Food Bytes: Chilling in a greenhouse... (Double Bay)

Ever since CapitaMall and CapitaCommercial trusts took over Raffles City, its been surprise after surprise as they revamped the place, increased rental area and brought in a whole new series of restaurants on the ground floor from space that appeared out of nowhere.

DoubleBay is one of these restaurants built outside the building in an area that used to be absolutely nothing. It's a snazzy Australian dining/bar that's got fantastic ambiance. The walls are entirely glass, so you can sit inside in peaceful air-conditioned comfort, while enjoying the bright sunlight, city buzz and fantastic view of Raffles Hotel opposite.

Another thing I really liked about the place was the drinks. Sure its not exactly what I would call cheap, but the mocktails and frozen blends come in really bright cheerful colours, taste good, and come in these really trendy cups. In fact what I liked was not just the drinks, but the huge range of really interesting cups the restaurant uses. Some may look normal, but they were using these double glass cups that weigh a ton but feel really good to hold. Sadly I only managed to take 2 pictures.



Oh the food! I was happy with my pot of mussels which came with a slice of hot toast smeared with what tasted a bit like crab paste. The stock was nice and rich, full of a seafood flavour that I soaked up with the bread and chips (from fish & chips).

*Shinta of course couldn't resist the crispy roast pork with apple sauce as a starter. The problem with roast pork is that in this humid weather, its really difficult to get it totally crispy. And if you fail, the resulting product is something that is hard, chewy and unpalatable. I would say that Double Bay managed to get it 70% there, which is not too bad a result, but not fantastic either.

And if you're the health conscious kind, just forget about ordering this!

For mains, we decided to share the fish & chips and a pie. You can select what fish you want to be used, and while it comes nicely beer battered with a generous yummy fillet of fish inside, *Shinta found it a little too oily overall.

Beware of the pie! There are quite a few selections of pie, but we went with the chicken and mushroom special of the day. We were expected a nice medium size pie that a single person could finish off, but what came was this humongous place which probably 2 people could very easily share and not order anything else.

The inside was hot and oozing, but because it was so huge and so creamy, we just couldn't even pretend that we could finish it. Strangely we saw someone else order the beef pie, and the radius of that pie was probably about half the size of this one?

Dessert was the chocolate fondant, which in one word.... "Fail!!!!!" The outside pastry was dry and tasteless while the inside chocolate was diluted, boring and a total waste of calories. Please please skip this. It was horrible.








I think I like chilling at Double Bay on a lazy Sunday afternoon, especially with the fun drinks and mussel pots. We were there at 3pm, but there were still other customers going in to get a drink or snack. It's got the cool ambiance of a Dempsey Road restaurant, but with the plus points of convenience in terms of location. You can always pop by to Raffles City after that to do your weekend shopping.

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Double Bay Restaurant
252 North Bridge Road, #01-22A Raffles City Shopping Center
Tel: +65 6334 6530
Hours: 11.30am to 11.30pm (Mon to Fri), to 1.00am (Sat to Sun)
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Food Bytes: A hidden little seafood place (Hup Choon Seafood)

Gosh its been so long since I wrote a food blog, that I've almost forgotten how to do it! Well anyway, *Shinta and I were out hunting for carpets, when we found ourselves hungry and lost in an unfamiliar place at Bukit Timah. That was when we stumbled across Hup Choon Seafood, a che char stall near Hua Guan Ave.

First thing we did was to order drinks. I noticed a lot of people drinking their homemade ice lemon tea ("ILT"), so decided to try that, while *Shinta went for the lime drink. Well the lime drink turned out pretty usual, but I really liked the ILT. It was just the right balance of tea (bitter), lemon (for a twist) and syrup (sweet). Unlike a lot of other ILTs, it managed to avoid being too tasteless and diluted, or too cloying sweet from excessive syrup. Even people who came to order da pao food, also specially ordered the ILT to take away.

Not having been here before, and due to our really poor command of dialect, our final order turned out to be anything but a "balanced healthy meal". First was the deep fried pork that was reccommended by the stall auntie. Apparently they don't have this every day. The bright brown crispy pieces were deliciously hot with large chunky pieces of meat inside.

This was followed by the prawn paste chicken. Good fried chicken is hard to get right, because usually even if the batter is nice and crispy, the meat inside might end up too dry. This however was also hot, crunchy while being very juicy and soft on the inside. Sadly, we would have enjoyed it a lot more if it weren't so similar to the pork, and the next time we go there, we will definately order just this instead.

