lower compartment, it will continue to steam and cook. So during the times when I am cooking a dish for longer period of time, I either add more water at the beginning of the process or add water after a while to keep the electric lunch box cooking.

Here are some of the dishes I have tried in office. They are all simple, one dish items.

Quinoa with salmon, carrots and edamame beans

Quinoa with steamed salmon, golden mushrooms and tomato

Corn, carrot and pork ribs soup with rice

Claypot chicken rice! Yums!

Pork porridge with cabbage, carrot and century egg

You can see from the dishes I tried above that it's simple to use this electric lunch box. Just need to exercise some creativity on what you want to cook for the day.

I ordered my electric lunch box from Qoo10 previously at around $20+ and it is a product made in China. You can use a travel adaptor for this lunch box as the original plug will be China plug. I have been using the cooking regularly for close to a year and is still working well.

For readers out there who find cooking to be a chore, this is something that you can consider to start simple healthy cooking. :)

Ambush at Plaza Singapura

Starting from last week, I had a pact with my 2 sisters that we will meet up every Tuesday for a 'sistery gathering'. We will just meet up, have dinner, gossip and even shopping. Anything goes. So this week, we headed to Plaza Singapura for dinner and we ended in Ambush.

Located on level 4 of the new wing of Plaza Singapura, it is not difficult to locate it because it is right in the middle. It does not have a shop lot like others but it is still quite spacious in it. We decided to order an appetizer and a few main courses to share.

 

Our appetizer is rosti and it is yummy! The crust is nice and crispy and they sprinkled black pepper in it which gives it a nice mild hot taste to it.

My youngest sister decided to be adventurous and ordered baby scallop and fish roe pasta with squid ink. It does not look appetizing but is the tastiest among the 3 main courses that we ordered.

My second sister also chose a pasta dish and it's vongole. It's not bad too but comparing the 2 pasta dish, i personally find the squid ink pasta to be more flavourful. It will be nicer is there is some chilli in the vongole pasta to give the extra kick.

I decided to go for marinara paella because my youngest sis tried it before and said it is not bad. I personally didn't like it because it has too much tomato paste for my liking and was very sour. The best paella is still from Serenity *THUMBS UP*.

I am a fan of chai tea latte and saw from their menu that they have honey ginger chai tea latte. Ordered it and I can't taste any honey or ginger in it. Hmmm......

What best way to end a sister-y gathering with some shopping??? We headed to Lowry Farm and I saw this top that I really like. It was on discount at $49.90 when the original price is $89 *gasp*. I will not buy this top at $89.

My second sis commented that it will look nice with a nice necklace (did I mention she is an accessory queen) so I pulled her to Lovisa with me to get a necklace to match this top and I ended with 3 necklaces!

Nothing beats sister-y times!

I love weekends!!!

Yet another week has come and gone again and very soon March will be over soon. Hope you guys had a good weekend because I sure enjoyed mine!

I had my first try of making baked pasta and was surprised with my own skills, lol. It tasted pretty good and doesn't take up much time. Preparation time plus cooking only took around 30 minutes.

Not sure how many of you ever since a $1000 note because I sure haven't seen one. When my mum's friend showed me, I told her to loan me for 5 seconds to take this picture. Haha.

I used to hate nail polishes with glitters because it is a pain to remove polishes with glitters. But after putting on OPI Teenage Dream for the first time, I really like how it looks!

And how can I not feature my furbabies in this posting??? Check out the bed hoarders (Astro on the left and Simba on the right) and Titus looking blur as usual in the next picture. :)

Another week has passed.......

Time certainly flies, doesn't it? I always suffer from pre Monday blues on Sunday and before I know it, it is mid week and yes, Friday is here! My week has certainly been up and down but let's focus on positivity!!

Check out naughty Astro! Sneaking into a bag when he has a chance, lol

And here we have blurry Titus who is snuggling beside BC

More Paul & Joe from Beautybay.com. I can't get enough of them!

I can finally eat cold stuffs after my cough has subsided, yeah!

All Day Breakfast at Robert Timms

This is yet another post on food, haha. But it has been a while since I lasted posted on food isn't it? BC and myself actually stopped hunting down places to eat over the weekends because he is either busy with work or we are too lazy and tired to find new places and just settle for the normal, boring, usual places near our places. So yesterday, we decided to head down to Robert Timms at Wheelock Place for brunch before he head off for work while I meet up with J.

