Essential Brew

Evelyn brought me to Essential Brew at Holland V for dinner today. She's working there right now and all staff members have a 20% discount, plus, she was awarded with a $20 voucher for chalking in tons of work hours. FANTASTIC. We paid $12.20 for a $40+ meal. :D Lovely.\

Anyway, Essential Brew is called essential brew because they incorporate tea into all the items in their menu. So there's things like Jasmine Rice Balls (rice steamed with, i'm guessing, jasmine tea). The desserts also have tea, like Green Tea Cheesecake and Green Tea Creme Brulee. There's also an interesting dessert called Rainbow Indulgence...evelyn tried describing it to me. Apparently it's some kind of dessert with pocky sticks stuck into it, pointing out in all angles. Sounds very Finnish avant garde to me! Haha. Other dishes include Oolong Chicken, Earl Grey Mussels, Earl Grey Ribeye Steak, you get the picture.

We ordered, upon evelyn's recommendation, the Jasmine Caper Salmon, a basket of Calamari rings, a Dance of Tea (chocolate drink mixed with tea) and a Jasmine Tiramisu. (should have taken pics...I brought my camera but completely forgot about taking photos -__-)

The salmon came with lots of carrot sticks, ONE broccoli floret and a ball of Jasmine rice (they scoop it with the ice-cream scoop). I'm not a big fan of the jasmine rice...quite odd if you ask me, and a bit too damp. The jasmine is not very strong, so the rice just ends up in the middle of no where -- not plain enough to be plain rice, yet not jasminey enough to be jasmine rice. The salmon itself though, is highly recommended. The Calamari rings were normal...and very value for money. They gave us a huge basketful of rings when I was only expecting like 5 rings. The Dance of Tea tasted like Chocolate Bubble Tea. I should have just gone for something more exciting. The jasmine tiramisu was odd. It was really liquidy...more like a pudding than tiramisu. Highly NOT recommended. I suspect it has been sitting in the display chiller for far too long.


Anyway, food aside, the place is fantastic for chilling out. Basically, you have to take off your shoes, to enter the "sitting area". In the "sitting area", they have low coffee tables and you're supposed to sit around the tables on beanbags and poofy cushions. It's a very comfy atmosphere...dim lights, soft music. Waiters who kneel down next to you to take your order LOL!

I may return again to try out more things...friends of staff get 10% off. Patty's birthday is coming...:) Birthday dinner??

Olive Tree

So last Saturday afternoon, we decided to check out the Olive Tree, a restaurant at InterContinental Hotel that serves Mediterranean seafood cuisine. It was surprisingly quiet and relatively empty when we entered, a great relief from the hustle and bustle of Bugis. The ambient is great -- sunlight streams through the glass ceiling and there are wall arches all around. There's even a view of the sea!! (They painted a mural on the walls...well, they deserve a pat on the back for effort).

We, being the cheapo Singaporeans we are, were estatic to find out that every table gets a free loaf of bread. The bread comes with a small dish of, supposedly, fermented anchovies drizzled in olive oil. (I think that's what the waiter said it was) It tasted more like the gravy that my mom puts on minced pork. It went well with the bread anyway, so we ended our chatter on meat gravies and continued acting posh and proper.

We had a choice of 5 toppings for the pizza, so we went with fresh mozarella, rocket leaves, asparagus, mixed peppers and shrimp! Then, we ordered an apple pie with brandy glaze for dessert.
The only way to describe how heavenly the shrimp was is through the use of a sound effect...*schrreessshhh* The shrimp was big, fresh, juicy and so succulent it didn't even feel like meat! More like jelly, in my opinion. The pizza crust was just right, not too thick, yet not too thin that you start feeling like you got ripped off..paying so much for a measly non-existent crust.

The dessert was a great way to end the meal. The apple filling was good too. I hate how some apple pies are so sickly sweet that they leave me feeling thirsty, dehydrated and pissed off. This one was okay, and the size was just right for 2. The only thing is that it looks kinda ugly, especially with the random orange berry sprouting brown leaves placed right on top. We couldn't get a good picture :(

On the plus side, they have cute waiters with excellent service :D

I hear that their buffet spread is not bad, maybe some other time, when we're richer! Damn..

Bibidibobidiboo

Finally a breather. Apart from the routine work, every night's been very busy with gatherings here and there, haha. Just a quick post on Saturday's (not quite) gep gathering. Our class had the largest turnout! According to Chan, 411 and 413 had a total turnout of 1 person, haha. But it was really good to see everyone again =) Every clique was represented! Even the non-cliquers were represented by Bern, haha. Gossiping with Wendy on the beach was very very fun, good old days, haha.

And here are a couple of photos of our class' efforts at brightening up the beach! Much thanks to Chan for bringing the sparklers! I think it turned out quite pretty, with falling sparks here and there =D
For the benefit of 12ers who couldn't make it, or had to leave early, from the rest of us 12ers =)


And one just for me =)


Everyone's going off to the army! Well, have fun Pak! Had a great catch-up dinner with our little finland group (except kevin who's in japan) on tuesday, really missed everyone. We must do this more often =)

Looking forward to the weekend, might make a post-Christmas fruitcake. And hey everyone, we must rush on our movie! Maybe it won't be a CNY one, but a birthday one? Will be just in time. Maddy, are we still on for Tuesday?

