Charcoal Buns Filled With Custard

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My colleague told me that Mirabelle’s chocolate croissants are very good.  Since we were in town, we swung by this little bakery at 27 Mackenzie Road, to pick up some for ourselves.  I visited this bakery once before but didn’t pick up any croissants; bought the sweet potato bread and some tarts.

Odd.  I love chocolate croissants but hate the plain ones.  For some reason, the plain ones make me sick in the tummy almost immediately after consuming them.  I used to overdose on the chocolate croissants (and blueberry tarts) at the Parkway Parade Delifrance because the cafe was one of our favourite hang-out places during college days. 

Ah, sweet memories. Somehow, I have been reminiscing alot lately.

The suaku me does not remember eating croissants from any place in Singapore except at Delifrance (and I have never been to France…).  I was supposed to try the ones at Hiediard but never got around to doing so.

Back to Mirabelle.  The chocolate croissants were amazing.  Light, flaky and buttery.  I wished I had bought more than just two croissants.  I am not eating croissants from Delifrance ever again. 

At Mirabelle, while waiting to pay, I saw a guy come into the shop and buy up all the bamboo charcoal buns on the tray (about 6 or 7, I think) and that were the only items he bought.  I had also picked up one of these black-coloured buns to try since they looked interesting and the colour reminded me of squid-ink pasta. Plus these buns had a custard filling and I’m a sucker for all things custard. 

All I could say about the charcoal bun was…UM. WOW! 

It was very good!  I loved the soft, chewy texture of the bread.  But I felt that the bun could do better with a more generous filling of custard.

I complained bitterly to TBH that I wished I had bought all the charcoal buns so that the guy who came in after me would be so disappointed that he had none to buy!  Now I have to wait till the next weekend to visit the bakery again since they are not opened on Sundays.   Okay, the next time I drop by the bakery, I am buying up ALL the charcoal buns. 

For sweet potato lovers – I am one – the sweet potato bun was very tasty too.

Alfresco, At Charlie’s Corner

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Spicy wings and a chilli dog, all washed down with a Pink Killer (a delicious Belgian grapefruit beer). 

HAPPINESS.

Have been eating their chilli dog since my undergraduate days.  Then, it was washed down with a big mug of guava juice, not beer.

Now, I have to find out where in Singapore can I get hold of a crate of Pink Killers.  They are great thirst-quenchers in this super hot weather.

Lub Kimchi Jigae

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I have been having regular cravings for kimchi jigae eversince I watched the movie Le Grand Chef: The Battle of the Kimchi.  Yawn.  I thought this movie is nowhere as good as the previous one, in terms of storyline, casting and acting.  But the kimchi gastro-porn was good.

Everytime I crave for kimchi jigae, I head out to Red Pig for a quick-fix during lunch.  As I have some kimchi from K sitting in my fridge, I decided to make kimchi jigae for lunch. 

The kimchi was so yummy I snitched half of it from the bottle before I even started on making the stew.  The taste is very well-balanced – not too spicy or too sour, and it isn’t strong smelling like the ones sold in the supermarkets.  I really can’t eat those.

Just so that TBH wouldn’t give me the ‘You’re feeding me poison’ look, I used quite alot more stock in the stew than I would ordinarily prefer so as to dilute the taste of the kimchi.  What a pity!

Hainan: The Russian Lady

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People have been asking me what we did in Hainan Island.  The answer is ‘hardly anything’. 

(Edit: And NO, there wasn’t a Rain concert in Hainan Island, in case anyone is wondering.)

Afterall, we were there for effectively three days. We spent one night and one morning in Haikou and the rest of our time lazing in the Kempinski resort in Sanya, drinking Chinese tea.

(The ride from Haikou to Sanya takes between 3 to 4 hours, depending on whether you travel by bus or a taxi.)

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In between our tea sessions, we visited the beach, I picked sea shells, my colleague made full use of her bikini in the pool, I snoozed on the deck-chair by the pool.

We also checked out the resort’s spa.  I’m not very fond of visiting spas but don’t mind getting a good body scrub once in a while.

Except for the time when we accidentally locked ourselves in the balcony and had to shout like crazy for help, we didn’t have any particularly interesting encounters.  Thankfully, a hotel staff heard our cries and got someone to rescue us from our own idiocy (and a faulty balcony door lock). 

