Singapore in Taipei

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Small Uncle is back in Taiwan for another teaching stint, and wanted to get together before I went back to Hong Kong. Once again I was tasked with picking a restaurant on short notice, once again during the lunar new year holidays. Taking into account mom's dietary restrictions, and remembering that she enjoyed our dinner at JL Studio, I decided to take the family out to Chope Chope Eatery and check out the place.

I didn't read the menu descriptions too carefully, but I figured that Jimmy would not be serving all the dishes in their traditional form. For a young and ambitious chef intent on making a mark - and he has certainly done that - he was, naturally, going to introduce a few twists. I, of course, don't mind new takes on classic dishes at all... as long as they are still tasty and faithful to the flavors.

Gado-gado - as the sweet peanut sauce came on the side, I made sure mom got a good selection of the veggies without the sauce. The tempeh was pretty decent, and everyone liked the krupuk udang.

Not the 50 Best tour day 4: breakfast noodles and old friends

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Two days ago PR8 blasted out a message to a whole group of people, inviting everyone to have breakfast at Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle (大華豬肉粿條麵). This is, of course, the famous hawker stall that got themselves a little macaron, and I have heard stories of people lining up on weekends for more than an hour for a bowl of their noodles. Well, I have no interest in lining up for an hour for just about anything, so I hadn't planned on coming here. But the promise was that we would 'skip the line' by special arrangement, and suddenly my curiosity got the best of me.

Word was that this outing was "limited to 15 people", but I know how PR8 works, and sure enough, I counted more than 30 people spread out over at least 4 tables. Even Wakuda Tetsuya (和久田哲也) showed up...

Of course, my day in Singapore can't begin without kopi C... Others, though, took advantage of the offer of beer at 10 a.m.

Bali hop 2017 day 3: Balinese pig

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We dragged ourselves out of bed at an ungodly hour for a second day in a row, as we were getting room service breakfast delivered before we head out for a droning session.  Only thing was... the rain from last night never stopped, and the skies were still dripping at 6 a.m.  Damn.

Of course, room service arrived on time, and we asked our butler to lay out the spread on the daybed under the gazebo.  While the weather was crap, we could at least enjoy the morning breeze and listen to the rain while we ate.  Out of the available breakfast sets, we chose the continental breakfast with its basket of viennoiserie, as well as the Indonesian breakfast for soto ayam and mie goreng - which was changed from the original nasi goreng.

Bali hop 2017 day 2: the best in Jimbaran?!

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We woke ourselves up at an ungodly hour this morning when we should have been enjoying our huge, comfy bed in our villa.  Hello Kitty wanted to catch the sunrise, and she forgot that we're here in the rainy season... and the clouds take a while to dissipate after thunderstorms overnight.  I also forgot to mention to her that the Ayana Resorts and Spa faces northwest...  Anyway, we dragged ourselves out of bed, walked around the grounds of the resort, and quickly gave up on trying to catch a glimpse of the sun.  Nap time in the poolside gazebo.

We did drag ourselves up again for breakfast, and it was just a few steps to DAVA Steak and Seafood - where we were seated outdoors with a view of the koi pond next to us.

I was pretty surprised when I saw kouign amann in the pastry tray that was brought to us, and I felt obliged to try one.  This isn't an easy pastry to make, and the one I had wasn't bad at all.  It may not be as good as what the Great One makes at home or Dominique Ansel's famous DKA, but given that we're at a resort in Indonesia, I was pretty happy with it.

Bali hop 2017 day 1: dinner on the rocks

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Hello Kitty is in Bali on a business trip, and her 500 sq.m. Ocean View Cliff Pool Villa has been comped by Ayana Resorts and Spa for the weekend.  Not wanting to leave her to her own devices in Bali, I dutifully bought myself a ticket and flew down to join her for the weekend.

My airport pickup was relatively smooth, and I was soon enjoying the tranquility within the privacy of our villa.  We weren't in one of the Ocean Front Cliff Pool Villas as I had hoped, but we did still have a view of ocean, and it turns out we were just steps away from the Villa Lobby and DAVA Steak and Seafood - a restaurant where we could have breakfast.

