Chilli's @ Jcube

Dining with my best friend today. I really like Mexican food a lot and Chilli's is one of the best.

Pictures are low quality because I forgot to charge my camera!

 



Old Timer with Cheez - $19

The burger looks small here but it is pretty big. About 1.5 times the cheeseburger of Mcdonalds. The beef patty is thick but pretty bland. However, it tasted just right with the cheese, mustard with more tomato sauce in it. Meat lovers gonna love the thick patty.

Fries are super long and soft on the inside.




Fajita Trio - $35 Grilled chicken, prawns and beef. Comes with a plate of dips and tortillas.

I get pretty confused with all the terms like tortillas, wrap and fajitas and more but a little research helped: Fajitas are made with grilled meat and veggies usually bell peppers and onions wrapped in a corn tortilla or flour tortilla.

Chicken slices are tender, prawns are springy but the beef is a little hard to chew. Bell pepper and onion on the bottom with a slice of lime at the side.





We got four pieces of mini tortilla.






Here are the dips and ingredients to go with. Shredded cheese, mexican crema, guacamole sauce, salsa sauce and lettuce. Guacamole sauce is creamy with avocado. My favorite combination of adding everything in it with all the meat and wrapped in the tortilla. Yum.




Pat. Pomegranate Margarita - $19

There was a promotion going on so 2 cups for the price of one. This is really fruity taste. The pomegranate juice is not that strong, taste a little like grape actually. The alcohol is thankfully not that strong as well like those of breezers.

Just Acia @ Dhoby Ghaut Exchange

Dining at Just Acia with friends today.

Set meal - Basically you get to choose a main dish and then have an option to add $5.90 for free flow drinks and ice cream. 

Aglio Teriyaki Chicken Spaghetti - $9.20

This is a pretty weird combination. The aglio olio is buttery and salted while the teriyaki chicken with sauce is sweet. Personally I don't think they go well together so I ate them separately. I think the chef added way too much garlic. After eating all the spaghetti, there is still half a tablespoon of garlic on the side. Pretty decent aglio olio but not the best I've tasted.

Teriyaki chicken was a little overcooked.

Chawanmushi - additional $1.20 (with any set meal)

The egg was really smooth. There is nothing much in here, only the slice of fish cake on top as you can see with another cube of chicken to be found in the egg. However, for $1.20, there is nothing to complain about as the price is really low to begin with.

Free flow soft serve ice cream (from dispenser)

Tasted like Mcdonald's vanilla ice cream.

Free flow ice cream (scoop it yourself) - Jackfruit, Taro, Lime Shermet, Blueberry vanilla (Clockwise, starting from the left)

The jackfruit and blueberry vanilla were a little sweet. I really like the Taro flavour - yam fragrance when it melts. Lime sorbet was very refreshing and not too sour. There are more flavours there but I didn't try it all.


All in all, I think Just Acia offers a wide variety of meal such as Western, Japanese, Korean, Thai and weird fusion to choose from. There are a lot of seats available so it is pretty good when you are meeting up with a large group of friends.

Saizeriya @ The Cathay

It had been 4 years since I last visited Saizeriya. Getting older. Compared to my visit 4 years ago, the portion seemed to shrink a significant bit.

Mushroom soup - $2.90

Really thick and rich mushroom soup with lots of mushroom bits in it. Thankfully the portion is just right so it does not get too cloying. I would love it if they serve this with a small piece of garlic bread.

Free flow drink bar - $2.80

I tried some latte, Schweppes and ice milo. Definite nono for instant coffee. Get the soft drinks instead.

4 "Wings" - $3.95

Somehow the spacing made the portion looks pathetic. Juicy and oily at the same time. The skin was a little crispy. Come to think about it, $1 for a joint of a wing is very expensive. I felt cheated.

Pepper Chicken Steak - $6.90

My main dish. Portion was tiny. Comes with a chicken chop, some corn and three potato wedges. I believe the dipping sauce is brown sauce mixed with vinegar. (I hope my taste buds were right) Chicken is juicy. The dipping sauce was a saver as it made the dish tasted better if not, a little bland. A side note: I really don't like corn.

