Candlenut Kitchen

I haven’t yet regained my appetite from the strenuous trek in Bhutan and my tastebuds seem to have gone haywire after eating too many fiery Bhutanese meals. 

I was craving for some appetite-stimulating food since the start of the day.  Kimchi stew for lunch or Peranakan food for dinner.

As I had to visit the orthodontist over lunch, the choice was abundantly clear.  Pig out on Peranakan food during dinner (since eating Korean food makes TBH sulk). 

I have been wanting to visit this new Peranakan restaurant called Candlenut Kitchen at 25 Neil Road.  A couple of blogs I frequent raved about the restaurant’s fabulously authentic food as well as the rather young co-owner and chef behind it.  An SMU-graduate, he enrolled in the Sunrice Academy, graduated with flying colours, and set up this restaurant.

I love Peranakan food.  So, try I must.

Located in one of the shophouses along Neil Road (with an open carpark just across the road), Candlenut Kitchen is a casual dining place which seats approximately 50 persons.   We ordered the itek tim, ayam buah keluak, chap-chye and ngor hiang.  I would have liked to order more, such as the kueh pie-ti, but there were only two of us, and we didn’t want to over-order.

I am no Peranakan food connoisseur but I thought all the dishes which we ordered were very good.  Especially the itek tim.  The soup was robust and had a good balance of sourness and saltiness.  For some reason which we didn’t bother to find out, my bowl of soup came half-filled, leaving me feeling vaguely dissatisfied.

While the food is very tasty, the service was quite lacking.  The serving staff is a pretty young bunch who are clearly untrained.  Yes, they are bright, smiley and very eager to please but still, fell very short of the basic level of service expected.  They should be sent to a Cantonese restaurant like Lei Garden or Imperial Treasures to be trained under those hawk-eyed waitresses.

Alright.  The restaurant made an effort to serve us all our food at the same time, piping hot. (something that many Western, charge-you-an-arm-and-a-leg restaurants are unable to do.)  Kudos!

But the serving staff forgot to bring us our rice. 

We twiddled our thumbs, salivated at the food set before us, and waited.  Nothing happened.

We then realised that the serving staff had decided that it was more important to dry the wine glasses and serve wine at another table than to give us our rice.  We were left in the lurch!  Waving madly for a while, someone else finally took notice of us and two plates of rice eventually made their way to our table (with profuse apologies).

Also, I wasn’t quite sure how I was expected to scoop the yummy buah keluak stuffing from the nuts as we were not provided with any suitable cutlery to do so.  (Maybe they didn’t expect us to actually eat the stuffing…? Are they insane? Well, finicky TBH doesn’t eat the stuffing but I worship it!)

So we asked for a small spoon.  They gave us a teaspoon which unfortunately was still too big to fit into the opening of the nuts so I ended up using the handle of the teaspoon to scoop the stuff from the nuts.  (The staff apologized profusely for the inconvenience caused, tried to look for something else to give us, and ended up giving us a two-prong fork.)

We were also a little taken aback when the service staff expressed surprise that we asked for sweet sauce to go with the ngor hiang.  (Would they have been less surprised if we had asked for tomato ketchup and chilli sauce?  Sigh, I just cannot understand Gen Y, or is it Gen Z?)

I want to visit Candlenut Kitchen again, and I hope they have ironed out the kinks in their service by then.

Also, have to ask my Peranakan friends to give this place a try to ascertain if the food is truly authentic.

Back From Bhutan: Back To The Basic

Ha Ha.  Bee is back.

Within minutes of arriving home from the airport (at 1am), I logged onto Youtube to watch Rain’s latest live performances of two songs from his latest album Back To The Basic. 

It has been a long while since I oooohed and aaaahed over him.  So I couldn’t wait to hear his new songs, although the titles of the songs seem to be rather lacking in the creative department (‘Love Song’, ‘Hip Song’, ‘Same’, ‘One’ *YAWN*)

I couldn’t resist watching the newly released music video of the title track, Love Song, while in Bhutan but without the benefit of hearing the song as there were no speakers attached to the computers in the places we stayed at.  I was aghast at how bad the music video is!  The acting is a lethal combination of what you see in a karaoke music video and a Taiwanese soap. 

But the live performances should be waaaay better since there are none of the cheesy acting bits.

Love Song:

Source: CloudVST

I like the melody of this song and the sweet, mellow huskiness of his voice.  But the BLINKING eyelashes are bloody awful and a distraction.  They are like a thorn in my eye!

I don’t even think he looks like a freak (he calls this look ‘androgynous’…?!) wearing those blinkers now, but more like a clown – you know, the long, flappy eyelashes painted onto the faces of a real clown?  All he needs is a red wig and a bunch of balloons.

