Chilli Crab or Black Pepper Crab....

Ok so I'm skipping straight to the weekend as last week was much the same as the week before, very chilled!

Highs

- Spending Saturday arvo strolling along the East Coast Park, supping on cold beers and ending on Chilli Crab!
- Discovering a Cable Wake Boarding Park, pretty cool
- Going to see The Expendables

Lows

- Dave working until 9pm on Friday night, I was absolutely starving by the time he came home but at least he came home with pizzas and beers!
- Dave working all of Sunday arvo

And for the foodies

Saturday - We ended up at the East Coast Seafood Centre, you can imagine my delight! The only difficulty was whether to go to Jumbo's for Chilli Crab or Long Beach for Black Pepper Crab.....after an agonising decision we settled on Jumbo's and as the sun set over the sea we tucked into a kilo of Chilli Crab, served in a very rich sticky chilli gravy, the crab was half cracked so it wasn't too much hard work to get the succulent meat out but it was very very MESSY! We had seafood fried rice and these little sweet buns to soak up the gravy to. It was awesome & next week Black pepper Crab.

Sunday - We went to the movies with just enough time to squeeze in some yummie gyozas and beef pancakes. We sat down and eagerly awaited our snacks but when they arrived we were given Red Bean Pancakes instead of beef pancakes, doh! I asked Dave what they were like as he tasted one and he said 'well you can't put chilli on them as they're sweet!' :( Dave went back to the hawker stall to re-order!

After the movies we decided just to grab a quick dinner in a Thai place in the mall, we had heard that Thai food wasn't very good here (which is strange seeing as it's just up the road!) But we actually thought this place was pretty good and very cheap, $6.80 for a Red Duck Curry which Dave ordered and I had Seafood Tom Yum Soup. When it arrived I was soo excited by the little red chilli's on the table I loaded them into my soup before I had even tasted it. Note to self: Always taste food before adding more chilli.


Chilli Crab

The Cappuccino Dunking Pit

Highs

- Spending Friday exploring the Asia Civilisations Museum and learning about The Great Singapore Duck Race down the river!
- Kicking the weekend off with burgers and beers in town on Friday night. And paying $5 for James Boags! Wow beer that was actually cheaper than London.
- Spending a lovely arvo catching up with Evan & Isabelle in the Botanical Gardens & enjoying Singapore Symphony Orchestra in the Park (which was free!) Followed by a top notch meal at Halia, a restaurant in the Ginger Garden. Quote Jayme: Whilst strolling out of the Botanical Gardens 'what an awesome, awesome day' :)

Lows

- Beef Rendang that wasn't really like Rendang
- Getting eaten by mozzies for the first time since we got here Note to self: Must wear mozzie spray when going to The Botanical Gardens.
- I wasn't that impressed with Newton Hawker market, had better at the food courts.


And for the foodies

Fri - We went to a place that had been voted one of the top burger places in Singapore - Bergs Gourment Burgers. Bonus being they sold $5 beers (prob why they were voted one of the top!) We picked our burgers and agreed to share 50:50 (a ratio which I was soon to regret and should have renegotiated a 80:20). I picked a 'Kiwi Stud' (Prime Lamb Pattie, Garam Masala Spices, Lettuce, Tomato, Red Onion, Aioli & Bergs Sauce) and Dave picked an 'Ayam a Chicken' (Grilled Chicken Breast, Chilli Ginger Marinade, Lettuce, Tomato, Red Onion, Cucumber Raita, Mango Chutney & Aioli), with a side order of Sweet Potato Chips and Wasabi Mayo to boot. My choice of burger was infinitely better than Dave's so I was quite upset at having to swap halfway through esp as I ended my meal with his dry chicken and not my juicy lamb. But then I had to remind myself of my marriage vows, through times of adversity and all ;)

Sat - We had a quiet day, stayed in and cooked Beef Rendang curry but the recipe said to put in 150g of shaved coconut, we actually only put 100g and even that made it far too coconutty and very dry which we weren't that impressed with. I don't remember Rendang ever being that cocunutty when I've had it out.

