April's Fool 2012

With a $20 voucher in hand and craving for ramen, Daikokuya was marked as the meal stop of the day.


Before even getting to look through the menu, she started bombarding him with all the stuff from office. So he got a plate of sashimi first, more time for her to get all the words out before picking the ramen. Nice looking slices with thick layers of fat, $$8.80++.


Mentai Mayo Gyoza, 6pcs for $6.80++. Not too bad, difficult to go wrong with mentai topping.


His Tokyo Chashu Shoyu Ramen, $15.80. Noodles were smooth and springy, but the meat was a little too dry. Soup was a good dip, but too salty to drink on its own.


Sapporo Miso Ramen for her, $14.90++. Loved how the egg was done, he traded a piece of meat for one of the halves. This was a better broth too.


Came some hot Kikumasamune sake, $14++ for ~180ml. Warmed the stomach and was quite sweet for a dry sake.


After ejecting themselves, she insisted on having dessert at Honeymoon Dessert, just few steps away from Daikokuya. Said that it was well-known in Hong Kong, and just steamrollered in.


Durian pancake, $4.50 for just one. Dissecting it, found that it looked to have more (vanilla) cream, but it tasted really good alright.


The glutton also ordered the mango pomelo sago dessert with bean curd, $6.80++. Plus point was that it wasn't overtly sweet.

09 Jan 2011 - Dim Sum and Dessert

Woke up at noon today and she wanted to go for brunch of dim sum at Esplanade Xchange. He took his shower, finished up chapter 6 of PMP and then prepared to go out.

The name of the eatery that they had visited before, Xing Cha Lou,the receipt suggested that it's part of Banquet.


It was easy to get seats as it was empty except for one couple, perhaps because of their bad eating timings.


Then the procurement process started, and the constraint was that the payment was cash terms when he was hoping that it could be paid by credit...

Steamed pork ribs that had tender meat, though the sauce they were in was a little too oily. He is still wondering how they keep the meat tender, as the pork ribs he uses to make soup always turn out to be tough.


Her bowl of steamed mixed meat rice, comprising of rice topped with chicken and pork. Good blend of colors huh.


Soup dumplings (xiao long bao) that were served in cake cups. He's probably mentioned this before, good for catching soup that spill out of the dumplings.


Pork dumplings (siew mai) that had succulent prawns and topped with fish roe. These were different from the usual pork mince dumplings in that the pork used were chunky resulting in a firmer bite.


Close up of the roe, each one is a flavourful burst when you bite into it.


"Claws of the Phoenix" - chicken claws actually, again, stuff that both of them like. Somehow the shin part was omitted.


Next up on the list... she remembered that the dessert shop Ji De Chi was too crowded the other day after they dined at Lai Lai Family Restaurant, and suggested that they head there to try their luck. Arriving at Liang Seah Street...


He had read off a blog about a certain green tea mango dessert and flipped through the menu in an attempt to find it. The green tea roll consisted of the mango fruit and glutinous rice as fillings.


Let's take you closer to the fillings part, mango chunk and glutinous rice within the green tea roll.


Not one to resist the durian temptation, the snowy ice durian dessert also arrived at their table. This is not your regular ice shaving, it was layered in sheets and the ice was really snowy soft, without the irregular ice bits that you have to bite with your molars. Served with refreshing lychee pearls and pomelo pulp.


Close up on the sheets of "snow"...


The damage that left him with 50 cents that you partially see on the left...

dessert on 26 december 09

bought quite a bit of flour these days and he was not too happy to have them standing there collecting dust.

suggested that they try making xiao long bao again, but she counter-suggested mochi. with the idea of competition in mind, he said he would make dango instead.

she had already gotten her recipe, so he quickly googled for a basic dango recipe and embarked on his project.

got 50grams of rice flour, 100cc of water, around 10grams of sugar and mixed them into a dough with a slightly crumbly texture. had difficulty in rolling them round, they would crumble too easily. and was afraid if he added more water, it would become runny.

a preview of the smooth balls of cadet dango before going for the boil


something probably went wrong somewhere, the dango core was still powdery instead of becoming chewy even after boiling for almost 30 minutes. the outside was ok though, chewy and sweet.


but eitherway, she still poured some strawberry jam over the dango. it only amplified the sweetness of the outside, but the core was still not that palatable.



wife used a mixture of glutinous rice flour, corn starch and 100cc of water to make hers. she used the steaming method to cook the runny dough for 20 minutes before working further on it. she also cooked some glutinous rice over medium flame, this was to be used as the powder coating.

twenty minutes up, she allowed the cooked dough to cool before dividing them into some pieces. next was to flatten them, put some nutella and roll them up into a ball. each of these were then coated with the cooked glutinous rice flour before leaving to set in the fridge.


a view of the mochi's insides. yummy nutella, but maybe the skin was too thick... opposite situation from the dango