Singapore Lifestyle, Beauty and Travel Blog

I ♥ Taiwan - Heart of 西門町 (Day 1)

June 26, 2014

4 months back, I was "having the time of my life" in Taiwan. As much as I was excited for my first visit to the country full of delicious street food, I never expect to fall seriously ill and spend my days getting jabs and vomiting. But that is another story. The weather in Taiwan was a whole new experience, convinced that I was able to withstand the "breeze" there, I bravely wore a dress and suffered serious shivers the moment I alight at the airport and had to escape to the wash room to throw on more clothings.

Our humble stay for the first 4 days - Taipei York 台北悠閣.

Taipei York is a home-stay place (民宿) located within 7 minutes walk from XMD station and the rooms come in different themes, which makes the stay more enjoyable. Our minimalistic room was unexpectedly clean and looks like a totally new room. The modern and chic design of the room had me forgetting that this is a home-stay place, it could easier be tag as a boutique hotel room.

After unpacking, our very first activity of the trip was non other than EAT! That's practically the main activity to do in this gourmet filled country. S brought us to this famous Mala hotpot restaurant (马辣顶级麻辣鸳鸯火锅) which usually requires advance booking, but we managed to score ourselves a table through walk-in! #lucky

We ordered collagen and mala soup base for our hotpot, those lychee jelly cubes lookalikes are actually collagen cubes that were dissolved inside the soup.

From appetizers to desserts, their range of food is beyond explanation. Tired of the usual soda drinks? Here, they offer you a wide range of flower tea that helps to improve your health. Ready to pick some food for your pot? they have 2 whole shelves of ingredients for you to pick, from vegetables to seafood, get ready to be wowed. Oh yes, free flow crabs, something you can't expect from local hotpot restaurants. Even their beef are of such superior quality, my stomach growls just looking at the picture. Love desserts? No sweat, they have an entire row of Mövenpick ice cream flavours to choose from.

This meal definitely started my Taiwan trip right.

Mother's Day Home-cooked meal

May 19, 2014

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This is the 3rd year we are celebrating Mother’s Day with home cooked dinner. We started off with Italian cuisine – Carbonara pasta with clam chowder soup the year before, and then Thai cuisine last year – Tom Kha soup, sambal kang kong, sweet & sour fish and cereal prawns. Fortunately, I grew up in a family where I was greatly encouraged to use the kitchen and explore culinary. Probably also because my siblings and I were taught to help out in the kitchen at a very young age, I grew up cultivating a passion for cooking. This year, we decided on Western cuisine – Chicken Cutlet with creamy chunky mushroom soup.

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I made mashed herb potatoes to go with my brother’s coleslaw as the sides for the main dish. Mashed potatoes are one of the easiest dishes to make. For a rather huge family, my side was made with 6 potatoes along with other ingredients: butter, milk, flat-leaf parsley, salt and pepper. As for the coleslaw, we chopped carrots and cabbage into small cubes before mixing it with coleslaw sauce and leaving it to chill in the fridge.

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The mushroom soup was the dish which required different preparation methods and longer time to prepare. First off, I had to slice shiitake mushrooms into pieces, chop the onion and garlic into cubes (not too small) and prepare a pot of chicken stock broth. Secondly, melt some butter in a saucepan and sauté the ingredients until they turned soft and the flavor comes out. Then I put the sautéed ingredients into the food processor and blend them into smaller cubes. You do not want to blend them into the mushy state as you still want to leave the chunkiness in the soup.

After the ingredient has been blended, I pour them into the pot of broth, add in chopped tiny basil leaves and milk before bring it to boil. Depending on how creamy you like your soup to be, you can add more/lesser milk to the broth. When the soup starts to boil, I add in corn flour to thicken the soup. When adding the flour, you have to stir the soup at the same thing, allowing the flour to instantly gets dissolved into the broth, or else they with become tiny bits of awful starch. Garnished the soup with extra parsley.

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My brother’s recipe of his chicken cutlet involves covering the chicken in bread crumbs and grated Parmesan cheese before frying it. For the sauce, he mixed honey mustard with sour cream and add in extra honey; definitely one of the best sauce I ever tried. It was so yummy, we made extra to dip the fries with.

It is not only the process that was enjoyable, the time spent hanging out with the family and the smile on their faces also made up to the sense of achievement. Afterall, family are the ones who know you best and will always be there for you.

