We went to Shimbashi Soba at the basement of Raffles City. I had eaten at original shop at Paragon when it first opened. But that was some years ago and I have not eaten at this restaurant for some time. I didn’t know there was a branch in Raffles City.

Soba cha ($4.50 a pot)

We had 2 pots of soba cha, tea from soba grain. Mao Mao liked the tea and said that it had a smoky flavor. When compared to the roasted barley tea, the soba cha is more smoky while the roasted barley tea smelled like coffee. Unlike the roasted barley tea, the soba cha is best when hot.

Aona goma cream kake ($6.80)

We ordered 4 types of side dishes. First was a simple dish of boiled tou miao with a creamy sesame sauce. The portion looked small but there’s actually quite a lot of tow miao. I quite like it because there wasn’t a strong vegetable taste and the sauce masked out the rest of it. Mao Mao felt it is a good thing that I am eating vegetables and kept asking me to eat more of it.

Salmon yukke ($9.80)

Next we had the salmon yukke which was very nice. There was actually quite a lot of salmon even though at first look, it seemed very little. But when Mao Mao and I started eating, there always seemed to be still some salmon left in the dish. We mixed the raw salmon with the raw quail egg. The salmon was fresh and very nice. There was also some slight spiciness. Mao Mao felt they added some Japanese chilli oil and I thought I tasted some sesame oil as well. This will be a dish that I will order if I dine at Shimbashi Soba again.

Nasu & cheese yuba tsutsumi age ($9.80)

Mao Mao wanted to try this – eggplant and cheese wrapped in beancurd skin and deep fried. There were 3 pieces of it plus a deep fried lady finger and a saucer of what Mao Mao called the Japanese thousand island dressing. I don’t really fancy it although truth be told, it actually tasted quite ok. I felt it was not as worth the money if you compare it to the salmon yukke which was tastier and a larger portion.

Tori karaage ($7.80)

The chicken karaage was quite nice and came piping hot. Mao Mao made a comment about it but I can’t really remember. Something about the coating was different from the normal chicken karaage.

Hiyashi kamo soba ($20.80)

Mao Mao and I had a bowl of cold soba each. You can’t see it in the photo but there’s actually quite a lot of noodles. I felt this dish was enough for a normal eater but Mao Mao and I were feeling greedy. The soba was freshly made. At the Shimbashi Soba restaurants, there is a small room near the entrance where people could see the chef making soba noodles. While Mao Mao and I were in the restaurant, we saw the chef making the last batch of soba noodles for the day. Because the noodles were handmade, they were not as smooth or powdery as those dried prepacked noodles found at supermarkets. The noodles were chewier and the slightly coarse texture meant the sauce was able to stick to the noodles so you can get a bit of the sauce with every bite. The cold soba dish we ordered came with 5 slices of roasted duck, a poached egg, some spring onions, wasabi and soba sauce. I mixed all of them together in the bowl. It was cold and salty and refreshing. I can imagine eating it again in this current hot weather.

Cream anmitsu ($9.80)

For dessert, Mao Mao and I shared a cream anmitsu. There were a lot of ingredients in this dessert. There were soba balls, fruits, Japanese jelly cubes, red bean paste and a sprinkling of black beans, all topped with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream. We were also given a small pitcher of brown sugar syrup which we poured over the ice-cream. I felt the creamy vanilla ice-cream goes well with the red bean paste. Mao Mao liked the red bean paste as well as it wasn’t too sweet. She also liked the soba balls which were chewier but less sticky than normal rice balls.

Shimbashi Soba
252 North Bridge Road
#B1-06/07 Raffles City Shopping Centre
Tel: 63378852

Mao Mao and I met Redhead at Little India. As usual with all gatherings involving Redhead, it was a last minute arrangement. We went shopping at Mustafa before going for dinner. Mustafa is so big that I felt a bit lost inside and we only went to the supermarket section. I was a bit disoriented when we exited the building and almost walked off in the wrong direction.

Redhead declared that she wanted to eat palak paneer so as long as the restaurant we are going to has palak paneer, all is fine. I brought Mao Mao and Redhead to Kashmir where I had eaten previously with LSW, KKH and Twin. I thought it would be an enjoyable dining experience for them. And the food’s not bad too.