Sun - We spent the early part of the day exploring parts of Singapore and then had lunch at Newton Hawkers market. I was quite excited to try Hokkien Noodles so I ordered a large one (to share with Dave obviously) and Dave ordered some chicken satay sticks. But the noodles were very slimy and nothing special apart from the prawns and the nice chilli sauce. As a pile of chicken satay sticks were placed on the table I said 'oh they really do come in 10's!' and they were pretty yummie served with the usual cucumber and shallots.
After having a couple of beers and enjoying the concert, Evan & Isabelle decided to head home but as Dave & I hadn't expensed any food for a couple of days we decided to treat ourselves to a meal at the Halia restaurant in the Botanical Gardens (set within the Ginger Garden). We sat outside amongst the jungle which was such a lovely setting (apart from the mozzie bites!). I had the Prawn Satay sticks (I'm starting to realise after writing this blog that I eat a lot of prawns!) served on a bed of glass noodles salad with papaya and grapefruit pieces all dressed with a ginger flower dressing and it was as superb as it sounds and more! Very zesty & refreshing flavours. The prawn meat texture tasted like it had been lightly minced with other added flavours and then grilled. Dave had a Ribeye Steak served with a jacket potato with truffle butter, mushrooms and green fine beans and his was also as superb as it sounds. You always know a good restaurant when even the beans are cooked to perfection, with just enough bite. And Pièce de résistance was the truffle butter, it was..was..I'm struggling to describe how good it was....so I will leave it to your imaginations.
It transpired whilst deciding whether or not to have dessert that Dave mainly wanted to visit this place as he had read about 'The Cappuccino Dunking Pit' made with layers of warm chocolate, cool vanilla cream and iced coffee shavings together with a brownie for dunking (shock horror!). So when the dessert menu arrived and it wasn't on there he was quite distraught, we gingerly asked the waitress about this infamous dunking pit and she explained it was only served during the day. Doh. But looking at our sad faces she advised she would ask the chef if he would make it specially for us and he agreed! Triumph! I will let the photo speak for itself :)


The Great Singapore Duck Race


How cool!


Singapore Symphony Orchestra in the Park


Halia by Night


The Cappuccino Dunking Pit

Week #4 - Mellow

After such a super foodtastic looong weekend, this week was short and rather mellow in comparison. So mellow in fact I spent one day just reading through a stack of newspapers that had accumulated in our apartment and eating lots of cheese.
Conclusion:
High - I'm better informed
Low - I'm a little bit porky! ;)

Another major low of the week was spending an entire evening inputting Dave's expenses into his work's system...yawn. To quote Dave 'that was the least fun thing I've done in ages'

And for the foodies

Tues - It may surprise you that we couldn't finish our take away last night so we saved the Mutton Mysore curry for tonight and I also threw some veggies in the spare curry sauce they gave us and made a yummie veggie curry to go with.
Wed - Tonight I made Mee Siam noodles with prawns and it was good but I wasn't in awe of it like most dishes we have out here, may be it's because I cooked it! The only bonus was it had prawns in it :)
Thurs - Dave went for after work drinks and then picked up some Japanese Bento boxes on the way home for dinner. I made the mistake of asking him to pop to the shop to grab some beers and he came home with beers and a mountain of crackers and some kettle chips!

Mission Margarita & some Monster Prawns

Highs

- Three day weekend. Happy 45th Birthday Singapura!
- Relaxing at a poolside candlelit table at the 'All you can eat & drink (Margarita) buffet' at the Grand Hyatt on Friday night
- Finding a funky rooftop bar in Club St, where we enjoyed a couple of pre-dinner Asahi's on Sunday
- Going to see Salt at the Gold Class Cinema - separated from the normal riff raff cinema with it's own private bar, first class airplane seats, blankets (air con makes it very cold after a while!), a little side table complete with a wine holder and a button to call your waitress, a full menu of meals and drinks including a Chocolate Brownie (guess what Dave ordered). Supping on red wine and eating freshly made popcorn.

Lows

- Dave having to pop into the office to do some work
- Our Italian meal on Sunday evening was our first bad meal experience. Well to be fair it wasn't 'bad' it just wasn't very fulfilling!
- Going to the gym

And for the Foodies

Friday - The Grand Hyatt - $68 each for 'All you can eat & drink Buffet', half of which we could expense meant only one thing....TAXI! We started with beers, some garlic bread and some more garlic bread, then we went for our second entree, a selection of salads, we esp liked the green papaya salad and the asparagus & avocado, they also had a massive plate of smoked trout with lemon & capers - YUM! (when I helped myself to the trout, Dave looked at my plate and said 'ok shall we just share that?' I turned with a confused look 'err no!') Time to hit the BBQ; steaks, chicken, pork, calamari and monster, I mean monster, prawns! I started with a plate full of monster prawns & some calamari and then finished with a plate full of monster prawns & some calamari. Dave went more for the meat and sausages with a couple of monster prawns on the side. We washed it down with as much red wine as we could guzzle, they were pretty efficient at topping up your glasses which was good! We had a bit of a rest after which Dave went for dessert, no brownies though - poor Dave :( Then it was Margarita O'clock baby! They were too icy to drink quickly but we perservered! The buffet finished at 9:30pm so at 9:25pm when the waiter was coming around with the jug to give everyone their last drink we frantically tried to down the ones we had = BRAIN FREEZE.

