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Sport & Recreation
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1=SGD 0.0587
First time to the newly open Ion Orchard's Swensen outlet. So much had been heard about the place especially the ice cream buffet. (I will touch on that later), decided to meet up with my friends for dinner yesterday. Since the place is newly open, I would expect quite a crowd there and the place to be packed to brim during meal times. On a Monday night, I can say that the place is packed to the brim with a long queue outside as well.
When I was looking through the menu, the waiter was quite attentive, coming every 5 mins asking if we want to order. Seems that they added in a few local dishes but if I want to eat dishes like chicken rice, I am sure that Swensens is not the first place I will think of. For mains, we ordered the normal dishes such as Swesens's Combo, BBQ Half Chicken and Breaded Chicken. (All the fried stuff less the BBQ Chicken). For dessert, we decided to go for the ice cream buffet.
Have to say that the mains came out pretty fast, within 15 mins. However have to say the portion or the taste of the food leaves much to desire. The fries are soggy, the fried stuff are oily, no taste, seems like they are fried again food. Simply BAD! With the food on our table, we were not served our cutlery, I have to remind the waiter for it before he too realized that he forgot about it. He came back telling us that they had ran out of knives, instead he passed us some spoons. In short, even after we finished the mains, we never saw the light of the knives. Such a BIG restaurant but they ran out of knives. Hmm....... Meantime, the whole place is buzzing and the waiters were walking past our table every other minute, but to get their attention was such a difficult task.
Next was the ice cream buffet, seems like they got lots of ice cream and topping to offer, still have waffles, mini pancakes, both dark and white coco fondue with strawberries and marshmellows and some pies. Too bad one of the ice cream fridge is down, this means all the Gelatos are out, we have 15 less flavors to choose from. However the price of the ice cream buffet did not drop due to that. I am very very disappointed with the buffet. From very sour strawberries to lack of ice cream flavors, and the service of the crew tending the ice cream bar really needs to improve (a lot!).
From the initial excitement to major disappointment! There is only 1 thing I am going to say: I AM SO NOT GOING TO SWENSENS ANY TIME SOON!
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It is pretty hassle-free and cheap to print namecards here. Much can be improved about the service though.
After many back and forth emails about how my image is not in the right colour mode, after me changing it several times, they finally provided me with a screenshot about what they meant.
It was such a duh moment, they could have provided me with a screenshot right from the start, I bet it's a common occurrence especially when most people design in RGB rather than CMYK.
So anyhow that got settled, and they told me I could collect it on 1 Sept but they will call me when it was ready.
1 September came and went, with no calls.
So I emailed them to ask about my order, only then did they reply to tell me that my order was ready.
When businesses promise a service or a product, make damn sure they deliver it, or it'll just reflect really badly on their image.
But I've got to admit, it's cheap and the quality's pretty okay for its price.
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In life we have dreams; they are our goals to work towards to, one step by one step, and approached it. I’ve always wanted to visit Spain; the country, with its rich culture and vibrant cities appeal to me, and of course, Spanish food.
I simply love the idea of Tapas; the option of having more variety of food in smaller bite sizes, seduces me. Why have two dishes when we can have four? And so our Spanish adventure started with the Plamuk tod ($12), tempura style calamari rings. Limon did a thinner version using less batter which allowed the taste of the squid. But the amazing thing was the strawberry yoghurt dip which came along with the calamari!
Tartar sauce? That’s so last season. Mayonnaise? That’s so passe. Try strawberry yoghurt dip!
Tapas has many similarities with our Chinese Dim sum; it’s the communal way of sharing food. Both encouraged people to try out more varieties, and at the same time shared the food with others. The Patatas bravas ($10) was essentially Spanish fried potatoes.
A little bit of this, plus a little bit of that
No I’m not talking about our saliva! We get to share food and try a bit of everything without getting full, isn’t that a brilliant idea? There’s no beef in the Moo curry ($12), instead there was pork & potato cubes pan-fried, with the red curry sauce being a tad strong.
How come the sausage tasted like brinjar?