The choreography makes me very happy although I could do without the heart-pounding part. His splendid, groovy dancing rights all wrongs (eeewwww, *blush*).  Love, love, LOVE this performance!

Mmmm, I dig those pants!  And his thunder thighs are no more.  But why are there so many pieces of clothing under the gladiator-looking top? Are we playing strip poker here? 

TAKE THEM ALL OFF, BOY. 

Then again, I thought the way he pulled the tank over his head but without taking it off rather clever.

Hip Song:

Source: CloudVST

Not hip at all; unless ‘hip’ refers to the constant gyration of that part of his anatomy. 

I don’t fancy either the song or the choreography – both music and dance seem to be going nowhere for me.  The song is like a disco track gone wrong and as for the dance, all I see is him hopping around like a grasshopper.   Very stylish and captivating hopping though.

But I like the outfit.  He looks super-good in it.  Sans the phallic pouch-thing on his groin!  *groans* What in the world is that?

On balance, I think he does look better fully clothed.  The right kind of clothes I mean.

Next thing to do, listen to the rest of the songs.  But this will have to wait till I have had a shower, gotten some sleep and unpacked my luggage.

Logging In From Punakha

I was intending to stay Internet free during my stay in Bhutan. 

But what was I thinking? 

Here I am, checking Facebook and my email account in Punakha, reading the blogs that I visit daily and yes, blogging away at the Internet room in our hotel (more like a dormitory I would say).

The weather, scenery and people here are lovely.

Okay, time to go trekking now.  And where is our guide….??

In The Land Of The Thunder Dragon

We left for Bangkok last evening, stayed one night at the airport hotel and flew into Bhutan very early this morning. 

We will spend the next 8 days in Bhutan.  Away from the urban jungle and my tiresome Blackberry. 

I hope we don’t get serious altitude sickness as we make our way up to some dizzying heights above sea-level to see the famed Tiger’s Nest.  Will be swallowing pills ahead of the climb! 

Crossing fingers.

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Whoops! The current (and still single) Bhutan King (King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck) is quite good-looking.

Passionfruit Muffins For Me

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YH bought me half-a-dozen organic passionfruits from D’Kranji Farm two weeks ago.  From the sound of their farmstay, I feel like booking a villa one of these weekends to stay and farm-hop. 

By the time I took delivery of the fruits, they were fully ripe, fragrant and sweet-tangy delicious.  I used a couple of them in a salad and decided to eat the rest au naturel. 

Over the weekend, I changed my mind and decided to make a batch of passionfruit muffins to take to my gramps.  Used this recipe for the first time. 

In the end, I postponed my trip to see gramps. And these muffins (most of them) ended up in my tummy instead.

I like fruit-based muffins and can add passionfruit to the list now. TBH does not quite share the same tastes as me here – ne’mind, more for me to eat.

Last but not least, Happy April Fool’s Day!

Edit: Oops, the fruits weren’t from D’Kranji farm but a neighbouring one.

Lemon Custard Cups

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It is fun taking photos of food.  More fun than making the food and twice as fun as eating the food, I feel.

The place in my flat where I take most of my photos and where I get plenty of natural light streaming in is on my washing machine in the kitchen (home to several pots of green plants Yeah, so once in a while, my laundry basket and/or dirty laundry find their way into the photograph when I am not careful.

Unfortunately, my lemon custards were still a little ‘watery’ at the bottom of the ramekins. I should have left the custard cups in the water bath for another 5 minutes.

Bali: The Padi Field Walk

Apart from the daily eating, the other activity that we enjoyed the most during this trip was the 2-hour walk across the padi fields encircling the Chedi Club’s compound and through a local village that was next to the compound. 

Two staff from the Chedi Club brought us on this “guided walking tour”, explaining the rice planting and harvesting cycle and local village customs as well as pointing out to us the various plants and vegetables that were grown in the area, some of which feature in the daily meals at the resort.

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Rice planting is back-breaking work.  We were also told that it is very laborious for the farmers to chase away the birds which descend on the fields in droves, pecking at the rice grains.  To scare the birds, the farmers put up scarecrows, hang up large pieces of coloured cloths which flutter in the wind, construct rudimentary-looking contraptions which produce loud, clanking noises as well as personally roaming in the padi fields making eagle-like screeches from time to time.

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Left: Glutinous rice.  Right: White rice.

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Cocoa trees!  This is the first time that I have seen a real cocoa fruit and I was so excited!  There were a few cocoa fruits hanging on the trees and I asked the guides if I could pluck one.  I wanted to break open the fruit and see what it looked like inside.  My husband glared at me when I voiced my suggestion and well, that was the end of it. 

And we saw coffee berries too!  Reminded me of the delicious Luwak coffee I tried in Jakarta, but no, civet cats do not live in Bali.

