Duxton Hill - L'entrecote Bistro + Bistro Bar Chill Out

Yay, weekend is here.

I have been doing revision for my studies the whole afternoon and so I took a break in the evening and head out to attend Donovan's birthday celebration. Time to let my hair down and meet new people.

Done with preparation and ready to head out.

I can never have enough of black dresses. I picked this piece out because the material was very thin and comfortable, at the same time it gave a chic vibe that make it suitable for night out.

The 7 of us have our dinner at L'entrecote Bistro located at Duxton Hill. 

The Steak & Fries Bistro is not to my liking. 

Bf and I spent $80 on the food and yet I don't even feel full.

The food was really expensive and nothing much to shout out. I will never visit it again.

The only decent food I have that night was this pack of fries.

We ordered another 2 foie gras that don't taste good.

A hungry woman is an angry woman. I was still not full after having all these.

After the dinner, we went for a drink with many people joining. 

It's been awhile since I last went to bar for chill out.

I didn't look very happy because I was still hungry.

Ordered a bottle and water as mixer. 

We tried a glass of the liquor raw and the feeling was "wow".

Meet the new bartender who just started her first day work.

I love my choker necklace that spice up my outfit, instantly my neck has become the center of attention. I got this choker necklace at about $4, an affordable accessories that added style to our outfit.

Chilling out with the couples, Kenneth and Vanessa.

Bf looking suave in collar shirt, looks good when he dressed up.

We didn't stay too long at the bar as I want to go home and catch up on my revision.

Enough of rest, time to go back to mug on my revision.

Good night.

Happenings in April - Movie Review + Chinatown Complex Food Centre + 100 AM Mall Food Hunt

Tuesday 18/4/17

Headed down to VivoCity after work to watch the preview of the movie. Thanks CK and CF for asking me along for the movie.

Shock Wave 拆弹专家 (PG13: Violence)

Running time: 119 minutes

Synopsis:

 Cheung Choi-san (Andy Lau) is a senior inspector of the Explosive Ordnance Disposal Bureau (EOD), a bomb disposal expert. 7 years ago, he went undercover and became the apprentice of Hung Kai-pang (Jiang Wu), a top wanted criminal specializing in bombs. During the operation, Hung manages to escape while his younger brother and allies were captured. To seek revenge for Cheung's betrayal, Hung comes back 7 years later and prepares to plant a series bombs in Hong Kong, which creates public panic, and lures Cheung out for action to unfold an ultimate plan for revenge.

Someone has to do the job, so Cheung wants to be that someone, to take on the job and protect everyone else. He is even willing to sacrifice himself to save the rest. His courage and righteous character is what I admire.

The movie also show the romance side of Cheung where he fall in love with a school teacher, Carmen, starred by Song Jia. They broke up eventually due to the dangerous nature of Cheung's work.

The thing that they feared happen. Cheung found Carmen in a car boot being tied up with a grenade held in her hands. Hung wanted Cheung to experience the helpless feeling he felt when they captured their brother. Now he is back for revenge against those participated in the operation 7 years ago.

Hung blocked the highway tunnel and exit and held hundreds of people as hostages with 1,000kg of C4 explosives being activated. He demanded the release of his brother from the prison and helicopter to get them out of Hong Kong.

With hostages, machine guns and bombs put all over the place, we can imagine how many lives are lost and how emotional the scene will be. It has heart wrenching and sorrow scene that drove me to tears.

Hong Kong's police film is always worth the watch. Head over to the cinema theatre to catch it now.

Rating: 4/5

Friday 21/4/17

Finally it's TGIF, I welcome my weekend with a dinner and movie date. We have been wanting to watch Boss Baby since it started showing, so we went Golden Village @ Plaza Singapura as I have a $10 capitaland voucher to utilize. After purchasing the ticket, we settled our dinner at The Manhattan FISH MARKET.

We have fish & chips for our dinner.

The dory fish was crispy on the outer and moist on the inner. The cheese and mayo sauce help to blend the oiliness of the fish so it did not leave much of a greasy feel after eating. Just nice for movie after our meal.

