Brunch: Jones the grocer

Some time ago, had brunch with Superfriends (minus AK) at jones the grocer at Mandarin gallery. Initially was deciding between jones, Antoinette or Wild Honey. But eventually because of the queue, we decided on jones. 

Not a very good move. The selection was not very great. Not a very interesting menu. The food don't look tempting especially when I had seen a breakfast menu much MORE interesting than this on xmas. Tsk Tsk..

We have unwillingly gave this place a try since we had already seated inside. Yap basically had to ate the things he ate in US considering that he had just came back.

The interior is quite homely.

The thing i don't understand is that they displayed their products to near to the customers, don't they afraid of "missing" items at the end of the day?

 My Mint hot chocolate. Very minty. Not bad. 

Rong's ice coffee with ice cream

Flavored sparkling soda for the guys. 

Very unique bottle for the sparking soda. Wondering if the patrons can keep it.. hmm.. We can't find the recommendations that AK recommended us to try. So we tried other things instead.

English breakfast with sunny side up. Yap had similar set as well.

My english breakfast with poached eggs. Aren't all poach eggs supposed to have some sauce on top of it?! And seriously, the eggs look so.... unappetizing. :( The things are so tough - toast bread and sausage. Disappointing.

Alvin's beef burger with chips. According to Alvin, the beef wasn't very nice. meh. 

Lynn's sandwich with avocado and bacon.

Overall, food are quite disappointing. Don't think I will visit them again. Bear in mind that the price is the higher side compared to hotel room service.
Keen to try out Wild Honey and Antoinette.

Address
333a Orchard Road
Level 4 #21-23 Mandarin Gallery
Singapore, 238897

New Phone for the New Year

Happy Chinese New Year!!

For this new year, I've gotten myself a new phone! Yay. Yippee.

Its the Galaxy Note.

Wheet! I eventually gotten Note instead of iPhone 4S mainly because of it's size and also to try something new since there are many good reviews on the phone. The size doesn't pose a problem to me. In fact, I like it big because I could view a wider screen to surf net, play games, whatsapp etc. Also, I don't put my phone in my pocket, so this is no issue to me at all.

So far so good with my phone. I find it of reasonable speed and not slow at all compared to iOS 5 on a 3GS. Much much much better.

Fiddling and still exploring the phone. The games selection is not as wide as iPhone's but still reasonably ok. Tried watching video on the phone and its great! Big screen! And transferring file over is a breeze!

The minus point could be that you can't really write a sms/message single-handed due to it's size. Well, unless you have longgggg fingers. Yea, longer than mine, that is.

I'm waiting for the screen protector to arrive from Gmarket. Hope nicer casing for Galaxy note will be out soon. The current ones are so ugly!

Senseless post. Gingerbreadman on the run

-Gone-

KissMe heroine eyeliner

Finally managed to lay my hands on this after many failed attempts at several watsons shops.

Tried using it yesterday from 5pm to midnight and it was not too bad. No smudges. Definitely can replace the majolica eyeliner that I am currently using.

The color is dark and the brush is fine. Works well. Just that when I applied onto my lids there is a slight discomfort. Not sure it's due to the eyeliner. But the discomfort soon goes away.

From what I understand that this eyeliner is selling like hotcakes. So, grab it when you first see it. Don't wait already!

Banana Hazelnut Cake

Decided to bake banana cake from a recipe I saw in a bakery book, you know, to try out the different banana cakes recipe and see if it turns out the same. Turns out that this cake is more "fluffy" and dry (more towards the cake texture) than the previous recipe I tried (Ok, I think that blog entry got deleted when I decided to start blogging afresh)

In my opinion, this version is much better. And of course, because I added hazelnut inside, there is a crunch to it. But my mum complaints that it has caused difficulty in biting (honestly, me too as my half erupt wisdom tooth is painful again). 

And, I have found a better place to take photo of all my baked goods - the balcony! There is sufficient lighting  without having to go through the trouble of photoshop. OK, the truth is I have yet to install photoshop in my PC. Lazy to switch on my mac. 

Recipe below. In my opinion, you can omit using the banana to decorate the top of the cake. 

120g butter

275g all purpose flour

150g sugar

2 eggs

Pinch of salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

zest of a lemon

2 ripe bananas (additional 1 more if you want to decorate the top of cake)

100g chopped nuts

2 tsp baking powder

1-2 tsp honey

1. Cut butter into small pieces and together with sugar, beat with an electric beater till light and fluffy. Gradually add in eggs, salt, cinnamon and lemon zest.

2. Roughly mash 2 bananas and mix into the batter. Stir in nuts, sifted flour and baking powder. Mix.

3. Put the mixture into moulds. 

4. Bake in the oven for 40 minutes 170 degrees. 

5. If using banana as deco, slice the banana and place on top of cake during 20th - 30th minutes and drizzle with honey.

Look back on 2011

2011 is going to end soon in few hours time and as usual it is time to reflect on what we have done for the year.

To me, 2011 is a year where I spend a awfully alot amounts of money. Bad.. Its to a stage where I began to wonder if its worthwhile to spend so much in the first place.

2011 is also the year where I go heavier T.T Sad. Sign of eating too much and not moving as much.

On a happier note, I have participated in my first 10km nike run. (Speaking of which, I still haven't received my souvenirs and voucher..).  This month, more people appreciate my bake wares and I established my own business. LOL. If you counted it as business. Friends and colleagues ordered cookies from me. Learning on managing the expenses and keep track on the accounts and orders.

2011 is also a year where Alvin and I understand each other more and saving towards our future. Yay.

2012 will be the year I will be looking forward to.

*edit*

1. Graduation! Finishing my studies soon! Finally.  
2. Expand bakery?
3. Learn driving
4. Be a wonderful GF
5. Be a wonderful friend
6. Lose weight
7. Find my direction

Wishing you all a wonderful 2012 ahead!

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookie

It's Christmas time! What's better than to bake some cookies for colleagues and friends. Other than sharing my baked goods with people, it is good to give them away as "Christmas gifts" when you don't know what to get for them for Christmas. No headaches to what to get!

Usually baking cookies is quite a chore. Especially cookies that contains butter as it makes washing very troublesome.

My colleagues had good raves for the cookies. 1 even enquire if he can order with me. Wah. Milestone. Someone ACTUALLY want to order my cookies.

So happy.

Anyone want order? Shall be going to buy my ingredients tomorrow.

Recipe adapted here

115g butter
115g light brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla essence/extract
150g self-raising flour
75g rolled oats
100g chocolate chips
100g white chocolate chunks, optional
directions :
1. cream butter & sugar in a bowl until pale and fluffy. add in egg and vanilla essence/extract.
2. sift flour over the mixture and fold in lightly with a metal spoon. then add oats, choc chips and white chocolate and stir well to combine.
3. drop heaped spoonfuls of mixture onto non-stick baking sheet, leaving space for spreading.
4. bake in a preheated oven of 170 deg c for 15-20 mins until golden brown.
5. leave on to cool 2-3 mins before removing from baking sheet and let cool completely before storing in air-tight container.

The cookies doesn't really expand much during baking, so the size of the dough dropped onto the baking sheet will pretty much be the resulted size.