Cereal prawns are my favorite, so if we're eating at a seafood restaurant.... While these were of acceptable standard, they really pale in comparison to the butter prawns from No Signboard that I started to crave.

Last order was a seafood fried rice. *Shinta pretty enjoyed this dish, and I had to say it was not too bad, with chunks of prawns and assorted seafood pieces.

Overall its not a bad place for a meal. Probably wouldn't bother to drive all the way up to specially go there, but if you're in the vicinity and want to avoid the expensive restaurants dotted along Bukit Timah, you can definately consider this place!

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Hup Choon Seafood
Binjai Park Tel: +65 6468 4081
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Riding the train

Attended the Circle Line launch party today (one of the very very very few perks I get). We got a chance to explore their Kim Chuan Depot, the largest underground train depot with a very cool automated spare parts warehouse system.

The event kicked off with one of the new MRT trains bursting through a curtain of balloons. Balloons also fell from the ceiling into audience, which promptly began stomping on them as though they were at a kid's birthday party!

We were privileged to be among the first few to take the train along the new Circle Line to the new platform at Bishan Station, where food, drinks and entertainment were ready to greet us.

The Circle Line opens tomorrow, and a whole lot of party events have been lined up for the weekend at the Bishan Circle Line Station, including free-for-all parties with the stars of The Little Nyonya and Peranakan performances on Saturday and Super Band on Sunday. There are also special items such as the "Circle Line" Danish created by Breadtalk and First Day Cover stamps. Can you also spy the SMRT staff in their spiffy new uniforms?

Do go check it out this weekend! Only 5 stations are currently open along the line, but the best thing is that all the fares collected from 28 May to 18 June will go towards the SMRT Silver Tribute Fund, which focuses on helping on the elderly in Singapore. Have fun with the family/friends at the party, be among the first to ride the new trains and know that you're contributing to charity at the same time!

One last thing, I really liked the escalators! Not sure if this is new or its actually been around, but I love the rotating wheels at the end...

I think every day should be "work-from-home-to-test-out-IT-capability-in-event-of-emergency" day...

The Travel Bug: Snorkeling Photography - Lessons a newbie just learnt

Some things I discovered on my first proper underwater photography trip... (previous trips using a disposable film camera does not count!)

Lesson 1: Image enhancement is key

Despite using the "underwater snapshot" settings, photos taken still end up with a terribly bluish tinge that hides all the wonderful colours of the coral. Using the "auto-levels" adjustment in Photoshop helps to remove this and reveals the wonderful natural browns, greens, yellows, purples, whites and blues of the coral hiding underneath.

Photo 1A - Original
Photo 1B - With image enhancement
Here's another example of how what appeared to be a terrible photo was saved...

Photo 1C - Original
Photo 1D - With image enhancement
Lesson 2: Image enhancement can only do so much for "blues"

Because Photoshop is adjusting to remove the over-skewed blue in the picture and balance the colours, its quite reasonable to guess that it means the "real blues" will be affected especially if the image was originally quite blue intensive. Photo 2A has a lot more blue sea in it that Photo 1A does. Hence after image enhancement, you can tell that while the other colours are not too far off, the blue looks a little weird.

Photo 2A - Original from camera
Photo 2B - With image enhancement
By the way, if you look closely at the left side of the photo, you can see a bit of the reef shark that kept circling us at high speed, making it impossible to get a good photo of it.

Lesson 3: Go up close to get the best natural colour balance

As you can see quite clearly when comparing the 2 shots, going up close reduces the amount of distance/water between the lens and the subject, and so the colour reproduction is much better and more accurate.

Photo 3A - Original, taken up close to object
Photo 3B - Original, taken from further distance with zoom
A bit of photoshop enhancement improves both photos, but since there's a lot less that has to be done for Photo 3A, the post-adjustment photo is better as well.

Photo 3C - Photo 3A with image enhancement
Photo 3D - Photo 3B with image enhancement
This is of course the best shot of all!

Photo 3E - Original, taken really close

Lesson 4: Plankton makes shots appear grainy

It's a little difficult to demonstrate this, but basically your photo will not be as clear as photographs taken above water. Reason is simple: Plankton. Similar to Lesson 3, the less distance (ie water) you put in between the camera and the subject, the less plankton.

Photo 4A - Original, taken up close
Photo 4B - Photo 4A with image enhancement
Photo 4C - Original, above water

Lesson 5: You have to know where to look

This photo is one of a sleeping reef shark. Amazing isn't it? It was hidden in a little alcove, and a less experienced snorkeler would have just passed by it without knowing it was there.