The Boss Baby is a hilariously story about how a new baby's arrival impacts a family. With a sly, heart-filled message about the importance of family, 

Soon after his bossy baby brother's arrival, 7 years old Tim discovered the weird actions of his brother.  A baby could talk and conduct babies meeting with the babies in their neighbourhood. Boss Baby is here for a mission to destroy the puppy's plan and save the babies from extinction.

To execute his plan, he needs the help from Tim. In order for Tim to help him, they make a deal.

Boss Baby will return back to Baby Corp (the company he is working for) after the mission and Tim will then become the only child back and enjoy his parents' attention.

From loggerheads to brothers, the pairs has bonded and get along well through the collaboration to accomplish the mission. The movie sends out a strong mission on family bonding. No matter how fierce we always fight with our siblings, during times of danger, the siblings love will automatically be displayed and we will protect each other with our lives.

It is a hilarious movie with happy ending. Suitable for family to watch.

Rating: 3.5/5

Friday 28/4/17

Hurray, it's TGIF and also last Friday of the month. I have spent my day eating the good food starting from lunch. We had lunch at Chinatown Complex hawker centre which house many renowned local favourites comfort food. 

I ordered omelette chicken rice at $4 from the Thai stall. I missed having omelette ever since I came back from Bangkok.

The omelette was fluffy and delicious, I finished all of it. The portion was generous too.

Initially I thought the soup was just some normal soup. It turned out to be tom yam soup that has a strong spice flavour in it. Clear soup is always the spiciest.

We ordered xiao long bao for sharing, $6 for 10 pieces. The xiao long bao was juicy good, we queued quite long for this. I love it when the dumpling burst open with the broth in my mouth. It tasted so good.

Mango sago to end off our lunch.

It was a short but quality time spent together. 

The 2 late queens.

Meet up with the poly peers for dinner, it has been a year since we last met. Grace has called for this meetup to find out about the recent updates of everyone. CL has recommended Ramen Keisuke Tori King @ 100 AM mall. We were there and managed to secure our seat without waiting.

I have ice green tea to go with my meal.

My pick: TORI KING Ramen Special (Clear Soup)(All Toppings).

What makes Tori King Ramen so special is their broth which is made from ingredients such as chicken bones, chicken feet, Japanese seaweed and an assortment of vegetables boiled for eight hours. It is infused with all the individually essential flavours. I love the generous chicken thigh that comes with the ramen.

Feeling super full until we have no space for dessert, we decided to take a little break by walking around the mall so that we can digest the food faster.

After resting, we proceeded to dessert shop next.

Tsujiri is a nice place to chill out with friends over their Matcha And Houjicha dessert and drinks.

Dessert makes a perfect ending to our dinner.

We have matcha Tsujiri parfait and matcha latte for sharing among 5 of us.

The bitterness of the matcha can be tasted from the soft serve parfait. Perfect for those who prefer a lesser sweet dessert.

Because Grace wanted to try the shaved ice right from the start but stopped by us, we decided to give it a chance and tried the sunrise shaved ice in the end. 

Me and Steffi.

We were all shocked to see the giant size of shaved ice in front of us. We helped ourselves with the fluffy shaved ice that was sweet at the top and bitter at the green portion. I like how they added red beans inside the shaved ice, it added sweetness to the bitter matcha. Lovely combination.

It was a lovely gathering with the peers.

Though we have not meet for a year, our relationship still remain strong and no awkwardness among us. Hope our next meetup is not one year later, see you guys soon again.

Johor Bahru City Square: Sushi King + Fast & Furious 8 Movie Review + llaollao + Season's Cafe

Saturday 15/4/17

Ever since I came back from Bangkok, I keep having the urge to travel again.

Hence, I decided to visit Johor Bahru (JB) for a half day trip to have a sumptuous meal and movie during this long weekend.

We headed in to JB at a slightly later timing so that I can spend some time on my assignment before enjoying my day.

We cleared the custom in JB at about 4.30pm.

From Kranji to JB, we only spent 45 minutes. If you don't really have much stuffs to do in JB, coming in at a later timing is good as it was not so jammed.