Oven Grilled Escargots - $5.90

Escargots were a little oily and buttery. The texture is in between a scallop and cockle. It was pretty nice and I finished it in 30 seconds. 

I always find that Saizeriya is a value for money place to dine in but now it seems like it is not the case anymore. However, I really like that they now have a bell on the table to page the staff when we are ready to order so we do not have to wave like idiots to get their attention. 

Decent food (pathetic portion), clean environment and I love the drink bar.

Nook DIY Pancake House @ Bukit Timah

Location: Bukit Timah, 21 Lorong Kilat,#01-03 S’pore 598123
Opening Hours : 
Monday – Friday, 12pm – 10pm
Saturday, 10am – 10pm
Sunday, 10am – 10pm
Phone : 6466 1811

Last week my friends and I went to the Nook's Pancake House for dinner. The place is a little hard to find because it was late at night (so it was really dark) plus it was located at some hidden corner of the street. Nook's pancake serves pancakes and other dishes like soups, salads and all day breakfast set.

Creamy mushroom soup - $8.90

This does not taste like campbell mushroom soup at all. It ihas a thicker consistency with mushroom bits in it. I don't know why this reminds me so much of thick coconutty curry chicken gravy. The first few mouthful was really great but it gets a little cloying towards the end.

Please do click to enlarge. Check out Nook's pancake menu on http://nook.sg/ I don't know why they don't put the prices on the website. I always quote prices of the food I ate on my website because I prefer the certainty of knowing the pricing and knowing what to expect so I thought other people might feel the same.

Some free flow chocolate and maple syrup for our pancakes!

Nook ran out of nutella so the leftover spread was actually on the house. We choose cheddar cheese and oreo chunks for our toppings and gourmet chicken sausages and hashbrown as savoury fixings.

Original and red velvet pancake mixture. These bottles remind me of the glass deco art I used to do in school. Strangely, I miss the idea of wearing a uniform and spending time in school doing nothing in particular with my friends.

The following are some ugly pancakes I did:

Ugly pancake #1 with chocolate syrup.

Normal pancake with cheese sandwiched in it and some leftover syrup on the plate.

I tried to make some mohawk evil creature.

As expected it looked ugly but it taste so good with maple syrup.

Random crazy swirly bear.

Pancakes are just pancakes to me. Soft and fluffy and they don't go wrong most of the time.

More pancakes.

This is Patrick's back view decorated with some leftover parsley.

Breakfast bully - $18

The set consists of garden salad, ham, sausages, bacon, bread, mushrooms, baked beans and eggs. I may be wrong but I think these are chipotle sausages. I love the mushrooms and garden salad the most. Big portion breakfast.


To sum everything up I think Nook's pancake house has a good concept.

Pancakes are cheap and easy to make with instant food available almost in every mart or supermarket. It is the idea of making of "do it yourself" pancakes they are selling. 10 bucks for a bottle of pancake mix is a little expensive for me but it I think they probably can justify it with the rent and decorations. The other dishes on the menu are pretty good as well and in my opinion more value for money.

Nonetheless, I still enjoyed myself decorating and eating my own pancakes. It is a good place for parents to bring kids to and have a good time. While eating there, the family with young kids were so excited.

KFC - Japan

You might be wondering why did we visit Japan to eat KFC when there are loads of KFC in Singapore. That's because KFC Japan's serve some really interesting flavors that can't be found in other countries.

It is kinda of like Japanized western food which I find amusing. The KFC outlet we visited was in Mitaka, Tokyo which is close to the Mitaka station. (after we visited the Ghibli museum)

Set meal 590yen. (approx. $8.40) Comes with one chicken (marinated with vegetables, fruits and pepper), one riceball, one coleslaw and one cup of oolong tea. There are other drinks like coke though but I like iced tea.

It is really thoughtful that they included wet tissue to wipe our oily fingers. The cup of oolong tea is some small - like some kid-sized drink but I like it that way because I'm always unable to finish regular size drink so it reduces wastage.

The chicken skin is really crispy. It taste like crispy chicken coated with honey and garlic. Sweet and spicy. This is the juiciest chicken I ever had from KFC and the meat is very tender and well-flavored.

