Are you blind when you're born? Can you see in the dark?

Fav Cats
#1 Rum Tum Tugger (yum yum!)
#2 Munkustrap (second in charge)

Fav Dance-Cat
#1 Mr Mistoffelees (made me wish I hadn't given up dancing)

Fav General Songs
#1 Memory (can't be helped...)
#2 Old Deuteronomy (duet by my fav cats!)

Fav Hum-along Song
#1 Mr Mistoffeless ("Oh! Well! I never!")

Fav Whole-Cast Song
#1 Jellicle Songs for Jellicle Cats (happy song)
#2 Journey to the Heaviside Layer (love the parts)

Fav Cat Story
#1 Skimbleshanks: The Railway Cat (so cute!)


note: photo was taken during intermission when it was allowed!

The Travel Bug: Things to watch out for on a road trip

1. Road kill (or things likely-to-become-road-kill)
2. Suicidal birds that fly into the window/ windscreen
3. Police cars / Radar guns / Speed traps
4. Potholes
5. "Next Rest Stop"
6. Other drivers
7. Broken-down vehicles (others')
8. Overheating engines (yours)
9. Tailgaters & road hogs
10. Road direction signs
11. Falling asleep
12. Running out of gas
13. Traffic jams
14. Confusing roundabouts
15. "Filled" plastic bags from window of car in front

The Travel Bug: Things to bring on a road trip

1. Passport (Let's just get out of this town...)
2. Charged Handphone (You should just give me a call...)
3. Bottled water (Lets don't wait til the water runs dry...)
4. Snacks (Food glorious food...)
5. FX (Money money money...)
6. Sunglasses (Got the sun in my eye...)
7. Camera (I wanna take a picture so I remember...)
8. Map (I get lost...)
9. Sing-a-long Music (So, everybody sing, everybody sing!)
10. Patience (I'll be waiting for you...)

Never judge a book by its cover...

If you haven't already, please catch Susan Boyle on Britian's Got Talent 2009

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luRmM1J1sfg

Golly, I really miss British television!

Food Bytes: Oriole Cafe & Bar (Update 1)

Was craving coffee so *Shinta and I made a special trip to Oriole to pick up take-away coffee. Remember my previous post on the place? I had totally raved about the coffee there, and subsequent trips to Oriole had also met with expectations both food and drink-wise. This time however, I was terribly terribly disappointed. Our coffees (latte and ice-blended) were not done by the usual 2 (award winning) baristas, and the end product was simply undrinkable.

Rather than an ice-blend with coffee and ice bits mixed up, what I got was a bitter cup of.... foam? It was really weird and tasted totally bad. I can't even imagine or start to guess what went wrong with it. Too much blending? Forgot to put sugar syrup? Too much milk? There were no ice bits in it, and no real coffee either. Even when I left the drink standing for a while, hoping for the foam to settle, the resulting layer of coffee at the bottom was bitter and "harsh". *Shinta's latte also had a foam problem with it.

If I had this standard of coffee the first time I visited the place, I would have been so disgusted that I wouldn't have returned. It's only because I've been there a few times, that I know this is not the "usual" standard for them. Or if I had drunk this there, I would have complained and sent it back. Unfortunately for us, because we had bought it take-away, we didn't taste it until we had driven off from the place, and were unable to give feedback or complain about it.

Moral of the story:
1) Make sure your coffee is done by the good barista
2) If you buy take away, check your drink before leaving the place

*sigh*

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Oriole Cafe & Bar
96 Somerset Road #01-01, Pan Pacific Serviced Suites, S(238163)
Tel: +65-6238 8348
Hours: Mon-Fri 10.30am - 9.00pm(food)/9.30pm(drinks),
Sat-Sun 10.00am-9.30pm(food)/10.00pm(drinks)
http://www.oriole.com.sg/
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The Travel Bug & Food Bytes: Ice Cream is happiness condensed - Jessi Lane Adams (Cold Stone Creamery)

Originating from the US, the Cold Stone Creamery is now part of a chain in Japan. Usually the "normal" ice-cream in Japan is already much better than most that you can get in Singapore (suspect this is because of the superior milk and cream available there). Cold Stone Creamery takes it a level further, "chopping" up the ice-cream and mixing it with other ingredients to make it even more interesting.

