Creatures

Located along desker road!

I chose this place for mummy's birthday celebration because mr and Mrs lil bee raved to me about this place (and they are seldom wrong). And in view that it's fusion Asian food, I thought maybe my parents will appreciate it better than western food.

I went there filled with anticipation but I was actually quite disappointed.

Firstly, food didn't taste as good as I hoped it would be - though there is slight level of creativity. 

Secondly, they screwed up on serving the cake with a candle - even though they did try to make up for it by wishing my mum but the element of surprise was just spoilt. I am quite annoyed when establishments screw this up coz these are things that u sort of can't undo.

Anyhow, food!

For the starters, we ordered their watermelon and feta cheese ($15)

The watermelon and the feta cheese did not establish any form of connection or teamwork in my view. When I ate it, the feta cheese kept dropping off so I basically felt that I was eating watermelon  and feta cheese seperately. Both are pleasant but just no punch and no idea what's the draw of serving it together.

Next starter we had was the duck salad ($17)...

This was pretty good. All of us agreed that this was the best dish for the night. There was a good amount of duck and they had a very nice tangy sauce with it.

And for sharing, we had a few items.

Kong bak pau ($22)

The pork belly was very thinly cut so lacked that textured goodness of how a Kong bak pau should feel like. But more importantly, the taste wasn't there. It was ok but nothing wow-ing. Meat was a little dry.

The prawn and pork buah keluah on prata ($15)

This was not bad, creative in that sense.

Another sharing dish was the spicy vongole with hua Tiao ($18)

This was also not bad, flavour some enough!

We also ordered a pork burger ($23) to share 

This was a miss. The pork burger wasn't good. The patty was just meh.

For mains, I ordered the miso cod ($32)

Price very steep for its portion. Didn't quite taste the miso. The cucumber was nicely peeled but pretty much just cucumber.

My dad ordered the rendang lamb shank ($30)

Portion was good but the lamb smell was too strong. So strong that my mum seated beside him could smell it too and lost her appetite. My dad naturally did not finish it.

My mom ordered the cod and vongole chowder ($30)

It was really just chowder soup with 2 pieces of cod fish. I find it way too over priced. But I did like how it taste. Really like a creamy clam chowder. 

Bunny ordered the prawn pasta ($24)

One of the more reasonably priced item and one of the better mains. In fact popular with everyone. Good aglio olio like taste.

For Detchie, she wanted noodles so she had the ah gong ah ma thingy ($22)

Comes with la mien and fried chicken. The fried chicken was not bad. The la mien was ok too. Mum chose to eat this in the end. Haha. 

But for mum to eat like a la mien for her birthday, I feel quite bad. But still, it's a $22 la mien -.-

And coz dad barely could eat the lamb, ordered another dish for him. 

Babi pongteh ($22)

The Babi pongteh was not bad. The pork was not bad, quite juicy. 

And for desserts, I heard the durian cake was good and runs out fast so I pre-reserved. 

N yeah, this was when they missed out on my pre requested candles. 

But yes, the durian cake was really good. It received thumbs up from everyone!

Aside from the durian cake, we also ordered the orh nee cake which was also really good.

The cakes will be what draws me back again.

Overall, some hits and misses, quite pricey for its range and type of food. Has good amount of creativity. 

Muji Cafe

Am I the only swa gu one who doesn't know that there's a muji cafe at paragon?

Discovered it today when I was shopping for sneakers!

Always been keen in the different packets of instant food and sauces that muji offers. Of course, also their biscuits and all. They used to have a maple cream biscuit which I think has been discontinued locally too. 

So anyways, they don't much variety. Basically only have precooked food which they call deli, kept in their fridge like place. Basically machiam like a jap version of chap cai peng! 

There was a promo going on whereby you can get 4 hot deli + 4 cold deli at $28.80. 

Our choice of 4 hot deli...

The pork ribs are their bak kut teh, quite interesting while on display! Taste wise, it's quite sweet but really has some bak kut Teh taste. But overall not something I will order again.

The other item covered in veg is the Saba fish which is just decent.

The orangey item is some sweet chicken thingy which is breast meat.

Our cold deli...

Overall, the cold deli tasted much nicer than the hot ones. The tomato with mozzarella cheese is good, especially the pesto sauce! 

The salads are also pretty good.

Forgot to take pictures of the drinks but their green tea macha is good!

The only other food item on their menu is the Japanese curry chicken rice...

The jap curry taste better than it looks. Seriously, surprisingly quite good!

The Tiramisu Hero

Been seeing this sir Antonios mascot figurine on social media, finally had the chance to visit The Tiramisu Hero today! 

My chance to take picture with the 'mask'!

Ok, probably too cutesy for a 'hero'!

Another pose!

Yeah! That looks more like a hero pose!

The place was packed with loads of Japanese! Almost more Japanese than Singaporeans!

Before the meal, we each ordered a drink. I had a hot honey milk....

Served in a very cute mug, the honey milk was quite nice. Slightly sweet warm milk. Nice!

