I had lunch in Chako, a Japanese restaurant tucked away in an area in Singapore I don’t venture to unless absolutely necessary. Getting to the restaurant was slightly cumbersome. Finding it was much, much easier. In an old mall littered with used car rental offices and dentists, it didn’t take long to find Chako. Just a white wash of walls and a small sign that bore its name – so achingly minimal but such is the way of the Japanese. And when you step past its faux rice paper sliding door and into the restaurant, you’d first notice how startlingly small – no, crazy tiny it is.

The entire restaurant is decorated in typical Japanese fashion: creepy lucky nekocat with extra long whiskers stares at you from the entrance, old paintings line the walls and a 2012 Mount Fuji calender is a visual tease to anyone hapless enough to have never gone (ME!). Sitting at the back of the cashier is a small Yakult fridge – the ones you can still find at old provision stores – with not one bottle of the colourful fermented milk that reigned in my adolescence. Instead, Fridge-san is filled with old bottles of sake. Old Japanese tunes are playing in the background, distracting us from the cacophony in the adjoining kitchen. I thought it was unfortunate a restaurant like this would be so inaccessible but having dined there now I realised it all made sense. For three hours, I was in Japan – where else would I be?

Let’s talk about the food. Chako is family-owned so they specialise in homecooked Japanese food. The head cook is a Japanese aunty who married a Malay sailor back in the day so Muslims, everything from the sauces to the softbroiled unagi served in Chako is made from scratch and is halal. The only thing is they serve sake to cater to the many Japanese expats who live in the area. It’s recommended that you shoot them an email regarding reservations and preordering your food before coming down because the restaurant can only take about 15+ people and that’s it. Here’s another catch: be prepared to wait for your food for this no-nonsense obasan only cooks the minute you arrive. How long did I have to wait for my preordered meal set? 2 hours. Not even kidding.

I didn’t mind the wait because I knew about it prior to my lunch and I was there with a bunch of great friends so we were entertaining ourselves with small talk in between sips of Chako’s homemade roasted barley tea. Diana ordered the Beef Sukiyaki, layers upon layers of enoki + shitake mushrooms, vegetables, thinly-sliced beef in this heavenly broth that all of us kept stealing to eat with our rice. I had the Unatamaju set – softbroiled unagi on the fluffiest bed of egg and rice. It’s $23, definitely not the cheapest unagi bowl in the country but damn, expensive unagi tastes extraordinary. So extraordinary, 4 of us ordered the same thing lol. My cousin, Nadz, hates unagi but after forcing a spoon down her throat, I think she might just like it a lil bit more now ;p Nadz had the Gyutamaju, sliced beef and egg in soy over rice which she loved. I had a bite of hers and the beef was so tender – I’d liken it to a truncated beef sukiyaki in a bowl actually – I’m ordering this next time! We also shared the Ikabata Yaki, stir-fried squid in butter and garlic, holy batman amazing. Every set comes with a small bowl of soft cold tofu, clam miso soup and pickles too.

Chako is so good at what it does, it’s put me in this permanent Japanese food mood; I am endlessly thinking about everything I ate since Sunday and I’d go there more often if I wasn’t living off a student allowance D: The food there is definitely not everyday cheap but where else can you take a 3 hour trip to Tokyo for under $30?

I’d like to wish all my Chinese readers across the globe a very stellar Lunar New Year! GET THOSE ANGBAOS, PEOPLE! x

Chako
Tel: 6776 3919
134 West Coast Way
Hong Leong Garden Shopping Centre
Mon – Fri: 12:15pm – 2:30pm, 6:30pm – 10:30pm
Sat – Sun: 6:30pm – 10:30pm

P.S: They have excellent customer service btw, they don’t open during lunch hours on Sunday but Diana did her superwoman thing and got them to open for us. A+, ‘mainstream’ sushi joints you could never.

I think Japanese shrooms tend to get overlooked here in Singapore since it’s readily available all year, you can find it anywhere, and a packet is just under a dollar (if you know where to look). Most people tend to go for the meatier, more expensive field or portobello variety which I’m also obsessed with and I’m lucky to be living in Australia where these shrooms cost half the price they get sold for in Singapore. The bad? The ‘specialty’ Japanese shrooms are expensive and should be avoided when you’ve spent half your allowance on things best left hidden away from the mothership LOL. Every time I fly home I make sure I eat my fill of Japanese shrooms until I can’t stand the sight of them anymore.