The last time Robert Timms caught our attention, it was unfortunately packed and we were not able to get a table as we did not make a table reservation. This time, we make a table reservation a day before and thus we got a nice table in the indoor area.

The All Day Breakfast menu is pretty extensive from french toast, american breakfast, eggs benedict and cereals. Price seems pretty decent between 12 - 19 (depending on the dish you chose) and from the pictures, it certainly look enticing as well.

BC ordered a french toast with fresh fruits while I opt for sausage with scrambled eggs croissant. There is a choice to choose between plain croissant and multi grain croissant. I chose the plain one because eating a multigrain one sounds weird in my opinion. Haha.

BC was not happy with his french toast because honestly, he has HIGH expectation of what a french toast should be. To him, french toast should have eggs soaked right through the bread and not just sitting on the surface of the bread. Robert Timms' french toast was unfortunately the latter. My sausage with scrambled eggs croissant was normal, but the scrambled eggs taste more like bite-sized omelette. I am fine with the taste but I still feel the eggs at Hatched win hands down.

BC enjoyed his skinny latte very much because it was frothy and strong, just what he need before his work on a Sat. My russian earl grey tea taste weird........ it taste more like burnt tea leaves in a pot with hot water added and was bitter to the max. Despite me adding sugar to the tea (which I usually was able to drink my tea without milk and sugar), it still taste bitter. So thumbs down for the tea.

But despite the food which I thought was normal, I have to praise their service. Their serving crews are attentive and polite which is a super plus, in my opinion. I probably will not head over for the breakfast menu and russian earl grey tea, but I would certainly want to try their desserts or coffee. :)

Spruce @ Phoenix Park

After completing my 2nd year with the current employer and stepping into the 3rd year, L and myself (we joined on the same day) decided to pamper ourselves by going for a nicer lunch. L, being a foodie went online and search for a place near our office and we eventually settled for Spruce.

Spruce is located at Phoenix Park, which is along Tanglin Road. A cozy place on a mini hill top and surrounded by trees and greens, it looks extremely relaxing and definitely a wonderful place for weekend brunch. I am soo going to ask BC to go Spruce for the weekend brunch!

The indoor area looks bright and white with many nice art pieces hanged on the wall. I like the relaxing greens of the outdoor area and we opt to sit outside since the weather was not too hot that day.

They do serve brunch menu but only on weekends and I was actually quite disappointed since I am a No. 1 brunch menu lover. Me and L decided to order 2 main course from their lunch and dinner menu to share. L chose Spruce burger (which is highly recommended by her friend which also seem extremely popular since we see a lot of patrons ordering it as well) and I chose Orecchiette, a pasta dish served with chopped prawns in zucchini and garlic cream.

In case you are wondering why is the Spruce burger and fries so small in serving size, I have to say the staffs there are very attentive to the customers. While placing our orders, L mentioned that we are sharing the food, they took the initiative to serve the burger and fries on 2 plates, this is what I called excellent service. :)

L saw her favourite cider and we decided to share a bottle. Although it has 4.5% alcohol content, we did not get drunk enough to be unable to work after lunch, haha.

And here I am posing like a silly gal!

Ardent's Cafe @ Neil Road

This is another week of brunch outing again. I love brunch (so I can sleep in later) and I love all day breakfast because I can never get enough of scrambled eggs. The new place which I had explored last weekend is Ardent's Cafe at Neil Road.

The decoration of the cafe is actually not bad but I forgot to take picture of the place as I was busy chatting with juju and BC most of the time when we were there. It is actually quite cozy with big arm chairs and sofas or normal dining table. The 3 of us ordered different food from the menu they are taste quite nice.

I shared a Big Breakfast and mascapone and nutella pancakes with BC. By ordering Big Breakfast, we get to choose 5 ingredients ranging from eggs, ham, bacon, snail sausages, smoked salmon, potato balls, sauteed mushrooms, baked beans, roasted beef, turkey ham with toast and salad. I like the flexibility of mixing and mataching what I want in my breakfast. We chose 2 portions of eggs (scrambled, of course), snail sausage, turkey ham and potato balls. The eggs is nice and smooth but could be a bit more salty (as it was quite plain) and the snail sausage has cheese oozing out which is quite nice. I like the potato balls because it is something different from the usual hash browns.

We had a surprise with the mascapone and nutelle pancakes as it came looking like pancakes with a scoop of chocolate ice cream. But the chocolate ice cream is actually nutella mixed with mascapone. It taste really rich and goes very well with the pancakes. However, for me who doesn't have sweet tooth, we couldn't finish the nutella spread at all. It was served with maple syrup and some pureed kiwi (i think) which we hardly touched since the nutella spread is all we need.

