I received my award! + My birthday celebration 09 - Marmalade Pantry with the Tai Tais

They were having a fruits party while giving out the award.  there was gonna be durian! i was joking wif my bosses to say... " didnt they know the award recipient doesnt eat durian? so smelly.. sob.. im getting a smelly award! " hahahha

sherlyn and anu who were supposed to help me take pictures of me receiving the award from the big big big big boss end up cam whoring and doing a fish....



haha..

receiving my award...



John took the pictures. and although there were a few other heads popping but i kinda liked the angle!

with our big big boss....



some of the fruits...



thanks to sherlyn who kinda drafted the nomination letter. actually i was also nominated last year but i guess i was still pretty new so i didnt get it. heee...



and also my boss shida...



myself with my TL and GTL...



and everyone were enjoying the fruits party....



quick congradulate me!



haha...

after the ceremony, i rushed back to office to finish up my work before heading over to the Marmalade Pantry to meet up with the tai tais. They are celebrating my birthday for me today!

like the postcard said....



'GIRLS NIGHT OUT!'

the interior of the restaurant...



much smaller than the branch at Palais.



here's what we ordered....



crab caesar salad...



this is super good. the veg were fresh and the sauce was just right. not overly thick or thin. taste wise was also great. the crab meat was generous and scrumptious! The pine nuts added a fragrant touch with every bite. YUM YUM!

aglio olio pasta with kurobuta pork...



while the pasta tasted good. i think the kurobuta pork was quite disappointing. i didnt find it tender (maybe moomba set my expectations too high) and the crispy parts werent crispy. i think i'd have liked the philip street's roast pork much better. haha

we also shared a beef sandwich...



done medium well...



the sandwich was good too. i'd have preferred the beef to be done medium rare. but having blogging this only one week later, to be honest i cannot remember the taste so i guess it wasnt wowing but just nice.

among the 3 i think my fav was the crab caesar. im still craving for it now!

the ladies were very interested in their desserts coz their colleagues and online research have told them that marmalade serves really good desserts.

we shared a mango and lemon grass crumble...



although i dun take mango but i chose this coz i remember loving it when i came wif carol last year and its the only crumble thingy they have. its the crumb bits dat i love of this item. the crumb bits mixed with the ice cream is simply mama mia~! if anyone from marmalade happens to read this, can you pretty pls innovate and come up with some other crumble so that non-mango eaters like myself can order it? haha

toffee date pudding ...



i'd say this is one of their signature dessert. today's one is much nicer than the previous few times i had this from marmalade. its nice. but in comparison i still much prefer broth's version. probably coz broth uses sour cream and it goes fabulously well wif the butterscotch.

us!



thank cute for the treat tai tais!

we were deciding between going for drinks along the pubs of far east square until we saw the lights at fullerton calling out to us.

we decided dat since its tai tai nights out, it made more sense to continue the night in a more tai tai-ish way. haha..

The courtyard....



tea~



each of us had a pot.





how can we miss cam whoring....













we each othered different types of tea. they had quite a range of tea and they had really interesting names. along the way i kinda had this wacky idea for us to pose and den i'd photoshop us in along with the theme of our different tea. the idea evolved when mummy gorzilla kept saying she wants a geisha to serve her her tea coz her tea is called geisha blossom and ah mah pig kept asking if i had the feeling of celebration after trying her tea.. haha.

ah mah pig began helping to fold the napkins into fans and check out these NG geisha shots...



haha...


and so, introducing the different tea....



Geisha blossom ($13)- Elegant and highly refined, this blend of Japan green tea and refreshing ripe southern fruits infuses into a fragrant cup that will calm and appease after a day's disruptions

its got a very strong fragrant fruits like smell. initially i thot the smell was from my apple tea but turned out it was from the geisha blossom.

Celebration ($18) - Rare white tea leaves are intricately handcrafted into a bouquet with blossoms of orange lil and osmanthus. Delicate and delightful.

among the 3 we ordered today, Celebration has the mildest smell. i'd prefer the Geisha blossom and the apple tea.

Apple Tea ($13) - A black tea with fresh green apple

I like my apple tea and find it pretty similar to the Geisha blossom.

Prawny has tagged 134 pictures of Leoie on facebook! haha

Last week leoie and i agreed we'll go check out that grilled chicken fast food place at iluma. i tried to ask the seafoodies also but only fishy agreed to come along.

leoie was late so fishy and myself went to window shop around. leoie was very late so we went to check out the chicken place first....



we ordered the 2 piece piri piri chicken to share....



the sauce is not wow-ing but now as i recall the taste, somehow i want to try more of it again. haha

they have some strawberry yoghurt drink thingy..



which i think is quite nice! not too sweet and has this fresh strawberry taste instead of an artifical strawberry taste.

we decided that we do not want to proceed with our dinner at piri piri so we walked around exploring the other food places while waiting for leoie. in the end, we decided on this japanese place...



the whole decor makes me feel like im transported over to japan.



myself and fishy!



this place is quite interesting! we didnt realise it until we took our seats.

