Mrs Pho

After work one day, I met Stef and SY at Mrs Pho for a comforting bowl of pho.

I like pho. It is light, tasty, and feels so healthy. Like a hot bowl of soup on a cold dreary night, a bowl of pho always lifts my mood

Mrs Pho is a small restaurant so the tables and stools were packed closely together. My back was almost leaning against the lady behind me. But the food definitely makes up for the lack of personal space.  

Chicken pho! Super tasty and light, love the broth. The tea was a miss though, I cannot really describe it but it tasted a little... odd and I was not used to it.

The meatballs were AWESOME. You should definitely order some to try. Juicy, tasty and so so yummy. I'm a huge fan of summer rolls but the meatballs were a much better side dish at Mrs Pho.

Finally a new place for Vietnamese food, in addition to Long Phung and Little Vietnam! Mrs Pho is accessible from Bugis MRT or Nicoll Highway MRT.

349 Beach Rd, Singapore 199570
6292 0018
11 am to 10 pm

11D8N Eastern Europe Tour with Chan Brothers Day 6 - Krakow - Slovakia - Budapest, Hungary

Heavy snowfall on Christmas! So excited to experience my first white Christmas. It was truly unforgettable. Drove a long way into Donovaly in Slovakia for lunch in a ski resort. Lunch was supposed to be free & easy but Eva kindly arranged lunch for us for 10 euros per pax because nothing was open on Christmas day and this was the only ski resort that was open in the area. 

A very simple meal of chicken breast and boiled potatoes in the warm confines of the wooden cabin. We had to move after the meal because another tour group needed the space for lunch. Some folks left and went outside to play with the snow. My family and I went to the bar for some hot red wine instead and watched the snow swirl in the wind outside. 

 

It was so beautiful. Everywhere was white and snow fell steadily for hours as we watched from the bar. When it was eventually time to go, we hung around outside for a bit to take some pictures of the white landscape.

My favourite polka-dotted scarf which the bf hates haha! (Because I am posting this almost TWO YEARS late, my bf is now my husband).

Long snowy drive to Budapest!

Heroes Square in Budapest illuminated at night. The double cross in the hands of the angel represents a unified Hungary as a Christian nation and the first statue beside the angel is the King who unified Hungary and introduced Christianity to the country. 

Dinner was Chinese food at 九龙大酒店 and the food was (surprisingly) decent and some dishes were in fact good! 

Checked into Novotel Budapest City and realised that the hotel had a really odd design. The toilet bowl was separate from the basin and bath tub so we had to shuffle from one to the other when washing up. The hotel was beside MOM Park Shopping Mall which would have been ideal for grabbing water and snacks and doing some shopping if not for the fact that everything was close during our stay over the Christmas holidays. 

Check out my post on Day 1 ,  Day 2 , Day 3,  Day 4, Day 5, Day 7.

Nirai Kanai Okinawan Restaurant

The first time I visited Nirai Kanai was for lunch with friends from office and our interns. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Okinawan food was so different from the usual Japanese fare we were used to and tasted like a mix between Japanese and Chinese food. Kept saying that I wanted to take my parents here to try this so finally, I brought my parents here for dinner after work one day.

I think we over ordered. The waitress looked surprised when we placed our order and was even more surprised to see us finish everything. To me, the food was really good that night! But my parents felt that the food was a little salty and probably not the best for senior folks (I grudgingly agreed haha!).

One of my all-time favourite at Nirai Kanai. Onigiri! Super tasty rice balls with bits of seaweed and meat in them.

Eggplant with minced meat. This really tasted like Chinese food with braised eggplant and minced meat, except that the gravy tasted a lot like miso. 

Stir-fried bitter gourd with pork! One of the top few dishes in the ranking above. This also tasted like bitter gourd and egg which I would have at a Chinese food store and I loved it. The bitter gourd was crunchy and tasty and, surprisingly, not bitter at all. 

Noodles with dipping sauce and pork. It was all right but definitely not the best tsukemen I have tried before. Wouldn't order this again the next time I come by.

Seaweed tempura! 3rd place on the ranking above and I can totally see why. It was so yummy! So crispy. It was like eating a seaweed snack!

Okonomiyaki. Was also okay but I have also tasted better okonomiyaki elsewhere before so I will also pass on this the next time I come by.