I like the idea of having Japanese food for New Year’s because it makes me feel like I’m one with my people HAHAHAHA RIGHT! The Japanese have this ritual of eating certain foods during New Year’s and while I’m not entirely sure whether they actually eat soba then but what the heck let’s pretend they do! I hope you guys like this recipe, it’s simple and clean eating – what the Japanese do best.

Tsuyu is essentially the dipping sauce that comes with your soba noodles and you can get it at any supermarket with a Japanese food aisle. Muslims might have some trouble finding a bottle without mirin or sake in it so here’s a recipe I always follow. Just replace the mirin with a little white grape or apple juice and add less sugar since juice is inherently packed with fructose ;p And because we’re already eating the soba noodles with the exact same tsuyu we’ve made/bought, I’ve added a couple of twists for the tsuyu simmering sauce so everything doesn’t end up tasting the same

Tsuyu Simmered Shimeji Mushrooms with Cha Soba

Ingredients
Chilled tsuyu
Cha soba (or normal soba if you prefer)
1 packet shimeji mushrooms (enoki works great too!)
A squeeze of lime juice
1 tablespoon soy sauce
Shredded seaweed

1. Cook the soba according to the instructions on the packet. Drain the pot when done and if you like your soba chilled, plunge the soba in ice cold water. Drain again and put it in the fridge until ready to eat.

2. Pour some tsuyu into a pot and throw in some shredded seaweed, lime juice and soy sauce.

3. When the tsuyu reaches a light boil, it’s time to dump in your shrooms!

4. Let it simmer for about 5-10 minutes or until all the shrooms are cooked.

5. Drain the mushrooms but don’t throw away the simmering sauce! You can pour it in a bottle, chill it and voila – dipping sauce for your next soba meal!

6. Get your soba out of the fridge, pile your shrooms on the noodles, garnish with more seaweed and roasted sesame seeds! Pour the rest of your chilled tsuyu in a small bowl and you’re all set! ME GUSTAAAAAAA

Happy 2012, everyone! Thank you for reading this tiny speck of space on the web, it means so much to me! I was thinking of changing my layout but I remembered how torturous it was for me to recreate all my graphics last year so I’m scrapping that idea LOL. I did, however, change the typefaces for my entry titles and headings so everything looks more streamlined now – that counts right? 8D I also just renewed my web hosting for another 3 years so I guess tea noir’s not going anywhere. Here’s to a beautiful and fulfilling year for everyone!

Here’s something I’ll miss doing when I was still living at the old apartment: having coffee at Alimentari. I’ve written about this cafe before here and at that time, I thought it was just an unnamed deli too cool, too chic to fiddle with names. One of my readers, Sher Reen (HEY GIRLLL! ;p), commented that said deli/cafe did have a name so that’s that lol. While some of its mystery has dwindled with the unveiling of its true name, you have to agree with me – Alimentari is one hell of a haute word. I thought it was a smart improvisation of ‘elementary’ at first but a quick google search tells me alimentari is actually Italian for food basics. Mmm. I can’t say I’ve tried their food since everything seems to be dripping in pork fat lol but their coffee? As fantastic as it looks in my pictures.

Here’s a quick update on what went down the last couple of weeks:

1) I’ve moved and am absolutely thrilled with my new place. I can’t believe I’m actually living in the city! My zip code’s Melbourne 3000 which isn’t as catchy as 90210 but I feel like I’ve made it somehow.

2) Results were released the first day of my move and my friends are tired of hearing me say this, but last semester was seriously my worst semester ever. I fell ill during the submission period and had to write all my essays while drugged by every brand of painkillers I could get my hands on. I also had terrible luck with essay questions this semester; I had to change my chosen question three times because Google wasn’t feeling any of them and (this is very painful to admit) some idiot actually got to the library books before I did. WTF SOMEONE IN SCHOOL IS ACTUALLY MORE KIASU THAN ME?! IMPOSSIBLE.

