Lunch without make-up: Relish

The power of social media alerted me to the fact that Relish was selling $40 vouchers at $30 only on one of those groupon coupon deals so since Bryan was hankering for a burger at Relish for the longest time, I did the good girlfriend thing and bought the coupon.

Relish, run by the same management who operates Wild Rocket, is tucked somewhere on the 2nd floor of Cluny Court. Parking is parallel along the quiet road on the other side of the court but since I fail at parallel anything, I chickened out and parked at Serene Centre next door instead, to the tune of $4.90. this inability to parallel park is really costing me. But then I tried to parallel park just now at home (my dad did say to practice whenever I can) and there were 2 lots worth of space and it still took me 5 minutes.

The place is a pretty wooden place that can sit about 50 pax. It was Saturday brunch so the place was full, good thing we had reservations. Allergic to noise, I winced at the sound level as there was a birthday celebration going on but the waiter managed to move us to a corner where I could observe at the cafe in peace.

To cut down on time needed to move from kitchen to floor, the owners have installed 3 large cones from the ceiling (seen on the left) to shoot out the waiters or the floor manager whenever a customer waves for attention. pretty ingenious I must say.

There was a table of good looking people in my line of sight so I kept staring at them. I was trying to figure out if Relish was a no make-up place or not because I wasn’t wearing make-up, having had a massage treatment just before lunch but the good-looking people were obviously dressed up for some noon time partying. it was only when they brought out a cake with a 33 candle on it that it made sense. Even I would put on some lipstick for cake.

Cod fish cakes. I like all things cod fish. even though it cost $19. the cakes aren’t that big. I just moved my iPhone really close to the food.

Bryan’s blue cheese burger. I almost threw up coz it’s blue cheese. Well I’d have the same reaction to durian chendol so no offense to Relish. but Bryan couldn’t stop moaning as he ate the burger so I guess it’s good.

I took the safer route and ordered Chorizo Fettucine, aglio olioed with wild rocket and pumpkin. surprisingly full of flavour, a bit like eating organic char kwey teow. reminded me of the wild rocket and pumpkin salad I had at House a long time ago.

Bryan likes Panna Cotta so we ordered this pandan version served with gula melaka. very creamy smooth and tasty. I recommend. I also couldn’t stop shaking the table just to watch the thing wobble like silicon breasts. I have a strange obsession with jiggly things.

you’d think that with a $40 voucher it would seem to make the meal cheaper but 1 cod cakes + 1 blue cheese burger + 1 pasta + 1 panna cotta + 2 beers + 1 coke = $110. not a cheap restaurant for sure, the food is relatively tasty, but for that price I’d rather go Les Bouchons. the toilet at Cluny Court is really clean although it reminds me of a swimming pool toilet for some reason. the shops upstairs are like the ones at Holland Village, dubious fashion and the random nail spa. it also has little boutiques that sells ridiculous things like a plastic cup for $12.90.

Adventures of Yoshimi: Loysey’s Toy / Papa Palheta

Loysey’s Toy (by Papa Palheta) is a specialty coffee place tucked away some where in between Lavender and the canals of Beach Road. It’s at the foot of some abandoned looking warehouse, abuzz with life of chi-chi coffee drinker types. I mean who else would drive all the way out here to this isolated corner to drink coffee and stare in disdain at anyone who dare step across the threshold.

actually the staff at Papa are very nice and friendly. the disdain came from the overly made-up girl who was glaring at me.

A bucket of paint, distraught at the state of the warehouse, jumped to its death here.

Bryan likes the coffee here and would make me drive all the way to the Bukit Timah branch to buy his kopi hoon. He has 3 coffee makers at home. Once at one of those mom & pop shops, he wanted to buy one of those old school coffee socks the old uncles used to drain their coffees and make kopi-o.

For once the bigger cup on the left is mine, with lots of milk and lot less potency. Very yummy I must admit.