Photo 5A - Original
Luckily we had a guide with us and not only did he know where sharks like to hang out, he was also able to dive down pretty far to check out these hidden spots for us. No credit to me for the shark photo, it was taken by him!

Lesson 6: Fish can be friendly!

These fish were really really friendly and came very very close within touching distance of us. I was at some point a little scared of them! This of course makes for some great shots, if only I could get the whole fish in the frame. Just have to try many times!

Photo 6A - Original, not cropped, with camera totally zoomed out

Lesson 7: Don't forget to zoom out

I was originally trying so hard to take a "profile pic" aka "mug shot" of the fishes, that I forgot to zoom out and look at them as a whole.

Photo 7A - Original
I still like some of the mug shots though!

Lesson 8: Underwater has lots of potential for interesting shots

I was actually trying to take a photo of the coral, and had already half-pressed the shutter to focus. Bubbles suddenly appeared so I waited a little for it to fill the frame before pressing down fully. I like this shot!

Photo 8A - With image enhancement to remove blue tinge

So that's the key 8 lessons I learnt on my first proper underwater photography trip. Something to keep in mind also, is that the sea is not calm when you're floating around in it... So its not like taking a photo while you're on land, you are going to be constantly bobbing around. A fast shutter speed is definitely important so that your shots at least appear focused. No matter how much post production enhancements you do, its not really possible to make a very blurry shot look sharp.

The other question is whether or not to wear a life-jacket while snorkeling. Putting aside the issue of whether or not you're a strong swimmer, I found it easier to "not move" and take a photo when I was wearing one. But wearing one means that you are unable to dive down to be closer to the coral (less distance between camera and subject!) and you also can't take close ups or check nooks and crannies where fishes might be hiding... So in the end its really your personal preference, but safety must always come first!

Oh if anyone can tell me how to clean an oily-from-lots-of-sunblock waterproof camera, I would be very grateful. Thanks!

And the answer is...

... Option 4!

In the end, the attraction of having the latest fancy model and not needing to lug around / maintain a separate bulky waterproof case for the Canon won the day, and we are now proud owners of the Olympus µTough 8000!

We're quite happy with it, the camera is extremely convenient for frequent beach-goers. I get a huge kick out of being able to just jump into the water, without needing to worry about fiddly things like opening and closing the case to put the camera in / download photos / charge camera, or worrying about the seal. We definitely carried the camera around a lot more and took tons more photos with the waterproof Olympus, than say if we had bought a separate casing for our existing camera.

If waterproofing is not something you're looking for however, I still maintain that the Canon Ixus is a better camera than the Olympus in terms of shutter lag (shorter), software (faster response time), focusing ability (better selection of focus points), ease of use (more intuitive and dummy proof), image & colour capture (more realistic and balanced), design (less fiddly)... ie everything!

Just to give a simple illustration, take night shots for example. I tried the "automatic", "night scene" and "fireworks" scene settings for the Olympus, but the best I could come up with (even after using a table and timer) was this:

Using the Canon Ixus however, the "P" setting was sufficient to give me a much more focused and colour temperature balanced photo:

The camera software, layout/type of buttons and programme selection is also a lot more well thought through on the Ixus, and definitely more user-friendly. For example, the Ixus has a simple 3 step selector (video/scene/P) while the Olympus has a complicated dial which is difficult to turn and very fiddly especially underwater. The dial also has what I consider "useless" functions such as the Beauty option, which causes delays in software response time if you accidentally turn to it. When in the "scene mode", to change the scene you have to either turn the dial to another mode and then back to scene mode, or fiddle with 3-4 different buttons in as many steps. Extremely cumbersome when doing underwater snorkeling and you want to change from "underwater portrait" to "underwater wide".

Functions that one normally takes for granted in the Ixus, are also missing in the Olympus. Examples include: Auto-rotation of photos, LCD brightness adjustments, manual white balance calibration, power saving settings...

Don't get me wrong, the Olympus *is* a good camera. Just that compared to the Ixus..... Well we don't regret our purchase, because it was the best decision given the options available to us. But if you're getting a normal everyday camera, I would recommend the Canon over the Olympus. And if you need a waterproof one and can wait a few months (or make friends with someone in Japan/US), do consider the Powershot D10 which will hopefully come to Singapore some time soon.

More on using the Olympus for snorkeling photos next time!