Fitness regime for someone who loves to eat

I have been trying to maintain a fitness regime which involves hitting the gym at least once a week for a 30 minutes cardio session and 30 minutes of resistance training. I started during my university days because I realized I was too fond of eating and I didn't fancy spending too much money on new clothes. Plus the university gym was almost comparable to Cali with little screens fitted into the treadmills and really new equipment. During my last year in university, they even converted a room into a ladies-only resistance training corner where we could train without having to squirm around muscled guys.

After I graduated, it was just a constant search for a gym to work out. I went to ClubFitt previously with the boyfriend and sometimes we cycled around parks. When Dennis Gym opened an outlet in Kallang within walking distance from my place, I walked over religiously every Sunday but it started getting increasingly crowded these days and I often had to wait around to use the equipment. 

Then I started work where I am working now and to my utmost surprise, there's a gym in the office! It's small but it serves. But recently I realized that once a week in the gym no longer works its wonders in keeping me in shape for my clothes. So I decided to try something new...

Yes pilates at home! I've been trying Cassey Ho's pilates work outs for about half a year and I have to say, they are amazing in strengthening your core! You do feel yourself getting stronger as time goes by and it's just so convenient to watch her videos at home and do the exercises. Try all her videos targeting various muscle groups like your core, your thighs, your backs, your arms... the list goes on. I do try her cardio and HIIT work outs too but those are real killers. Somehow it works me harder than my regular gym sessions.

Yay to Youtube! I seriously discover all sorts of interesting things on Youtube these days!

Coriander at East Coast

We were trying to decide where to head to for dinner before Sze leaves for UK and we eventually decided on Coriander at East Coast. Before Coriander became Coriander, the same shop space was occupied by Cafe Oliv which served pretty decent Western Food. Stef mentioned that there is a new cafe in the area and I was all for trying it!

The layout and deco look kind of similar to Cafe Oliv. Simple, no-frills plastic tables and chairs lined both sides of the cafe with a counter at the back. When we arrived for dinner on a weekday night, the place was practically empty except for another table of two. Coriander is a cozy place for a quiet dinner and a much needed chit chat session.

We ordered two chef's recommendations - the Chili Crab Pasta and Barramundi Fillet. The Barramundi Fillet came first wrapped in aluminium foil, with the fillet beneath a generous portion of mash potatoes and some carrots and long beans at the side. The fillet was soft and tender with the essence of a clear lemon sauce drizzled on it. The mash potatoes were buttery and delicious. The dish was a good combination of both Chinese and Western cooking styles, as the fillet in clear lemon sauce resembled steamed fish in Chinese restaurants and the mash potatoes and boiled vegetables were definitely Western.

The Chili Crab Pasta was really omg!!! Totally divine. The chili crab sauce was so tasty, and the pasta was done al dente. I love the generous serving of crab meat and the sweet juicy cherry tomatoes. I would definitely order this dish again because it was just so well done.

Our snack platter because we wanted to try more stuff. Yes, it's not really the healthiest option but nobody can resist some yummy chicken wings, chewy calamari rings, and juicy deep fried button mushrooms!

If you are taking a bus, Coriander is one bus stop after I12 Katong. The cafe is beside Doong Ji, a small cozy Korean restaurant with quite a reputation as well. Do drop by Coriander if you would like a nice cozy place for dinner and some uninterrupted peace.

220 East Coast Road

Nam Nam at Raffles City

My first time at Nam Nam! The queue is always so incredibly long and it's always so hard to get seats for a group of 4. So when it was just the two of us heading out for lunch the other day, we decided to try our luck at Nam Nam. The queue was long as usual, but seats for two were available quickly. 

The place was very crowded and all the seats were arranged closely together so we had to shift around every time someone wanted to leave or settle into the table beside us. But I hardly noticed as I was super engrossed with the menu.

This is the menu for the value lunch set. The lunch set is indeed value for money! For $9.90 net, you could have a bowl of pho chicken or pho beef, fresh Vietnamese rolls, and either coffee or lotus tea. I chose pho Chicken, and hot lotus tea with the Vietnamese rolls. We were given a small piece of paper to write our orders after which we have to proceed to the cashier to place our order and pay.

I was curious about the array of sauces available. The chili sauce for the pho was average, not very spicy, and not very tasty either. The fish sauce was nice! It went very well with the slices of chicken in my Pho Chicken.

The rolls were so refreshing and healthy! I love the juicy prawns and herbs in the rolls. With the dip, the rolls were so crunchy and delicious!

