London - December 2006

Another short stay in London for a getaway from Sheffield last December before Christmas.

My must-have lunch again in the noodle stall mentioned in my previous post. Same dishes ordered just that this time round, lots of vinegar in the sweetcorn soup.



A lot of people swear by this restaurant as serving the best roast duck in London and if you are a frequent visitor to London, then perhaps by now you should already know which restaurant I am talking about. Despite the ridiculously long waiting time, with or without booking, it is hard to miss the hustle and bustle of this place.

People come from everywhere just to try its roast duck and this is also the place that won my mum over and as quoted from her one of the best roast duck she's tried. Although I have not personally tried it before, perfect scores from basically everyone who's been here cannot be wrong ya?

For those visiting London, give this a try and I am sure you will not be disappointed. It's located in Bayswater and once you are there, just keep a lookout for 'Four Seasons' restaurant or just go towards where there is a long queue forming along the street.

Fish maw soup



Sweetcorn with crabmeat soup



Salt and pepper squid



Kai lan with cuttlefish cake



Seafood bee hoon



The highlight of the night - the house speciality roast duck (half)




All of the abovementioned dishes are only for 2 pax and as most of you are aware, I do not eat meat meaning my fellow diner actually finish half the roast duck by himself and still craving for more after the meal despite him not being a big eater most of the time.

The hotel chosen for this trip is Hilton Olympia London.

In short, this is way below the normal expectations I would expect from a Hilton branch. The location despite being next to a tube station is out of the way and the room is plastered with gloomy wallpaper with dull dirty green bedsheets to match. Further, the lock in the room couldn't work and it took the maintenance people 2-3 hours before they got back to us. Talk about service.



Crossing my fingers that my next stay in Hilton in a few more weeks will not bring disrepute to the name again...

London - November 2006

The trip to London a year ago was when my mum visited me in UK for a short holiday and since her stayed lasted merely a week, the visit to London was a short one.

I remember she was craving for chinese food and so I brought her to my list of favourite restaurants in London. This noodle bar, located right opposite Bayswater tube station, can easily be located from the big 'mien' (noodle in Chinese) sign at the front entrance.

I never fail to have their vegetarian version of mo po tofu rice for lunch everytime I visit London except for my most recent trip down when the circle line was under maintenance and my common sense conveniently disappear forgetting that the district line can still get me there. It seems plain but very often the nicest food is always something so ordinary but heartwarming and this is the exact comfort food I come for each and every time.




My mum tried the 2 roast noddle.




We shared a sweetcorn soup and kai lan with crabmeat sauce.






The lunch was about 20 quid which is why people always say living in UK is expensive...I say it's all about not converting back to sing dollars to avoid feeling the pinch.


My random breakfast.






For this trip, we stayed at Millennium Gloucester Hotel @ Gloucester Road nestled in Kensington district which is literally across the street from the tube station with easy access to most tube lines . Recommended by my Canadian friend as a Singaporean owned hotel of good standards, I am of course not disappointed and if staying in London will be expensive, then why not pay a little more for a more pleasant stay and for those missing Singapore delights, they even have got a restaurant on the ground floor by the name of Bugis Street or the like!




More London food to come...

Banana Bread

I apologise for the lack of updates. Been very occupied these couple of days and will be more so for the following weeks to come so while I am stranded in the library working on my seemingly 'mission-impossible' essay, do be patient with the updates :)

I am trying my hands on baking and if you are a first timer as well, this is an effortless recipe to follow through.

(Pardon the lousy quality of the images...I can only get my camera on the 19th Dec)




Ingredients:

- 1 cup 2 tsp flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 cup butter
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 4 bananas
- 2 eggs
- raisins
- salt


Instructions:

- Mix butter, sugar and egg
- Beat egg gradually into the mixture
- Mash the banana and add it into the mixing bowl after the eggs
- Add raisins
- Fold the remaining flour and salt into the mixture
- Bake for approximately 50-65 min depending on your oven (I set mine at 180 degrees 60 min)


I shared the banana bread with my friends and they prefer this to the cornflakes bake so I actually got more bananas from the supermarket to bake them for the gathering last night. However, due to time constraint I bake the cornflakes snack again.




I am now thinking of what to do with the bunch of bananas in my kitchen (I don't like to eat banana as a fruit itself) now when I barely have the time to even prepare a proper dinner.

Til then...

Beijing - Day 4 & 5

The Great Wall of China is our final destination carefully planned so that our stamina do not get exhausted prematurely. Getting there was tricky as it is out of the city area and I do not like the idea of renting a taxi for the whole day despite the cheap pricing but then to have them drive us to aimless tourists traps. So with me nagivating, we found ourselves staring at the magnificent structure 1.5 hours into the journey.