After we sat down, a staff came with a copper pitcher and bowl for us to wash our hands. Then we dried our hands on the towels provided by the waiter. Redhead asked with a little apprehension, “Are we expected to eat with our hands?” I pointed out that there were spoons and forks on the table so we could use them to eat. After we washed our hands, a staff passed us the menu. We spent a long time choosing our food.

Sweet lassi ($4)

I ordered a sweet lassi. The lassi was nice as there wasn’t an overpowering yogurt flavor. I’m the only one who ordered a drink as Redhead and Mao Mao just had plain water.

Papadums with sauce

After we placed our orders, the staff gave us a plate of papadums and a container of green sauce. Judging from the color, I thought the sauce would be either minty or spicy. It turned out to be neither, even though Mao Mao commented that it had a refreshing taste. The sauce was cold and salty and all of us liked it a lot. We put lots of sauce on our papadums and finished half of the container along with the papadums.

Kabargah ($12)

We ordered a mutton dish called kabargah. It’s mutton that was boiled in milk and spices, then fried. There were 4 pieces of meat on the plate. The meat was a little tough, but I think that’s because it’s mutton rather than the cooking. Although the meat was a little tough, it wasn’t dry so that’s a good thing.

Murg tikka labbabdar ($11)

For the other meat dish, we had murg tikka labbabdar which was chicken cooked in tomatoes and onions. I like the gravy which was full of tomato flavor. Mao Mao felt that this dish tasted better when you eat it with rice rather than naan.

Palak paneer ($10)

To tell the truth, I was a little tired of palak paneer after eating it so many times. I didn’t eat much of it but the rest did and enjoyed it.

Other foods that we ordered but missed the camera:

Chilly cheese naan ($4)
The naan was described as more salty and cheesy than spicy by Mao Mao. I took a bite and there was a tinge of spiciness but it wasn’t as salty as Mao Mao said it was.

Garlic naan ($3.50)
I did not eat this so I don’t know if it’s good or not.

Rice ($4.50)
I felt like eating rice so I ordered a serving of rice even though I was rather shocked at the price. $4.50 was expensive for a bowl of rice. It turned out to be a big serving, enough for 2-3 persons. The rice used was the long grain basmati rice. I thought the rice was nicely cooked and the grains of rice were not stuck together. Mao Mao said the rice smelled different from the rice Chinese eat.

Masala tea ($3)
Redhead ordered a cup of masala tea after the meal. The masala tea was okay and we felt that there was a weak taste of spices. I would have preferred the spices to taste stronger.

Altogether we spent $19 each for dinner.

Kashmir
52 Race Course Road
Tel: 62936003

It was around 8pm when we finally went for dinner. We decided to go to Muthu’s Curry for dinner. It’s a festive season and we were in a mood to indulge ourselves so we ordered quite a few dishes.

The restaurant was filled with people and the waitress who took our orders was so busy that she forgot to key them in. So we waited for quite a long time and had to ask another waitress to check on our orders. That’s when they discovered that our orders weren’t keyed in yet. The staff was very apologetic about it and a few of them, including the waitress who forgot our orders, came to apologize and told us that they have asked the kitchen to cook our orders first. They also came around later to make sure that our orders arrived.

Apart from that hiccup, dinner was quite enjoyable.

Tadkaa daal ($8)

For vegetables, we had tadkaa daal ($8) which was a lentil gravy with some chilli and other spices like cumin and mustard seeds. The lentils were cooked until almost everything is soft and mushy. It’s not really spicy even though chilli is added.

Mutton vindaloo ($10)

We ordered the mutton vindaloo ($10) which was quite nice. The dish contained mutton and potatoes with a spicy gravy. The mutton was very tender and the potatoes quite nice too. Because the mutton and potatoes were about the same size and colour, Bell mistakenly took two pieces of potatoes when she wanted to take the meat. “It’s fate,” I told her and she glared at me.

Cheese chicken kebab ($13)

The cheese chicken kebab ($13) came with a green sauce which I did not like very nice. I felt that the chicken was flavorful enough and do not really need the sauce. But that’s my personal opinion because I noticed Bell do eat the chicken kebab with the sauce. The chicken was tender and juicy which was somewhat of a pleasant surprise because I was afraid that it would turn out too dry.

Butter naan ($4 each)

We ordered a butter naan each ($4) to go with the dishes.

Mango lassi ($6 each)

For drinks, we ordered a mango lassi each ($6).