Lets catch up

May 09, 2014

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Indeed, it’s time to do some catching up. This space is definitely lacking on my daily updates. It has been almost 2 months since my Taiwan trip and all the photographs are still silently waiting for me for blog about them, whereas the girlfriend has already started with the trip! I can be a really neglectful blogger at times. But the truth is (as always), life really had been hectic. I truly wish I had more than 24 hours.

Some weeks back (thanks to S & B), I finally visited the renowned ‘The Tiramisu Hero’ café. The place was simply stunning and impressive. The lawn, the brilliantly designed and brightly lit interior as well as those hand drawn graphics of Sir Antonio on the walls; every little detail caught me heart even before I sank my teeth into their food.

When you’re at The Tiramisu Hero, you obviously have to try out their signature item – Tiramisu. And so, we ordered 3 different tiramisu: Original, strawberry and chocolate to try out. I personally love the classic one to the others. I never say no to coffee and the aroma of the espresso greatly appeals to me. In addition to the chilled cream and cakey bite; it was a whole new level of heaven for my taste buds. Their chunky mushroom soup is one of the items you should definitely try! Majority of us agree that it was one of the best mushroom soup, and this was proven to be fact when we realized that it was the most frequently prepared order in the kitchen.

THE TIRAMISU HERO CAFE
121 Tyrwhitt Road Singapore 207548

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The heat of café hopping has notably risen through the years. I have caught the heat myself. In search of cafés, I came across Commune Café & Bistro No. 50 and bugged J to try it out with me. Commune is actually a furniture design and lifestyle company, the café is located beside their flagship store. Having seen way too many of pictures of their waffles and marvelous coffee arts on Instagram, I was clearly pinning high hope on it.

The café’s dining area is actually situated at the link way of the mall. It seems strange and awkward for placing seats in such weird locations. But after settling down, I started to notice how pleasantly quiet the surrounding is. It seems to be the perfect spot to study, do some work or enjoy a book. We ordered their grilled chicken panini, waffle with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream topped with blueberry sauce and a cup of mocha with extra hazelnut blend. When the mocha arrived, I was so disappointed with the coffee art. It seems like a pool of unstirred cream, and the waffle was not crispy enough, it was rather doughy. Only the chicken panini was able to salvage our disappointment.

COMMUNE CAFE & BISTRO NO. 50
9 Raffles Boulevard, Millenia Walk, #02-50

Momiji Japanese Buffet (City Square Mall)

April 22, 2014

valentine's at antoinette

March 06, 2014

CNY hightlights 2014

February 12, 2014

The chinese new year hype might have died down, but containers and containers of cny goodies stacked at home served as a constant reminder that this festive celebration was just a week ago and that I should get back to my fitness routine. This year, I never expect that I would commit myself to queuing long hours under the scorching sun just to purchase bak kwa (bbq dried pork slices). I always see it as ridiculous and a waste of precious time, but I still went with it anyway. I'm glad I did. I am always so busy trying to get my post-education life together, having so much stuff to worry in my mind, I never truly enjoyed something. The 3 hours wait was honestly excruciating, but after I got my hands on those legendary cny products, the achievement I felt was beyond words. Besides, the bak kwa was really yummy too.

Kim Peng Hiang (金品香) might not have done as much advertising as big brands such as Lim Chee Guan, Bee Cheng Hiang or Fragrance, yet this 70-years old brand still attracts eye-catching queues during the chinese new year period. Kim Peng Hiang only has 2 outlets set up on this island; Chinatown Pearl's Centre and 465 Changi Road (main outlet). Their hot selling product is the Pineapple BBQ Pork, where thinly shredded pineapples were adding into the pork slice. A whole new sensation to the taste buds.

Instead of the usual hotpot dinning style for reunion dinner, our family had ours in the peng chai (盆菜) style. This year, we also had a record breaking of over 10 containers of cny goodies received from families and friends. Just J alone, has already contributed 5 containers to the batch. It's going be a tough time finishing these goodies but nevertheless, I appreciate all the love showered on my family. 初二 was filled with house visiting/hopping, and the last house visit we went before calling it a day was Timo's place. We had a tour at his gigantic house located at Stevens Road before being ushered into the kitchen where endless delicious food keeps coming out from the kitchen. I guess this must be what it feels like to live like a queen haha! Last few visiting for the entire chinese new year period too place in Malaysia, over at my maternal family. I would say the best thing, beside see my long-distance relatives again, was getting to eat my favourite coleslaw fried dough fritters (油條) again :)