Saturday - We ended up down at our local Japanese restaurant & we had a pretty satisfying cheap & cheerful meal. Sashimi to start which had an array of different fish; salmon, tuna, prawn, yellowtail, red snapper and smoked eel. Then Dave asked them to make something that wasn't on the menu - Gyūdon (rice topped with fried beef & onions in a mild sweet sauce with a raw egg on top). It was his favourite dish from his time in Japan and as I tutted and shook my head at his cheekiness, the waitress knew exactly what he meant and was happy to acquiesce to his request. I had fried rice with Kimchi and pork belly with a side order of lightly battered prawns covered in Wasabi Mayo. Both were scrummie esp the prawns! Although when the prawns arrived, on one side of the plate was your usual meat of the prawn which had been fried in a extremely light batter & then covered in Wasabi Mayo. Then on the other side were all prawn heads, eyes, legs and all. They had been covered in breadcrumbs and deep fried as if to be eaten! YUCK! Obviously this was much to the delight of Dave who continued throughout the meal to advise me that I had to eat the prawn heads otherwise they will not fulfil their prawn head destiny. My argument was that a prawn's head destiny is not to be eaten but to be thrown in the bin! As much as I love prawns I could not bring myself to eat a prawns head battered or unbattered. When the waiter was clearing the plates, Dave asked 'are you sure you don't want your prawn heads Jayme' with a smirk, this prompted the waiter to look at me for an answer 'no I'm quite sure, thank-you'.

Sunday - We wandered down Club St to find somewhere for dinner, we checked out some menus inc an Italian restaurant and as soon as I saw Linguine Vongole I had decided for both of us! There was no fault with the starters, we shared some Bresola & a Bruchetta. The mains were also good but tiny! Dave had lamb ravioli, it was fresh but they only gave him six bits and I had a pitiful amount of Linguine. It's always annoying when Italian restaurants skimp on pasta, it's not like it's really expensive (it's just flour & water after all) esp when your paying £13 for it! When the waitress asked if we wanted dessert we replied 'can we have a garlic pizza bread please'.

Monday - Whilst eating our bacon & egg muffins (I would like to add that we boiled the eggs instead of frying them & cut all the fat off the bacon) Dave reminisced about how much he had missed bacon.....until I reminded him that we had in fact had bacon in our sandwiches yesterday morning at a cafe and then he remembered that he had a bacon roll on Friday when he had gone 'out for breakfast' with his boss! Later that arvo (after the gym!) we went to do a food shop but we were a bit peckish and as everyone knows, shopping on an empty stomach is very dangerous for your wallet. So first stop was the food hall and at the very last stall we found the most delicious yummiest delectable freshly made Gyoza's (nearly as good as yours Jax!) and beef pancakes (tasted like Gyoza but with beef) ever! We dipped them in ginger & soy and very hot finger chilli's and soy. Exhausted from our visit to the gym & our shopping we couldn't be bothered to cook so we ordered a lamb, cheese and mushroom Murtabak, an onion Prata and a Mutton Mysore curry to share from Spize.

What an awesome food weekend!!

oop.s. sorry it's sooo long!


Brain Freeze


Seeing Stars

Week #3 - An Evening in a Swish Rooftop Bar

Highs

- Spending most evenings motoring our way through the second season of Fringe and oh my what a finale!!
(- Joshua Jackson, just sneaking that in for the gals!)
- Spending the day exploring a bit of Singapore, starting at the Singapore City Gallery, wandering down Club Street with old shophouses transformed into trendy bars, boutique hotels & restaurants, meandering along the river through Boat Quay, down to the Merlion and along The Esplanade before I was melting so much I had to find some A/C!
- Meeting Dave, Russell (Dave's boss) and Ian (another CS boss) for drinks at a very swish rooftop bar at The Fullerton Bay hotel. An awesome evening!
- Buying a couple of really nice dresses.

Lows

- Taking cover in a shopping mall for a bit of a cool down and ending up spending all the money in my wallet on two dresses, oops!

And for the foodies

Mon - Well we had so much curry sauce left from our take away on Friday that we bought some chicken and made a chicken curry with it, easy as & pretty darn tasty!
Tues - Beers, beers and some red wine, oh and Dave had some tapas but I was too busy shopping! On our way home from the swish rooftop bar we ended up grabbing some pies & Cheezels from the petrol station. Oops!
Wed - Dave bought home some salads and smoothies - something healthy at last!
Thurs - I cooked up a Spicy Italian Sausage Stew and I must say I was rather proud of it! Esp as everytime I cook Dave comes through the front door saying 'oh that yummie smell is coming from our apartment' ;)


Children Playing by the River


Boat Quay


The Marina Bay Sands Hotel (which we need to pay a visit to)


Merlion


The Esplanade


Swish Rooftop Bar (we didn't take this btw!)