Each table will have a scanner device like this....



to order, you have to first scan your table number....



the device will den announce your table number (yes! got sound one!) den prompt you to proceed to select the items you want to order.

so as you flip through the menu, you will notice these small item codes beside each item which you can scan....



on the bottom of the menu is also a chart like thing. after you select the item, the device will prompt you to select quantity which you can refer to the chart...



den u can choose to review, send or proceed to choose another item until you have ordered everything you want den proceed to click send. and den items will be sent to you one by one.

its fun! i was scanning away!

but the only thing abt this is, its hard to haf special request for the orders. but of coz, you can scan to request for server's attention under " waiter ".

and the whole thing just kinda excited me. soon they found me monopolizing the device and happily scanning away... WEEE~

the items  i  we ordered.....



the sashimi was not bad, fresh.

the tasteless items that looked good on the menu but quite tasteless....  (except the radish, the radish was GOOD!)...



tuna and quail egg sushi...



pretty good!

the half sized ramen...



the ramen was good. the soup was tasty. one of the better items tonight. but the char siew was just so so.

den for drinks, leoie saw this picture and had wanted to order this...



but i stopped him because he had previously already said root beer and i had already scanned it in. hahaha.. anyway, we didnt know what this drink is.. i somehow just felt dat it might be strawberry juice (most probably coz i saw the strawberry slices floating on it)... so i ordered strawberry juice and when it came, it turned out to be a normal red liquid in a cynlinder glass. so i thot ok maybe its not strawberry juice so i was curious to koe what drink it was. we tried to ask the server who was probably a thai. She took the menu, pointed to the picture and told me.. " picture only ".

so  i thot.. ok.. maybe she didnt koe wat i was talking about. so subsequently when a managerial level looking man served us our food, i tried to ask him again... den it was hilarious. firstly, i didnt realise he was japanese and he began trying to explain to us in his very strong japanese accent influxed english. he was also pointing to the menu den he used his index and middle finger to point to his eyes gesturing a 'see'.. and he said.. " see only... apple juice, orange juice, no " and he shook his head. omg.. it was HILARIOUS. my jaws almost found its way to the floor.

so... i was convinced. its just a picture. i feel mildly cheated but i had a good luff. haha

fried squid...



again, not particularly tasty in terms of taste. texture was also just mediocre.

teppanyaki oysters...



initially when it came, i was just teasing to say.. " got more chao ta one or not "... it turned out to be surprisingly good! also another one of the better items for tonight. in fact we didnt really taste any chao ta taste.

the meatballs..



another tasteless item. like the hardboiled egg and the sausage, they all seem like they are served boiled.

seafood fried rice...



ok.. rice was relatively tasty but not wowing.

some japanese style fried noodles thingy....



the two of them were excited when they saw it in the menu and when it was served on the table beside us. but somehow... i didnt find it nice and i dun think they did either. its just fried noodles.. wif egg. they ordered the one with pork belly, cannot even locate the pork belly.

and yeah,   i  we ordered a table full of food!



ahahaa.. n the funniest part is, they said i only ordered, i didnt help to eat =p

after dinner, they were shouting about how full they were. i, on the other hand still had room for desserts. the cheeky chocolate place was yelling out to me. sadly it was closed.. den as we walked over to empire state, i gleefully told them... " eh.. still open leh "

den they flipped the menu and the server walked over.. and i went.. " table for 3 " the two of them immediately flipped and gave me the WTH look. muahahaha



as we went through the menu, leoie said he will go for the pancakes. i was toying between the pancake n chocolate brownie although i koe they were super full, i decided that they can haf the pancake and i'll haf my chocolate brownie!

who knows, pancake was not available. the server offered to replace it with waffle instead and leoie was so cute and funny. he acted like a 'child' and went... " why no pancake? here say available all day "



and refer to menu....



hahahaha!

the yummilious look pancakes...



and if u are wondering why this entry is titled 'Prawny has tagged 134 pictures of Leoie on facebook', its coming right up!

Fishy was and myself were playing with Leoie's iphone and den fishy began taking shots of me and herself.. den she began taking pictures of Leoie... den together we both started to *flash* *flash* *flash*.....



cute! i realised only when i got home his tongue was sticking out!





good angle... like got like dun haf like dat....



and leoie commented.. " siao liao.. tonight i go home, facebook will put.. prawny has tagged duno how many pictures of you ".. hahahhaa





this picture leoie look very shuai!









and we did a picture in picture!



i also want!!





Den our dear fishy left as soon as the orders came!

oh.. n before the orders came, while they were going on abt how full they well, we came to a discussion.. u koe how pancakes are usually piled up? so now dat they are gonna replace the pancakes with e waffles, will they actually pile up the waffles? we were worried that they would. hahahaha

thank god they didnt....



the waffle was a bit hard actually. miss the waffle from gelare.

the chocolate brownie...



Agree wif leoie that their chocolate fudge is gao eh. ahha.. very thick! very sinful but quite yum!

and hehe... as expected, i cannot finish... so in the end...



muahhaa.. thank cute leoie!

After dinner, i told leoie.. " let's take the bus home " haha.. and we did! leoie sent me all the way back to my house.. what a gentleman like always.

anyway an da, im v.happy for u dat u are doing so well in ur work.