Bliss

Tried out Valentino's yesterday at Rifle Range Road. Pretty cosy place, with a fairly sophisticated clientele. Food wise it wasn't too bad. I didn't spend much because I shared a smoked cheese and salami pizza (split 2-ways) and a fried pancetta-wrapped cow-cheese starter (split 4-ways). Paid a little for a white wine on their list. My total expenditure was SGD 20. (I was told that corkage is expensive--SGD 30, I think.) The norm was around 40-50 per head for the others who shared starters, had a main each and drank the white. The pizza was pretty normal, smoked cheese didn't taste any different. The starter (daily special, not in the menu) was good though. The ham was a little crispy and not too salty, while the inside was slightly melted but chewy. The cow's cheese was mild and fresh (: stole a little of my friend's pasta in squid ink sauce and a seafood risotto. The risotto was not bad! The pasta was not bad either. (To give you a better idea, risotto > squid ink.. Like maybe a 6/10 for the pasta and a 7/10 for the risotto. But that's on a relative scale, and not the objective scores I would award each individually.) Skipped out on post-dinner drinks and clubbing in favour of an early night. I'm growing old \:

Last Saturday, in between making goodie delivery runs and a 'reunion' dinner with the usual weekend gang, brother and I stopped by Canopy. It's a restaurant in Bishan Park, hence the pretty setting. Lots of lush greenery outside. Order an apple crumble--it came a la mode--and a crabmeat aglio olio. The pasta was only so so, the crabmeat was pretty generous but salty and the pasta lacked spice. The apple crumble was good, but a little on the floury side if you're an apple pie nazi. They have really cheap drinks during happy hour, but that's only on weekdays. Hehe.

Canopy restaurant

The photo is a little overexposed and lacklustre, but I didn't want to use flash which might've disrupted others' enjoyment. That was the only way to capture the indoor portion. One gripe about the place, though, is that the ladies' washroom is terrible. There is none to speak of, so we have to share the handicapped toilet. Which is very dark and dirty, damp and smelly. And the sink is all the way outside but has neither paper towels nor functioning hand-drier. Ugh.

Dinner at Por Kee in Tiong Bahru was alright. Not a fan of their signature champagne pork ribs, though it was cooked nicely. The sauce was sweet, not quite my type of food. We had the 8 course set menu, which included: shark's fin (I didn't find much), cold dishes, roast chicken, steamed fish, crispy butter prawns, scallop, vegetables, fried udon and yam paste.

Accidental haute presentation by my brother's friend when dishing out food to my brother. Hehe. A second after I took it, it fell over.

Friday's dinner at Quan Le Yuan was good, but could have been better. We ordered the usual suspects--ngo hiang/he choh, braised duck, stir fried gu chai (or not? Might've been some sort of leek variant), steamed giant silver pomfret--and instead of cold pig trotter jelly, we tried the oyster omelette this time. The oyster omelette was surprisingly good. The oysters were fresh little babies, filled with sea juice but none of the yucky taste. They were just cooked through, so with each mouthful, little bursts of joy would explode onto your tongue. So good! The egg was... eggy, not starchy, but it wasn't crispy (unlike my favourite version which doesn't exist anymore). My favourite condiment, the traditional teochew sng nee choh, which goes perfectly with fresh steamed/boiled seafood:

My skin is not getting any better. It's worrying ): I used my new Stila lipgloss--courtesy of my friend back from exchange--and it was quite nice. A little on the red side (Cranberry!) but I like itttt (: it smelt yummy and wasn't very sticky. It felt a little tingly-weird though, when applied somewhat thickly. Not sure if I'm allergic or anything. Mmm.

My CNY break starts early because I have no family law seminar tomorrow. Beams. (Ok fine, it's self-declared. I actually have another class but it's only 45 minutes long.)


XOXO