Jayme's Spicy Italian Sausage Stew

Satay Sticks only come in 10's

Highs

- Finding Percy Pigs in M&S, whoop whoop!
- Seeing a Olive Backed Sunbird eating nectar out of the flowers on my way to the shops
- Buying a PedEgg, basically a grater for your feet but they're pretty good & a cheap alternative to pedicures!
- Lazing by the pool together on Saturday morning
- Getting rather tipsy watching the rugby and meeting Andrew who shared his (company expense carded) beers with us, what a nice chap! :)
- Spending a lazy Sunday arvo at Holland Village eating & drinking beer (Quote; Singapore's bohemian enclave, Holland Village is a microcosm of life here)
- Dave's earphones still working - PHEW!

Lows

- Finding Dave's very expensive earphones in the pile of washing I had just taken out of the washing machine.
- Being very hung over on Sunday, finding two bruises on my shins but having no recollection of walking into anything!
- Shuttle Runs

And for the foodies

Friday Night aka Take Away Night - At about 7pm there was a scuffle at the front door and when I opened it to investigate there was Dave with so many bags of food he couldn't even knock on the door properly never mind get his keycard out to open it! He had nipped into Spize restaurant on his way home. Note to future self; Do not allow Dave to go to the take away place alone. We went for mainly Indian, Garlic Butter Prata, Murtabak, Mutton Briyani, Nasi Lemak Ayam Kunyit (Fried rice with chicken & turmeric), oh and 10 mixed satay sticks (apparently according to Dave you can only buy them in 10's!). We decided we had so much food we needed to eat it in courses, so we had the Prata & the Murtabak to start, the prata bread was light and smothered in garlic butter, it was very very nice! And well the Murtabak was one of the best things I've eaten since we've been here, it was like the prata style bread but stuffed with chicken and spices and all things yummie. It was sooooo good I just had to take a photo! Both came with a delish curry sauce that you could dip them in. Then we had the satay sticks, they gave us a ridiculously large amount of deliciously thick savoury satay sauce most of which is still sitting in the fridge! We were of mixed opinion on the main courses, Dave liked the Nasi Lemak whilst I preferred the Mutton Briyani but we were in agreement on one thing and that was how nice it is when you have to pick out the cardamon pods, star anise, curry leaves, cloves etc as it just shows you how freshly made the dishes are. Which is what makes them sooo tasty tasty!

Saturday - Pretty uneventful in the food department as we were too busy drinking! But we did manage to squeeze in a Wagu beef burger at the Boomerang bar after watching the rugby.

Sunday - We got up late & very hungover! After lazing around & generally feeling sorry for ourselves we decided we needed something easy to do so Dave picked a restaurant from our guide book and called a cab. Easy! When we arrived at Holland Village we realised all the restaurants stop serving food between lunch and dinner and being so late our chosen restaurant was closed so we went to our back-up plan. Jayme had spied a Wendy's on out way into the village! We decided that if we were going to have Wendy's at all then today would be a good day as fast food burgers & chips are good hangover food! We were a bit sceptical after our KFC experience so much so that Dave suggested just ordering one burger to test it before we committed! But I couldn't be bothered with the faff factor. Much to our delight it was GOOD and it was as good as the Wendy's in NZ so Dave was a happy man. It was just what we needed even though we realised that we had a burger yesterday as well, oops! After lunch we went for a quick exploration, then it started raining so we were forced into a bar! So 'Hair of the Dog' it was, two pints of Asahi a chocolate brownie later we were ready to return home after our strenuous day. Later that evening (just before the GP) we realised we needed dinner so we took a wander down to our local mall. We were just agreeing that we should eat something healthy after our fast food weekend and get some salad or something from the supermarket when this evil man walked past us with take away pizza's.....and the rest as they say is history.


Olive-backed Sunbird (I didn't take this btw!)


Chicken Murtabak



Chocolate Brownie Addict

Week #2 - Food Opera

Highs

- Chowing our way through two tubs of Ben & Jerry's ice cream, Chocolate Macadamia & Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Actually got some clear blue skies & pool weather this week, Tan:Stage One - nearing completion
- Started a proper gym workout (I'm gonna need it!)
- Buying a pretty dress for $10
- Dave found some trainers in his size & a very nice pair of sunglasses that suited him
- Dave bought me a nice new apt mug (we have the tiniest tea cups in the apartment, so small that it's not actually worth the effort of making the tea!)

