Spring Fever

Spring is late this year but it’s good to be late than never! I was looking forward to Spring for the rise in temperature (away the cold bitter winter) and also the bloom of the flowers.

We managed to spend some time at the parks for some sun and fresh air over the past week and it feels rejuvenating~ I’m starting to fall in love with the 4 seasons.

I would love to have a garden like this. ❤ ❤ ❤

Folks doing pond fishing.

Lovely sweet bloom.

What a perfect romance movie setting.

Man-made pathways.

Basking under the sun.

Watching the kids running around the grass patch.

Spring is vibrant and filled with so much energy! Enjoying every bits of Spring before Summer seeps in.

a lil’ special day

It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon except for the light drizzle before lunch officially started.

I chose to hold the lunch gathering @ Flutes. It’s a nostalgic 1908 colonial black and white bungalow, situated at the end of Fort Canning Hill.

Being surrounded by the green and florals is just so relaxing and I love this serenity.

The most wonderful thing about gatherings is the interaction between people and I’m glad the photographer captured some of these:

I’m glad everyone enjoyed the food and company! And I’m so happy to have them their blessings. ❤

les petit mangoes

It’s an eye opener at times when I do my daily groceries shopping here, with the wide variety and range of food. Loving the seasonal fruits especially!

Recently I noticed lots of small mangoes-like fruits at the fruit stalls. And upon a closer look, they are really mangoes!

They are really small! The average ones are like palm-size while the smaller ones are like half the size of the usuals~

According to the descriptions, these mangoes are mainly from Taiwan. I think they do look kind like kidneys and even beans! Heh.

Being a BIG fan of mangoes, I bought a couple of petit mangoes and oh boy, they tasted sooo good! They are not only sweet, they also have a strong sweet fragrance that makes one drools.

This is gonna be my favourite food snack for now! heh.

Food Cravings Satisfied

Haloha!

It was errands running week and prepping myself for the next stage of my life. The thoughts of it seems exciting and scary at the same time!

Oh wells, that aside, by going around the island, I managed to give my stomach a good treat, no wait, many good treats~

My favorite Korean BBQ restaurant: Hyang-To-Gol, situated at the city center. It’s a very popular restaurant and be sure to make reservations in you’re going in bigger groups. This was recommended to me by a Korean friend a few years back and I’m totally loving it!

Cold Kimchi Soup to kickstart the meal. It’s sourish and lightly spicy, has a refreshing taste that whets the appetite.

I was there for lunch so I ordered the lunch set instead of having BBQ all by myself.

What I love most is the unlimited refillable side dishes. Besides, being refillable, they are really tasty too!

Another of my favorite is the Ginseng Chicken Soup. Love digging the rice out and slurping it with the soup. Yums.

Hyang-To-Gol
Tel: +65 6220 7160 
165 Tanjong Pagar Road
2F The Amara Hotel

Recently, I’ve been having constant cravings for meats. Yes, meat! And this made Nando’s one of my best friend.

YAMI peach yogurt with colorful pebble cornflakes. Definitely brightens up the day plus low in calories. Heh.

The Tanjong Pagar Food Hawker is a gem and I think it’s one of the best hawkers around. Conveniently located near the MRT and filled with lots of good food. This sliced fish soup stall is one of my regular choice.

The Fish Maw Mee Sua is paired with sliced fish, minced pork and pork liver. Plus tomatoes, lettuce and bitter gourd. Love the tasty soup! I find it best to visit the stall right after the lunch crowd as the soup goes through more hours of stewing, which makes it even tastier. But be sure to go before 3pm else they might be closed by then.

The other stall that I’ll not missed out every time I visit TP hawker is Aunty Annie’s Peanut Ice Kachang, which is just next to the fish soup stall. She serves the best chendol! She uses thick and rich coconut milk and gula melaka sugar syrup, which makes very cent worthy. The red beans are soft and in tact as a whole to give some munch. I’m personally a big fan of chendol but I have also tried her famous peanut ice kachang and that’s 2 thumbs up as well!

Avocado Chicken Sandwich from Cedele.

Dragonfruit with sour plum powder from Taiwan. Mommy knows me the best!

The famous Beef Hor Fun at Gelyang Lorong 9. My family have been a regular to this place during my teenage years and it has been quite a while since we visited again due to transportation issues. I believed it was unarguably the best beef hor fun once. The standards have dropped now, with the kway teow less charred and the overwhelming black pepper and chilli taste. The good thing is that the beef is still as tender as before!