I was jittery the entire morning and refused to check the results until I couldn’t take the suspense anymore. So I did and I scored 3 distinctions and an A! I don’t know how the heck that happened but I am very, very, very thankful. Thank you God, you amaze me. I’m going to have to step it up next semester, get straight distinctions and borrow all my library books 2 months before my essay deadlines or something. These people need to know they’re dealing with a relentless Singaporean mmkay. Just kidding.

…or am I? ;p

3) Playing host/tour guide to friends and family is the worst thing to do in the midst of a move. My cousin flew in just as we were moving and dude, the residual stress from trying to fit the past two years of your life into boxes will temporarily disable all socializing skills, I can tell you that. Thankfully, the city itself was beautiful enough to captivate my cousin or we’d have failed as hosts tbh. Moving is serious business man, I don’t want to do it again.

4) I declined my dad’s offer to get me a Prada wallet as a reward for my grades and an additional bribe to keep them up next year. I know, I said NO TO A FREE PRADA OMFG WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? There’s a story behind why I said no though, and honestly, do I really need another Prada wallet? (Yes, yes, I do lol DAMN IT).

I’m flying home in a week YAYYYYYY! I can’t wait to start working on Storm in a Teacup when I’m back in Singapore again, thank you so much for all your FB ‘likes’ and comments on the project! I was so scared nobody was going to find it interesting but everything worked out for the best. I’m still ironing out some issues with both my new and old apartments and my roommate’s family is here too so this might just be my last entry before I’m back in Singapore Ah well, I’ll see you guys soon on the hotter side of the planet, take care x

Alimentari
251 Brunswick St, Fitzroy

My Diana Mini I’ve ignored for far too long and one of my favourite buys of the year: a vintage brass ring Aaron thinks must have come straight out of the Lord of The Rings. Everyone else keeps mistaking it for a YSL. Either way, I’m not complaining.

Left: One of the small boutiques along the street sells French soaps and bubble baths. Honestly, I could care less about the fancy soap; I just want the beautiful bottles they come in. Right: The unnamed Deli (or is it just ‘Deli’? hmm..) whose lattes I have a fondness for.

Technically, this bakery isn’t on Brunswick St but on Gertrude St which is pretty close. It’s called Fatto a Mano and they sell some of the best (and cheap) organic bread. They’re famous for their sourdough and potato & olive pizza slices which always run out by mid-day :/ I LOVE their jam doughnuts as well. Unlike conventional doughnuts, their version is a simple ball of light yeasty bread. It’s sliced in half with raspberry jam slathered on one side and a heaping of cream in the other. Mmm. Creammmm.

Fatta a Mano’s pizzas I was talking about. Left: Sundried tomatoes and basil. Right: Potato and Olive. Yep I bought a slice ;p

Perseverance Hotel: love the old architecture and the turrets but would I ever consider staying there for a night? Never.

The many tiny roads leading out to Gertrude St/Brunswick St have some great graffiti. On that subject, I do consider graffiti a form of art but only when it’s on the streets and not on a property I own. Fork yeah, double standards!

And as always, I’m suckered in by any species of pretty plant/flower.

Some photos I took while meeting a friend for coffee at Brunswick St, the ‘hipster spot’ of Melbourne. It’s essentially a ten minute walk from my place and it’s one of the few things I’m going to miss about living in this crap hole apartment. It’s also where you can find my fave fish & chips shop, Hooked (which I wrote about here).

I’m trying to write shorter entries for this blog so nobody has to wait a month for another one of my super long entries. I’m not good with multitasking: when I have school work, I have finish it first which is why I can no longer read my favourite blogs as often as I’d like (forgive me, friends! ) and any thought of updating my own blog has always been ignored and pushed to the back of my to-do list. And frankly, I also can’t afford to get an Asian F on my transcript or my parents might threaten to cut me off LOL. So here’s to a more regular posting schedule on tea noir! ;D

Fatto a Mano Organic Bakery
228 Gertrude Street
Fitzroy VIC 3065

Uni started this week and my mind still hasn’t adjusted itself to the escalation of thinking required when attending classes. The first week after spring break is customarily filled with “how was your holiday?”-type questions and I’m always happy to oblige. Against a background of my friends recollecting their adventures in Sydney/Queensland/Monaco (k the Monaco tale did make me a lil green), I was one of the few who would say unashamedly, “I did absolutely nothing and it was beautiful.”