Lows

- Not being able to stop thinking about the ice cream and running around the apartment in an ice cream withdrawal craze, shouting 'I need ice cream' and not having any ice cream.
- No more shopping allowed!
- My legs are feeling considerably less than 'perfect' after my 'Perfect Legs' workout

And for the foodies

Monday - I was feeling a bit under the weather so in the need of some healthy food, Dave brought home Thai Beef & Smoked Chicken salads for dinner and a yummie NZ smoothie (Mango, peach, apricot, orange and yogurt), they were quite good salads for Singapore and Dave is so impresssed by the smoothies he has one a day! At least they're healthy.

Tuesday - We cooked stir fry again and was yummie again.

Wednesday - Dave came home with chocolate brownies for dessert, he said he couldn't resist as there was a whole bakery dedicated to chocolate brownies and if you eat-in they are served in a chocolate soup with ice cream! We're going to eat-in soon. We cooked Prawn Laksa for dinner and oh my it was GOOD! And how we relished in our accomplishment of creating this fine dish, that was until we looked at the fat content of the coconut milk and it had 60g of saturated fat in it!! That's probably the last time we cook that unless we find a low fat coconut milk! :(

Thursday - After some more shopping we stopped for a quick meal at a Food Court called 'Food Opera' on Orchard Rd. We decided on Indonesian, Nasi Kuning Ayam Goreng(a chicken quarter in a very savoury aromatic sauce served with rice cooked in coconut milk & turmeric and a side of marinated cucumber/courgettes/chilli) and a chicken quarter in this light batter (not sure what it was called, Dave just picked it coz it looked good!) with rice & Okra with chilli, yummie yum yum! Dave ate every last bit of chicken he could find on those plates! It was pretty tasty just like everything else we've sampled (apart from the KFC!) Then on the way home we were cunningly seduced into a Frozen Yogurt Parlor by an evil girl standing out on the hot sweltering street with samples of the most deliciously flavoured frozen yogurt AND they were fat free! Just the thing we needed to solve our Ben & Jerry's problem. So with that we stomped into the Parlor, now whoever opened up this place had the right idea, it's set up like Woolworths Pick & Mix (you know the one where you put a few sweets in a bag and next thing you know it's sitting on the scales and the lady is saying "that's £8.35 please"). Well 10 flavours = 10 'help yourself' machines and at the end a whole world of SPRINKLES! Trying not to get too carried away we picked the biggest tub and filled it with 3 flavours; Passion Fruit, Mango and Chocolate, then we sprinkled it with nuts and chocolate chips and we could have kept going as they had everything you could possibly imagine sprinkling on Frozen yogurt, until Dave expertly deduced that the sprinkles were probably the thing that made it expensive as they were 'heavy'! lol! So we quickly stopped and put our tub on the scales and the lady said "that will be $8.45 please".


My new Mug



PRAWNS!


Prawn Laksa

The Weekend Has Landed!

Sorry got a bit behind on the blog already! Nothing very exciting happened last Thursday & Friday though so skipping with joy straight to the weekend. If only you could do that in real life eh.

Highs (mostly shopping orientated!)

- Finding a Roxy store in Vivo City and it was cheap! Note to self: Must stay away from Vivo City.
- Instructing Dave on the way not to let me buy any new tops under any circumstances and buying two new tops.
- Dave finding a bag for work that he likes. Search over.
- Going to see Predators & Toy Story 3. Toy Story 3 was very very good!
- We have a channel that shows the GP!

Lows

- Dave being very hungover on Saturday after work drinks on Friday, not the best state to drag him around 'Singapore's largest Retail & Lifestyle Destination'!
- Dave finding a few shops that sells the trainers he wants but not in his size. Frustrating.
- Dave not impressed with the Singapore commentators on the GP or the coverage, not as good as the BBC & we miss Jake Humphrey, Martin Brundle and David Coulthard.

And for the foodies

We were in such a rush on Saturday that we ended up having KFC for lunch. Bad Dayme! But Dave being an avid KFC fan we had to at least sample it to see if it was better than the UK/as good as NZ. But alas it was a big disappointment so we defo won't be going back (apart from the Egg Tart, that was yummie, not very KFC but very good!) After the movies we went to Mr Curry, we just couldn't resist the name! It wasn't anything fancy, just choose a curry sauce & a topping with rice and away you go. It was a cool Japanese restaurant that had the shiny plastic model versions of every dish stuck all over the walls. We had Chicken Katsu & Tori Karaage, whilst they were both yummie we thought the Tori Karaage was better. The curry sauce was sweet & spicy (I didn't realise it was made with mango's), defo going back to try the extra spicy one.