Grilled Chicken Thigh with Yuzu. The chicken thigh was really tender and juicy, but the sauce was a little too salty. I assumed that was where the excess salt that my parents were talking about came from.  

The grilled squid was good but nothing fantastic.

This is a good place for dinner and drinks after work because it is quiet and you could sit around catching up for a long while without worrying about any queue outside. I would definitely come back again soon!

177 River Valley Road, #B1-01 Liang Court, 179030

11:30 am to 3 pm, 6 pm to 11 pm

6339 4811

11D8N Eastern Europe Tour with Chan Brothers Day 5 - Krakow, Poland

This is way overdue but, once again, better late than never.

2016's Christmas Eve in Krakow, Poland. We started the day at Auschwitz with our local guide Greg. Greg was definitely the best local guide we had on this trip. He was dedicated, responsible, and really passionate about sharing his knowledge about the Second World War. Some local guides just spoke the bare minimum and hustled us along, but not Greg. Greg was one of those who clearly enjoyed his job, even if it was Christmas Eve, and even if it meant braving the cold with a bunch of Asians in the empty streets of Krakow, when he could be enjoying Christmas Eve with his family. When we parted at the Main Square in Krakow in the late afternoon, Greg took the time to tell us the cafes which could be open in the area on Christmas Eve.

Auschwitz - I have always wanted to visit Auschwitz and really glad I have the opportunity to come by one year after its 70th anniversary. I remember reading about the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz camp in the papers in 2015 and thinking that Auschwitz was a place that I should definitely visit.

A place which saw horrors and atrocities beyond what a human mind could imagine, a place that felt so cold and sad on that grey wintry morning, and a place that should never be forgotten.

 

Lunch with the tour group at Galicja Restauracja where we had golabki which is a traditional Polish cabbage roll with minced meat. I felt that it was the first nice meal on the trip that was part of the tour package!

After lunch we started our stroll with Greg around the old Jewish Quarter before heading to the Royal Castle on Wawel Hill.

Wawel Hill has a folklore about a fire-breathing dragon. The King had promised the hand of his daughter and his crown to the man who could defeat this dragon. Many knights tried their luck but none of them succeeded. One day, a shoemaker came and brought with him lambskin and sulphur. He constructed a lamb-looking bait stuffed with sulphur and fed it to the dragon. The dragon ate it and exploded. A statue of the dragon stands at the foot of Wawel Hill to commemorate this folklore.

Walking around the grounds of the Royal Castle.

Horse-drawn carriage along an empty street.

After strolling through the beautiful grounds of the Royal Castle, we walked to the Main Square where the St Mary Church was located.

Some stores of the Christmas market in the square were still open but the large shops around the square were all closed for the Christmas holidays. In fact, we soon found out that everything was closed because of the Christmas holidays. There was absolutely nothing open. Even Macs was closed. We had an hour of free time to explore the Main Square on our own but there was absolutely nothing to explore. We could not even find a place indoors to keep warm. Thankfully, Greg told us about this kebab place (Mr Kebab) which was a short walk from the Main Square so we tried our luck. It was open! Words cannot describe how happy I was to see the lights coming out of Mr Kebab because the prospect of wandering around aimlessly for an hour was making me feel very sad. Most of us ended up inside, drinking hot tea and munching on kebabs until it was time to meet at the Main Square.

St Mary's Church at the Main Square. I will always remember the church as the place where we huddled outside in the cold while Eva sang Christmas carols, waiting for others to return from wherever they were so that we could head back to the warmth of the coach bus.

And then, it started to snow! OMG. It was really going to be a white Christmas! I have never experienced a white Christmas, but it always sounded so magical. And it really was. There was something amazing about watching the snow flakes fall, knowing that it was Christmas eve and families in all those little windows dotting the streets were bending over dinner together, perhaps saying grace, and enjoying the warmth of family.  Snow flakes in my hair!

Returned to the hotel where we were free to go anywhere or do anything we wanted. But it was so cold and everything in the area was closed (we walked to the nearby Macs in the snow to try our luck but it was also closed) so we had dinner at the hotel restaurant. Ordered baked salmon and mulled wine. Good hearty Christmas eve meal!

Check out my post on Day 1 ,  Day 2 , Day 3, Day 4, Day 6, Day 7.