Okay, that was a semi-lie. I spent the last two weeks getting my body back on track: I threw away all the junk food I had in my house, even my roommate’s emergency bags of crisps when she wasn’t looking. Just kidding. It took all of my powers of persuasion (“It’s not food wastage if it isn’t real food to begin with!”) and she finally relented in the end. I also ate more complex carbs and at some point, the only form of protein I was consuming was tofu so in some ways, I became a pseudo-vegetarian LOL.

This was unintentional to be honest, I couldn’t be arsed to go to the market to get fish and meat ;p But the two week meat purge did me some good: I’ve lost 3 kilos so far WHOO /o/ Anyway, my fridge is now fully-stocked again so I guess that’s the end of my stint as a vegetarian haha! It feels great to be eating healthy again though and I can’t remember why I went down the dark path of evil processed food – Oh right – school, the elitist institution responsible for nurturing, not bright minds, but weight gain.

The irony in this entry is that I’m about to share a seafood chowder recipe which isn’t exactly on top of the healthy food list since it’s loaded with one of God’s greatest gifts to female thighs: cream. But one can always make healthy adjustments to the recipe by using lite cream and skim milk, yes? I take no credit for the recipe, it’s actually my roommate’s which is why I’ve named it after her ;D Thanks Nini! <3

Nini’s Seafood Chowder

Ingredients
1 teaspoon butter
1 onion
2 gloves garlic
1 potato, boiled and grated
1 cup fresh milk
1/2 cup cream (YEAAAAHHHHH)
1.5 cups of seafood marinara mix
1 tablespoon parsley, chopped finely
A pinch of salt and black pepper

Instructions
1. Melt the butter in a heated pot and throw in the garlic and onion until fragrant.

2. Add in the grated potato and stir.

3. Pour the fresh milk into the pot and let it heat up for a bit.

4. Add the marinara and cream into the mixture and make sure you stir well!

5. Season according to taste with the salt, black pepper and parsley.

6. Serve with bread or with pasta!

I actually like it enough on its own ;D Bon appétit!

And because I’ve been a proud Apple advocate since 2005:

The man whose computers and applications I have to thank for allowing me to create beautiful things like tea noir and the many other design projects I was involved in during my days as a design student and subsequently, as a working designer. Thank you Steve, and goodbye.

Image credit: Time.com

P.S about the Apple logo: It wasn’t designed by Steve Jobs or anyone under Apple for that matter. It was designed by a man named Rob Janoff who says the story of Adam and Eve had nothing to do with the bite in the famous apple. Here’s my favourite quote from an interview he did:

I’m probably the least religious person, so Adam and Eve didn’t have anything to do with it. The bite of knowledge sounds fabulous, but that’s not it. And, there is a whole lot of other lure about it.

Turing, the famous supposed father of computer science who committed suicide in the early 50’s, was British and was accused of being homosexual, which he was. He was facing a jail sentence so he committed suicide to avoid all that. So, I heard one of the legends being that the colored logo was an homage to him. People think I did the colored stripes because of the gay flag. And, that was something really thought for a long time. The other really cool part was that apparently he killed himself with a cyanide laced apple. And, then I found out Alan Turing’s favorite childhood story was Snow White where she falls asleep forever for eating a poisoned apple to be woken up by the handsome prince.

Anyway, when I explain the real reason why I did the bite it’s kind of a let down. But I’ll tell you. I designed it with a bite for scale, so people get that it was an apple not a cherry. Also it was kind of iconic about taking a bite out of an apple. Something that everyone can experience. It goes across cultures. If anybody ever had an apple he probably bitten into it and that’s what you get.

It was after I designed it, that my creative director told me: “Well you know, there is a computer term called byte”. And I was like: “You’re kidding!”