We immediately went to mmCineplexes to purchase Fast & Furious 8 movie tickets for 6.15pm showtime. The movie costs RM18 per pax.

I have dinner at Sushi King again, but different outlet this time round. 

Sushi King is located at B1. There are 2 escalators leading to B1, remember to find the right one because the other one lead you to the carpark. The makan place at B1 is really a hidden gem.

We picked some of the sushi from the conveyor belt while waiting for the dishes to be served.

Tamago sushi.

Salmon Skin Piri Piri.

I have tried before fish skin, but this is my first time trying salmon skin. It didn't taste as crispy and as good as fish skin.

California Maki which includes crabstick, cucumber and omelette roll topped with fish roe.

I love the Salmon Teriyaki the most. 

The salmon is juicy and delicious, it is grilled to perfection and drizzled with sweet sauce, making every bite tasted flavourful. The kitchen took quite a long while to serve the cook food. We were done eating and just purely waiting for our ordered food to be served. They took nearly half an hour to serve the food.

We have Soft Shell Crab Tenpura again. 

We love the deep-fried soft shell crab served with tempura gravy.

Nevertheless, we have a delicious dinner and the dinner cost was RM102.

Time checked, we still have 15 minutes left. We decided to go to Secret Recipe for a cake.

Feeling full, we ordered one slice of white chocolate cake for sharing.

With tummy filled, we were ready for the 2 hours 18 minutes movie.

In this instalment, a mysterious woman who turns out to be a cyber terrorist. She got Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) to work for her and bring him into the world of terrorism. He turns his back on his family and betrays their trust.

The movie started off with a action packed car racing in Cuba when Dom is in Cuba for his honeymoon trip. He has a race with the Cuban loan shark and they become friends after the race.

One can expect a lot of action packed scene from the movie. From the start to end of the movie, it will keep your eyes glued to the screen. There is a part where Cipher (Charlize Theron) controls the whole town vehicles and make them move in sync all at the same time. It is a sight that I never see before.

This is a movie where all racer expert with different skill sets come together to prevent a cyber terrorist from destroying the world.

Rating: 4/5

**

It was nearly 9pm when we finished watching the movie. We dropped by Hui Lau Shan (許留山) for dessert before coming back to Singapore.

Ordered a mango ice with coconut juice for sharing.

We have learnt my lesson, it is not a wise idea to leave at some a late timing. The custom and bus was packed with lots of people. A safe timing will be to leave before 9pm so that there is no need to worry about catching last train home.

Saturday 22/4/17

Johor Bahru (JB) is a place that I never get tired of visiting. I have become a regular traveller to JB ever since I knew the way of going in. If you ask me how regular I visit, the probability is about once a month or whenver we have nothing in mind during weekend.

Today, we went in slightly later and by the time we reached JB custom at about 5pm, we were surprised to see the queue after we came out from the toilet. The queue was empty. We cleared the custom in less than 5 minutes. 

Upon reaching JB City Square, we stopped by along the bridge to buy Xuan Tea. It's been a long time since I drank bubble tea, so we purchased a taro bubble tea to quench our thirst.

Decided to have a little rest and enjoy dessert after I was done with shopping, we stopped by llaollao to have a cup of frozen yogurt. For topping, we selected white chocolate and oreo chips. These toppings added sweetness to reduce the sour taste of the yogurt.

We decided to go Season's Cafe for dinner. Season has a store in JB City Square that sells breads and cakes. In my previous visit at the start of the year, I purchased their macha and salted egg cheese tarts, and it was very delicious. Hence, I decided to give their cafe a try.

A selfie while waiting for food.

Since we just have dessert earlier on, we didn't order too much for dinner. We just ordered a main course each.

I got this checkered boyfriend shirt from GF, a gift from her during her KL trip. Thanks GF (:

Boyfriend shirt is one of my favourite fashion style because the shirt is very versatile and it creates different style depending on how we wear it.

Enjoying my short day trip to JB.

Coming to JB always make me feel relax and enjoying, except the custom jam part.

I have chicken baked rice.

The rice tasted very normal, nothing fantastic. But good thing is the charging is not expensive either, about RM20.

