Still CNY

Finally went for some sort of CNY celebratory meal at the Bugis Street Brasserie at Gloucester Road, one of the few Singaporean/Malaysian restaurants in London. Was secretly hoping they had yu sheng on their CNY menu, but discovered then that all the dishes were chinese but not distinctively Singaporean. Oh wells, but it turns out that I enjoyed every dish! 22.50pds per person was on the high side, but you do get alot of food of sizable portions. Was definitely stuffed even before dessert.

 Seafood & hot and sour soup.

 Complimentary tiger beer. It wasn't as bad as I remembered it to be, perhaps my tolerance to the taste of alcohol has increased by now. It was the first alcoholic drink I've ever tasted and I thought it was really bad at that time.

 The claypot braised beef was really tender and yummy. :)

 I really really like the black moss/mushroom/pak choi dish!

Glutinous rice ball in red bean soup dessert.
Am going back again tomorrow! 0.0 This time its a free buffet. :) Please let there be yusheng!

Also, chinese new year themed nail art which will only last till tuesday cause of hospital attachment. :X toothpicked the drawings in case anyone is wondering. Relatively fast to do actually!

Cheers!

Vday Totoro bento - キャラクター弁当!

Happy valentines' day!

 The 14th of february is here once again.  And this time I decided to make a charaben 'kyaraben' キャラ弁 (character bento) for the first time ever since I started obsessing about them 3 years ago (essentially looking at bento sites and buying cute boxes). Made Totoro bento (which is a highly popular character) based off designs from google images as he is associated with it in many ways.

totoro character bento

This took wayyy more time than it looks cause I had to figure out how to make it based on whatever's in the fridge! Its kinda like doing art and craft which is fun except I had to keep in mind everything is to be eaten and had to be clean (so much washing!). Also, taste is an additional factor, along with a balance of ingredients e.g. how much rice is needed. It takes more planning then expected. Had to improvise by colouring rice with mashed up boiled curly kale (with a fork!). Never knew colouring rice with natural foods can be so much fun lol. Didn't have fishcake which is commonly used for the eyes so i cut cheese with a scissors! *_* All the nori (seaweed) pieces are hand cut too as I don't have fancy bento cutters!

The tomato heart is the only hint to the bento's purpose. Would ideally have made it more vday-ish but for a first attempt, I'm satisfied! Wouldn't do this on a daily basis for future kids though, kyarabens take too much effort. :P

ととろ after microwaving for 6mins and stabbed with a spoon for eating by hungry soul returned from school.

Anyway, first options class tomorrow plus workshop, perhaps a meal out later?

x Van

Happy Chinese New Year!

Its been a week since I updated, and I think its cause I've been too busy slacking and chilling from everything, including most of the online world. But its 除夕夜 so here's some time off to record the week. 

A week ago, on Saturday we took a ride on the Eurostar across the English channel, pass France into Belgium. Its kinda like a random destination, but since tickets were cheap (on sale for 30pds pp!) and I wanted to get somewhere after being stuck indoor revising the last few weeks, AND I've promised to visit Karlien sometime, there we went. Booked a place at Hotel van Belle in Brussels for 2 nights, which turned out to be a pretty decent basic hotel that I'm glad we picked as its worth the price and the location is not too far off from the train station. (I keep seeing the word "van" everywhere and it turns out it means "of"!). 

Arrived there at night and after walking around the main tourist area namely the Grand Place and its surrounding streets, St Hubert gallery, had dinner at an Italian restaurant (one of the rare few without touts) on Rue de Bouchers.

Grand Place

One of the many Belgium food specialty shops littered around the area.

Window shopping in Gallery St. Hubert

Tintin! and chocolates!

Italian waiter counting the bills.

Anyway, more on the 2nd and 3rd day on a second post.

After I came back, mostly been playing the 3DS spending my time in virtual cartoonized shibuya fighting "noise" in a shinigami game to help the characters survive and regain their life. I quite like this game so far cause it appeals to my interest in Japan (Shibuya fashion and jpop/rock background music, plus I dig the art style.) I'm completing the chapter with Shiki soon, there are 2 more left. Might pace this out more cause the game mechanics rewards players for a more regular progressive play (shutdown time lapse needed for certain exp gain etc).

The world ends with you

As for CNY festivities, well I did go to Chinatown to shop for ingredients for hotpot at Liz's place. There were tons of Chinese shopping for CNY stuff last time and also some western curious onlookers. Also paid a visit to the salon to which had awesome complimentary neck massage and good service (cute welcome message and tea+biscuits/sweets!). Its a Japanese hair salon in Covent Garden called Hayato London! Haircut was average but I think I might be abit harsh.

xxx 新年快乐!