Old Tiong Bahru Bah Kut Teh

After exhausting all places to eat on a particularly busy weekend lunchtime, our Singapore relatives finally got down to taking us here instead, in Old Tiong Bahru Bah Kut Teh

Location: Within the Tiong Bahru streets, in Chinatown district

Setting: Typical Chinese restaurant, with real China girls as workers there
Atmosphere: 8/10 (very hustle-bustle, good patronage, even though it's already late into lunch hour and people still go for here)
Design: 6.5/10 (standard design, could use a bit more wider space)

Random shot of their wet wipes

We're eating for four, so the bulk of the food here includes:

Cha koi (oily breadsticks)

Broiled tofu skins

Broiled tofu strips

Pickled veggies

...and pig trotters

We ordered two kinds of bah kut teh, one with the innards (spare parts) and one with just the meat. Both of them are pretty similar, the only difference is that this is the first time we've seen bah kut teh served in white soup, because most of the time, the bah kut teh we ate were dark and black in colour due to the herbs, but looks like they cut out the herbs part


A pretty delicious place, and I would rate it an overall 7/10 for this, but it might just be a little dear to the wallet because when our relatives paid for it, they got very little change back, so yeah, even eating in regular kopitiam would cost you an arm and a limb in Singapore... -_-;;

Palm Beach Seafood Restaurant

Went out on another dinner date with my hubby's relative, and they took us down to Marina Bay to have a taste of seafood at Palm Beach Seafood Restaurant.

Location: Within One Fullerton, Marina Bay, where the Singapore merlion statue is

Setting: Typical seafood restaurant setting, with outdoor dining for those who wants to enjoy the scenery and have a more lively dining atmosphere with boozing involved (unfortunately doesn't apply for me, not now anyways T_T)
Atmosphere: 9/10 (very busy and almost full-house, meaning extra good patronage, and apparently you need to book prolly days in advance before you can actually get a decent seating, because believe me when I say that if you go there on a whim at the last minute, you'll be waiting forever, like the few tourists I saw coming in on the spot and ended up having their little girl crying out of heat and frustration due to the long wait, so you can't really fault the slow service coz they're really super-packed)
Design: 8.5/10 (simple and clean design, very clear cut and very spacious, and easy to look at)

Random shot of my cutlery, which includes a washing bowl for those who ate with their hands (best way to eat crabs and prawns, but sadly no crabs for me)

Drinks: Orange juice (mine) and Earl Grey tea (my hubby)
Presentation: 6.5/10 for mine and 7/10 for my hubby (standard issue kind of serving, though my hubby's drink does have a bit of elegance to it)
Taste: 6.5/10 for mine (needs a bit more sugar, but then again this is prolly actual freshly squeezed orange, so shouldn't be too much of a big deal)

Appetizers: Singapore acar and fried dried ikan bilis
Presentation: 5.5/10 (standard issue)
Taste: 5.5/10 for the ikan bilis (dunno about the acar, since I'm not really a big fan of acar, but it does look good, just dunno how it tastes like. The ikan bilis could use a little less salt)

Food: Broiled broccoli and mushroom, prawn otak-otak, beef and chicken sate, steamed fish and fried butter prawn
Presentation: 8.5/10 overall (very impressive presentation, with a feel that you just wanna sink your teeth in and munch the shit outta it, though the most impressive would be the fish, since it's served in such huge portion, especially when it's accompanied with meehoon and tomatoes and others)
Taste: 8.5/10 overall (the vegs are nice and fresh, especially the broccoli with its rich crunch to it, and the sate is nice and chewy, but not too dry and still juicy. The fish is still the winner though; it has that nice hot and sour taste to it. Mm-mm~!)

It's a really nice place to be with the great scenery, but the main in-house dish this restaurant is technically famed for was crabs, lovely succulent crabs that can be cooked either black pepper or white pepper or whatever, as I could see from other customers eating, and the best part is they can have booze out in the open, eating just like that and enjoy life, giving the whole new meaning to 'wine and dine'. Possible reprisal might make it, and totally am gonna take advantage of that after Jr is born.

