Saturday, February 25

Graze

Hello! (:

The weekend's finally here again and I'm pleased that the weather held up today because I went towning to get shoes! I've thrown away most of my flats because they're either too worn out or too old so I was on a mission to buy at least one pair of flats but I got distracted along the way and got another pair of blue wedges! Ah well at least I fulfilled my mission at the end of the day because I managed to find a pair of affordable black flats so yay for me (:

Town was, as usual, pretty crowded and I was pretty relieved that I decided to have an especially late lunch so that I could beat the lunch crowd! (: Will blog about my lunch adventure in town another time because I want to blog again about Graze @Rochester! (:



I think Graze is fast becoming one of my to-go places when I feel like having a late lunch because I know they do not close for lunch and the atmosphere is really laid-back. You can spend your entire day there without feeling pressured that the staff will chase you out (: Coincidentally, it rained on the day I went to Graze so we basically sat indoors and ate and chatted till the rain stopped before we left (: What a decadent way to spend a weekend afternoon!

While waiting for food, it is always nice to have a good drink to keep the agony of waiting at bay. For me, it was a cup of frothy cappuccino ($6), which was average. I'm no coffee connoisseur so as long as the coffee doesn't taste too milky or overly burnt/ bitter, I'm fine with it. Am more of a chai-tea latte kind of person though so if there's chai tea latte on the menu, I'd always be tempted to try!

Because we knew that we were going to have a HUGE dessert platter that day, we chose to skip the appetizers and went straight for the mains!

I had the garden asparagus ($20) which consisted well-cooked asparagus and a poached egg that sat atop a piece of cooked salmon and muffin bread. It was a nice change from my usual eggs benedict because I could have some greens as well (: The small portion gave me ample room for desserts!


Matty chose to have the striploin ($44), which basically is steak with garden salad at the side. He said that the steak was very well-cooked and the black pepper sauce that came with it was not bad too.



My past trips to Graze have taught me that their desserts are generally above-average and since I was feeling like I could do with some endorphins that day, I chose to order the Dessert Tasting Platter ($36), which was honestly a dish fit for a dessert monster like me! My favouritres were the two scoops of icecream, a fried round ball that tasted like churros (there were dips for it!) and the banana creme brulee (: I felt that the chocolate lava cake was a let down because the lava didn't flow that day! =S Guess they didn't have time to heat it properly. I would urge you to order this so that you can sample most of their desserts at one go and I promise you happiness and a sugar high after you're done polishing the entire dish! =P

Alright that's all for now! Hope your weekend's going well. Have a great one! (:

Sunday, February 19

Bistro Petit Salut

Hello everyone (:

The weekend's coming to an end once again =S I sometimes wish that we could have a 4day-work-week and a 3day-weekend but I guess that's only possible if you are a uni student or if you have very flexible working hours!

This weekend was especially precious because one of my sisters will be going abroad for 5-6 months for exchange so we had a family farewell dinner and post-dinner walk together yesterday! It was particularly nice because most of us made the effort to be present and our moods were high so we had a great time yesterday (: We'll be having our farewell dinner part 2 this coming Friday when we go to the airport to send her off!

I realised that I've been heading to Holland Village area instead of Taka area on Sundays since the breakup because it's more convenient to get to Holland Village from wherever I am. Also, I think it takes less time to convene back home from Holland Village compared to town if I don't have the car. Thankfully, Holland Village is packed with numerous good restaurants so I usually am spoilt for choice! One of my favourite restaurants is definitely Bistro Petit Salut, which to me is a nice homely French restaurant that serves delicious and comforting food!

For those who think that Au Petit Salut at Dempsey is slightly too crowded or posh, you may wish to head to Bistro Petit Salut as I find the ambience more relaxed (:

Apart from their three-course lunch set ($28++), there is also a three-course executive lunch set ($38++) for those who prefer to have something a little more extravagant.

A basket of warm bread which came with cold, hard butter (the only kind that I'll eat!)

That day, we had 2 normal lunch sets and 1 executive lunch set. You can have a preview of their menu here.

Here are the photos we took that day of our starters:

 Duo of homemade pork garlic sausage and rillette with mesclun salad, walnut dressing


“Salade Lyonnais” with poached eggs, vegetables and croutons 

Cured Norweigian Salmon Tartare with Olive Oil, Lemon Juice & Fresh Herbs  


For our mains, we had:

“Minute” onglet beef with French mustard jus and mashed potato


Seafood risotto with light cream emulsion, parmesan cheese 

 Pan-seared US Sirloin Steak served with Mashed Potato & Garden Vege


And last but not least, for desserts, we had:

2 servings of Choux buns with vanilla ice cream, warm chocolate sauce and sliced almonds because we really like them a lot!

 Homemade chestnut roll served with mixed berry compote


 We also had a cup of complimentary coffee/ tea each! (:
We entered Bistro Petit Salut ravenous and ready to be stuffed and we left happy, full and satiated (: I honestly think it's one of the most worth-it places to visit because of the incredibly affordable quality food! I will definitely be back again soon (:

Alright time to take a break from the computer! Will rest a little before getting back on to do prep work for tomorrow! Enjoy the last bit of your weekend! (:

Friday, February 17

La Braceria

Hello everyone! (:

It's finally Friday and it looks like it's going to rain again! I'd a great time at Goodman Arts Centre watching the Lit kids perform their self-produced puppet shows - they did such a wonderful job (: What a nice way to start the weekend!