It was hilarious when we mistook the eggplant for sausages at first bite, I’m never a fan of the purple plant. The fusion aspect was on display by preparing the Spanish Bibao (sausages) with Thai green curry sauce. Chorizo con curry verde ($14)
Honey, they shrunk the prawns!
I was sceptical when the “king prawns” that they’d mentioned was so tiny, but for what was lacking in size, the prawns more than made up in taste. The “tiny” creature was so prawny and crunchy! With ingredients like olive oil, lemongrass, black pepper, garlic, nameko mushroom; it was a mixture of flavours.
The Gazpacho con vino blanco ($12) was a traditional Spanish cold soup, with the novelty level upped by serving it in a baby coconut husk. The white wine flavour was subtle, but the experience of drinking soup was redefined into drinking coconut!
Paella. This was THE dish besides churros that I was looking forward to. And I had problem pronouncing it the whole night, so I came up with a simple way of remembering it, paella (my own pronunciation: Pie-ya). It was done with a Thai twist; incorporating tom-yum with the Spanish paella, there was plentiful of mixed seafood. It was delicious, every grain of rice tasted so good. Since I did not have paella before, there was no way I could make comparison, but it was good enough for me. And the tom-yum flavour wasn’t even strong (at least to me). Paella de tom yum ($20 for main size).
You like fish?
You will definitely love the Bacalao ($36)! The blue cod fillet was so fresh that it seemed alive on my plate, but I would prefer it to be slightly more pan-fried on the surface. Every piece of flesh was so delicate when our utensils touch it, oh baby, I’m gonna eat you up!
The lomo de cordero ($35) was a perfect sight to behold. There’s something about the Rack of lamb, which always make it so sexy! But somehow the ingredients like rosemary, oregano, mint, white wine, lemongrass sauce did not manage to cover the gamey taste.
Lobster, I love lobster! And I’m not going to share with you. No, get your hands off, it’s mine, it’s all mine! I was freaking excited when the Live lobster krapow ($38) arrived on our table. Every bite of the oven-baked lobster was so good, but there wasn’t enough meat for me! Taking a fork, I tilted the lobster head upside down, and dug at the shell beneath it, and yes, there was more lobster meat there!
On first look, I thought it was panna cotta, the Italian dessert. But it wasn’t. The dessert in picture was a Lemon caramel egg custard flan ($10). The texture was very similar to panna cotta, but I couldn’t quite figure out what was the difference.
And yes, I know chocolate cake has nothing to do with Spanish or Thai, but apparently the pastry chef at Limon does such a good chocolate cake that they decided to put it in the menu. And boy, it was true. The Homemade Chocolate cake ($9) paired with vanilla ice cream was a delight! If you could look at the plain chocolate cake up there, there’s the lava-flowing chocolate on top of the moist chocolate cake. Even though it was a pity there wasn’t any vanilla bean ice cream, but a scoop of cold icy one was enough to bring out the best of the chocolate cake.
I love to share food. But somehow the evil twin in me took over when we had the Crema Catalana con frescas ($10). There are times where you eat something that was so good, yet you couldn’t tell what it was, so you just ate, and ate, and ate. This was what I did, I took a spoonful of the egg based cream, put it in my mouth, and I couldn’t taste what it was. And the second bite became even better. So I simply took up the whole glass, dug, and dug further into, until the whole dessert was finished.
It was a medley of flavours when the Spaniards and the Thais come and play together. This was my first time trying Paella, and I’m glad I tried it! My appreciation to Towie, the owner of Limon, and Nicole for hosting us for the food tasting session.
You are always welcome to visit ladyironchef for a full-up on this trip. Whatever written herein are my genuine feelings expressed in words. Food, my dear, is what they call an adventure!
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I visit MANY online blogshops and this is definitely one of my faves.
There are SOOOooO many reasons why!
They update often. About twice a week.
Packages arrive well-packed and are prompt. I have not experienced any delays. I also have not gotten any defected pieces from them despite buying from almost every collection.