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Oh, we met a rather interesting Russian lady at the resort. Interesting because she speaks Mandarin quite fluently, albeit with a strong foreign accent.

I have never had a conversation with a Caucasian in Mandarin! 

We chatted for a while and she told us that she studied in Haerbin for four years and that’s when she learnt to speak Mandarin.  Her family has been spending the first 5 months of the year in Hainan Island the last two years so as to stay away from the harsh Russian winters and to let her children study Mandarin in China. 

After talking to her, I felt a strong urge to polish up on my Mandarin.  It is in a deplorable state.

Bhutan: The Campsite Dinner

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We were driving towards the Queen’s Monastery in Punakha one morning when we got to know 3 Chinese girls on the road.

Literally. 

They were doing a 10km (I think) cycling trip that morning and were cycling in the opposite direction from us when our guides stopped the car to greet their guide (who owns the local travel agency that we had signed up with). 

They went: “Oh, aren’t you guys the Singaporean couple who are supposed to go whitewater rafting with us this afternoon…?

Yeah.  We chickened out in the end.  (I am hydrophobic, remember?)

So we got out of the car, introduced ourselves and started yakking with them in the middle of the road.  All three live in Hong Kong and two of them are Americans. 

And they invited us to their campsite for dinner that evening.  Which we happily accepted.  I think I last sat before a campfire when I was 17 years old. 

In Punakha, they were putting up at a campsite that looked so cool.  Each tent is spacious, clean and had a huge bed.  The atmosphere was quite romantic.

Another American couple from Idaho joined us for dinner.  They were in Bhutan for work – the husband is involved in designing and developing chalet-type bungalows on a small plot of land near the campsite and they brought us to see the prototype bungalow.  (It is gorgeous and we want to stay there when it is ready!)  This couple is now probably in their 60s, have 7 grown children, 9 grandchildren; look nothing their age and carry backpacks around.

We had a great time at dinner, enjoying the food and the conversations at the table very much.  I can’t remember when was the last time I had such a good time talking to strangers.  Which we will probably never meet again, unless someone passes by Singapore and decides to drop us an email to meet up.

(I have been debating with myself as to whether I should put up a blurry but really nice photo of us taken during the dinner….)

Just today, one of the girls sent me an email to give me the links to the two Flickr albums containing her Bhutan photos.  I drooled.

Oh my…  Her photographs are beautiful! She captured so much more of the place which I could not, did not.  And the pictures of their activities made me wish I had joined them. 

Damn, I should have gone whitewater rafting.  The river doesn’t look so scary in the photos.

And why didn’t I experience riding a mule?  Instead, I went trekking…and nearly keeled over.  Life always looks better on the other side of the pasture.

I love her album which contains gorgeous photographs of the Bhutanese, young and old.

Hainan: Hainanese And Their Chicken Rice

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Wenchang chicken rice.

I haven’t figured out whether Hainanese chicken rice is a Singapore invention or whether it originated from Wenchang, Hainan Island. (Wenchang is the city where my grandfather was born in.)

My grandparents say it is the former.

Whatever is the case, I definitely prefer our Singapore version as the chicken meat is more tender and flavourful.

I have a sudden craving for my grandmother’s home-made chicken rice balls.  I love eating chicken rice balls dipped in chilli sauce (also home-made). 

One bite of the rice ball, followed by a bite of chicken.  Plus other fixings like cabbage soup and chap chye.

Hainan: Touching On Family Roots

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Sanya (三亚), Hainan Island.

I have never really thought about visiting the place where my maternal grandparents were born, and whose Hainanese blood runs amok in my veins. 

Expiring annual leave and a Jetstar voucher gave me the opportunity to visit this tropical island which is often referred to as the ‘Hawaii of China’ with a colleague who is Hainanese. (I am actually Hokkien….in form.)

We went down to the southern tip of the island known as Sanya and spent two days doing nothing. 

Drinking tea.  Enjoying sandy beaches, pristine waters, nice weather, fresh air (are we really in China..?!). And COCONUT TREES.  SO MANY OF THEM.  Everywhere.

It was a little odd at first hearing the Hainanese dialect – albeit slight variations of the dialect that we speak at home – almost everywhere when the dialect is rarely heard in public in Singapore.  I kept wondering if I should also converse with the locals using the dialect. 