The coolest thing in the meal. I believe that the riceball is dipped in soya sauce and fried because that is what it taste like.

The surface tasted like soy sauce rice crust and in the middle just plain white rice. I feel like I'm eating mixed rice with chicken and vegetables.

This looks suspicious with the light green color mayonnaise. I was right, this coleslaw contains wasabi! The wasabi is quite mild though. I don't really love coleslaw in particular but I finished this one because it taste really good.

This might sound strange but be sure to eat KFC in Japan!

4 Fingers Crispy Chicken @ ION Orchard

4 Fingers Crispy Chicken located at #B4-06A My friend said that the chicken here are pretty good so I decided to give it a go.

Soy garlic chicken - 6pcs $4.95 (3 wings, 3 drumlets - student price after 230pm)

This is surprisingly good. The best part about 4 fingers is that their chicken is piping hot. The wings and drumlets has like sweet honey crispy skin with the aroma of garlic.The chicken is tender and juicy within.

Pretty cool box of chicken! I haven't try the rest of the menu but they sure look delicious. I'll definitely recommend this one. Check out their website here


Rating: 4/5

Chili's @ Jcube

It is my birthday! Hang out at the Chilli's. I thought Chili's is a Mexican food franchise but I just found out that the very first Chili's hamburger grill and bar started in Texas. Tex-Mex cuisine.

This is a very expensive cup of Lipton tea. $5 per cup for the soft drinks or tea but it is free flow so you can drink as much as you want. We made sure we drink at least 2 cups to make full use of our bucks!

A very interesting fact about Chili's is that all the prices of the food are in whole numbers. Like this Bacon ranch chicken quesdillas is $18. No decimal points! I like! I really love the taste of the quesdillas. I'm not sure how this is to be eaten but here is what we did. We stuff the tomatoes and lettuce in the quesdillas and put the sour cream on top and dip it into the dressing!

The chicken is tender and juicy and so are the tomatoes and lettuce. The sour cream and ranch dressing combined with the smoked taste of the chicken wrapped and slightly sour tomatoes wrapped with chewy toasted quesdilla is really fresh. Really appetizing.

Next is the Crispy honey-chipotle chicken crispers - $23. The serving is really huge, it can be share between two person.

For this dish, you can choose two sides from the menu so I choose the french fries and mashed potatoes. The staff was really nice and gave an additional cup of gravy when requested. French fries are thick and goes well with the tar tar sauce.






























The mashed potatoes has a smoke taste and is rich and creamy. It has a lumpy texture and the potato skins are found in it as well. The mashed potatoes goes well with the tartar sauce too.

The chicken strips are really crispy and the outside and juicy and tender on the inside. The only complain I have is that the spicy honey sauce is a little too sweet and gets a little cloying on the second strip I had.

Here comes dessert! Chocolate chip paradise pie - $9. I think the combination of warm pie and the cold vanilla ice cream really tops this treat. I love the hot fudge and caramel drizzle with nuts bits that adds to the texture of the ice cream. The pie is a layer of coconut and a layer of walnut that is soft and sweet like brownie. A spoon of ice cream and pie is heavenly!

Rating: 4.5/5 I'm very impressed with the savory food and the staff are really friendly. The food are slightly pricey but definitely recommended.

Astons @ Jurong East

This is the first time I order Astons takeaway. I usually eat at the outlet.
 Chargrill chicken with 2 sides: $6.50

I really don't know if the staff gave me an extra portion of the pasta salad or it was meant to be that much.

I figure that the two spaces are meant for two sides so the staff did give me an extra portion. The pasta salad was really off standard. Very diluted unlike the creamy ones I usually have. This is sour and bits of pepper made it bitter. Two portions didn't brighten my day.

On the underhand, the chargrill chicken is delicious. The meat is really tender and the portion that Astons gives is bigger than that of Chargrill. This is one juicy chicken cutlet and the mushroom gravy goes really well with it. Very well cook.

The vegetables in the garden salad is really fresh. I love the tomatoes. The sauce is ridiculously sour. I scraped some out. Other than that, it is fine.

Rating: 3/5 I really want to give it a 2.5 because of the pasta salad but the chicken saved it.