Each update is done by a different owner. They have 3 owners who all have different tastes and different styles! So the great part is that each update has its own style and there'll be something to suit everyone!
Prices are very reasonable and the quality is good! However, there are one or two pieces which have to be handwashed and I'm soooo lazy.
The owners are very friendly. And on top of that they are customer-oriented. Payments had to be done within 24 hours. But there was once when my pet was very ill and I had to bring my pet to the doctor they were very understanding and waited for me! They even asked about my pet after. :) So sweet right?
They were even featured in the Straits Times National Day edition!
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If I can give this place less than 1 star I would.
My sister bought a package at this place 2 months ago but she didn't go for her manicure/pedicure. She figured that it's very near our home and my mom and I can use it which is why she bought the package. The package cost $800 and consisted of 12 full manicures and pedicures and some disinfecting balls.
Last week, I went, thinking that I deserved to relax. I sat down and the lady, Cecilia, started to work on my legs. Just minutes into scrubbing my feet, she started to sell me a special treatment which is suppose to be good for removing corns, which she claimed I had. I have been to so many salons and no one said that I had this problem. But anyway the treatment costs $200 and I wasn't sure if it was good so I refused.
Then with cream on my feet and stuff, she started hard-selling. She refused to continue, saying that if I top up my current package to the one with the corn treatment she can do it right away so that I can experience it right now. THE TOP UP COSTS $2000 ! And that was on top of my current $800 package! I couldn't budge cos my feet were dirty and she refused to continue, though she remained polite all the way. Finally when I said loudly I didn't want because I didn't have the cash for it she continued... not before insisting that I do the $20 scrub. I was so sick of her ranting then I agreed to the $20 scrub.
After having everything painted and my nail art done, I sat at the counter to have my nails dried... then Cecilia came back with a "MORE ATTRACTIVE" package which she claims that I can pay by instalments. She insisted that MY credit card can pay by instalments. Then came the 45 min lecture on why I should take up the package etc... More and more staff came to hound me.
Finally I relented. Only because I know my mom had a corn problem and I thought she could really use it. To say the truth... I was on the verge of tears. I kept saying no... kept saying that I needed time to think about it because it was so expensive... but they surrounded me and kept going on about it.
We went to the machine to pay by instalments... AND IT DIDN'T APPROVE! Can you imagine how embarrassed I felt when they said that loudly? It wasn't even my fault! Then they hounded me more and I paid a deposit of $400 for the package.
Only then did they let me go. The whole process... wasted 3 hours of my time. Have you ever had a 3-hour pedicure? Nope not even with a manicure.
When I was standing there making payment... I saw them do the same thing to an older lady. They hounded her.. until she was so irritated she pulled out her wallet, tipped it over to show that she didn't have any cash on her and didn't bring her cards. After that they left her alone... and I really mean alone as in there wasn't ANYONE serving her at all. They just left her there for about 20 minutes choosing colours and preparing her feet at all.
** the aftermath:
After leaving, I came to my senses. And I realised that they would hard-sell me, my mom and my sister things every time we went... I realised that I CANNOT take up that package. I went back and argued. The $400 cannot be refunded (which I expected) but it is now a credit on the old package which can be used for other things. After the package is up.. I WILL NEVER go back there again.
BTW, my nail polish chipped in 4 days. Faster than if I painted it myself. Sigh.
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I love watching dramas, because they got fairy-tale endings; there are moments where you smile like a fool, or weep together with the scenes, but at the end it will be a happy ending – I like happily-ever-after outcomes.
And there are always food in the show, the characters are only human, they need to eat too! So when I watch dramas, I will always get hungry. This bring us to Korean food, it’s a shame that we can’t put our hands inside the screen and grab that very delicious-looking food. So, we hunt, for Korean food.
We wanted the spicy looking Korean noodles but it was sold out; so we took the next-spicy-looking, kimchi soup set ($5.50) instead. It came with a appetiser with choices of tofu or anchovy, kimchi soup and rice. The kimchi soup was fabulous; spicy yet not to the extent of fiery, with a subtle hint of sweetness – I love it!
