Chinese - Si Chuan Dou Hua

Ah yee and uncle sq's wedding food tasting held at Grand Plaza Park Royal (near funan centre). This is the restaurant where the food tasting was held.



Si Chuan Dou Hua.

and the setting of the table...



This is the comments sheet dat the hotel gave to ah yee and uncle sq.....



I koe the fonts are too small for you to read the names of the dishes.. but later i'll list them...

When we first got seated, the server came round with this big long (i forgot wat the mouth of a teapot is called) teapot mouth (anyone who knows, correct me please).



Haha.. although this kinda refilling tea is very interesting.. but i somehow found it abit intimidatingly irritating. So long! den will scared duno will spill anot! U see from the angle he's pouring huh...if spill or splash, surely will kena the guest's back or head. I just find it dangerous leh... i told ah yee, wedding cannot haf this kinda teapot!

Anyway, first dish was the Grand Plaza Park Royal Combination (Deep-Fried Silver Fish, Roast Duck, Honey Pork, Jellyfish, Spring Roll)



Coz so many people around.. i paiseh to stand up and make them wait for me to take a nice close up pic la... so i took from my seat and zoom zoom in. The pics will be abit blur... makedo la! its very clear considering is fone camera already hor!

The deep fried silver fish, majority of the elderly felt dat it tasted like french fries and didn't seem to quite like it. I found it ok leh.. like koropok! I guess the main reason why the elderly didn't like it is because they felt dat its not worth the price - they said its just fried flour.

Next is the Braised Shark Fins Soup with Crabmeat and Conpoy.



Overall, all of us had no complains about it. Except that some of them actually could taste crabmeat shells and wanted the chef to take note. (but hor.. actually hor.. i feel dat hor.. eat sharkfins with crabmeat, must have abit - i said abit, not alot - of crabmeat shell den will be nice one mah... no meh?)

Third dish is the Stir Fried Octopus with Fresh Scallops and Broccoli.



Ah yee and myself found dat it was abit blend but everyone else felt dat it was just right... dat kinda got us abit worried.. is it our tastebuds? lol... oh.. n they liked the way the deco was done... haha... u should listen to the elderly comment! U see the red rim.. its all tomato slices.. and the green rim are kiwi slices.. they said must tell the chef the actual day must use as much tomato and kiwi slices to deco .. if not wait lugi! WAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA.... lidat they also wana count.. wahhahahahahha

Fourth dish is Drunken Live Prawn



Everyone liked the portion (coz they give alot) and the type of prawn (they said its some duno wat light water prawns) but they felt dat more wine should be added coz the wine taste is not strong enuff. Uncle sq's mummy felt that the prawns should be changed to prawnballs or any other prawn dish because it'll be easier to eat which i agree, coz go wedding banquet sure alot of people lazy to shell the prawns one. But ah yee likes prawns like that.. can shell one.. haha... she's the bride mah! and i agree it looks nicer when served as compared to prawnballs.

Next is the Steamed 'Live' Garoupa in "Hong Kong Style".



Din manage to take a pic of the whole fish coz they merely showed us and den brought it to one side to divide for us. According to uncle sq's uncle, the fish is dispersed in a very scattered and ugly manner. Must feedback to make it disperse more nicely. Taste wise, it was just ok la. Not fantastic but not not nice loh.


Den comes... Roasted Chicken with Crackers



I personally found the crackers too oily. The roast chicken skin was very crispy and the meat was so tender (coz i got a drumstick mah!). But hor, elderly said the skin not crispy enough and after we finished most of the chicken, the main plate seemed to be very watery with traces of blood and looked somewhat disgusting. So they say must roast until skin is crispier, meat is tender yet cannot haf blood. (wah, they quite demanding hor? =x )

The second last dish is Fried Egg Noodle with Seafood.



The prawns very big and ok la, crunchy... not very crunchy.. just crunchy. The noodle tasted like bee hoon to me leh. The taste is ok loh.. not fantastic but can eat la. They requested for the noodle to be changed to Ee-fu noodle.

Finally, the last dish is the dessert. Sweetened Red Bean Paste with Lotus Seed & Lily Buds.



Hur hur.. i dun dislike red bean la.. but i prefer yam paste

Cafe - Bugis Cafe

Checked our Bugis cafe with Meina and Weipang..



At the entrance of the cafe, we saw something rather interesting.... DIY chocolates...



and they were so colourful (though they dun look appetising) and cute! We initially thot they were just different shapes of colourful chocolates for sale. We later realised it was actually DIY chocolates... Customers can actually colour and probably mould the chocolates on your own...



