Drunken Fried Beehoon

Sunday and creativity can do wonders. I was feeling productive when i woke up at 9am today so i decided to take a look at my kitchen cabinet. I rarely cook at home and usually eat out just because it is more convenient and therefore, I have an almost empty kitchen cabinet. But then, I saw a packet of beehoon (rice vermicelli) and I thought, okay I should make fried beehoon. I opened up my fridge and Its empty, no veggie at all. All I had was half can of spam, a tau kee (fried dried beancurd), and a quarter of soybean paste chili. Luckily, I remembered the time when I went to one of the fried beehoon store at redhill market and saw the way the uncle cook. The key is: BROTH. So, I quickly opened up my kitchen cabinet and there I found.. the miracle broth: Drunken Chicken Hotpot Broth. So, putting all these ingredients together, I made fried beehoon. Here is the details:

Ingredients - portion for 2:

1/2 packet of rice vermicelli
1/2  packet of drunken chicken broth, mixed with 500mL of hot water.
2 spoons of soybean paste chili
spam (as much or as little as you want), chopped
taukee (again, as little or as much as you want), chopped.
5 cloves of garlic, chopped.
oil for frying and stir frying
~ 3 tablespoon of soysauce
~ 2 tablespoon of pepper for seasoning (adjust to liking).

To make:
1. Soak the beehoon in a hot water to soften the beehoon. It will take roughly 5-10minutes. It gets soft pretty quickly. Drain, put in a bowl, sprinkle a tiny bit of oil so it won't stick to each other.

2. Heat up oil, stir in spam and taukee (at this point, you can put pretty much anything that you would want to fry). Cook until golden and set aside.

3. Heat up oil in a wok, stir in garlics and soybean paste. Cook until fragrant then dump in all the beehoon. Stir until the colours are even. Slowly, pour a little bit of the broth and cook until the water all drains out and then put in more broth, around 1/2 cup at a time. Put the wok lid and wait for about 3-4 minutes until the water drains out and the beehoon is soaked with the "miracle broth".  Turn off the fire and top with spam and taukee (or any other thing that you want to add in).

4. Serve while its hot.

A hidden gem: Sushi Bar

Who am I kidding, I'm a major shopaholic and a glutton. My perfect choice of meals on a saturday when I just want to kick all the shops at the Orchard rd is a quick and fulfilling meal that can fuel my shopping for the whole day. For that, I came to a sushi bar located at Far East Plaza.

My good friend introduced this place to me. The place is pretty hidden, we got lost 2x before we actually found it. It is located at a corner of level 3, the exact location is #03-87. The place itself is very small, there are only 6 tables of 4. I ordered 3 things on this visit: aburi salmon with soft shell crab (heavenly), fried small fish a.k.a shishamo (again, really good!), and chawan mushi. None of these dishes fails. I believe this place need a little more advertising so here I am writing to promote this place!

Sushi Bar

Far East Plaza #03-87

No reservation required. 

A secret bar: The Library

At the heart of chinatown, there lies a stretch of hipster bars (seriously cool bars!). The one that I have recently visited was a bar called THE LIBRARY. If you passed the keong saik road, you might wont realize that the bar even existed. I went there once but then I missed the place the second time. Luckily, I memorized their address. The front of the bar is just a bookshelf and to enter you need a password. The password changes every week and you need to enquire before you get it. Pretty unique, huh?!

Enough of that. I went there on Saturday at 7PM (yes, I know its early for a drink but I was trying to avoid the crowd). When I went in, the bar was pretty empty and I was just loving it. The place smells really good too. Now, I need to make a note to ask them what candles they are using the next time I visit. Just FYI, the bar usually get really packed by 9PM, so come before then with a password in hand!

It was just the two of us and we came with a mission to try this duckie drink (It turns out to be called duck-ah-dub-dub - correct me if i'm wrong). Also beware, this drink is meant to be share by 4 people as it is HUGE and quite potent. I also ordered chili fries and Iberico Ham with cheese toastie. To my surprise, they are REALLY GOOD! I made it a point to bring more friends to this place just for this.
The rest of their menu seems really good too, the table next to us ordered Lobster sandwich and it looked pretty good to me. The place really offered a unique cocktail experience (they also have mocktail,FYI) but we didnt get to try the rest of the drink menu. Overall, unique experience that I would probably be babbling about for the next 2 weeks or so.

Iberico Ham and Cheese Toastie

The infamous duckie-ah-dub-dub!

Cheers to the night!

 Address;
47 keong saik road
Chinatown. 089151

For pw, called earlier at: (+65) 6221 8338

Makassar: a food heaven

I finally feel that as a food blogger I should start promoting the food from the place where I grew up. As much as I love eat and travel and have tried many hatted restaurants,I guess nothing can beat the taste of hometown food. So, i am dedicating this blogpost in an effort to promote my very own hometown.

it is known to many Indonesians that Makasssar (used to be known as  Ujung Pandang) is a food heaven. Long ago, when my cousin visited us from Jakarta, he said Makassar could make him gain 10pounds in a week. Why? I'm telling u we have the Best of the Best cuisine.

The food in Makassar varies based on the time of the day.  It is also largely influenced by a mix of Chinese and Indonesian roots. Here is some of the food that you have to try when you visit:

1. Pangsit mie (wonton mee)
This food can only be found from breakfast till afternoon (usually 2-3pm). There are a lot of stores that sells this. My favorite is the one at Jalan sangir called pangsit mie palu.  Ask your guide to bring you there. The most famous one is angpinglao which in my opinion is overpriced.  Not as good as they used to be.

2. Gobar from ratu gurih
My bf favorite food in makassar. He go about promoting this dish to everyone here in sg.  Gobar is a fish dish made by frying and grilling hence the name gobar (goreng bakar ) . Again ask your guide about this place they should know.

3. Mie kwantong
Again this dish is very chinese inspired. In Singapore it is almost like horfun or ee mie.  But i still like the one back in Makassar. It is much tastier.  My family favorite is kios lombok located at jalan lombok.  While there also try the red fried rice and fried soya sauce boneless chicken (beware: it is life changing)

4. Ayam goreng sulawesi
Now this chicken dish is just everyone's favorite. I have the fondest childhood memory of this dish. My dad used to bring us eat there after we went for afternoon exercise. It is delish!! There are several store and they taste relatively similar. It is a musttt try. I don't know how to emphasize this enough.

5. Coto Makassar
I have to warn people first that this dish is an acquired taste and you have to be very open minded to eat them. The soup consisted of internal organs. From brain to intestine. This might sounds gross but mt favorite is the brain and the intestine. Lol. This is definitely a local favorite and a legacy Makassar should keep on passing to the next generations. Family favorite is coto nusantara at jalan nusantara.

Mie Kwantong - Kios Lombok

Fried Soya Sauce Boneless  Chieken - Kios Lombok

Red Fried Rice - RM. Ujung Pandang

Gobar Fish - RM Ratu Gurih

Ayam Goreng Sulawesi (Sulawesi Fried Chicken)