On Sunday we walked past the Marriott's Outdoor Cafe and after a hard days shopping & watching Toy Story 3 we decided that we deserved a treat! We ordered a cold beer each, a starter and a main course to share. We spent $3 over Dave's daily food allowance on one meal - Oops! We had the; Charcuterie board - Shaved leg ham, salami, bresaola, prosciutto, pate & duck rillette, Homemade breads, cornichons, mustard and tapenades and the 100% Wagyu burger 300g, Melted raclette cheese, tomato, dill pickle, rocket, shaved red onion and chipotle mayonnaise. These meals were HUGE! The Charcuterie board must have had half a cow/pig on it and the Wagyu burger had two burgers in it! Plenty enough to share in fact Dave wussed out and left me to finish the meat on the Charcuterie board. I felt so sick afterwards but I couldn't leave it to get thrown in the bin and not fulfil it's Charcuterie Board destiny after all it had been through to get there!! We couldn't decide what made the Wagyu burger taste so much better then a normal beef burger but it did, it was melt in the mouth delish! Presentation was top notch as well, both served on a mini dark wood chopping board, with the chips wrapped up in a cone of paper, top marks.

When we got home we refreshed ourselves with an ice cool G&T and watched the Grand Prix. Which reminds me the ice tray in our freezer is so cool, it has a drop down tray underneath the built in ice cube trays so you can empty them out and store them and freeze more cubes - very smart for a normal freezer (those of you with posh freezers won't appreciate it so much!) ;)

Meeting Molly...

Highs

- Spending the arvo lounging on the day bed by the pool and falling asleep whilst reading my book.
- Managing to meet up with Evan & Isabelle (Evan married us) at their Son's condo. Michael was actually away for work but we met his lovely wife Cate and their gorgeous 2.5yr old daughter, Molly. Cate & Michael have been here for about 4/5yrs so it was good to chat to her about what a more long-term life here entails.
- Feeling very loved by Molly, Cate told me she had been talking about me all day & had planned an evening of us playing with her toys & play dough. I was first to be asked to read her a bedtime story! She is the cutest little thing, blonde curly hair & big blue eyes.

Lows

- The afternoon sun not reaching the pool area, will have to check out what the mornings are like and change my daily schedule!


For the Foodies

It was lovely to be invited to Michael & Cate's house for dinner, making us feel at home in a country we've been in for less than a week. A pre-dinner G&T to start with some CHEESE :) and crackers. And we thought we wouldn't be eating cheese for a couple of months. Awesome! Dave had just been commenting earlier that he was craving a salad, so when dinner was served, lasagna and salad, Dave was a happy man! It was lovely to have something Italian esp as we had written off being able to afford such cuisines. We washed it down with a NZ Pinot Noir. After a second helping of lasagna, homemade Banana Cake and Chocolate Fudge Brownie appeared on the table, well we had to try both! The Chocolate Brownie was cooked exactly how they should be oozing melted chocolate when you stuck your fork in it and the Banana Cake was very moist & oozed banana flavours! After a lovely meal & lots of chatting & catching up, Cate kindly dropped us home with a plate full of Chocolate Brownies...

Little India

Well another day at the office for Dave & another day of pottering, gyming & sitting on my laptop for me, researching cheap flights to KL & Thailand. Having Malaysia & Thailand on our doorstep is definitely one of the highs of being here! Planning a trip to the Phi Phi islands in Thailand so very excited about that. And of course looking forward to some authentic Thai & Malaysian food! On the subject of food....

For the Foodies

The next on our list was Little India, I met Dave from the office, well eventually after standing outside the wrong building for about 10mins, oops! We jumped on the MRT (Singapore's 'much better' version of the tube!) and headed to curry central. Now we didn't actually research where to eat and as it was dark & raining we just stumbled into the first restaurant that handed us a flyer & a '10% off' voucher! And we weren't disappointed. It took us a long time to choose our dishes as the menu was huge! But eventually after many minutes of slurping on our Mango & Strawberry Lassi's we had decided, much to the delight of our waitress! So we ordered the Chicken Achari (chicken pieces marinated in yogurt, spices and lemon juice), Mutton Mysore (marinated in lots of different spices, with whole dried red chilli's & a tomato based sauce), Aloo Jeera (potatoes & cumin), Chilli Pakoras, Rogani Naan, Missi Roti & Jeera Rice. When trying to decide if we needed one or two rice dishes, the waitress chirped in and said 'I think you should start with one as eating too much food is not good for you' and as she walked off Dave and I pondered over the possibility that we had ordered too much food!

The Chilli Pakoras were first to arrive; whole big green chilli's stuffed with spices and covered in a very light batter, not greasy at all. The Chicken Achari was next and delicious! (I'm glad Dave convinced me to order this over my usual Jalfrazi), the chicken was not dry at all as I feared it might be, it was grilled & covered in this thin layer of creamy spicy marinade. This was followed by the Mutton, rice, potatoes and breads. The Mutton was not chewy at all as again I feared it might be (Dave had assured me as long as it's cooked correctly Mutton can be just as tasty as it's younger counterpart)and the dried red chilli's had just the right amount of heat, the sauce was dark & rich. The Naan bread was thin & crispy, not doughy & soggy like you get in the UK. It was all without fault.