Oh oh! One last thing, I just bought this book Nursery Knits by Zoe Mellor from Borders, it has really really great designs and ideas, can't wait to try them all out! The clothes are all very sweet, and they have cute patterns for knitted toys. Good thing I have so many small cousins, haha. Her books have really adorable baby models too. Do check out her other book, Animal Knits, as well, if you happen to go by the library. Just to take a look at the pictures, they're really very nice =)

Eggy

Mag Egg

Was doing a little bit of googling earlier, and look what I found! Mad Egg Hompage, Madegg's HomePage, Last.fm MadEgg. Honestly, I though MadEgg was a pretty wacky uncommon name...but guess not! There are so many other madeggs out there...we're not special anymore :(

At least we're not at the last threads of our sanity ;)

Happy New Year Lim Family

More pics from our little latenight 5am adventure...

The little guy below is the star of the project. He's the Xin Nian Kuai Le bear, inspired by my carebear. Look closely, he has a bow on his left ear and adorable rosy cheeks :D Fu Dao Le indeed!

A formal message to the Lims...We tried to disguise the handwriting.
Then we slid Xin Nian Kuai Le bear and the new year message through the side gate...
New year plant decorated with avant-garde felt balls.

Enter the peaceful outdoor zen garden, dotted with elegant origami cranes...made from pages of Time magazine.


Atop the front pillar...


On the inner side of the gate (the side facing the house), we hung Chun Lians, made from doilies and ribbon. Our calligrapher was eggy, . I don't really remember all of the cheng yus we put there...I think there were the normal greetings like "Long Ma Jing Shen" (dragon horse energy), "Shen Ti Jian Kang" (body healthy), "Wan Shi Lu Yi" (ten thousand events success), "Ming Nian Geng Hao" (next year even better), "Wang Zi Cheng Long" (wish son become dragon...wow the translation is fantastic). Then we had a couple of joke chun lians like "Mai Yi Song Yi" (buy one get one free), "Wu Wu Liu Liu" (aka THE band). I really tried my best to recall the hundreds of chengyus I memorised for my Os back then, unfortunately, only a few unsuitable ones kept repeating in my head again and again. Chengyus like, "Tong Liu He Wu" (flow and get dirty together), "Dui Nui Tan Qin" (play music to cow), "Zhu Peng Gou You" (pig dog friends)....doesn't everybody just love chengyus? :D...oooo and how could I forget the ultimate essay-starter, "Feng He Ri Li"(wind nice sun pretty)!!! Those were the days.

We then decorated the bins with our leftover materials (cranes, ribbon and crushed-up newspaper balls). The ribbon chain is hideous.

And our masterpiece... Extreme Makeover, Singapore style! We should have taken a 'before' picture..damn.

The one thing I learnt from this adventure is that Scotch magic tape is our best friend. And that The Prata Place isn't open 24/7 (It closes at 12+).

Yesterday, mom was in charge of making potato pies for her dinner event thing. So she rounded up the kids and some friends, and we created a little potato pie factory in the kitchen. (Think we made almost a hundred pies altogether). The potato pies didn't turn out as yummy as usual. There wasn't enough pasta and it was a bit too salty. I would have preferred it with more potato and less cheese. Oh well, they were still really well received. Everyone wanted to pack them home, so we gave them all away.

why do gorillas have big nostrils

Am currently down with flu due to the constant lack of sleep =( can't really breathe and I keep sneezing everywhere, haha, and I was seriously wondering whether or not to go to work today. I felt well enough to work I suppose, but it's food production after all, isn't hygiene and sanitation supposed to be top priority? But mrs yap didn't say anything, so I just tried not to sneeze in the direction of any pudding, haha.

I've been too lazy to update these few days, what with all the moaning and plotting to take medical leave from work that never came to pass. So here's a quick summary:

MondayMade mushroom quiche! It was really simple, but it didn't turn out like I hoped. The mix was too wet I think, because the filling didn't manage to be as hard as I liked. Quite jiggly actually, haha. And it took so long to bake, a lot longer than the recipe stated! Could it just be my oven? Well, time to experiment with another recipe.

The really fun bit was at Maddy's place on Monday night. A very spontaneous sleepover (just me and Chan) with a very spontaneous programme for the night too, haha. Our redecorating ambitions are finally getting some headway! We got our very first client in the form of Sin ni, who is not yet aware of it. At least, I think she's unaware, unless she's just planning a very very sneaky revenge.So anyway, we gave her place a lil' midnight New Year spruce up. You better love it Sin ni, it took us all night to pick out the gaudiest ribbons and gayest main character (no, not chan) to hold up the favoured chun lian! And I wrote all the chun lians (with minimal aid)! Been 2 years since I last wrote chinese man. Hopefully Maddy has better photos, you can't really see it in it's true gaudiness here.

and here's chan's very pretty jam heart from our celebratory breakfast at 6am.

Today
Just something I whipped up really quickly. I like all these quick cookies, cos there's still time to do it after work, and this one had a short baking time too =) It's a chewy cookie, a bit cake like actually, and it has crisp edges. I substituted almonds for pecans since I had some lying about the house. Not a bad cookie to try. You could try increasing the amount of maple syrup though, the flavour is quite subtle, and I like my maple oatmeal cookies a little more maple-y =)

Okay, it feels like i've forgotten to talk about something, but it'll come to me when it does. That's all for now then!

Eggy

Maple Pecan Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup ap flour
½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp baking soda

1/s tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

1/2 cup butter, softened
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup maple syrup
1 egg

1 cup rolled oats (regular or quick cooking)
½ cup coarsely chopped cinnamon glazed pecans

Preheat oven to 375F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a small bowl, whisk together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
Cream butter and brown sugar together in a large bowl. Beat in maple syrup and egg. Stir in flour mixture and oats, adding pecans at the last minute. Stir only until just combined.
Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto parchment lined baking sheet.
Bake at 375 for 9-12 minutes, until set and golden brown around the edges.
Makes about 2 dozen.

from Bakingsheet, one of my fave reads =)

oh, and because they have big fingers.