The Pho Chicken came next. I'm always very particular about the soup base so that was the first thing I tried the minute the waiter set the bowl of pho in front of me. The soup was very light, clear and refreshing. The first thought that came to mind was "Everything is so healthy here!". I like how the soup was not oily at all, and did not have the overpowering taste of spices. It was just sweet clear broth. The pho itself was springy and I dripped some fish sauce onto the pho for some added punch. They were very generous with the chicken too, and there were many slices of chicken in my bowl of pho. The chicken was tender and juicy.

#B1-46 Raffles City

Jersey Boys at Marina Bay Sands Theatre

I finally got around to watching Jersey Boys last month after much procrastination. It was the boyfriend's treat as an early Valentine's Day present and I was so excited!! It's been a very long while since I watched a musical and I'm just rolling around with glee to be able to immerse in the music and dance once again.

We reached Marina Bay Sands early and settled down at TCC for dinner. I love the pasta and drinks at TCC! I ordered a Olive and Mushroom Pasta and a glass of Toffee Nut Latte. The pasta was awesome as usual, with the yummy tomato-based sauce, large slices of juicy mushrooms and generous servings of olives. The Toffee Nut Latte was thick with chocolate and very addictive!

I was really excited to watch Jersey Boys thus I decided to put in some effort to dress up before heading out. I curled my hair in the morning, slipped on my wedges so that the height disparity is less stark, and wore a form fitting orange dress! My luck wasn't too good that day though. It rained, my curls were washed out, and my hair became limp and wavy instead ugh. But still, could not resist a picture at TCC!

Jersey Boys was fantastic! The production outlined the rise and fall of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons with many awesome songs like "Sherry" and of course, the all-time favourite "Can't take my eyes off you". I loved the songs, the dance, and the indescribable feeling I always get when I watch a musical. The part that really struck a chord was when Frankie Valli described a particularly difficult period of his life when the band was beginning to fall apart. He stated that "This too shall pass" and went on to explain that this line actually cuts both ways. The bad passes, but so does the good.

Actually, that is a thought that I always find myself going back to recently. Whenever something bad happens, I will tell myself that "This too shall pass". It is true and it gives me the strength to trudge ahead. But when I'm really happy, a tiny voice in my head will also whisper "This too shall pass" and I end up being terribly afraid that I will not be able to retain that happiness for long. I fret and worry that this fleeting moment of happiness will disappear, that I cannot experience it to the fullest, that one day I will forget how I once felt during this particular happy moment.

Maybe that's why I blog and religiously dump all my pictures on Facebook. It's like my unofficial diary. A place for me to chronicle all my happy moments so that I can look back on those days and perhaps the feeling will come rushing back.

The Corner Place Korean Bbq Restaurant

Happy CNY everybody! Hope you are all enjoying the festivities despite the rain. I'm loving all my new dresses, the endless supply of new year goodies, the ang pows, and all the fun and laughter. Might actually do a post on my new year shopping haul sometime soon since I want to write about something other than food. And I've been procrastinating writing about Jersey Boys too! Ah, I need more time and more mood to write after work. 

But anyway, for this post, I will still be writing about food - a Korean restaurant at Marina Square that I visited with my parents shortly before CNY. The parents text me one day after work and asked if I was free for dinner near my office. I was just getting ready to go, so I was so happy to be able to hitch a ride to dinner and then back home. We ended up at Marina Square, and somehow wandered up to the food court level where The Corner Place Korean Bbq Restaurant is.

They have the Korean Bbq buffet going on, but the spread did not look too exciting, so we decided to have ala carte orders instead. We ordered a large Spicy Tofu Hotpot to share and my dad got a chicken bimbimbap. As usual the orders came with some side dishes, but the side dishes at The Corner Place were seriously disappointing. All the side dishes were bland, not tasty, and looked pretty dismal if you ask me. They do not offer free flow of the side dishes too, unlike other Korean restaurants where we could always ask for more. But in any case, I was not interested in more of this lacklustre stuff.

The Spicy Tofu Hotpot was decent. The soup base was thick and quite tasty, and they were generous with the ingredients. The hotpot had large chunks of tofu, vegetables, golden mushroom, slices of pork, mushroom, and glass noodles. It was very satisfying to have the hotpot with a bowl of rice. 

The Corner Place Korean Bbq Restaurant is definitely not as good as my all-time favorite Korean restaurant Togi, and I definitely will not make a trip down just for this. However, if I'm at Marina Square, I might actually consider dropping by if I have no idea what else to eat.

#04-102 Marina Square (right beside the food court)

Choupinette

Have been wanting to try Choupinette for awhile and eventually made the trip from our homes in the East to Bukit Timah where Choupinette is. The journey was unexpectedly quick actually. We took Circle Line from Paya Lebar to Botanic Gardens and then hopped onto a bus from the bus stop right outside Choupinette. We alighted at Coronation Plaza which is about two bus stops away and Choupinette is right opposite Coronation Plaza on the same side of the street. Look out for the colourful signboard!