Lunch without make-up: Smiths Authentic Fish & Chips

Found at 230 Tanjong Katong Road, opposite our favourite June Eating House, is Smiths Authentic British Fish & Chips. I’m not sure what the authentic part is as it tastes like any other fish & chips to me but then that’s coz I don’t quite fancy fish & chips. given a chance, I’d rather eat the fish without the batter, which was what I ended up doing, peeling the crispy skin off and eating and moist flesh underneath, much to Bryan’s amusement. Personally I prefer my fish covered with soy sauce or cooked diao zhang style.

You put your order at the counter and wait for your number to be called. all your fish comes wrapped in paper, great for easy clean up after.

Overall it’s rather good as it doesn’t have the fishy smell or taste, and the batter is nice and light, and quite tasty when doused with generous amounts of vinegar. I got the cod while Bryan ordered the haddock. the haddock was rather dry but my cod was quite moist and tasty. definitely better than fish & co anytime, but I’m not too sure about driving all the way to the east just to eat this again.

Spending time with my dad

This morning while getting ready for work, I was ruing the fact that I don’t get to see my dad much anymore. Apart from spending half my time at Bryan’s place, when I’m at home, sometimes my dad’s out and by the time he’s back, I’m already in bed. I fondly thought of the week Bryan was in China for a week where I spent a lot of time with my parents almost everyday, and even spent an entire day with my dad car shopping. Privately I wished that I could have another day like that with my dad.

Then my car died.
Luckily it happened in the car park and not in the middle of the highway during peak hour traffic. I couldn’t start my car at all and I suspected that the battery was flat. The first person I called was my dad. Within minutes, he was driving into the car park in his jogging gear. He had been on his way to the reservoir for a casual jog when I called him. He parked his car in front of mine and tried to jump start my car but it didn’t work. So we called for the tow truck instead.

My baby being towed away

Rather than sit in the tow truck with the grumpy tow guy, I sat in my dad’s car as we followed the truck to the workshop. after checking my car in, we went for lunch at a nearby coffee shop. There we talked about my brother’s wedding preparations and he told me about the Dinner of the In-Laws. As I sipped by carrot apple juice, he his kopi-o, my dad told me tales that I never knew before.

Done with lunch, we went to take a look at the show flat of the place we were eyeing, so we drove to the site and wandered around the show flat. We grabbed a copy of the property brochure and stood in front of the model as we discussed deeply the best non-afternoon sun facing block. Then he dragged me out into the hot sun and we started studying the geography around the area. we even went so far as to climb to the top floor of a neighbouring flat to get a better perspective. then we trekked around the proposed site to mark out the surrounding areas. We stood still as we listened to the roar of the traffic to determine the noise level. We loitered outside a nearby school to figure out how noisy school children can get.

I was vehement against facing a school while Bryan was against facing another flat. My dad, amused, asked why so, and wondered outloud if Bryan was planning to walk around the house naked. I recounted a conversation where we discussed what would happen if Bryan’s mom moved in with us and my first thought was, that I couldn’t walk around my own house naked. When I retold Bryan this conversation, he looked at me and said, you basically told your dad we will be seeing each other naked in future, if we haven’t yet already. it’s a good thing my dad has a sense of humour about such things.

by then my car was ready and my dad gave me a lift to the workshop to get it. I was just mighty pleased that I got to spend the day with my Dad. We had such a good conversation today. Just that I don’t need my car to die on me the next time I want to hang out with my dad again.

Guess who sat in my car today?

When Bryan isn’t around, he gets to ride shotgun.

I started reading comics at a young age, not the Marvel or DC comics variety, but more of Tintin and his adventures, and of course the lovable Asterix and Obelix. The 2 adventure loving Vikings amused me to no end, the never-ending battles with the Romans drew giggles from me. I soon grew familiar with the villagers; Vitalstatistix the chief, Hydrophobia the fishmonger’s wife and Cacofonix the out-of-tune town bard. now upon reading their names as an adult, I realised what their names really mean.