The trick about this ice cream, is that the ingredients (ie ice cream, cake, chocolate, toppings etc) are not pre-mixed and then frozen together. Rather, they are individually chopped up and prepared on a specially cooled metal plate (ie "cold stone"). This ensures that the ice cream doesn't melt too much in the process, the ingredients are not frozen together becoming tasteless, and everything is in large chunks which makes eating it more interesting. Some places in Singapore do sell something similar (eg Island Creamery's pineapple biscuits during CNY), but it doesn't taste as good because all the items are mixed in small bits and frozen.

We checked out this branch at Level 5 of Lumine Est at Shinjuku. You can customise the flavours and ingredients of mix you want, or choose from their many suggested combinations. We decided to share the Strawberry Cheesecake and their Valentine's Day special, the Bitter Romantic Moment.

For the Strawberry Cheesecake, first goes the ice-cream spread, topped with chunks of crumbly butter cake...

... followed by strawberries and cream

This then gets chopped up into bits and mixed together before being scopped up into a wafer cup.

The finished product!

The Bitter Romantic Moment is a mix of bitter chocolate ice cream, raspberries, cacao cake and fudge. First was the bitter chocolate ice cream again spread out on the cold stone, followed by fudge and raspberries...

... then the cake is added and the mixture chopped up and mixed.

Tada!

I heard a rumour that Cold Stone Creamery is available in Singapore, but I don't know where the location is. Anyone able to shed some light?

Food Bytes: Breaking all the rules for it (High Street Tai Wah Pork Noodles, Bestway Building)

Thought I should write a quick note about this place since its the only place that I am willing to make all sorts of exceptions for:

- Not complaining about the lack of aircon
- Going there 3 weeks in a row
- Ordering chili with my noodles
- Queueing up

Although Bestway Building is just a short walk from Tanjong Pagar MRT, its on a side rarely frequented by passer-bys and therefore casual walk-in customers are probably rare. Previously a school, it became a TV studio for a while, and is currently serving as the office for a variety of small businesses.

What makes the place interesting, is the little food court right in front of it. This is where my favourite pork noodles (more commonly known as Bak Chor Mee) can be found. High Street Tai Wah Pork Noodles is one of the outlets run by the youngest of the 3 very well known brothers and their families. Other branches include the one at Crawford Lane behind ICA Lavender MRT (run by Brother #2), Hong Lim (run by Son of Brother #3), Vivocity (run by Son of Brother #1). I don't know if Brother #1 has a stall too, so drop me a note if you know where it is.

I've tried all the stalls except the Vivocity one which is new, but my favorite is still the Bestway Building one. Its horribly horribly crowded on weekdays, and even when I worked a short 5min away, I never could bear the long and extremely slow moving queue. So *Shinta and I usually go around 11am on Saturdays only. Each bowl is freshly prepared, and he does each one individually (no production line or mass cooking), so the wait is always long. If there is even so much as 2 people in the queue in front of you, except to wait a good 10-20mins.

Anyway there are a million reasons why I love these noodles. The vinegar is excellent, the chili is really yummy (I ask for less chili), they are generous with the minced pork and the pieces of liver are cooked just right making them soft and tender. I love the pieces of lard and the fish that comes with it. *Shinta usually generously passes me the additional fish he gets with his $5 bowl since my $4 bowl doesn't have enough for me.

This fish is also used in the filling of the pork balls and the dumplings that come with the noodles, and that's what makes the 2 items really different from other places. Sometimes instead of ordering noodles, I just order a bowl of pork ball and dumpling soup. Yummy!

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High Street Tai Wah Pork Noodles
12 Prince Edward Road, Bestway Building #01-16
Hours: Mon-Sat 9.30am - 2.30pm
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