Juju ordered a baked omelette which looks quite interesting. It has tomatoes, mushrooms, asparagus and I think ham in it? I had a taste of it and it has a slight tangy taste from the tomatoes.



Ardent's cafe has a very interesting man-made grass area as their outdoor area. It has swing and some outdoor tables and chairs for outdoor dining which is quite nice. Unfortunately I did not managed to take any pics as it was raining when I wanted to. But if you are interested to see more pics of their cafe and outdoor area, you can check out Beatrice's blog posting here and juju's posting here.

I have no complaints about the food at Ardent's and in fact I like their all day breakfast menu. But I certainly has issue with the service staff there. When we arrive at Ardent's, we were the first customer and there were only a female staff there. Her service attitude is really bad..... She doesn't smile, and when we ask her question about the option of choosing 2 portion of eggs in our Big Breakfast, she was impatient in explaining to us and answered in a tone like we were idiots. Seriously, I am put off by it. I'm ok with no smiles because I don't smile as much too but as a service staff, it is important to take note of your tone when talking to your customers, isn't it? If I know everything about your menu and cafe, why would I bother to ask you??? For someone from a country whom I know ALOT of friendly people, I think she really need to self reflect.

Nonetheless, for brunch fans, I would still recommend this place to you for your enjoyment of their food but I will be praying for you that you do not get the lousy service I exprienced.

Ippudo Singapore @ Mandarin Gallery

For the longest time, I have heard raves about Ippudo ramen at Mandarin Gallery. Everything I walked past, there is always a queue outside the shop and I seriously thought to myself if it is really that good.

Last Saturday, I was in need of a serious ramen fix and I told BC that I want to try Ippudo ramen (no negotiation! since BC hates queueing and Ippudo does not accept reservations). We headed to Mandarin Gallery around 530pm and there is already a queue building up. We were in queue for about 10 - 15mins and a table was arranged for us.

The ramen menu was pretty straightforward. There is only 3 types of ramen: Shiromaru Hakata (ramen with char siew, black fungus), another type (which I forgot but is pretty similar to Shiromaru Hakata but with garlic oil) and spicy version of Shiromaru Hakata. There are options to add flavoured eggs, pork belly, tender pork cubes or even bamboo shoots (with additional costs). And both me and BC chose Shiromaru Hakata with flavoured egg.

The soup is flavourful and the ramen is Q and firm. If you prefer your ramen to be softer or harder, you can indicate to their staff when they are taking down your order. I opt for normal firmness and it turn out well and Q enough. The char siew is soft and tender but a bit on the salty side. The egg is to die for because the external is hard but the centre is super soft and the yolk is still a bit runny, NICE!

We ordered potato mentai on the side and we find it was just normal with potato baked with mayonnaise, roe and cheese.

Overall the ramenis quite nice as I like the Q noodles and the flavourful soup base. However, the soup does gives me a dry throat after the meal, which I suspect could be due to the MSG. The restaurant is quite noisy as the shop space is small and crowded with people so it's definitely not a place for you to chill out and catch up with your friends. For you guys who would like to try Ippudo ramen, my advices are:-

1) Don't go in big group. Max 4 pax so it's easier to get a table

2) Queue earlier. At least an hour before the normal meal time.

Brunetti

Nothing beats a nice breakfast with a good friend and hubby. Yums yums!!

TGIF

I almost survived the week!!! It's finally Friday today..... It should be 530pm now and not just morning.

In current hectic environment is Singapore, sometimes it's really hard to find a nice, relaxing and cool (given the heat during this time of the year) to hang out. Last week, me and BC headed to MBS after our movie at Marina Square and had our dinner at Coffee Bean & Leaf before the dinner queue starts.


While having our food, the gigantic water fountain next to us start the ritual of releasing water from the top. It doesn't splash unto us at all even though we are sitting pretty near but we can feel a nice cool breeze with faint damp feel. It's quite relaxing in my opinion. Me and BC end up looking at the 'water fall' without talking for about 5 minutes. It feels quite serene with all the crowd still happening around.


After a while, I joked with BC that I felt like I am sitting beneath a gigantic basin and someone above is washing their dishes! Lol

If there is any nice places you guys can recommend for a relaxing weekend, do share with me. Air conditioned place preferred. Haha