The smallest one would cost around $6, price varies depending on the design. Meina was very tempted to try to do one but the person-in-charge said she was closing the shop soon so we decided to wait till another day.

This Bugis cafe has quite a good view of the level one shops of Bugis village...




and the food we ordered....



Overall the food was so so. Though not fantastic but for the price, its very value for money! So its considered nice for the price.

And u will not believe it. The last 2 pics are that of the ravioli i ordered!


Truly, a disappointing Ravioli. I ordered it with my craving of Modestoes' Ravioli in mind.... Of coz i koe better den to expect something as tasty as Modestoes' (I'm drooling and literally swallowing my saliva as im blogging this and reminiscing on Modestoes' Ravioli) because i'm well aware that yi fen qian, yi fen huo. But i never expected it to come like this.. If you referred to the picture, it came with Spaghetti. Ravioli is supposed to be the pasta itself. Its not supposed to come with Spaghetti. And the ravioli.... it looked and it tasted like... WANTON! =(

Ravioli is supposed to look like these!

Modern Pacific - Tao's

I hate to say this but the Tao Restaurant that i raved about previously kinda disappointed me a great deal this time round. Jo-Ann dear and myself went in first. We got a table for 4 and we ordered first coz i had to rush off around 9 odd to meet up with the imperial members.

While we were having our first dish of the bacon and mushroom gratin, this server (i've mentioned about him before, how he's one of the more impolite servers i've come across at Tao) came over asking if we would like him to help us change seats to another table, saying that the other seat would be more comfortable etc (like he meant us well). I declined the offer because i felt ok in the current seat. Also, to make me shift while im halfway through my meal, i would feel even more uncomfortable. I politely declined the offer.

THEN! This server actually said.. " Actually i also need this table ". I was actually abit annoyed. I mean, its so hypocritical. Offering us a change of seat AS IF it was for our benefit when its because he needs the table. If i had rant about Tao's wonderful service previously, den i believe i wana change my statement. Asking a customer to change table while they are halfway thru their meal is so not good service. It causes discomfort and hassel to the customer! I probably wouldn't have been so annoyed if he had directly told me he needed the table instead of trying to act like it was for our good. Also, i probably wouldn't be so annoyed if we were not halfway through our meal.

With such, i replied him, " So you are making us shift? ". Which by now, he tried to say things like " oh no... its up to u. "

In the end, i did agree to a change because i thought that if there are 6 patrons outside the restaurant waiting to come in (coz there's a 2 seater table beside us and our tables can be combined to become a 6 seater), i wouldn't wana make the 6 patrons outside wait for a table. A little shifting on our part to let another 6 enjoy their dinner, why not. And so we shifted over to another seat. Dar dar and Andy zai arrived shortly after.

But u know wat??? U can say im childish, im boliao but yes, i was observing the other table. After we shifted seats, no patrons came in to occupy the seats until 50 mins later!

10 mins later.... the table was still empty.



20 mins later there was still no one! I was getting more annoyed!



Half an hour later there's still no one! WHY THE HELL DID HE MAKE US CHANGE TABLES FOR? VERY FUN AH?



Not even 40 mins later!



it was only by 50 minutes later that patrons came to occupy the table. So he was wat? Making us go through all dat inconvenience of shifting tables for a JUST IN CASE need of table? Infuriating right?



We were pissed but we just let it go at that. Just terribly disapppointed that Tao actually provided such lousy service. Or is it just dat particular server?

Anyway, food wise, they changed their seasonal cocktail to this....



surrounded by a thin layer of radish skin is mashed potato with a layer of egg toufu at the bottom. I really liked the mashed potato with its tinge of peppery taste. Not too spicy, it was just nice.

But i felt so shortchanged at the steak. This is the steak that they are now serving. Its with bones, very thin, rather tough and with lotsa fats by the side!



I retrieved the old pic that i took on our first visit. Just look at the 2 pics and compare! Obviously the before looks better right? Its boneless, thick, tender and juicy!



The steak now is thin, with bones and lotsa fats by the side. I feel so shortchanged. Look at the remains....



Disapppointing!

There was this new dessert on the menu though. Sesame pudding. Which was not bad, quite nice.