Bibimbap ($5) will always my choice when I have Korean food, not that I’ve eaten much, but I like the mixture of everything in one bowl. And I also like it to be in a hot stone bowl so that the rice will be piping hot! The one at Ming Jia was pretty decent, just that it wasn’t hot enough! Still, it was great to mix everything with the spicy-and-slight-sweet chilli!
(1) Ming Jia is very near my place.
(2) Ming Jia is very affordable.
(3) Ming Jia is unpretentious and homely.
(4) Ming jis is helmed by a Korean lady, and Koreans go there too.
(5) Ming Jia will be the place to go when I’m craving for Korean food.
You are always welcome to visit ladyironchef for a full-up on this trip. Whatever written herein are my genuine feelings expressed in words. Food, my dear, is what they call an adventure!
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Situated in an old neighbourhood coffee shop, LavaRock is another food stall determined to bring fine food to the masses.
It's hard to miss them; their signboard is huge and bright red, while the service staff would tempt passers-by with copies of their menu.
Their style of service is somewhat similar to Kenny Rogers - you order a main and get to choose two side dishes from the array at their counter.
I decided to start with their Homemade Mushroom Soup. It was a little bland and there were some lumps of starch floating around. At $2, I guess I couldn't really ask for much. It's leaps and bounds better than canned soup after all.
Apparently they are famous for their steak, so how could I not try it? I ordered a Grilled Ribeye Steak King Sized for $15.90. Yes they have queen sized steaks too but I was really hungry... They tried to up sell me the Sizzling Grilled Ribeye Steak for $2 extra, which is essentially the same thing I ordered except it comes on a hotplate. Didn't see the point or value in that.
Anyhow, their steaks are chilled, not frozen, and air-flown from New Zealand. It really does show when you bite into it; the meat was slightly pink in the center, tender and juicy, while the fat completely melted in my mouth. Awesomeness in a bite!
With my steak, I had Mashed Potato with Gravy and a Pasta Salad. Nothing special there, just comfort food.
My boyfriend had Chicken Cutlet ($6.50) with Creamy Pasta Salad, Butter Potato and Butter Rice. Carb overload much. Anyway, the chicken was very crispy, a little oily but generally very tender and not chewy like what you get at other kopitiams. However, if you go there, don't order the Butter Rice. It's completely tasteless.
Overall, the price is a little steep for a kopitiam but great for the quality of food they provide. For the main courses, anyway. Try if you're in the area!
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Yes! The good old irresistible Scotts (Picnic) Beef Noodles is back, and can be found at B4 foodcourt - Food Opera, within ION Orchard Turn. This is the same famous stall that popularise the Beef Noodle Dry ($5.00) that comes with the thick, flavourful and yummy gravy.
Paired it with Chor Bee Hoon (Thick Vermicelli), Beef Balls, Sliced Beef, Beef Brisket and Beef Tripe and one gets a satisfying bowl of noodles.
Did HFB also mentioned that the small bowl of soup coupled with the dry version also tasted really flavoursome too! Ahhhh.... such wonderful memories.
You can view all the photos here.
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If one was there for lunch, chances were they were in for 7atenine’s “Lunch Unlimited” offering @ $37 per pax – where there’s no menu in sight, and diners are subjected to unlimited elements of surprises and heighten anticipation by the chef.
First up, we had the Tomato and Thyme on Parmesan Biscuit – this was one of the two dishes that we did not complete. Uninspiring.
Another dish that looked better than it tasted, the pairing of Thai Asparagus Rolls with Wasabi just didn’t make the grade for HFB in this instance. The veggie was slightly tough too.
Sadly, the Homemade Ravioli with Parmesan Cheese and Ebi Bisque was flavoursome in a bad way - the cheese totally overwhelmed this dish i.e. the prawn flavoured broth waned in comparison.
To be honest, HFB certainly didn’t expect to spot the Maguro Sushi with Roe at his table. It wasn’t bad, but it certainly didn’t impressed. Perhaps the whole Japanese dish served in a western restaurant concept didn’t resonated well with him.