Oh, we saw an avocado tree with many fruits on our way up to Bedugul too!

Other Posts On Bali:

Bali: From Ubud With Love
Bali: The Chedi Club
Bali: What We Ate
Bali: Adorable Creatures We Saw
Bali: Bedugul

Sperm Sacs, Any Takers

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Shirako (cod fish sperm sacs) in a ponzu sauce.

C and I went to Chiharu for dinner several days ago and had shirako as part of our omakase meal.

Eating sperm sacs does sound a little squeamish but I find this stuff very yummy.  I enjoy telling my guy friends and male colleagues about how tasty shirako is and watch them squirm.   They probably feel an imaginery pain somewhere in their groin listening to me. 

People have asked me about its taste.  Well, it is soft, smooth and tastes slightly creamy.  But I can’t really describe the taste!

Looking at the shirako in the photo now, doesn’t it look like the pig’s intestine that we eat in kway chap?

A Bowl Of Soup

We had another hearty home-cooked meal at the Tangs over the weekend. 

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Fried chicken wings. Sambal sweet potato leaf. Stir-fried eggplant with minced pork.

Fried eggs – Rich, runny yolks with unctuous whites and crispy sides. 

And best of it all, an awesome slow-cooked winter melon soup with pork ribs and dried seafood (“Pow Tong”).  The soup was intensely flavorful .  The long hours of boiling must have wrung every bit of goodness from the meat and seafood.  (I have no idea what other secret ingredient was added! Hee.)

I love home-made soups, especially when it has been painstakingly simmered by someone who cares.  To me, a bowl of home-made soup is what it is meant to be – warmth, goodness and kindness. 

White rice, fried eggs and a piping hot bowl of soup – my perfect last meal on this earth.  Okay, throw in a good cup of coffee as well.

So when I got home and was in the midst of uploading photos from the camera into the computer, I was like: WHERE IS THE PHOTO OF THE SOUP?

Nowhere to be found.  I must have forgotten to snap a picture of the soup.  Darn.

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Dessert was delicious shortcakes with Korean strawberries and whipped cream. 

I was kinda disappointed that I didn’t get a good photo of this pretty dessert the second time round.  As usual, TBH was hurrying me so that we could all eat dessert and I just couldn’t get a satisfying shot with him going “fai-di, fai-di’.

Argh.

♥ Teochew Porridge ♥

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I’m not Teochew but I like Teochew porridge alot. Comfort food, really.

We have been frequenting this Teochew porridge place called Xu Jun Sheng Teochew Cuisine at Joo Chiat Place. We had dinner here again last night.

Our standard orders for two:

Steamed clams with wine, garlic and chili. My favourite!

Prawn rolls (hei zor).

Tau pok. Otah.

Sweet potato leaves stir-fried in sambal.

Plain porridge drizzled with steamed clam gravy and tau pok sauce.

The steamed pomfret is fresh and delicious but we order this only when we’re dining with friends.

*Burp*

Seafood Paella, et al.

Seafood Paella, et al.

I made seafood paella for dinner last night. Or what I think is seafood paella because I can’t quite remember how paella tastes like. It didn’t turn out so well.

I didn’t cook the carnaroli rice long enough before adding the seafood, resulting in us having to eat wet paella and over-cooked seafood. Orso, I burnt the rice at the bottom of the pan so the poor pan is undergoing a major soaking exercise. 

As part of the prep work for the paella, I roasted red peppers in the oven (which I forgot to use in the end…*darn*).  I now know that red peppers roasting in the oven produce delightful smells.

For starters, we had insalata caprese. The plum tomatoes were good but the buffalo mozzarella that I bought this time didn’t seem to have much flavour to it. (According to Wiki, insalata caprese is also  known as a Tricolore salad due to its three colors, which mimic the Italian flag).

Thinking that we needed more vegetables, I also made a mesclun salad with balsamic vinaigrette dressing.

Chocolate Mousse

The chocolate mousse turned out decently. Light and not-too-sweet as it was made with mostly bittersweet chocolate and egg white – the recipe didn’t call for heavy cream.

Have to try making the paella again someday.  Can’t expect to get it right the first time.

Chocolate Mousse

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Inspired by the 3-layer chocolate mousse D made last weekend, I tried making one last night.

Mine has only one layer of bittersweet chocolate.  I used Green & Black’s Organic Dark Chocolate with 70% cocoa.

I am not a fan of chocolate-based desserts. But since my cousins are coming over for dinner tonight and they like chocolate desserts, I thought making a chocolate mousse would be nice and also, manageable for me since it could be made in advance.

The mousse looks a bit dull in the glasses; maybe I should add tiny, chunks of fruit to pretty it up. Maybe not, in case I mess it all up. 

I haven’t tasted the mousse, and am crossing my fingers…..!

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