Pistachio kulfi ($5)

For dessert, I had what I usually order, pistachio kulfi ($5). It came a bit melted but much easier to eat because it is no longer rock-hard.

Strawberry kulfi ($5)

Bell had the strawberry kulfi ($5) which she enjoyed as well.

Muthu’s Curry
138 Race Course Road
#01-01
Tel: 63921722

This beetle can flying into my room and gave me quite a scare. A first I wasn’t able to see what it was as it buzzed noisily round the room. It was quite big, about 2.5 cm from head to tail and had a beautiful green shine. This is the first time such a big beetle flew into my room that I was at a loss about what to do with it. With smaller beetles I could just throw them out the window but this beetle was so big that I felt it would not be a good flier. So in the end I put it on the window sill and let it flew away by itself.

Illustration Friday is a weekly creative outlet/participatory art exhibit for illustrators and artists of all skill levels. It was designed to challenge participants creatively. Illustration Friday just gives a no-pressure, fun excuse to use it. No clients looking for a particular thing. No one judging the outcome of the work. It’s a chance to experiment and explore and play with visual art.

My first thought when faced with this week’s theme “Adrift” is being adrift on a raft in the sea. I felt it was predictable so I tried to think out of the box and came up with being adrift on the wind. It was only after I finished my picture, that I found out the idea isn’t so unique after all, judging from all the entries on the Illustration Friday website.

I did a quick drawing of my idea in pencil. I wasn’t in the mood to ink or colour it so it is just a pencil sketch for now. I decided to keep the idea of having an inflatable raft and tied balloons to it so it can float in the sky. I had the passengers playing cards without a care in the world, as if floating away in a raft tied with lots of balloons is just an everyday occurrence. The passengers were originally intended to be manga-like characters but I decided to change them to Englishmen in top hats to give it added quirkiness. There is just something about an expressionless well-dressed Englishman in a top hat that pushes quirkiness to the next level.

Maybe I’ll colour this one day. I quite like the idea and hope to see it in colour. But that’s for the future and won’t be anytime soon. Because right now I working on something else.

My mother is not cooking dinner today so I bought some food on the way home. I went to Gong Cha and bought 奶盖绿茶 for $2.40. I felt the green tea taste was quite mild and not as strong as red tea so the tea taste ended up getting overpowered by the milk.

Then I bought a sushi set ($11.80) from the Hokkaido Fish Market stall behind the Gong Cha stall.

Then feeling greedy, I also bought a sashimi set ($13.80) to indulge myself.

Needless to say, it was a very filling dinner. So filling that I told myself not to be so greedy next time.

Illustration Friday is a weekly creative outlet/participatory art exhibit for illustrators and artists of all skill levels. It was designed to challenge participants creatively. Illustration Friday just gives a no-pressure, fun excuse to use it. No clients looking for a particular thing. No one judging the outcome of the work. It’s a chance to experiment and explore and play with visual art.

This is an old pencil drawing from a long time ago. It was meant to be part of series about some children and their pet pig called Peggy Sue. But I never got around to completing it and only this and another drawing exist. I planned to colour them but I never did. Guess I’m subconsciously afraid of spoiling the picture as colouring is not my strong point.

Then Illustration Friday came along and I thought this drawing fits the theme. So I took out the pencil drawing and inked and coloured it.

I’m satisfied with the colouring but I felt the coloured picture seemed to lose some of the charm of the pencil drawing. I also liked the expression on the pig more on the pencil drawing than on the coloured picture.

We ordered 4 dishes to share. We had escargots, pizza, seafood gratin and sausages. The food was quite decent. Although the servings were rather small, each dish was pretty cheap and in total dinner cost $30 after taxes.

Saizeriya Italian Restaurant
B2 City Square Mall
Tel: 68344878

I find the escargots rather nice. Oily and buttery with lots of onions. There were 6 escargots so Bell and I had 3 each.

The hawaiian pizza was nice and the restaurant was quite generous with the toppings. It wasn’t a thin crust pizza but neither was the crust too thick.

The top of the seafood gratin was covered with cheese, prawns, scallops and squid, baked over a layer of penne pasta. When Bell and I first ate the seafood gratin, we thought that it was too creamy. But as we continued eating, it didn’t felt so creamy and turned out to be pretty tasty.

Then feeling greedy, we ordered some spicy sausages with wedges. The sausages were fat and juicy but not really spicy.