Starbot Cafe

Taking a break and catch a snack after a looooooooong day of walking around in Universal Studio, and the first place stopped into was Starbot Cafe

Location: Sci-Fi City, Universal Studios, next to the Transfomers: The Ride arena

Setting: An interesting futuristic eatery kind of food court, like those you see in sci-fi movies, reminding me most of the food court in Alien, Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek (the newest one) and some other movie I can't really recall but also has such similar settings
Atmosphere: 7.5/10 (nice atmosphere and air, really like being in a real sci-fi food court, and patronage is good, but then again, this is Universal Studio we're talking here)
Design: 6.5/10 (while the atmosphere is good, the design was a-OK, I suppose. It does give a feel to a sci-fi food court, but the design itself is not really, more like a high-school cafeteria, actually)

Food: Chicken chops and potato wedges (my hubby) and soba and chicken nuggets with fries (mine)
Presentation: 6.5/10 for both (still looks more like a fast-food grab-and-go kind of presentation rather than an actual sci-fi-ish kind of presentation. Could work a little more on that)
Taste: 7.5/10 (for the fried stuff) and 5.5/10 (for the soba) (the soba could use a little work, since this is fast food style though, I prolly shouldn't expect much of it to taste like actual Japanese restaurant soba, but the fried stuff is actually quite delicious and crispy, and even when I asked for doggy bag to bring the fried stuff and brought it back to the hotel to eat, it still retains its crispiness and yummy taste despite being slightly cooled)

Recommendable place to grab a bite (though technically this is the only place in Sci-Fi City you could get a bite) but prolly not for a full-course meal, more like if you're getting the munchies

Toast Box, Food Republic

We were on our way to the long-awaited trip to Universal Studios, but first we had to have breakfast of champions, so we went to have it at Toast Box in Food Republic (their fancy name for a food court)

Location: At the Level 3 of Vivo City, towards where the Boardwalk and monorail that leads to Sentosa Island is

Setting: Typical food court style, though it has a very wooden theme to it, and despite being told that I'm not allowed to take pictures (claimed by one of the workers even though I don't see a signboard to back her up), I went 'Fuck it' and took it anyways
Atmosphere: 6.5/10 (high-patronage, since it's daytime rush hour and near Sentosa Island where everyone is going and need to grab a nice bite, though the workers there definitely needs a little boost in service since she actually showed a bit of impatience when we couldn't understand her thick Chinese accent)
Design: 7/10 (nice and simple, like a typical coffee shop counter service, nothing much to comment, though the jam shelf looks quite interesting)

Food: Mee siam with fresh barley drink set (mine) and peanut butter toast (my hubby)
Presentation: 6.5/10 (mine) and 7.5/10 (my hubby) (simple and clean, served in its yummy simplicity)
Taste: Same as above (my mee siam tastes a little sour-ish and thick, not sure if that is supposed to be how mee siam taste like, but there is something missing that I can't pinpoint; the peanut butter toast is nice and sweet, and it's quite crunchy to the taste, the toast crisped just right)

Nice place to grab a bite and all, and next time we get here, maybe we could try other places else in the food court, so a reprisal is possible

Gourmet Carousel

My hubby's Singaporean relative invited us for a buffet dinner, so after a rather bumpy taxi ride, we made our way to Gourmet Carousel.

Location: Within Royal Plaza, down in Orchard Road, next to DFS boutique mall and across the Hyatt Hotel

Setting: A typical hotel restaurant, though not really sure if this hotel is 5-star or above
Atmosphere: 9/10 (amazing patronage, and has a very welcoming feel to it, a place where you don't mind to just hang around for as long as you like)
Design: 8.5/10 (awesome design, everything in its place and the cutlery itself was just amazing and interesting)

Since this is a buffet, I'll just list down what they have in that is in store for us:

Sushi dishes

Seafood cold dishes

Cold cuts and salads

Appetizer cheese

More seafood cold dishes (with raw oysters~! My fav~! But I couldn't eat it coz I'm pregnant, dammit~!)

Main courses, including Chinese, Western, Indian and grilled and barbequed poultry and pasta of all makes, as well as a variety of soups

Dessert section, with bread and butter pudding, chocolate lava pudding, chocolate fountain (YUM!!), ice cream, etc...

Random shot of the interesting cutlery

The food is absolutely delicious, with a wide variety of items (much, much more than what most hotels in Brunei are prolly able to offer) and the atmosphere is so lively, it compliments the dishes really well.

Overall, I would give it a 9/10 and a definite must-go eatery destination