Big D-isappointment
Bus 48 stops outside the famous Holland Village coffeeshop selling XO fishhead noodles. I wanted to get some lunch for Tempest and myself, so it was pretty convenient to grab some food from this coffeeshop, instead of my initial thoughts of going to the hawker centre within the Holland V arena.
Scanning through the few stalls - XO fishhead noodles, braised duck rice, Big D's Grill, economical vegetable rice, soups - I somewhat fixed my attention on the western food stall. Tempest likes western, and we had eaten at Big D's at Bedok before it shifted here. The food wasn't too bad. It was the same big tall, bald guy at the helm. He handed me over the menu and patiently waited for me to make my orders. After some consideration...
Me: "I will have a fish n' chips, and a grilled boneless chicken leg. Takeway please."
Big Guy: "Sure. There will be an additional 50 cents each for takeway. Is that alright?"
Me: "Ok".
My thoughts: What else could I have said??
Big Guy: "Please take a seat. I will deliver it to you when it's ready."
Me: "Ok".. and walked away to find some seat not too far away from the stall.
I must have waited for about 10 minutes or so, or maybe even longer as the old man seated at the same table already finished his meal of braised duck rice. Maybe I was back-facing the stall or what, Big Guy did not deliver the takeout to me. I happened to look over and saw a neatly packed plastic bagful of food and decided to check if my order was ready. Indeed, the food was just sitting there waiting for me. What happen to Big Guy's words? He promised to deliver it to me once it was ready! And Big Guy disappeared to nowhere.
Never mind. I asked the Malay chef if there were any utensils packed in the plastic bag. And he said yes. After a few steps, my intuition got the better of me, and I checked. None! I walked back to the stall and asked for the utensils. Guess what? "We ran out of fork, spoon can?" OMG! I ordered fish n chips plus chicken chop. Does he think that those can be eaten easily with just a spoon?!
Me: "No, I need forks."
He then walked over to the next stall and got me 2 forks.
Downright horrible service. It's not as if they were busy with customers. It was 2.30pm with only a third of the coffeeshop filled. I didn't even see anybody else eating western food! The signboard was plain white, with "Big D's Grill" in large black fonts, and the single 'D' in red. It was not even lit up, unlike the rest of the stalls. Kinda pales in comparison. I even thought that the stall was closed until I walked up and saw the chef busying with some stuff at the stall.
Still, I was determined not to let that incident get me down. I was feeling satisfied from the gym workout earlier. Not that I expended large amount of energy, but being able to return to a fitness regime after few months' break is indeed invigorating! So, I crossed the road and waited for bus 95 which dropped me off at Lower Kent Ridge Cresent, just before Yusof Ishak House. And sprightly walked 1 km under the burning hot sun to reach Engineering Block.
It was almost 3.15pm when I reached Tempest's lab. He was eager to have his lunch. Afterall, breakfast was ony a couple of siew mai and half a big bun at 10am. But, I just have to stop him and take the following pictures. I needed them to emphasize my complaints!
They dared to charge me 50 cents for an over-sized paper bag??!! A ridiculously high cost to recreate a teeny weeny bit of the authentic feel of ol' english fish n chips. 
2 large pieces of beer battered fish with no hint of beer. It could have been pretty crispy if eaten immediately after being served. The fries were good - long and chunky.
Palm-sized chicken chop. Nowhere did it resemble a chicken leg to me.
Tempest had a fairly good time devouring the slightly charred skin; he gave it a thumbs up. But I thought overall, the chicken was a tad too dry. The fries had also turned soggy from being soaked in the sauce for 40 minutes. The baked beans were cold, so not very nice. One commendable thing though was that they added small pieces of bacon to it, giving it an extra bite.
Given the portion of the foods, $8.90 each seems a bit too expensive, especially so with the likes of Aston and Botak Jones serving equally tasty stuffs, maybe slightly bigger portions (at least for BJ) but at slightly lower prices.
Anyway,
ieatishootipost had a pretty good review of this stall, mainly of its high-end stuffs like kurobata loin, and wagyu beef. Actually their pasta didn't look too bad. I saw its chef cooking up a dish for himself - the thick sauce clung on tightly to the pasta. If you like the dry sort of pasta, you will probably give it a thumbs up.
For me, the lousy service spoils everything.