Finally, had the chance to visit Antoinette. The first impression of the restaurant – it is seemingly to similar to Ladurée, which annoys me. I had the French Toast, Macaroons and Mont Blanc cake.

The French Toast was too sugary for my liking. I prefer the Marmalade Pantry’s for their fragrant caramel sauce. The Macaroons and Mont Blanc were average as well. I find Antoinette being over-rated.

Antoinette
+65 6836 9527
 333A Orchard Road
#02-33/34 Mandarin Gallery 

 

Twelve Cupcakes

I had been a follower of Jamie Teo’s blog previously and so when I learnt that she opened a cupcake shop, I was eager to try out her baking skills. But sadly, Novena is hardly an area that I hang out at.

A couple of days ago, I happened to be in the vicinity and decided to grab some cupcakes from Twelve Cupcakes. It was a small store chucked at a corner of United Square, with lovely sweet decor and alluring cupcakes.

As I arrived at 5+pm, there wasn’t much selection left to choose from. I badly wanted a salted caramel and it was sold out. Frankly speaking, I wanted to buy just 1 cupcake and eat it on the spot before committing to the whole box but I thought that would be weird. So, I ended up with 2 Red Velvet, 1 PB Chocolate, 1 Strawberry Chocolate, 1 Strawberry Vanilla and 1 Blueberry Vanilla.

With much expectations, I started off with Red Velvet when I got home. Sadly, it didn’t wow me. I felt that the cake was a little dry and the cream cheese frosting didn’t taste strong enough.

What wooed my heart was the Strawberry Vanilla and PB Chocolate. I guess Peanut Butter and Chocolate can never go wrong. For the Strawberry Vanilla, the white chocolate bits on the strawberry frosting was just marvelous! It melted in my mouth instantly and the luxurious mix of strawberry and white chocolate was perfect with the moist vanilla cake. Yums.

I would still love to try out the other flavours but I’m just not sure when will that be.

Twelve Cupcakes
+65 62568130
101 Thomson Road
B1-60 United Square  

a simple CNY

This year’s CNY was as the usual – lots of nibble goodies, tangerines, yusheng, and catching up with relatives.

Mommy and I made a last minute decision to bake pineapple tarts!

Butter crumbs.

Before they are sent to the oven.

The tarts didn’t turn out to be like previous years. The crust was pale and dry and we reckoned that it’s all the cheap butter’s fault.

My favourite dish during CNY. Love the plum sauce with crackers~

May we have a prosperous Dragon Year!!!

Went down to Wen Zhou Association on the 2nd day for the Lion Dance celebration and visiting the elderly.

That’s all for my CNY this year. Somehow, it’s getting boring. Hopefully things will spice up next year! Heh.

Moleskin Passion Journals

I recently discovered this range of journals from Moleskin named “Passion”.

Each journal has a specific theme and provides what you need to document your particular passion! I find it pretty interesting and I guess I’m gonna get my hands on some~ 🙂

Here’s some interesting ones that you might be interested!

Style Journal

Recipe Journal

Dog Journal

Baby Journal

The Last of 2011!

Can’t believe it’s already the 2nd week of 2012!!! And CNY is juuuust coming right up in less than 2 weeks~

L managed to fly over on NYE and we check-in to MBS~

The view from our room. It was very last minute and therefore we couldn’t get any of the City View rooms.

We had TWG for dinner because I was craving for the scones with tea jelly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The scones tasted better at ION outlet and the tea jelly is still divine~ ❤

A kind friend helped me brought back these little devil sweets from London!

Oh how I miss you little babies!

Extremely happy on NYE!

Savouring my Rose macaron` ❤ ❤ ❤

Well, when i had both brands in Paris 2 years back, I favoured La Durée over Pierre Hermés. I kinda felt PH crust was overly soft. LD had a chewy bite.

But for now, I think I prefer Pierre Hermés. However, I’m still not a big fan of his experimental creations. The traditional flavours are my cup of tea!

Now, I wonder when will be my next encounter with these little sweeties!

MBS had made special arrangements for hotel guests to countdown at the Infinity Pool.

Just look at the crowd at 11:30pm!

It was a splendid night spent watching the beautiful fireworks popping just right in front of us! 🙂

Happy 2012 everyone!

May the New Year be filled with love & happiness everyday~ ❤ ❤ ❤