Of course not forgetting the 2 stars, Asterix and Obelix.
looks a lot like Bryan and me eh?

Every time a person meets Bryan for the first time, they invariably ask the same 3 questions:

1. How tall are you?
2. Are your parents as tall as you?
3. Do you play basketball?

I think instead of rolling his eyes, he can say he fell into a tub of magic potion as a kid, but I doubt many would get it.

if they know him through me, they will ask me the 4th question: How do you 2 have sex? I AM NOT KIDDING. you have no idea how many times this stupid question has been asked of me.

The Asterix Grand Collection = WANT!

Lunch without make-up series: Simply Bread

My Sundays are always lazy. I’d like to say it’s after a night of partying but unfortunately not as my partying days are over (12 years of partying does wear you down). I guess it’s the thought of the weekend ending that makes me wanna slow down and do as little as possible to drag it as long as I possibly can.

Lazy Sunday lunches are thus the order of the day. Ever since our Sunday lunch at Colbar, I’m now on the hunt for lunch places where I don’t put on make-up and not care about it. The usual searches on hungrygowhere got me nowhere. I tried gooogling “Lunch + Singapore” but all I got were chi-chi recommendations on ladyironchef’s website, which goes against my make-up-less decree. So it is with great difficulty that we found this little cafe at Guthrie House along 5th Avenue.

Simply Bread is a sandwich cafe, as the name suggests. It is a small simple cafe which serves a simple selection of sandwiches from ham & cheese to roast beef, on a variety of bread. One would expect the smell of freshly baked bread in a place such as this but I guess that’s reserved for those who turn up in the mornings. When we got there, the place was almost full with the lunch crowd which was an unfortunate thing as the place is low-ceilinged so the chatter was uncomfortably loud and annoying.

Roast Beef sandwich on Ciabatta. The sandwiches are full-bodied meat stacked between fresh vegetables in between thick slices of bread. All sandwiches are served with a side of coleslaw. You have other breakfast options such as french toast or ham and eggs. Or something simple like toast with butter and jam.

Ham & Cheese sandwich on garlic ciabatta, which I didn’t like very much, but then that’s because I don’t fancy sandwiches much myself. Strangely enough, I cannot eat my meat with bread, although I love them separately. So here I am eating my sandwich in parts; first the top layer of bread, then the greens, followed by the thin slices of ham. by the time I’m halfway through, I was about to give up on my lunch. The garlic was slightly overpowering and I guessed I’d have been better off with plain ciabatta or sourdough. Overall a little disappointing though since Bryan can make a sandwich as this by himself, which he did once for me when I had to pack breakfast to work.

Overall I don’t think I’ll go back there unless I forget how much I prefer not to eat sandwiches. It might be a nice place to hide but go only after the lunch crowd clears around 3pm.

Lunch without make-up series: Colbar

I was introduced to Colbar by Tricia on the day post Halloween. We were all suffering from different degrees of hangoverness and feeling like crap. All we wanted was a quiet place to have lunch before we headed home to sleep.

Colbar, which apparently stands for Colonial Bar at some point, is a quiet single storey building set at Portsdown Road. It is an unassuming place that doesn’t pretend to be a cool cafe that only good-looking people go to. in fact, the interior of the place looked a lot like an old school coffee shop, complete with the tiny square tiles from the 80s. the place was covered with old trophies and pictures from yesteryears. the place is run by an auntie with a few helpers.

 

The place is patronised by many ang mohs, which in itself surprising considering the layout of the place and the type of food. The food is a mix of western fry (mixed grill, chicken cutlet, etc) and asian (Hainanese pork chop rice, stir fried noodles, etc). However due to the white crowd, the prices of these things are a little higher than usual. The chicken cutlet I bought tasted like any other cutlet from a western food stall at a coffee shop, which would at most go for $5? At Colbar it was $10. Our Nescafe coffee was $1.80 per cup. They also have a wide selection of ales and ciders which makes this place most interesting.