Puzzles
Everytime I sit on the MRT, I will see someone with a book of crossword puzzles or sudoku. They are usually ladies; but yesterday afternoon, I chanced upon a middle-aged man who looked very serious in his crossword puzzles. That was the part that amused me. Most that I saw casually outlined the words. But this guy even used a ruler! Heh, maybe he could have used a highlighter instead. With the advent of highlighter erasers, there is no fear in highlighting the wrong words anymore. Plus, it's convenient and he can still do his puzzles neatly without getting a seat on the train :-p
Now and then, I also like circling words out of a maze of random alphabets. My brother and I used to have a couple of crossword puzzles lying around in the house. We probably got them cheap at a dollar or two in some book sale. When I am bored with nothing else to do, I will pick up those books and while away an hour or so. Strangely, sometimes I just feel like doing those puzzles.
At a glance, it seems like a mindless activity. But somehow, as I squint my eyes and try to uncover each word, I derive a sense of satisfaction from finding strings of letters that are purposely spelt backwards, diagonally, diagonally backwards.. Such concentration isolates the mind. It forces away fleeting thoughts on studies (in the younger days), work, friends, the future, the past, hopes and disappointment. Sounds like I got a troubled past, haha. Far from being the truth though. I simply enjoy a mind-numbing activity now and then.
The birthday that started and ended at work.
16 Jun, 12.30am: I left office after clearing my personal mailbox and mailing a copy of the leave calender to my yahoo mail account.
16 Jun, 2.05pm:I left home for work.
17 Jun 12.15am:I left office after deleting my sent items in my personal inbox. It's really frustrating not being able to send out emails because the mailbox is full.
I had the above thoughts when I was crossing the road this afternoon on my way to the office. This is not the first time I am working on my birthday. I don't really feel the need to take the day off unless it falls on a Friday or before my leave or before any public holiday (which is impossible for me since Singapore doesn't celebrate any festival in June).
I have had cakes and department celebration in my previous employment as well. In D-bank, there are 20 - 30 of us who would crowd around in the pantry and sing a birthday song with the cake the AVP aka our manager had bought. Some other colleagues who are closer to each other would then pool together a sum of money and get a gift for the birthday boy / girl. The bad thing is we relied on the AVP to get the cake. Somehow, someone will inform the AVP that somebody's birthday is coming and the latter will get the get somewhere and on someday in the birthday month, we will sing the birthday song together.
In M-bank, it's pretty much similar. Except that there are a group of managers now co-sharing the cake. There are also about 20 of us in the department. No gifts though, but they will buy one cake each. So if there are 2 people born in the same month, we will have 2 cakes on that day of celebration. If it is the birthday month of the Boss, then the birthday cake will be huge with definitely some picture of Winnie the Pooh, and most likely a lunch spread of pizzas, chicken wings, tze char, beehoon etc, compliments from the Boss who thinks that we put in a lot of effort plannning her birthday celebration. It is also almost a tradition to have Mr Yip singing the cantonese version of "Happy Birthday". We just loved to hear him sing; not saying that it sounded fantastic, but it is definitely entertaining and refreshing~
Now, in B-bank, there is the cake, and there are also gifts! Things are more upmarket here. Let's talk about the cake first. Mr. NQ who was nominated as the social & welfare committee this year always delight the group of 13 with his selection of exotic, fine-tasting birthday cakes. Last month, we had a ultra-rich chocolate cake by Cova (the high class Italian cafe that boasts of a great house brew). Today (or rather last evening), he got me and another birthday guy a triple chocolate cheesecake from
Canele, again some high class chocolate patisserie.
Yea, it looks exactly like the picture above, less 2 non-blowable candles!
Hear the mouthful of description:
Walnut chocolate fudge cake, chocolate chip cheese cake and dark chocolate chantily.
It costs $78.00 per kg!
It was nice of him to search for that cake when I told him I felt like having a chocolate cheese cake :p Oh yes, I am his appointed deputy committee member who would source the gifts for female colleagues while he does the guys' and of course, the cakes. He always asked me what cake I would like whenever he needs to buy any for the office. Cool!
I got a Billabong sweater and cap! Thanks to EW & BL who went to Raffles City to get the gifts.
The sweater was in cream color. in 80% cotton and 20% polyester. It fitted rather well, and is quite soft,and comfortable. It may not be very thick, but it sure is heavy on the hanger.The cap is 100% cotton and looks cute with its slightly squarish top. Short at the sides, it looks like some kind of Recruit's cap when I wore it. Upon googling, I found that these are termed 'Railroad Caps" or "Engineer Caps".Of course, each one of us has to 'donate' $10 - $20 each during each birthday month, depending on the number of people celebrating it at the same time. T's birthday fell on 13 Jun and mine on 16 Jun, so it was really a good timing to celebrate it. Due to some data entry error, where T's was entered as 16 Jun, we had the celebration today instead. Haha.