I think my “bullet-train” speech patterns found its roots in the Hainanese dialect which I picked up from living with my maternal grandparents for many years.

We ‘talk very fast’ and at higher-than-the-usual decibels.  So we sound like we are engaged in shouting matches with each other when we are merely having a civilised conversation. 

TBH (who grew up in a soft-spoken environment) gets un-nerved by our family conversations because we make such a DIN.  And my friends, alarmed by the decibel-level, used to tell me to “stop shouting at your mother”! 

For goodness sakes, no one is shouting.  We are just animated folks.

Whenever squabbles broke out at home (involving gramps, mom and me), my dad would immediately put on his headphones and turn up the volume on the CD player.  Neighbours would, at some point, turn up at our doorstep to see what the ruckus was all about.  Oh, so embarrassing.

The next trip to Hainan Island, I will visit the villages where my grandparents came from.  But I think I will have to leave the ‘mister’ at home.  Doubt he will survive being Hainanese-d.

Bhutan: The Gho & The Kira

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Ha! Guess what was it about these two guys (or maybe it’s just one of them) that fascinated me?

The national dress was introduced during the 17th century by the unifier of Bhutan to give the Bhutanese a unique identity.  The men wear the gho and for the women, the kira.

Men in skirts! The gho is a long robe hoisted to the knee and held in place with a kera, a woven cloth belt, wound tightly around the waist. The working men complete the outfit with knee-length socks and dark-coloured, leather shoes. Some of the men look really stylish wearing a ponytail (like our guide). I saw so many ruggedly good-looking men!

The kira is a floor-length rectangular piece of cloth wrapped around the body over a blouse. The kira is held from the shoulders by broach-like hooks and is fastened at the waist with a kera. The dress is complete with a short, open jacket-like garment.

As part of the national efforts to preserve and promote the kingdom’s cultural heritage, all Bhutanese are required to wear the national dress in government offices, schools and on formal occasions.

The impact of modernisation is slowly, but surely, creeping into Bhutan. We came across quite a number of youths wearing modern clothes, such as jeans, tee-shirts, leather jackets and sneakers.

For some reason, I didn’t take many photos of the Bhutanese women – maybe just one or two. Too busy gawking at the men, I think!

When The Bacon Turns Bad

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…..and the fridge has only tomatoes, celery and nothing else (not even eggs)….! 

Looking at the plate set before him, TBH mutters that he is reminded of cattle grazing in Bhutan, eating nothing but grass and hay.  (I am quite sure pasta isn’t part of the cattle’s diet.)

I am happy to go without meat once in a while.  And I like celery.

Break-fasting

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My idea of a perfect breakfast is a glass of freshly squeezed juice, a plate of fresh fruit with yoghurt, a bowl of muesli or cereal with milk, a pot of coffee and a stack of blueberry pancakes with butter and honey (I don’t really like maple syrup). 

Or.

A plate of beehoon with a fried egg, a slice of luncheon meat, a pile of cabbage, lots of sambal chilli and a cup of teh

Over the weekend, we drove all the way to Holland Village to eat this very delicious beehoon at the food centre.  The stall (#01-11) is immensely popular and there is always a queue.  Our friends introduced us to it last year and we have been back several times since.

I like the beehoon,  it seems to be thinner than the usual ones, very tasty and doesn’t come glistening with oil.  The fried fish slices and fried chicken wings are very popular.  Unfortunately, the wings went temporarily-out-of-stock just when it was our turn to order.  Sad.

If blimping is an option, I will have beehoon for breakfast every morning, Monday to Friday. Unfortunately not.  In any case, there are no good stalls selling beehoon around my workplace.

Lovin’ Them Pine Cones

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I wasn’t sure if I could bring these coniferous things out of Bhutan.

As pine cones can be seen lying on the ground nearly everywhere in Bhutan, I figured I wasn’t committing an illegal act by bringing some of these lovelies home.  Our guide also didn’t think it would be an issue as long as I did not try to cart home a truckload of pine cones.  But I could almost hear the ‘idiotic tourist’ refrain going on and on in the minds of the hotel staff who gave me a paperbag to store these pine cones.

I just could not resist picking them everywhere I went (but one has to be mindful of cattle manure when picking pine cones or any dried flora/fruits, etc out in the open). 