However, if there was any reason why HFB would be back at this establishment, the Beef Roll with Parmesan and Wild Herbs alone would sufficed as the answer. Served atop a piece of hot rock, one gets to enjoy the very bottom of the beef cooked, the middle portion medium rare, and the top raw. The play on the texture was amazing, the meat was succulent and the parmesan complemented the dish. We certainly did request for repeated servings of this dish.
The Crispy Pork Belly with Apple Puree was another brilliant dish. Nicely crisp on the exterior, the sweet and savoury combination also flourished. Marvellous!
The Jerusalem Artichoke Puree with Foam was flavourful despite its lacklustre appearance. HFB enjoyed this!
However, none can be said about the Cucumber Gazpacho with Crouton. It didn’t work well for HFB - acting as a palate cleanser, he found it too “green” for his liking.
The Caesar Salad was another one of the "ordinary" dishes that day - nothing quite wrong, yet nothing striking.
Another reorder we had was the Seared Scallops with Avocado Mousse and Red Grapefruit. The scallops were really sweet, luscious and nicely seared. HFB though craved the scallops to be bigger.
The Crab Salad Wrapped with Onion was the other dish that was left unfinished. Although in its defence, HFB had to say he enjoyed this dish pretty much. His guess was one probably need to enjoy onions to appreciate this dish. He surely did.
The Tuna Tartare with Miso Jelly was a dish of hits and misses. While he truly enjoyed the tuna, HFB felt that the miso jelly didn’t quite make the grade – its texture was chewy and the assortments of veggies within just didn’t quite gel.
Simply called the 7atenine Burger, the beef patties were really yummy and goes really well with the salsa coupled within. Only irk was that the bread was a tad oily.
One of their signatured dishes, the Udon Carbonara with Miso Scented Cream Reduction and Serrano Ham was in replacement of the beef roll, when we wanted for a third serving. Luckily for us, the Lolita of Spicc, Katharina, was gracious enough, as it was unavailable for the day’s lunch unlimited offering, to offer us a chance to savour her favourite dish. It was really a pleasant twist and in truth palatable, although HFB thought the noodles were slightly overcooked – al dente would have been much better welcomed.
Once we were done with the carbs, we signalled for the desserts to be served. The Cranberry Pastille with Chocolate Praline looked unimpressive yet it tasted oh so good. Simple yet packed a punch!
The Vanilla Mousse with Mango Ice-cream was really fruity and HFB thought it was a nice way to end the meal, along with Assorted Biscuits which went really well with our cup of coffee.
Overall, it was an out of the ordinary dining experience and although there were some misses with the dishes, there were others that makes a revisit a possibility.
You can view all the photos here.
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The world we live in, is complex and beyond our wildest imaginations. Life is a mess, there will always be new problems arising everyday. Life is never fair and you have no control over it. But hey, who says life is ever gonna be easy? Babies cry when they enter this world don’t they? But sweetie, our world is also a beautiful place to live in, close your eyes and hold your breathe for a second; you will appreciate it a lot better.
And in life, nothing beats walking into a bakery with the smell of the freshly baked bread straight from the oven!
But I knew from the moment I stepped inside the bakery that it was a mistake. I wanted to buy everything! It was astonishing to see the number of Milkpan that they baked there - rows and rows of them, and everything smelled so good! The unbelievable softness, the light fragrance, and the creamy custard fillings, oh my god, one milkpan’s really not enough.
There was two types of anpan; I was convinced/psycho to get this one. It vaguely reminded me of the red-bean buns that I often got from the neighbourhood bakery. Nosh and nosh.
The scary thing about the bread here, they’d sold out the moment they are out! We got ten of them, five custard, and five chocolate. And it definitely wasn’t enough.
We preferred the chocolate wassants though; the other one was lacking in flavour, while this one had the subtle sweet chocolate within the bread. And there’s even a new kaya version, but that’s for the next visit!
You are always welcome to visit ladyironchef for a full-up on this trip. Whatever written herein are my genuine feelings expressed in words. Food, my dear, is what they call an adventure!
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