MIA

It has been a long while since I last posted anything and I don't have a good reason for dropping off the radar. I could say that I was busy with work (indeed I was) but I know that it was much more than just being busy. I was, to put it plainly, exhausted. I felt like I was running on an empty tank for the last quarter of 2017 and I just cannot muster the strength to blog. But things are starting to look up now and I finally feel right to come back here and write.

Am going to start posting again!

11D8N Eastern Europe Tour with Chan Brothers Day 4 - Krakow, Poland

Set off very early for our long drive into Krakow. Many traffic accidents along the icy roads and we were caught in numerous traffic jams. We were trying to make it to the Wieliczka Salt Mine before the salt mine closed for the Christmas holidays but the terrible traffic and icy roads made it very difficult. We had to press on with our journey to get to the salt mine in time so all of us chose to pick up a sandwich at a rest stop for lunch instead of stopping for a long proper lunch. Many thanks to our superb coach driver for getting us to Krakow safely and just in time before the salt mine closed. 

The Wieliczka Salt Mine was amazing. If you find yourself in Krakow one day, do take the time to explore the salt mine. A UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Wieliczka Salt Mine was a large compound, but only 3 levels were open to the public. We started our guided tour by taking the elevator in the small shaft down 64 m. It was quite scary being in the elevator because the drop was sudden and quick, and the elevator was not enclosed so we could feel the wind gushing in from the sides. 

Legend has it that Princess Kinga, a Hungarian princess, married a prince in Poland and asked her father for salt since salt was very precious in Poland. Her father, the Hungarian king, took her to a salt mine where she threw her engagement ring into the mine. Later, when she arrived in Poland, she asked the miners to dig until they came upon a lump of salt with her engagement ring inside. 

We walked down long narrow passages (like the ones below) and explored different areas of the mine. I thought it might be hot and stuffy in the mine but ventilation was superb and, in fact, it was rather cooling inside.

As salt dissolves in water, the salt mine had numerous drainage systems to ensure that water flowed into a well and not into the salt crystals around the mine.

A large chapel deep in the salt mine with chandeliers made of salt crystals! This was my favourite part of the mine. So beautiful and... raw. Not the usual curated beauty but really, something so classical and surreal that I would not have believed it at first sight. The tour guide said there were couples who booked this chapel as a wedding venue. It must be so magical to have your wedding in this chapel!

The Wieliczka Salt Mine provided a glimpse of how miners lived and worked underground all those years ago. My first time in a mine and I was extremely impressed! What an eye-opener.

We checked into Hotel Swing in Krakow and had dinner (fish and potatoes that were not very nice) at the hotel restaurant. Headed to Auschan, this supermarket in a large squat building behind Hotel Swing, to stock up on water and snacks for the Christmas weekend. Quite thankful for the accessibility of the hotels to nearby supermarkets so far!

Check out my post on Day 1 ,  Day 2, Day 3, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7.

CreatureS

A very belated birthday lunch with Stef because we were both overseas when it was her birthday and we were just so swamped with work thereafter. Made a reservation for CreatureS for our Sunday lunch, and we arrived in our Grabcar both looking like we just rolled out of bed. Perfect look for a Sunday!

Located in a little shop house near Little India, the deco inside CreatureS was quaint and interesting. The waiter took us to the second level and we settled down in a table by the window. The second level was empty when we arrived but the crowd grew steadily and it was fully packed when we left.

Crayfish Hokkien Mee ($30). I saw this on TX's instagram and wanted to try it because it looked so good! The noodles were fried in a delicious prawn broth, and the crayfish, prawns and squid were so sweet and fresh. The japanese fish roe was a nice touch, and everything went well with the sambal. 

Garden and Crab Risotto ($34). Risotto in crab broth with crabmeat and salted egg. CreatureS was very generous with the crabmeat but I was a little disappointed with the crab broth that tasted a little bland. Might be because our Crayfish Hokkien Mee came first and our taste buds were already pampered by the rich prawn broth in the hokkien mee that we could not taste the lighter fragrance in the risotto.

Coffee and Manuka Honey Latte.

Ended the meal with a slice of Lychee Martini Cake. The cake was light and the lychee bits were so sweet and refreshing. But I really want to know what that blue tinge at the side was and whether it was just food colouring. 

120 Desker Road

Singapore 209639

62916996