If I was left to my own devices, I would have brought back dozens and dozens of pine cones.  But under the watchful eye of the irritated-by-my-pine-cone-picking husband, I could only bring back a small stash. 

I was quite worried that they wouldn’t survive the plane ride.  Well, some of the small cones (spruce cones, I think) didn’t quite make it.

Aren’t they pretty with their “woody-ness” and “alternating fish scales” design?  (I don’t know what is the right word to describe this part of the cone.) 

Especially the squat and fat-looking red pine cones. Each ‘scale’ is thicker and the surface smoother compared to the long and thin blue pine cones.

When I First Heard Of Bhutan

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Paro Airport

I was 16 going on 17 (yeah, so tacky-sounding) – and about to embark on the best two years of my life – when I first heard of Bhutan.   From my first-year civic tutor in college who also taught Geography.   

A dynamic and tough lady.  We were all a little frightened of her.  But mostly, in awe of her.  She gave us a glimpse into what life was like studying outside Singapore and inspired us to seek more in our lives besides academic excellence. 

Ah, I really liked the tutors and lecturers in the Arts faculty – they were such fun people to be learning from.  I did Arts for 3 months by which time it became pretty apparent to me that if I wanted to pass my A-Levels and go to university, I had better go back to studying Science.  Stodgy Science.

Our tutor hung out with us often.  Besides telling us stories about varsity life overseas (rowing, partying, mugging, weekend trips to Europe and so on and so forth), she used to talk to us about this beautiful and mystical Buddhist kingdom located ‘very high up in the world’ but closed to the world, called Bhutan, triggering fantasies of mountains, valleys and rivers.

It all sounded so exciting to me then, having never been out of Singapore except to Malaysia.  I told myself that if Bhutan opens up to tourism someday, I want to go visit the country. 

(Our tutor eventually gave up teaching to go into something completely different, like banking.)

There are too many places and wonders in this world that I want to see.  And I forgot all about Bhutan.  Until I was introduced to this travel company called Country Holidays in the middle of last year, saw travel itineraries of Bhutan on their website, rang them up to make some inquiries and learnt that the kingdom is not terribly far away from home, approximately 5 hours by air (excluding waiting time). 

So we bought a customised 10-day package to Bhutan with Country Holidays, to go in April this year. 

As there are no direct flights to Bhutan from Singapore, we had to fly to Paro via Bangkok (other entry points are Kathmandu and several Indian cities).  The flight leaves Bangkok at an unearthly hour (650am, Bangkok time) so we had to fly into Bangkok the night before and stay the night at Bangkok’s airport hotel. 

Flights into and out of Bhutan are solely operated by Bhutan’s national carrier, DrukAir. The airline owns only two planes (the Airbus 319) so the number of visitors entering and leaving the country daily is limited by plane capacity. 

Currently, there is only one flight leaving Bangkok for Paro and vice versa daily.  Direct flights to and from Bangkok are available 2 to 3 days a week, which unfortunately, were not our travelling days and we had to make transits.  On our way into Paro, the plane stopped by in Dhaka for approximately 45 minutes and on our way out of Paro, it stopped in West Bengal for about the same period of time. 

The plane’s descent into Paro airport offered us some really gorgeous views of Bhutan’s beautiful mountains and rugged landscape.  It was rather cloudy and foggy that day, but we could still make out the peaks of the snow-capped mountains in the far distance.

Macarons From Dalloyau

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A lovely box of Dalloyau macarons from C who bought me this in Tokyo.  And the macarons come individually wrapped!

With a 200 year (or is it 400…?) history, Dalloyau is one of France’s oldest and most respected maison de gastronomie and they created the infamous Opera cake (or Gâteau L’opéra ).  I read that the cake was named as a tribute to an Opera prima ballerina. 

I love the Opera cake which comprises several layers of Joconde biscuit soaked in coffee syrup and garnished with coffee butter cream and chocolate ganache. 

I remember Illy making the cake last year at my place – it was ALOT of work making the cake but the end-product was delicious!  I can actually say that I helped to assemble the Gâteau L’opéra (which is being the go-fetch girl for the patissier)!

I doubt I will have a chance to try Dalloyau’s Opera cake anytime soon, so my best bet is to head to Hilton Hotel for a slice.

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