After the complete body workout, we decided to return to the hotel to have a shower before proceeding for dinner but since our tummy were by then protesting, we went to Oriental Shopping Centre, 5 minutes from the hotel, for a quick snack when we saw Food Republic food court at basement of the shopping complex.

Cashless system.




The vegetarian food was a terrible experience. Everything tasted like rubber which was a huge disappointment when my mum's hotplate chicken and my sis's chilli squid seem so tentalising.

The Liang Pi (which turns out thick and gluey).




Vegetarian Dan Dan Noodle.




A follow up with a more than pleasant dinner an hour or so later, at a restaurant opposite the popular Silk Street Market, made up for the earlier disaster. The place is well hidden along a small street with almost a full house consisting mainly of the locals.

BBQ skewers marinated with plenty of herbs.




A simple garlic broccoli stir fry.




Gong bao chicken dice.

My sis enjoyed this so much she almost finished it all by herself!




My mum's favourite.

We ordered a whole fish cooked in Beijing style. This is very identical to the clear tom yam soup but even spicier flavoured with lots of diced small chilli in the soup base. I like how the fresh fish meat complements the slightly sourish base that almost numbed my tongue with its explosive flavours.




Lastly, fresh prawns with ginko nuts.




5 dishes between the 3 of us...very sinful...but also a nice sum up to our final night in Beijing :)

Day 5 was spent shopping in Oriental Plaza again and a western lunch at Sizzler before heading to the airport.

During this trip, we stayed at Park Plaza Wanfujing Beijing which is right smacked in the city centre, directly behind The Regent - 5 minutes walk to the Oriental Plaza, a little longer to the nearest tube (but trust me the taxis there are so cheap that there is little reason to take the tube at all), 15 min to Wanfujing.

The hotel lobby.




The room (bed was not made as yet when we arrived at the hotel at 9 in the morning).




Next up will be my London trip (and possibly continuing with Hong Kong, Phuket, Rome and Paris) before the hopefully successful resurrection of my camera in 4 weeks time.

Beijing - Day 3

I enjoy the freedom of being able to plan my own itinerary so the trip was a free and easy one with me being the 'tour guide' to my mum and sis. Provided time permits, I will say planning for a trip and then anticipating it is just as enjoyable as going on the trip itself :)

We spent the morning at Yi He Yuan with the infamous marble boat and 17 arch bridge...




And the afternoon @ Temple of Heaven...

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Thereafter it's food street and more food streets!






Waiting for the teriyaki squid...nicely marinated 30cm skewer for 2 sgd...




One of the few official Olympics store in the city area.




Another similar food street...

Bing Tang Hu Lu that we always see on tv. (Notice the sign on the right? Loosely translated as fermented 'smelly' toufu that smells through ten thousand years...I kid you not but the smell was so strong it was as if someone puked on me!)






My favourite Liang Pi again.




And the many types of BBQ skewers all 2 sgd or less.






The exotic cocoons and scorpions...I never fail to get goosebumps all over whenever I see these photos again and the thing is I suspect they are 'for show' only cos seriously I've never see anyone else ordering them!






Day 4 and 5 coming soon...

Cornflakes Bake

Sudden midnight craving for something sweet...

I remember seeing my sister baking these cornflakes bake back home but since I do not have any weighing scale, the baking is done soley on estimation as per my usual cooking style because one thing for sure, taste differ from person to person and as such, I usually go with my 'guts' feeling as to how much per ingredient to add.




It took me all but 15 minutes and all that I need are cornflakes, honey and butter :)

Beijing - Day 2

We had lunch at a restaurant that specialises in Guo Qiao Mi Xian, loosely translated as crossing the bridge noodle.

They serve a large variety of noodles and most people order the set which comes with piping hot noodles and raw meat served separately so you get to add the ingredients to the noodle yourself.

Mine was a mixed seafood mi xian which comes with a good mixture of seafood in a subtly sweet broth and of course, the cold dishes that my mum and sis ordered.




Tianenmen Square and Forbidden City






All of us were starving by 4.30pm and thus an early dinner. We headed back to Wang Fu Jing and found ourselves in a restaurant that serves individual style steamboat. An interesting feature is that from my observation, the chinese enjoys dipping basically everything in the sesame sauce provided and even ask for refills a couple of times.

However, my mum being a chilli addict was quite disappointed that they do not serve any chilli sauce although I do find that the sesame sauce very appetitising especially when dipped with vegetables.






Good food can be found almost everywhere in Beijing really...and most importantly they do not hurt the pocket a single bit!