But what I really like about this place is its quietness, apart from the children running around in the adjourning lawn. there are even big dogs lying around looking at the children. You can sit there and stare into space as your weekend ticks away. A great place to recover from a hangover. This place is so laid back you can turn up in t-shirt, shorts sans make-up.

I Love Zi Char series: Jin Long Seafood Restaurant

Always on the hunt for good salted egg crab ever since the one I tasted at Port Dickson, Malaysia 5 years ago. We’ve pretty much settled on the one at June Eating House which served the dry type which I very much preferred to the condensed milk version. However at Aaron’s insistence, we decided to check out the one at Bedok.

Jin Long Seafood Restaurant
Blk 412 Bedok North Avenue 2, #01-152 Singapore

Jin Long started out as a regular coffee shop zi char place where its popularity grew and it is now its own restaurant. Last night alone, there were 3 families celebrating grandma birthdays (yes they even played the cheesey HAPPY BIRTHDAY track for them), which attest to the fact that the food is good enough even for joyous occasions.

Tofu with chye poh. we picked this based on an ieatishootipost review. as tofus go, I prefer the softness and tastiness of the one at June, but the crispiness of the chye poh here gives it good flavour.

Sambal kang kong. Aaron is on some weird taste test to find the best sambal kang kong in Singapore. this one is not too spicy, which is good for Bryan’s weak palate but it’s mighty tasty due to the dried shrimp.

This is an amazing fine. usually I don’t order hor fun unless it’s something I can pack home for dinner but based on another review Aaron found, it came highly recommended and it’s amazingly good. the sauce is nice and thick, and is very very tasty without being too salty. the kway teow comes with the right amount of wok hei, which is the charredness you get when stir frying in a wok at extremely high heat. it adds a delicious burnt flavour which goes very well with the sauce. it was so good Bryan was inhaling his wok hei, which I thought was a little insane.

Since everyone had a favourite to try, we appeased Bryan with Thai Style pig trotters, in replacement of the pork knuckles at Junes. I typically don’t like Thai styled anything coz of the sticky sweet chili sauce. the meat on this pig leg was soft and succulent. both boys cleaned it to the bone.

And the reason for the 30min drive to the east arrived as last dish. I took a pincer and started licking the shell. there was a thin coat of salted egg clinging onto the shell which was mixed with curry leaf and some chili which gave the flavour a kick. it was surprisingly good that I started licking the shell earnestly, much to Aaron’s disgust. I even took the shell head in the end and licked the other side of the shell, totally ignoring the precious crab roe that most people usually go for.

Orh Nee, the nectar of Gods. actually it’s just yam paste with gingko nuts. Funnily I don’t like yam but I love orh nee. Jin Long’s orh nee is well-made, thick and sweet without being over-poweringly so.

Definitely worth the drive there. The service was unexpectedly good, where they separated the meat on the pig’s trotter for you and even served the horfun into individual bowsl before you could ask. There was this nice auntie who reminded us 5 times that the bowl of water with lime was for us to wash our hands. and she also made sure we really didn’t want to stick the entire trotter bone in our face and suck it dry before she removed it.

Parking is at regular HDB car park behind the restaurant.

***

Since we’re in the far east, we headed to Quarubar at Frankel Avenue, a chi-chi looking bar that serves a respectable range of whiskys (any place that serves Bryan’s Auchentoshan has gotta be of some standard) among other things. Alamay was present to sing a few evergrens and jazz hits. they had 2 tvs showing the Wigan vs Man U match. it was a nice place to chill at if you’re in the neighbourhood, minus the fact when Alamay is singing, you can’t even hear yourself. they should really adjust the volume a tad bit. you can park by the side of the road as the place is surrounded by landed property so no problems with parallel parking there.

Singaporean drivers aren’t that bad

Anyone who drives invariably has something to complain about other drivers. Other drivers who do not signal as they change lane, other drivers who hog the roads, other drivers who cut your lane too suddenly, other drivers who do things you would never do in your life. It’s always something that some Other driver does that pisses you off. Road rage is a common thing, whether in a small or big way and even the nicest person on my livejournal circle can be prone to screaming and shouting in the confines of the car.