Towards the end of our meal, there was this other server who was always very friendly during my previous few visits and he came by to ask if we were satisfied with our dinner tonight. Our awkward expressions obviously gave us away. In the end, dar dar only feedback to him about the steak but we omitted the table shifting annoyance. His response to us was that the recently just changed their steak. It was changed because customers have feedback that the previous steak was too thick (really got people will complain steak too thick one meh??) and this new steak they changed is supposedly more expensive (Zhen de mah?). And we just took it at that. I'm most probably not going back anytime soon.

Seafood - Mellben Crab Bee Hoon

Dar dar and Andy zai brought me over to Ang Mo Kio for the famous Crab Bee Hoon.

Located at Blk 232 Ang Mo Kio Ave 3. Mellben Seafood.

Wednesday night, 7.30 pm, FULL HOUSE! Check out the crowd man!



and check out the boards. These are all shells of the crab with celebrities signatures on it.



We finally got a seat after a short wait.... This is their menu.. Mellben seafood.




We ordered the following.....




Yam Ring with Scallops ($15)..... hmm.. pretty tasteless. But comes with a very nice sweet sauce.
Chilli Fried Dua Tao ($duno).... not fantastic.. in fact abit sandy.
Chilli Crab with Man Tou ($30 +$2)... the crabs are not bad but the man tou is great!! I LIKE!!! In total we ordered 15 man tou!! I finished most of it *smug*
Crab Bee Hoon.... very nice~ (though i prefer XO Fish Slice Bee Hoon) but this is nice as well!

Cafe - My Secret Garden (Dear dear's birthday celebration)

I went to pick dear dear up from Bugis and we headed to My Secret Garden for dinner. Its kinda my bday treat for her.

Check out the interior of the place.



Surprisingly, despite being a weekday night, the inside was almost fully booked. (wah.. business got so good anot?)


Our starter was Prawn Fritters.. ($12) !



After we were done with our starters, we waited a whole 20 + minutes before our mains arrived. By then i was starvingggggggg i tell u! Their excuse was that the cod fish takes a long time to bake and they wanted to make sure both mains were served together. And so we waited...



On the left is dear dear's chicken ($18) n on the right is my cod fish ($28). The chicken they actually allow u to choose if u want the breast meat or thigh part. Its taste was not bad, serving is good. The cod fish was strongly recommended by my loh gong zai who went there on a date with his Kendi dear. Bloody hell... serving so damn small loh!!!!! Where got full?? The taste is not bad la . The chicken is more wu hua loh!! LOL... The side mashed potato was quite nice as well.

We den decided to order dessert... For dessert, dear dear chose Orea Cheese Cake ($6) while i chose the marshmallow fudge brownie with ice cream ($6).



Dear dear liked the oreo cheese cake. She said its very nice. I think its quite nice as well. I ordered the marshmallow fudge brownie coz i liked the nuts on the brownie. Im not really a marshmallow person (except if its barbequed) but this marshmallow was slightly heated and melted as well so it was not bad!

Steak - The Ship

I brought dar dar, loh gong zai and Kendi to the Ship Restaurant. haha...

Dinner was good!

For soup, Kendi and myself had Seafood Chowder while dar dar had onion soup. My seafood chowder was not bad. Most people should koe i like lobster bisque alot but the lobster bisque there is ard $14+. The other soup were only $4 - $5. Its a tad bit not worth it hence i ordered the seafood chowder.

I forgot to try the onion soup. hahahaha.. nvm.. ask my dar dar to tell u if its nice!



Then came our appetiser.... Baked oyster with spinach and cheese!



According to my loh gong zai, the oyster "mei you yi liu ye you er liu" (no 1st class also got 2nd class) hahaha...

I find dat its not bad also... but i prefer the MU one.

Den came our steak!! hehe... Sizzling hot with flames!




Loh gong zai calls the above performance!! hahahhaa.. So happens dat the King Steak and Surf & Turf that he and Kendi ordered were not on hotplates so he said... " lidat we very lugi.. no perfomance" hahahahha




Dar dar and myself had the cognac steak and ship steak respectively. All the servings were big. One thing about my ship steak is this time round its got lotsa fats. So end up the edible parts became quite little. I personally like the steak from loh gong zai's King Steak. Overall i still like their steak la!!

We were actually quite full already but we just thot we should order dessert. Like i was telling them, the bomb alaska actually feeds up to 5 and not 2 as stated in the menu. haha... they had wanted to order it but it was out. So in the end we ordered the crepe.

Yet another performance for the crepe.




Loh gong zai and i realised the crepe tasted very similiar to the crepe we had at Shashlik. Actually even the performance is similar.