At about 9pm when NQ was leaving the office, I had a quick chat with him over birthdays. I was telling him that most of my friends (even my family) don't do gifts and cakes anymore, and ironically, I only get such stuff in my workplace, past and present. He said he will cook up something himself and get everybody to celebrate for him if nobody does that, hehe. Anyway, subsequently he sent me a SMS which stirred my emotions:
In verbatim:
"I think there is some truth in perhaps when u grow older, pple celebrate things like bdays less. But just to let u know, I was particularly excited when i got u the cake and pple like EW n BL were all excited about getting u the gift n all :) I would be very happy if got so many pple celebrate for me liao haha. Happy bday! Savor the last few hours."For the record, this guy's a married man who loves his beer and humor at all times. On getting his msg, I decided to express my thanks once again to him, EW & BL who went through the trouble to make the event a memorable and tasty one for me! It's nice having wonderful people around me, and I ought to learn to appreciate them. A word of thanks may not be much, but that's the beginning!
Taking a step back, I still have good times with my friends. Though we only have dinners and no cakes, it was still emotional to know that I have friends beside me and who will lend a helping hand when I am in need. Birthday celebrations are more of a ceremonial practice to get together to chat over meals.
As for Tempest, I always have great times with him. He never fails to surprise me on my last 3 birthdays I had with him. I am waiting to see what he's up to for the 4th one :-p
Weekend feeding frenzy
It was a weekend of eating!
It started with Saturday afternoon where I met up with the girls at Manpuku@Tampines One to celebrate G's & my birthday. Somehow, our appetites got smaller as we grow older. Between the 4 of us, we shared a bowl of miso cha siew ramen with extra corn topping, a plate of mushroom curry rice, a plate of omu rice accompanied with a slice of pork katsu, an okonomiyaki with prawn fillings, one banana caramel tart, one strawberry tart, one grapefruit tart, and 4 glasses of drinks. The bill came up to only about $90, much less than what I would expect to pay for a birthday treat.
I still remembered our first treat held in Marche. That already in itself was $70-$90. At a time when we were all poor university students, it was quite a meal, at least in cost. The birthday girl will get a gift in return. I can't recall how we had this idea of celebrating birthdays. And the birthday girl is actually the one giving the treat, in contrary to most friends' of which we heard.
10 years down the road, this practice developed into something simpler. I think it started with me asking for angpow instead of a gift. Rather than taxing on the girls' brain power to guess and think of what I really wanted, I gave them an easier time by getting the money instead. Initially, they objected strongly to the idea and insisted on giving stuff like clothes, bags etc. But gradually they ran out of ideas of what to get for me, and relented. :-p
Now, everybody's adopting my preference. It sounds like a convenient excuse to not think of a suitable gift for your dear friends, and convincing ourselves that the person would much like to receive the cold hard cash so that they can get their favorite toy at their own sweet time. Indeed, it sounds a bit sad that we can't even find time to meet up one another now to shop leisurely together to get gifts, and so the demise of the 'top-up' scheme (for example, I top up $10 to the $80 angpow I get in order to buy a $90-worth object). Then again, it seems inevitable as
each of us has different priorities and more responsibilities now. I am just happy to meet them regularly, and share tidbits of our life over tea and snacks.
Next, I travelled to Boon Tong Kee situated next to Boon Keng MRT to meet up my parents for a Father Day cum my birthday celebration. Even more amazingly, 5 of us (3 females and 2 males) eating only half a white chicken, one small plate of stir fried kailan, one small plate of deep-fried golden bean curd, and a bowl of rice/porridge each! The entire bill was only $40! Super cheap.
I took the porridge since I was already full from the Manpuku lunch. It was awfully bland and watery. Not nice at all. I ought have taken the rice if I knew they served chicken rice. The stir fried kailan was surprisingly crunchy and green. And the beancurd is quite tasty, with a really crispy crust holding within it soft smooth cube of curd. The chilli dip and dark soya sauce are also thick and not the watery stuff you get in most hawker centres.
I got a feeling that everybody else wasn't entirely full due to the minimized portion. Yet my brother didn't want to order when asked to. Too bad Tempest had to attend a wedding, dinner else we could have dared to order more varieties or bigger portions.
This place is still worth a second visit since there are so many other dishes that I haven't tried. And most of the dishes are quite reasonably priced. Overall pretty satisfying.
The next day, I managed to pull Tempest out of his bed to go jogging at the gym. Though it was only a half an hour jog (maybe less), we assured ourselves that we had done enough to deserve a buffet. Afterall, we hit our target weight for the week, and it was my birthday, and Tempest got a new job...
We called up S & GZ about the durian buffet they kept inducing us to go. Yet unfortunately they can't make it. Therefore we ended up at Hanabi at Katong Mall.