How often then do we notice those who are not bad drivers? The ones who do signal or give way when you’re trying to filter into their lane? A taxi driver actually gave way to me while I was trying to turn out into his lane and I waved him thanks. How often do you wave at someone in thanks coz they were courteous to you on the road? How often did someone wave to you coz you gave way to them?

Perhaps it’s because people expect these things that they take the small stuff for granted. We all talk about appreciating the small things in life, or the small things your loved one does for you. How about appreciating the small things that other drivers to for you? I think it will make the roads a better place to drive on.

Which leads me to what happened today. I was driving along CTE (central expressway) this morning stuck in peak hour semi-traffic when I hear the sirens of an ambulance. I glanced at all mirrors but didn’t see anything so I assumed that the ambulance was on the road going the other way. Suddenly, the huge Mercedes on my right started inching into my lane and I looked at him alarmed when I realised why, coz the ambulance was right next to him trying to  squeeze through the rightmost lane. now I don’t think they teach you in driving school what to do but the School of Life dictates that I try to give way to the Mercs so he could give way to the ambulance. the car in front wasn’t moving so I signaled left and tried to inch into the lane on my left. 2 cars went by before a huge ass lorry looming into my left view mirror started slowing down and gave way to me. The Mercs turned into my lane and the ambulance sped down the road that is now mostly cleared by the cars in front. I guess it was partially stuck because of me not reacting quick enough to the Mercs, as all this while I was thinking perhaps the ambulance siren was coming from the radio.

I couldn’t help but smile to myself and said I did that little bit by giving way to an ambulance in need, along with all the other drivers. I’ve heard some say that in Singapore, drivers don’t know how to give way to emergency vehicles the way they do in Western countries. well today proved them wrong. Others would say, this deed goes without saying! But I feel that every good deed shouldn’t go unmentioned.

This definitely made my day and I was smiling for the rest of my drive.

Feast of Everest Kitchen

Beautiful Nepalese dinner at New Everest Kitchen at 55 Chandar Road

They were showing the tv promo of some Asian food show where local star Kumar was going gaga over curries and I suddenly had a craving for curry, when I don’t usually like curry. Talk about power of suggestion.

Bryan was surprised when I mentioned Everest as it was one of his favourite restaurants (he loves all manners of Indian or like-Indian food) and we rarely go there. We bravely drove to Little India on a public holiday. And yes if you’re wondering. Little India on public holiday is as bad as it is on Sundays. The locals were crossing the street like they owned it and the cars were the ones trespassing.

Everest was almost full when we got there. We ordered the usual:
Momo: deep fried dumplings (or Americans call them pot stickers – which I find amusing) with minced meat served with orange curry sauce at the side

Butter chicken: pieces of chicken coated with a rich layer of butter cream sauce

Goat cheese with spinach cream sauce

Eggplant curry

Mutton Vindaloo, very very spicy mutton curry cooked with tomatoes and potatoes. EAT AT YOUR OWN RISK!

All this with my favourite butter naan and a pot of Nepalese tea (actually masala tea). I usually order a glass of mango lassi but I had a cough it’s doctor’s orders to avoid anything sour.

Nepalese food is a lot like north Indian food, using a lot of yoghurt, cream and vegetables like eggplant, chickpeas and tomatoes. It’s vert rich and a nice pot of tea at the end washes everything down nicely.

So we were talking about A’s girl when he mentioned she wore braces. I mused out loud what it was like kissing someone wearing braces and if you’d hurt yourself by grazing against the metal bits. A was about to reply when Bry interrupted by saying not really, obviously taking reference from his previous experience with his ex, whom we fondly refer to as Metalmouth. I shot Bry a glare and said who asked his opinion (how dare he think of her in such context). He obviously found it hilarious, laughing till his belly ached.

Humph. It’s going to be a long time till we visit Everest again.