And low & behold we managed to eat all of it bar a few spoonfuls of rice!

A couple of things that made me smile today...

Not much in the way of highs & lows today as Dave was at the office all day and after my Wifely duty of cooking him eggs on toast for breakfast I just pottered around the apartment, I suppose that's a low for Dave and a high for me!

A couple of things that made me smile.

The Instructions on the teabag box - "Brewing the HIRAMEKI way"

1) Pour freshly boiled water and cover for 2-3 mins.
2) Whilst waiting, take a deep breath and bring your arms up into a 'L' shape. Keeping the 'L' lift your left knee to your right elbow, then your right knee to your left elbow. Do 10 sets. This exercise is good for your mind. (I think you have to be sitting down but it forgets to mention that!)
3) Dunk the teabag 5 times then remove. Now you tea is ready.
4) As you enjoy the taste, see the world from a different point of view. See, you've got HIRAMEKI!

Secondly, there have been some pretty terrible floods here which obviously didn't make me smile but in an article about them, it was reported that 16 live fish and 40 live crabs had escaped from a restaurant in the floods, now that made me smile! They even had a comment from the restaurant owner "perhaps someone will be lucky enough to find them".

For the Foodies

We cooked our first home cooked meal tonight which was nice, and we used the rice cooker which was so easy we're not sure why we've never owned one! We're defo getting one when we get back, rice is cooked perfectly fluffy. We cooked chicken, with cashew nuts, lots of Asian veggies inc three different types of mushrooms (Enokitake, Oyster & Buna Shimeji)- I love mushrooms! Dave & I often have mushroom disagreements as I put them in everything whilst he follows these funny little rules like 'they're not supposed to be in Chilli Con Carne'.


The Ingredients


Just look at all the yummie Shrooms!


The Dish!

A Day of Rest or Shopping....same same but different.

Highs

- Sleeping in again, oops! ;)
- Spending two hours ambling around the supermarket and getting very excited about all the yummie food.
- Buying said yummie food; Rendang paste, lots of different types noodles, flavoured rice that you just add to the rice cooker with water and turn it on, easy as! Lots & lots of different types of mushrooms, Boysenberry Jam! (not very Asian but we got very excited about it!), spring rolls for snackage, a whole bag of tiger prawns! To name a few.
- Eating a big prawn spring roll for breakie.

Lows

- Looking at the prices for cheese (about £10 for some Camembert), and houmous (about £6 a pot) and wine (cheapest bottle about £15!) Hmmmm.....
- Orchard Road aka the shopping mecca of Singapore - we're probably the only people who were not that impressed! It's ok if you shop at Dior, Prada, Gucci, DKNY, Versace, Hermes, Armani, D&G, Tiffany's or Louis Vuitton. No Roxy! Pah.
- It rained most of the day. Checked and discovered that Singapore in fact has two Monsoon seasons, one of which is June to September. Doh!

And For the Foodies

Another dinner in a shopping mall but we had time to peruse again today. However we ended up at the first counter again! Mainly for it's value for money; 1 main dish, 2 side dishes and rice for about £2. Who can argue with that! We always share so we ordered the Beef Rendang, with french beans in chilli and bok choi in soy and a Green Chicken Curry, with celery & seasame seeds and some sort of courgettes oh and a corn fritter to share. Then we spent about 5mins at the till filling little dishes with all the different varieties of chilli based condiments, we took so many that the woman behind the counter offered us another special one she had hidden away! All the food was again exceptional, beef was slow cooked and fell apart and chicken pieces cooked on the bone so still tender. Flavour bursting out of every mouthful!

After an experience that left us wandering around with our trays (Eddie Izzard fans will be pleased to know 'you'll still need a tray' in Singapore!) looking for a space to sit & a chair to sit on, we have now learnt, one of you gets the seats and one of you gets the food!

Someone Tell Him He's Dreaming...

Highs

- Moved into our 2-bed serviced apartment with pool & gym which is very nice, spacious and much better than a staying in a hotel room for two months.
- Drinking James Boags and being in the correct hemisphere to watch the Rugby.
- Paying the equivalent of £4.50 each to see Inception at the IMAX, very cool movie. Dave is a happy man.

Lows

- saying goodbye to our five star hotel.