Anyway, since I've a bit of time on my hands now before I head out to meet a few kids, I thought I'd do a post on La Braceria, which is a very homely Italian restaurant near my place! We actually went there for a family dinner to celebrate my birthday at the end of last month so you can imagine how backdated this post is! Anyhow, La Braceria serves pretty decent food at reasonable prices so if you would like some 'homemade' Italian food, do pop by this restaurant and you will probably get your craving fulfilled.

We started off the evening by sharing two starters. This is called Antipasto Braceria ($42), which consists of grilled vegetables,  artichoke, grilled mushrooms, rocket leaves, ham and a huge chunk of cheese (sorry I forgot which type of cheese this was!). This hearty spread whetted many of our appetites so we were more than eager for our mains to come!

We also ordered a plate of calamari ($24) because we were afraid that the antipasto wouldn't sit well with everyone. I felt that the calamari were only average and that they were severely overpriced!

One of my sisters ordered ravioli ($18), which was the cheapest dish of all our main courses and rightly so because the portions were pathetic! Please don't ever expect to get full on ravioli because the 5 pieces of 'pasta dumplings' won't satiate your hungry tummy! I would think that this would be better as a snack or something you would order if you weren't feeling hungry at all.


Since I've never had my teeth stained black with any kind of squidink pasta before, I thought this was a great opportunity to try since I was out with family and family wouldn't judge even if my entire mouth was stained black! haha So I went ahead to order the Fettuccine Black Ink Sauce with Seafood ($22), which was surprisingly tasty! On hindsight, I think it had a cheesy taste and perhaps that's what made me feel quite full quite quickly.

Linguine Crab ($22) was also very well done! I liked that it wasn't overly cheesy or creamy so you won't get gelat finishing the entire plate! Would certainly order this again the next time I visit!

Another sister ordered the Seafood Spaghetti ($24) which came in parchment paper. I realised that spaghetti/ pasta that comes in parchment paper tend to not have very strong flavours probably due to the more soupy nature of the dish. I generally prefer my food to be more flavourful so I wouldn't order this dish if I had a choice.

Gumtoo had the pasta of the day which was king prawn pasta ($24). The prawn was so huge that it almost looked like a lobster! Gumtoo enjoyed her dish quite a bit so I was thankful that we decided to get the last pasta of the day!

Since my brother only eats meat and cheese, we got him the Rucola and Parham Pizza ($24), which he truly enjoyed. For once it was large enough for him not to order a second main!

The other pizza we ordered was the Prosciutto e Funghi ($18), which was ham and mushroom pizza that tasted pretty average or slightly above average.

A cup of hot chocolate to warm us up ($5.50) or if you prefer, you can order soft drinks like coke and sprite for ($4.50 a cup)

In all, we enjoyed our dinner and I think our empty plates and full bellies are testament to the above average food served at La Braceria! Definitely a place that we could afford to revisit again in future.

Alright that's all for now! (: Have a great weekend everyone!

Saturday, February 11

Jaan

Hello everyone! (:

I'm finally going to blog about my first trip to Jaan! Three of us went to Jaan for my birthday lunch last month and we really loved the food and experience! (: Each of us ordered a 3course lunch set ($52++) and we tried very hard to not repeat dishes for each course so that we can see the range of dishes offered at Jaan. Initially I was afraid that the restaurant would give me the overly pretentious and atas vibe but am thankful that it turned out otherwise. The atmosphere was relaxed and the ambience was that of tranquility so lunch turned out to be an enjoyable affair! Here are some photos we took that day:

 Menu

Lovely flower sitting at our table


Complementary starters:



Honestly I can't remember the exact components of each dish but they are balls of potato, some smoked fish with some jelly on top and hummus with crackers (yum!).

Then the most interesting of dishes came before us:


 Mushroom tea! (: (: (: It tasted really smooth and all three of us liked it a lot!


One of the nice things about Jaan is that there is free flow bread and butter throughout the entire meal! There are four types of bread to choose from but we only photographed one: 




Appetisers:

Jerusalem Artichoke Veloute: Smoked organic egg, chauterelles, iberico de bellota & porcini crumbs.

Hand-dried Scallop & Avocado "Millefeuile": Light crustacean jelly citrus, ikura & bronze fennel (*additional $15)

 Organic Beetroot Composition: Burrata, olives, almonds & basil


Mains:
Iberian Black Pork: Confit belly, braised cheek, grilled rib, trotter 'caillette', wild chantenay, carrot, pickled grey shallots & roasted chestnuts

Slow Steamed Atlantic Cod: Cauliflower cous cous, shellfish, sea grapes & watercress jus


Juniper Roasted Venison Loin: Pear, celeriac, sauce 'grand veneur' & black truffle


Desserts:

Choconuts 2012: Tanariva mousse, peanuts & macadamia nuts icecream. (The orange dish was given to cleanse our palattes - very refreshing!)

Brie de Meaux Truffe:  Herve Mons selected brie de meaux, perigord truffle and hazelnut (additional $25)

 Complementary coffee (I chose to have a cup of cappuccino!)

Complementary petit fours:


I would love to go back to Jaan again some day in the near future! (: The fact that we had a great aerial view from the restaurant made it better! (: Thank you for the birthday treat! (:

Tuesday, February 7

Carrot Cake Hunting

Carrot Cake from Marmalade Pantry

So far I've tried Marmalade Pantry's, Cedele's (which I like), Brewerkz's, P.S. Cafe's, Cafe Beviamo's (which I also like, though I prefer their Hummingbird Cake), Delicious, Coffee Bean and a few other places which I can't quite recall at this present moment. I like having nice slice of carrot cake (:

*

Just decided to post an entry because I forsee myself being very busy over the next few days so I'll only put up the Jaan post this weekend! (: Have a good week ahead!