Squiddy and myself ordered a hero platter each, it came with a choice of starter, choice of pizza (mini size), choice of mains (mini size) and choice of side. Basically more like a sampling kind of platter.

We both pretty much had the same things except for our choice of mains. 

This is how the set looks like...

It's cute (to me) that they indicate our names on a tag, calling my set my hero platter!

I was initially quite worried I wouldn't be full but it proved to be ok. I was still craving for more though coz my mains was so good! The platter was priced alright at $16.90.

We both chose the mushroom soup

Which I felt was not bad. In fact I felt it was quite nice but Squiddy didn't like it, she felt that it was sour-ish.

The pizza was like a puff which we both chose Hawaiian ...

The puff was nice! The fillings weren't superb but I like the puff. Goes very well with the soup too!

For mains, Squiddy had the curry rice while I had the swatty breakfast 

Squiddy's curry baked rice....

Which wasn't very good.

My swatty breakfast

My swatty breakfast is very good! It's mashed potato below topped with a runny egg, tomato and cheese! 

Soooo good! 

Side was potato puff which was more like a hash brown.

Actually before coming over, I read some reviews of the place on fb, many 1 star 2 stars, I was a little worried but overall I enjoyed my meal.

We were wondering whether to order the tiramisu or not. Coming here and not ordering tiramisu where tiramisu is meant to be the hero is funny. But Squiddy tried it before and said it wasn't good so we didn't want to risk a miss. In the end, we ordered anyway...

Verdict is, the tiramisu is not hero here. Haha it was quite dry. 

Overall, I really like the swatty breakfast. Will be back for it!

Ne Ne Chicken

Tried the Ne Ne Chicken today

I opted for the 2 piece chicken which can have the sauce separated. The fried chicken was good! Skin was crispy and tasty!

Bunny had the soy sauce tenders. Breast meat but again, the crisp was good!

The drink with bite size chicken on the top is called nene pop! Haha not to my liking coz it's breast meat!

The rice is soy rice but was too sweet for my liking. Bunny liked it thou.

Overall, I will be back for the fried chicken (without sauce!)

Common Man Coffee Roasters

It's one of the rare days where the girlfriend is not working on a weekend and I wasn't as lazy and we decided we must pull ourselves out of the house to do brunch.

Having said that, we gave very serious considerations which brunch joint we should go since its relatively rare for us! After much deliberation, we decided on common man because I recall I very much enjoyed my brunch with little bee here previously and we seem to tend to head back to symmetry all the time (though symmetry almost never disappoints for brunch).

So there we were, arrived at common man around noon. 

There wasn't a queue but the place was packed.

Seats are placed very close together with very small tables to maximize seating capacity.

Bunny ordered the full breakfast...

It was overall nice. What I liked most will be the baked beans coz it's not those canned ones. Not saying the canned ones aren't nice but you know it makes you feel you are paying for quality food. And I think they did actually do a good job of the beans. It was quite tasty!

The bacon is good for those who like it crispy. I prefer the type of bacon along the likes of the one from the Populus. The scrambled egg was not bad and the sausage was ok too. 

We topped up for add on of avocado and  spinach

For myself, I had the croque monsieur...

It was pretty nice except portion was small.

Overall the food is pretty ok but just felt like it lacked a punch. The gf saw me looking a little dissatisfied, she said to me, "next time, let's just go symmetry " hahaha

The gf's latte...

Beanstro

Heard some raves about the aglio olio from beanstro, something that springed out from Coffee Bean so we are here to try it today!

Ordered a crab cake to share

The crab cake was ok, decent in texture but not crabby enough for my liking.

We also ordered a seafood risotto, which was cheese risotto

The risotto smells good when it arrived. Especially the grilled prawns. comes also with mussels and scallops. Pretty yummy!

The by right star for today, the aglio, took a long time to arrive (like any big star) but arrived totally off fashion

This was really how it looked when it arrived and totally no plating. 

Taste wise was quite bland. Didn't like it at all. Had difficulty finishing it even.

The Sushi Bar

So I just finished doing my nails and we walked past the sushi bar to find that there was no queue! That was a clear sign that dinner should be here.

And to be honest, with lesser crowd, service tonight was significantly better. In fact, I will even say it is great!

And to start off, they are having some kind of a promotion:

Cheap till Siao please! $3 for salmon sashimi in THICK cut! Damn wu Hua!

I end up ordering 7 portions from the original 2 portions!

Just look at how thick the pieces are!

And there was this other $3 salmon collar

Also damn wu Hua! And quite meaty too!

Bunny ordered the maki

Which was good. I mean, there's mentaiko and aburi salmon, what's there not to be good?

We also shared the chilled udon

This thin version of udon is somehow just very springy, very yummy. The shoyu that came with it was a little too sweet for my liking but bunny likes it!

And of coz, can't miss out on our favourite dish, pidan tofu!

And I had a rather decent negitoro Don!

Yums!