Total dinner cost is about RM50. In total for all our food spending, it cost us about $25 after conversion. Now you know why we love coming here to spend our weekend?

JB, see you soon again.

Happenings in April - Disney Tsum Tsum + Manna Story + Yayoi

Saturday 1/4/17

Counting down, another week to go before my Bangkok trip. Looking forward to it. It was a very impromptu decision to visit Bangkok, we only decided it 2 weeks before the trip so the air ticket paid was a steep price. So my mission today is to change our currency and plan our itinerary.

After we got our currency changed, we lazed around at Marina Square Kopitiam to plan our itinerary. There were plenty seats over there.

Time for dinner after everything settled, got our dinner from the Japanese stall at Kopitiam. Simple and delightful.

We then went over to Raffles City to locate the Tsum Tsum display. Each CapitaLand malls have different Tsum Tsum display, seeing the adorable Disney Tsum Tsum characters cheered me up.

With the adorable Disney Tsum Tsum characters and my favourite pooh bear was there.

How I wish I could bring all of them home.

Sunday 2/4/17

Headed down to Bugis to settle some stuffs for our trip.

Since I didn't have a full lunch earlier on, we went for some cakes before heading home. 

We went Fish & Co. at Bugis+ to laze around and have a piece of cake each to our own.

Red velvet cake.

The restaurant has a peaceful environment that makes it a great place for a relaxing chill out for a meal.

Found another Disney Tsum Tsum display at Bugis Junction.

Wearing a black shirt dress out, it gave a feel of smart casual. Too long to be consider a shirt and too short for a dress. I love the low cut boots very much, it is fashionable and comfortable. It is the pair of boots that could take me miles away.

Tuesday 11/4/17

Just came back from Bangkok yesterday evening and feeling so sian today. How I wish the holiday can be longer. No time to rest, have to earn back the money for the next trip.

Reward myself for a good lunch. We traveled down to Plaza Singapura for lunch at Manna Story.
With the trend of K-Wave flowing to Singapore, it brings many Korean food here too. Manna Story is the place to go to get our Korean food fix, they have a wide selection of authentic Korean dishes.

I have the bowl of spicy pork for lunch. The bowl contained generous portion of pork which added flavour to the soup, which make it appetiting and aromatic. I enjoyed every bits of it, especially the pieces of pork.

A nice meal to keep me going and endure the week.

Thursday 13/4/17

This week is a short working week for everyone as tomorrow is Good Friday. Yay to the long weekend. Lunch has always been a lavish affair for our lunch kaki group. Today we went Liang Court for lunch.

We went to our frequently visit restaurant in Liang Court at Yayoi, a Japanese teishoku restaurant. Teishoku means all side dishes are served together in a set.

I have sliced pork in ginger sauce rice set. The set comes with a soup, salad and tofu.

The sliced pork was blended with the ginger sauce and the flavour was well-mix, even the bean sprout was equally tasty too. Normally I don't eat bean sprout because I don't really like the taste. But this dish was exception, I finished everything. So nice.

Friday 14/4/17

Suffering from post Bangkok travel syndrome, we decided to relieve our experience in Bangkok by visiting Artbox Singapore. It was raining very heavily the entire afternoon, I was glad the rain has stopped so we dropped by to visit.

It was a horrible experience at the Artbox, I underestimated the madness of crowds that turned up.

I think the number of people that turned up is more than the number of people that visited Chinatown during CNY eve.

Practically we were being squeezed by people, there was no way you can stop to take a good look at the stalls available. I was fed up after 5 minutes of squeezing so we just left. There were elderly and children in the crowds, so worried for them. It's good to bring your family out for family bonding but not to Artbox, it is a hazard place.

I just wanna leave this place. We then went over to Marina Square to have some light bites at Beyond Pancakes. Though we were at Beyond Pancakes, we didn't order any pancake. Lol.

Having our favourite drink, avocado yogurt milkshake.

Double cheesy fries for sharing.

Straight cut potato fries baked twice with mozzarella and cheddar cheese served with chilli flakes. I felt so shagged that night, need to eat supper to replenish my energy loss.