It's a nice little cozy cafe. There are only about maybe 10 tables or so inside the cafe and about another 4 outside. We chose to wait for the seats inside and thankfully we did not have to wait long. We milled around outside the cafe for about 10 minutes and were soon ushered into the cafe.

It was brightly lit and felt like a good place to hide from the imminent thunderstorm. The seats are arranged really close together though, so you end up having to shift around a lot during your meal to allow others to either get into their seats, or get out and leave.

The menu was extensive but I only paid significant attention to their brunch menu. Each set comes with a fruit juice and hot drink. Such value for money! All other brunch places I've been to usually serve drinks separately and when you add everything up, it's usually more than $20+.  

I ordered the Tristan's set because I'm craving for some mushrooms, a cup of orange juice and hot lemon and ginger tea which was served after our meal. I could choose how I want my eggs to be done so I opted for scrambled as its been a while since I last had scrambled eggs. I also had a choice between pork or chicken sausage and I chose pork because pork sausages are always more sinfully delicious (to me).

Let me just say that when my Tristan's set arrived, I was confident that I could finish every single bit of it, but that proved very hard indeed. The serving was truly more than I can place into my tummy! But it was really good! The scrambled eggs were nice and fluffy, the mushrooms were well-sauteed and super juicy, the tomato was ripe and sweet, and oh my, the pork sausage was sinfully delicious (as I expected). The only not-that-fantastic bit about the Tristan's set has to be the whole meal bread roll. It was so hard, I had trouble biting into it, and I soon gave up about halfway through the roll.

She ordered the Eggs Royal's and I tried some of it. Choupinette is really generous with their smoked salmon! There are so many slices of smoked salmon sitting under the poached eggs and hollandaise sauce. It was really good, super yummy!

It's a nice place to come for brunch, one of the best brunch places I have visited so far and their brunch sets are really value-for-money! I love the idea that I could have a fruit juice with my set and then tea afterwards. We had a nice chat over our hot drinks before we were asked to leave because another set of customers were coming in. They were really nice about it and we were apologetic that we had stuck around for awhile. It was not really our fault though, since the thunderstorm outside was pelting down at full force. We left and wandered out into the thunderstorm anyway, since there was nowhere to hide from the rain in the building. Eventually we settled for Starbucks at Coronation which was nice and warm, and we managed to dry up a bit.

607 Bukit Timah Road

Krabi Day 4 - Ao Nang Beach

It was our last full day in Krabi and we did not have any plans lined up. We wanted to sleep in, laze around, and take our time to stroll through Ao Nang street at our own leisurely pace. 

We left our resort around noon and wandered down to the main Ao Nang street in search of food. We finally decided to dine at Aining Restaurant because it looked pretty decent and we were hoping to have something other than Thai food that day.

The boyfriend ordered the beef burger and I ordered mushroom and ham pasta in cream sauce. His burger was enormous! The patty was amazingly thick and they were so generous with the ingredients. My mushroom and ham pasta in cream sauce was really good too. I'm not fond of pasta in cream sauce and I actually ordered this without knowing that it came with cream sauce. But I have to say I was so pleasantly surprised when I tasted this pasta! The sauce was light, tasty and not cloyingly creamy, and the spaghetti was done al dente. Wonderful. It was really reasonably priced too, and we were so happy after our lunch.

We proceeded to wander further away from the main Ao Nang street and went further, down the row of shop houses and far from the beach. This area is definitely way less touristy and much quieter, with less eateries and shops, and less activities as well. It was nice to just walk along the empty streets and explore.

It started to rain during our nice little walk, so we ducked into a nearby 7-11 and started shopping. It was a large 7-11 and we were having so much fun picking up drinks, snacks, sweets and all sorts of random stuff. The boyfriend noticed that they were selling some mini musical boxes with Winnie the Pooh and friends on it. You just have to wind it up, press the button, and the little figurine will start to spin to a tune! I was so fascinated with it, and we wanted to collect a set of 4. Sadly, after popping into every 7-11 along Ao Nang street, we only managed to purchase 3 musical boxes. But I'm still really happy!

It was dinner soon enough, and we decided to try Rialto because the guy at the door had been calling out to me every night we walked past with the same "Hello Miss Malaysia". Miss Malaysia?! Okay, never mind about that, I never got to know what he meant, but maybe he thought every Chinese was from Malaysia (which is weird). 