The anticipation we had were far greater than our appetite. Not that the food was lousy, some were quite tasty, like the yaki niku (stir fried beef in some sauce), salmon sashimi, prawn fritters with wasabi mayo.. I also gotta give special mention to the tako sashimi - it was coiled around lemon slices so that when you bite into the thinly-sliced chewy meat, it had a refreshing zest to it! It's quite sad when they didn't do the same with the other sashimi, not even placing lemon slices by the plate they serve in.
What surprises me as an after-thought was that Tempest only took 2 tempura prawns! Usually during buffets, this guy would chiong for the prawns, mussels and anything that swim in the sea. We had a total of 3 rounds - serving size for the first 2 rounds were alright, but the 3rd round's appeared slightly larger, especially the prawn fritters maki. We were told that there would be only 3 pieces, but each piece is as good as 2 pieces! The tiny prawn was surrounded by a thick layer of sushi rice! Tempest was reminded of the same thing happening when he had the buffet at Tung Lok. We therefore concluded that it must be a ploy of the restaurant to stop us from eating further by packing larger servings and making it saltier.
Comparing this to the times we had kuishin-bo buffet, this was probably only 50% of our usual food intake. No more the "shiok-ness" of eating mounds of food! Not a bad idea actually, when we were trying hard to shed the extra fats and flesh hugging tightly onto us!!
Rucola = Rocket
I first tasted this herb in
Spizza, along Jalan Kayu. Interestingly, their pizzas were all names of Italian women, from A to V. Maybe they are reserving W, X, Y and Z for new creations :p
Me and Tempest had a 'Katrina' if I remembered it correctly. For sure, the pizza comes with tomato, mozzarella, rucola salad, shaved parmesan and some kind of ham. Using their online menu as a guide, I think I must have had a "Katrina".
We asked the chef what was rucola. I thought Tempest was disappointed to realise that it was a vegetable, and not some kind of exotic meat. "Some people like it, some people don't" The chef reminded us that the herb is an acquired taste. And I liked it! I don't specifically recall the taste except that it was slightly bitter, and was perfect companion to the large slices of thinly-shaved cheese.
Anyway, I found a description of the herb which could give it the desirability it deserves:
NATURAL ENERGY
Very common in ancient times, rucola (often called rocket in English) was a staple component of the Roman diet. This is borne out by poets like Horace who credited his friend Martial, who spoke of it as a magical herb, with having discovered its aromatic and flavoring properties. When allowed to grow in a wild state, the plant can reach a height of some 50 cm, producing leaves with a sharp flavor that is augmented as the acidity of the soil increases. When cultivated, rucola tends to be milder and more delicate than the wild variety, and much more tender, as well. Currently rucola is used in cooking as an herb, a side dish to accompany meat dishes and as a topping for first courses. It is also found in herbalist's shops thanks to its medicinal properties. It lends a slightly pungent tang to pasta dishes; it is added raw to sauces and is generally combined with tomato and garlic. It should be tried in such dishes as Tortelloni con Prosciutto Crudo with rocket and almonds or Farfalle with peppers and rocket. Energizing and rich in vitamin C and mineral salts, when combined with other vegetables it adds a lively zest to fresh salads. Creating a "bed" of rucola has become a classic way of enhancing the presentation of delicatessen products, meats and all sorts of cheeses. Distinguished by a slightly bitter aftertaste, it is a favorite ingredient for dressings and mousse preparations with butter and ricotta. Once dried, its roots are used to prepare excellent digestive infusions that take advantage of its aperient and diuretic properties. Rucola, as a natural emollient, is also used in cosmetics, in scalp treatments and moisturizing, toning lotions for the skin. It provides a bracing shot of energy, promoting a restoration of psycho-physical vitality. It is a great way to overcome spring asthenia and the accompanying sense of lethargy and fatigue that so many people suffer from at the end of winter.
How I missed it when I saw a lady discarding the rucola and only attacked the salmon in a dish of norwegian salad in Cafe Bar. Such a waste! And rucola, often refered to as 'wild rocket' in supermarts, are quite expensive compared to most other herbs and vegetables. Tsk tsk tsk!
I should return to Spizza again, if not for the 'Katrina', then for the so many others that sound so tasty.
They dared to charge me 50 cents for an over-sized paper bag??!! A ridiculously high cost to recreate a teeny weeny bit of the authentic feel of ol' english fish n chips. 
2 large pieces of beer battered fish with no hint of beer. It could have been pretty crispy if eaten immediately after being served. The fries were good - long and chunky.
Palm-sized chicken chop. Nowhere did it resemble a chicken leg to me.