I had just enough time to get settled in and unwind before dinner.  One of the perks we had was getting our restaurant bookings done ahead of time.  Since sunset was supposed to be around 6:40 p.m., we asked for a table at Kisik Bar and Grill at 6 p.m.

Destination wedding Bali day 3: lunch and go

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A lazy morning after a late night of partying.  Hung out in the villa cabana and surfed the net, while I waited for lunch time to roll around.  My two-day stay in beautiful, sunny Bali is coming to an end.

I head back to the Warung for lunch, and take in the wonderful view of the deep blue sky.  I enjoy the last few moments I have at the Alila Villas Uluwatu.

Destination wedding Bali day 2: east over west

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After a late night, it was late morning when I opened my eyes.  I decided to hang out in my villa and get some use out of it for once…

There was a plate of local fruits in my room, and I decided to have it as breakfast.  The mini bananas were somewhat ripe.  The carambola was ripe and reasonably juicy.  Salak has never been my favorite, as it's always too sour and I don't like the texture in my mouth.  The mangosteen was ripe and juicy, and it's been a while since I last had some.  My favorite fruit in Bali is the local passion fruit.  I just love the fresh, subtle fragrance and delicate flavors - in stark contrast to the intense flavors of "normal" passion fruit that we are used to seeing.

Destination wedding Bali day 1: welcome to Bali!

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I'm in Bali this weekend for another wedding.  Bali sure has become a popular choice for destination weddings particularly among those of us in Asia.  It's an easy location to get to - with direct flights from many Asian cities - and the beauty of the island of the gods is indisputable.  I'm happy to be back after a 3-year absence.

After finally collecting my checked in luggage and suffering from anxiety about having it picked up by someone else from the carousel, I took a taxi to Alila Villas Uluwatu, where some of us are staying for the weekend.  The villas here are a little too modern for my taste - mostly straight lines at 90 degrees with sharp corners.  Too much concrete and cement, and virtually no Balinese or Indonesian architectural elements.  Having said that, the villas are very spacious - both indoors and outdoors.  I look forward to dipping in the pool.

This is the first time I'm in Bali by myself, and with just a few hours until the welcome dinner, I decided to spend some time in my villa.  The sky is a beautiful hue of blue, and the temperature is a relatively cool 27°C with a nice breeze.  I hook up to the hotel wifi and sit under the shade of the cabana, enjoying the view out to the distant ocean.  No, I did not come to Bali to surf the waves.  I'm surfing the net.

Bali wedding day 5: Thanks a lot, Tony Bourdain!

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Last day in Bali, and I woke up with beautiful views of the greenery in Ubud. I am finally able to look out from my terrace and enjoy the view and the tranquility, but not for long...

We decide to take breakfast at Uma Ubud's restaurant, since we weren't able to on our last visit. It's a nice breakfast that's designed to be healthy. The nasi lemak was so upscale I didn't even recognize it... Guess I'm too used to the ones that come in a banana leaf and costs next to nothing... I did notice that we were the only Asians having breakfast, and that 80% of the patrons were from Australia and knew each other. Maybe these are the guests from the wedding they had just finished hosting.

The focus of the day is on lunch, but first we needed to do a bit of shopping. A friend asked us to buy some vanilla so that she could make vanilla crème brûlée. We of course are only too happy to oblige, as long as we get to taste some of the finished product! After visiting a number of stalls and bargaining the price down, we finally bought about 100g of the longer pods which looked like they were in decent condition.

We head for lunch at Ibu Oka's. This is a famous restaurant which serves only babi guling - roast pig. It has been at the corner of Ubud's main crossroad next to Ubud Palace for a long time, but we found that they had moved. It is now in a larger, more beautiful compound hidden in an alley. The new digs are much, much nicer.

