Happy 22nd Birthday, Dearest...

Date: May 28th 2009 (Thursday)
Occasion: Charmaine's 22nd Birthday

It's supposed to be celebrated on May 28th, Thursday... but there was Dragonboat training @ Bedok Reservoir that evening, in preparation for the upcoming JUNE RACE. Hence, I decided not to skip training & join Charmaine & her family for a nice buffet dinner @ Oriental.

Just check out the good food especially the prawns & desserts! What a waste! What a waste!

And these two sisters (Charmaine & her sister, Pamela) are ever so evil... They purposely took video of the prawns & the desserts. Haha!

So anyway, after training @ Bedok Reservoir, I headed over to her place for the cutting of the birthday cake. Auntie Betty was also so funny, because Charmaine's Birthday falls on the same day as the Dumpling Festival, so she bought five dumplings & pretend that those were Charmaine's 'birthday cake'. We even placed the candles on the dumplings, lit them up & sang 'Happy Birthday'. So funny! Of course in the end, Auntie brought out the actual birthday cake & surprised Charmaine... and we had a round of photo-taking session with the birthday girl.

That's my Girlfriend... Forever the Drama Queen! HAHAHAHA!

Photo-taking session with the Birthday Girl~... ♥♥♥

So... that ends the night of celebration, with me eating up most of the YUMMY-LICIOUS cake! Hehe
~.~.~
End of Part 1 - 28.05.09
~.~.~

As I wasn't able to spend time with Charmaine on her actual Bday, I made it up to her by spending the following day with her instead. I brought her to Raffles City's food court - Food Place after work for dinner before bringing her to The Marina Barrage. Frankly speaking, the Food Place @ Raffles City does have some nice Japanese food, like the Japanese Omelette rice & Tempura Yong Tau Fu.

"Ebi Omelette Curry Rice & Tempura Yong Tau Fu Set Meal + Chawanmushi"

Took a train to Marina Bay, followed by a long & dusty walk through a tunnel to an out-of-place bus stop & waited for a bus that we thought would never come... Alighted at the designated bus stop & walked quite a distance before FINALLY reaching The Marina Barrage. Super inaccessible, without a car!

Beautiful Water Fountain...

Too bad, my digital camera was spoilt that night so we had to settle for Charmaine's handphone. If not, we could have taken more nice photos in the dim lights. Nevertheless, the night view of The Marina Barrage is still great... and the atmosphere just nice for dating. hehehehe

In the end, I got her a stuffed Monkey (which she named "Monty") together with a sunflower I promise to get her for every birthday... Teehee
~.~.~
End of Part 2 - 29.05.09
~.~.~

Xiao Long Baos!!! Char Sao Baos!!! Come get some Baos!!!

Crystal Jade La Mian Xiao Long Bao @ Holland Village

Thanks to our 小王子, JinHan... We had another "batch" gathering graced with the appearance of Ashley & JiaQi @ Crystal Jade La Mian Xiao Long Bao, Holland Village before our upcoming June race on the 27th & 28th of this month.

I wanna recommend this CJLMXLB to others too, for its South-Northern Steamboat Buffet which starts from 8:30pm to 1am on weekdays. Remember to make your reservations, it seems that business is quite good. There were quite a number of people also queueing up as the time approaches 8:30pm & we had to wait for quite a while to get our seats, even though we already made reservations. But then again, we had 14 people so we can't really blame them.

The place is located @ Holland Village, next to the Holland Road Shopping Centre & at the intersection of Lorong Liput & Holland Avenue.

I think I prefer this outlet much more than those in Bugis Street. The place is air-conditioned & comfortable as a place for gathering amongst friends & families. The food for the steamboat is well prepared & very hygenic. Not forgetting the free flow of drinks (like barley, water chestnut etc) & xiao long baos, char siew baos, man dous that you can stuff into your mouth. The xiao long baos & char siew baos are really good too. How do I know that? Because we can gobble down 40+ baskets of xiao long baos (5 in each basket) & 20+ baskets of big char siew baos (2 in each basket). Desserts are also served, such as the red bean pastry, clear osmanthus jelly & almond beancurd. But in my opinion, only the almond beancurd is truly YUMMY & REFRESHING~!

As for the steamboat itself, they serve 4 different soup bases for the steamboat, such as Sichuan Ma La Spicy Soup & Pork Bone with Sweet Corn Soup. You can try out the bi-combination (yuan yang) if you want two different soup bases at the same time. The ingredients for the steamboat include the usual veggies (lettuce, cabbages, spinach etc), mushrooms (oyster mushrooms, golden mushrooms etc) & sliced meat (pork, beef, chicken, lamb). They also have those beancurd, dumplings, fish balls, sotong balls, shrimp balls, crabmeat balls, salmon balls, sausages, pig's skin, pig's liver, pig's belly, cuttlefish, u-don & vermicelli etc... No seafood except for the designated 100grams of prawn each person is entitled to. But the food was really good enough in terms of quality & quantity. Not much to complain, unless you are really one of those picky people who like to "pick bones out from eggs".

We had a great time there, but I don't think the same can be said for the waiteresses & staff working there, serving two tables of 14 monsters whom are "whacking" the xiao long baos for all their worth (Nick, on the other hand, "whacking" the orange soda drink). It was a great feast cum gathering! One of those I truly enjoy... Hope this culture never ends.

Check out the glorious good food~!!!


How Good is the Food? Just ask Boon, Denny, Jonah & Nick!


Look at how high the Xiao Long Baos stack up! We can't even see Enyu behind it!





Check out the reasonable price too!
Each of us only paid $24 for all that good food!