Business was good and every table was occupied. We ordered a Chicken Pizza and Aglio Olio Spaghetti to share. The pizza was very very good. Thick and fluffy, with lots of cheese and tender well-marinated chunks of chicken. The Aglio Olio Spaghetti was a disappointment though. It was so oily! Just look at that picture below. The bunch of spaghetti was sitting in a pool of oil! And it was so salty too, like the chef simply sprinkled some salt on the dish as a careless afterthought.

We wanted to go for some drinks and live music after dinner, so we went to Crazy Gringos which is behind Rialto. There is a row of pubs and bars at the back of the main street, most of which have pretty awesome live music. We settled for Crazy Gringos because they had incredible Happy Hour drinks and we could not resist SGD 4 cocktails.

The live band was very good! I love her deep soulful voice. We sat there enjoying the music, sipping our drinks, and just allowing time to go by. It was a lovely moment, so peaceful and serene that I often find myself going back to that particular night in that bar and feeling a deep sense of calm. I love such moments. 

And with that our Krabi Trip came to a nice lovely end. Read about Day 1, 2 and 3! 

Vivo American Pizza and Panini

We had always walked past Vivo American Pizza and Panini but had never gone in before. The small cafe is situated right beside Gong Cha in the basement of Central and I am sure everyone who has been to Central would have seen it at least once. However, there were so many other more attractive cafes around, and Vivo is far from eye-catching, so I'm not surprised if it did not cross your mind to enter for a meal.

We eventually did go in for their lunch set one day because we wanted somewhere indoors, with air-conditioning, and quiet enough for a chat. Vivo was all of that, and the lunch sets looked reasonably priced, so we ventured in. 

I ordered the Black Pepper Chicken Baked Rice which came with a bowl of mushroom soup and cost me $6.90. If I choose to pay $1.50 more, I could have a drink to go with my lunch set, but I declined as I was craving for a cup of bubble tea.

The mushroom soup was pretty normal, and nothing much to scream about. I like the large bits of mushroom though. Much better than the non-existent mushroom slices in some mushroom soup.

The Black Pepper Chicken Baked Rice was good. The thick layer of cheese on top melted evenly on a bed of soft fluffy butter rice and the chunks of chicken were tender and well-marinated with the black pepper sauce. 

I would come back again for my Black Pepper Chicken Baked Rice lunch set!

#B1-20 Central

Jing Hua Restaurant

My family and I were in Chinatown to run some errands and were unfortunately stuck in the massive human jam in that area. I hate going to Chinatown during the Chinese New Year period because it's just so horribly crowded, and with everybody towering over me, I can hardly see anything at all. Which is basically such a waste of time for me to head there in the first place. Furthermore, I hate crowds, so I was just trying my best to keep calm and get my act together while grabbing the stuff we need.

After that much squeezing and shoving, we were finally done and it was time for dinner! We decided to drop by Jing Hua Restaurant for some Zha Jiang Mian and dumplings. To get to Jing Hua Restaurant, simply cross the road from Maxwell Food Centre and walk along the row of shop houses. Jing Hua Restaurant is situated in one of those shop houses facing Kreta Ayer.

They recently renovated and expanded the place and the queue was much more decent. When we were here previously, the queue was atrocious, and we were left standing outside the shop house for about 20 minutes, while a grumpy old man came out every now and then to demand a proper queue. It wasn't the most pleasant experience but we came back because the food was good.

The menu is limited, but almost everything tastes awesome. 

We ordered Zha Jiang Mian (which is noodles with minced meat in bean paste sauce), pan-fried mixed seafood and pork dumplings, xiao long bao, and Chinese Pizza (which is basically mixed seafood and pork inside a large pancake).

The zha jiang mian is really unique and tastes very different from the usual Crystal Jade or Imperial Treasure ones. I'm not particularly fond of the noodles as they probably have been cooked for a tad too long and taste kind of soggy. But I love the minced pork and bean paste. The bean paste is really thick and goes very well with the minced pork. They are also very generous with the vegetables and slices of crunchy cucumber.

The pan-fried mixed seafood and pork dumplings came next. I love the pan fried dumplings here! The skin is always crispy and nicely fried while the pork within is just so fragrant and juicy. If there's one thing you should not miss here, it has to be this.

The contents of the Chinese Pizza is basically the same as that within the dumplings. The only difference lies in the skin of the pancake. I prefer the thin pan-fried skin of the dumplings as compared to the thick oven-baked skin of the pancake. They are always generous with the filling though and both the dumplings and Chinese pizza are filled with lots of mixed seafood and pork.

The xiao long bao came last. I would say that the xiao long bao here isn't the best I've tasted and was kind of disappointing. The skin is way too thick and there is too little soup within the small xiao long bao.

The prices are generally reasonable and if you come at the right time, you might not even need to queue! My family and I have been coming back regularly and it has always been worth the trip.

21/23 Neil Road