We sat down and ordered a regular portion of the roast suckling pig on rice, as well as an extra portion of the crispy crackling. While it has been a few years since our last visit, the prices have gone sky high during this time. What used to cost IDR 10,000 is now listed as IDR 25,000. And IDR 30,000 buys you just a few pieces of crackling. Whoa! I know that food prices - particularly the price of pork - has gone up worldwide. But I immediately thought of another factor - Tony Bourdain. Since our last visit in 2005, Tony has visited Ibu Oka's and introduced it to the Western world on 'No Reservations'. As a result, there are now only tourists at the new location, whereas we were packed amongst mostly locals in 2005. The complete absence of locals - other than tour guides accompanying tourists - tells me that prices are now so high that locals no longer give Ibu Oka their business.

The food arrived and we dug in. The meat was still tender and the wafer-thin crackling still yummy. But we noticed a reduction in the amount of spicy sauce given. The combination of everything was still tasty, but certainly much less spicy than before. I think this is in response to the changing customer mix, as tourists are less likely to be able to handle the heat. I remember that I found it difficult to take the spices on my last visit, but was completely OK this time around. I did enjoy the couple of pieces of fried pig intestines, although I thought the blood sausage was a bit too dry.

In spite of all this, we ordered a large portion of the suckling pig with rice to take away. This could very well be our dinner on the flight back, if we didn't find the food in cattle class to our liking. The pig was good, but we probably won't be back for a while as we search for another spot with better value for money.

We were dropped off in front of the McDonald's at the airport, and I promptly checked out the menu for anything special that isn't available elsewhere. Unfortunately there weren't any, so I didn't get my overseas Mickey D's fix this time around. On a brighter note, we were upgraded to Business Class for the flight back. This is probably my last upgrade before I lose my current tier status at the end of the month, and we were pretty happy to have a bit more space and a better menu. I guess the box of babi guling would make it back to Hong Kong after all...

Bali wedding day 1: Balinese delicacies

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I'm in Bali for a few days attending a friend's wedding. For my first meal in town, I went back to Ketupat, the fine Balinese restaurant which is hidden amongst the tourist traps on Jalan Legian in Kuta. I first visited Ketupat in January 1998. The Asian Financial Crisis was full-blown, and IDR went from around 2,400 to 10,000. This made everything extremely cheap as most places hadn’t adjusted their prices in IDR. On that visit, we ordered so much of the mango juice that the restaurant ran out…

It took us a bit of time to figure out where we wanted to sit, and we finally ended up by the pool as the ladies wanted. I’ve always loved coming here, as one can choose to sit in the open courtyard and look up at the stars, or in more traditional ‘cabanas’. The group faced a dizzying array of dishes shown on the menu, and decided to order a few appetizers first to quash the hunger while we took more time to figure out the rest.

Meanwhile, we ordered a round of drinks and tried out arak, the Balinese liquor made from rice (or palm sap). I had mine on the rocks (arak es) so I could get the true taste of it. Actually it tasted like a stronger version of Korean sochu. After a few sips of our drinks, we were ready for the food...

Lumpia langsing – bean sprout salad wrapped in crêpes. Not bad but essentially a veggie spring roll…

Perkedel jagung - these fried corn fritters were disappointing. Kinda soggy and pretty salty, these are nothing like the ones made by my friends' Indonesian helper in Hong Kong.

Rempeyek - these are the delicious peanut crackers I've had before as snacks. Large, thin chips topped with lumps of peanuts and local spices. Yummy!

Nasi goreng petani - not sure why the vegetarian fried rice were served right after the appetizers, but it was pretty delicious.

Sate campur - a mixed selection with chicken, pork, beef and mutton. Served with two types of sauce and some ketupat - the rice dumplings for which the restaurant is named.

Udang batolok - prawns stir-fried with chilli and green tomato. This was actually pretty good.

Ikan bakar colo colo - this grilled snapper was served with a salsa of tomato, shallots, basil and lemongrass. Pretty nice flavor and the salsa was a surprise.

The waiter forgot to take our order of roast duck, and we decided to give it a pass as we were pretty full at this point. We looked around for some Indonesian sweets but wasn't able to find anything really intereting.

I'm glad I came back to an old favorite, and used the opportunity to introduce Balinese cuisine to my friends. Next time I'll make sure to have the duck and a few other classic dishes, maybe I'll finally do the rijsttafel!