And For the Foodies

We needed to grab a quick dinner before the movie, so we headed straight to the food court in the shopping mall. On the way there, Dave said 'OK we don't have much time so let's just grab the first nice thing we see rather than looking around'. So we walked in, stopped at the very first counter and ordered two Chicken Laksa's (this decision was probably inspired by Denis who had just said to us on chat 'have you tried the laksa yet?' and by the fact that it was indeed the first nice thing we saw!) And it was very very nice, especially with all the different types of chilli based condiments we added! Defo loving all the little chilli/condiments & flavouring your food to your own exact requirements! Although were slightly confused by the spaghetti instead of noodles? Denis is this normal?

Turning Japanese

Highs

- A 13 hour sleep in a very big comfortable bed with a choice of pillows, I opted for the ones soo fluffy your head sinks into them and nearly loses itself!
- A hour & a half work out in the plush hotel gym.
- A monsoon shower you could spend a week in! Seriously so good it has to feature twice.
- Asia's version of the 'pot noodle' for lunch - even they are YUM and at $1.65 a pot who's complaining!
- the scales in our bathroom saying we're both 2 kilos lighter than our ones in London (this is definitely a five star hotel!)

Lows

- Dave's first full day at the office. Oh yeah... that's why we're here!


And For the Foodies

After meandering along the river through all the different Quays we came to the conclusion that all the restaurants here were pretty touristy (& pricey) and seeing as we're not 'theoretically' on a holiday we opted for a cheaper Japanese Restaurant in a shopping mall that had a massive queue outside it and no Westerners (usually a good sign!) We had to wait for ages which was actually quite lucky as it took me this amount of time to choose what I wanted to eat! We ordered chicken patties (which were like the filling of a Gyoza on a stick and grilled) and some Gyoza (both YUM!) then we had Pork Okonomiyaki (a Japanese style pancake) and I ordered a Chicken & Seafood Rice Stone Pot which was bought to the table to cook, I was instructed by the waitress not to lift the lid until the flame had died, about 20mins so obviously I sat there for the next 20mins wanting to lift the lid. When it was finally ready I sprinkled my spring onion & salmon roe on top and it was done. It was so fresh and deliciously seafoody tasting!

Hello Singa Pura!

Highs

- It's hot!
- It's clean!
- Five star hotel for two days :) :)
- Very cool hotel porters dressed in what I assume to be old style Singaporean attire which was gorgeous, and they open every door for you with an infectious smile.
- A monsoon shower you could spend a week in!
- Coming home from dinner to find our bed linen turned down at the corners with flowers placed on them, then racing around the room trying to figure out where the classical music was coming from and then realising it was coming from our own room from the Bose sound system.
- Drinking beer and eating Cheezels looking over the night skyline of Singapore from our hotel room.


Lows

- It's very hot!
- Waiting for two hours for our hotel room to be ready (I know, it's a hard life!)
- Beer is very very expensive here, infact all alcohol is, £2 for a small can of beer in the supermarket. Wowsers!

And For the Foodies

For our first dinning experience in Singapore we decided to try out our local food court in Raffles City Shopping Centre on our hotel doorstep. Now, we needed to make an informed decision so we walked around the entire place to check out what each food counter had to offer us. After 'several' (I use this word loosely!) minutes perusing we opted for Char Siu and Roast Pork with noodles and some Bok Choi in Soy Sauce (£4) and a Nasi Biriyani Set (£3). Oh my word, they were out of this world! The pork was sliced off a massive rib, we got bits of roasted belly & bits of the pink edged ribs, the veggies were so savoury and the Nasi Biriyani was very very tasty, big piece of chicken on the bone in lots of sauce and tasty tasty rice. Luckily we had hidden ourselves away on a table in the corner so no one could detect our excitement after every single bite! After this meal we had pretty much decided that we wanted to live here.

Dayme takes flight in their Business Socks

Highs

- Quick & easy check-in and fast-tracked passport control away from all the queues of Riff-Raff ;)
- Business Class lounge - Riff-Raff free, plus free food, drinks and bar....although was a bit early for drinking.....
- Champagne o'clock! Glass of Champagne as soon as we got to our seats.
- Telepathic chefs who created a King prawn & watercress salad with fresh peas and caper dressing for the starter (YUM - they must have known I was coming!) and Dave's lamb was melt in the mouth, all accompanied by some delicious Aussie wines.
- Seats that moved into practically any position you wanted and large TV screens that popped out of the side table & lots of films to choose from.

Lows

- The corporate car driver took Trinity Rd and Wandsworth Bridge to go to Heathrow, resulting in us sitting in lots of traffic all the way there, hmph.
- The bag of nuts that accompanied our pre-dinner beer were the same size as you get in Riff-Raff Class, pah! I thought they should have been at least double the size!
- My fish was a bit dry but we decided it probably wasn't appropriate to send it back ;)
- Even with my chair in a bed position, my free PJ's on and half a sleeping pill I still didn't sleep :(
- Knowing one day soon we will once again be Riff-Raff.