Ahh I would have gotten this entry up earlier if it hadn’t been raining so much in Melbourne! The weather’s been perfect for personal slumber parties in my room; I’ve been curling up in bed while watching fashion documentaries like Valentino: The Last Emperor. That, by the way, is an incredible film! It was pretty amazing spotting all the dresses I took photos of in my Valentino: A Retrospective entries (part 1 and part 2) and if you loved The September Issue, you’re going to love the Valentino film too ;D

I met Ana for brunch the other day at a new patisserie and boulangarie called Chez Dre in South Melbourne. Her photo’s up there, just so you know I don’t go to all these places by myself k. She’s one of my more recent readers and get this: she discovered my blog by googling for the reasons behind ridiculous, expensive Malay weddings and found herself agreeing to everything I’ve said in this particular entry (which I remember writing while under the influence of sugar) Just how cool is that lol? Anyway, since the Malay community in Melbourne is extremely small, it turns out we’ve actually met before at a mutual friend’s house for last year’s Eid! We’ve been proper friends for about a month now and it’s been beautiful.

I think Chez Dre (which I’m assuming is French) is fairly new to the Melbourne brunch scene and the place they’re located at used to be a warehouse before it was turned into this fine eating establishment. I love that breakfast is served all day in Chez Dre and you don’t have to go anywhere else for dessert because damn it, you can see they’ve got that covered. Different varieties of eclairs and strips of mousse cakes decorated with house-made macarons and gold leaf, I had trouble settling for one. I don’t know how we did it but Ana and I actually shared dessert wtf. We tried the salted caramel eclair which was filled walnuts and a buttery cream slightly reminiscent of smooth cake batter, it was SO GOOD (this coming from a person who’s indifferent to walnuts). I’m so impressed, I’m heading there again tomorrow and sry2say I am not going to share my dessert with anyone 8D

One of the best things about blogging at tea noir is meeting and getting to know, not just other bloggers, but the people who regularly put up with my sparse updates/nonsense: you. It’s wonderful hearing what people think about my blog in person, over a cup of coffee. That way, I can be sure I hear only the good stuff – anything bad and that cup of coffee is going home as a stain on someone’s top just sayin’ girllll. HAHAHAHA nah, I am completely open to -ahem- constructive criticism but so far, people seem to have the same complaint: that I should update more. I hear ya, I hear ya!

Just two days ago, I also met up with my sole stewardess friend, Hid, who was in Melbourne for a day! We regularly stalk each other’s blogs, except she hasn’t blogged in ages *cough* Honestly, I was expecting it to be a little awkward because it’s been two years since we last saw each other and like a man, I tend to get slightly nervous around exceptionally beautiful girls rofl (shut up Hid, you’re beautiful okay!) But again, I had a smashing time – we ended up talking for hours over the most random things: how horrid Ibiza really is, the Singapore education system, photography and how much she disliked Angelina Jolie and Natalie Portman (I know right, I told her she was crazy). Thank you so much for the great company, Hid! Hid also has a blogshop, Nyla, and hopefully if our schedules don’t clash, I’ll have a stint as a guest photographer for Nyla! ;D

Anyway, I am completely digressing from my main point here. I would really love to meet my readers in person because I firmly believe any girl (or guy) who enjoys reading this space would probably be great to hang out with so I’m proposing a massive tea noir meet-up in Singapore when I head back! That way I can meet you guys and you guys can meet each other! I have no idea how I’m going to organize it yet but I just wanted to get this idea out and see what you would think of it. So, who’s interested? ;p

Chez Dre
285-287 Coventry Street
Melbourne, 3205

It’s strange. It’s never occurred to me to try my hand at making sushi despite it being a staple food I buy when I don’t have time to cook. I have made onigiri before to great success but never its more elegant sister, the maki roll. It’s a combination of factors that draw me away from making the maki: 1) I don’t have a bamboo mat. 2) Rolling sushi seems to be an art form that should be left to the professionals. 3) What if I screw up somewhere?

But one becomes brave enough to take a whack at making sushi when one spends too much on ASOS. If like me, you’ve fallen on hard times but aren’t willing to give up on your weekly Japanese dinners – I bring you THE NON-DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO MAKING SUSHI /o/

You should only use medium or short-grain rice to make sushi. Long-grain or the ever popular Singaporean favourites, jasmine and basmati rice, should not be used at all! They aren’t starchy enough to hold up the shape of the sushi.

Sushi vinegar
The recommended ratio for sushi vinegar is 5 parts rice vinegar: 2 parts sugar: 1 part salt (I used a tad more sugar tho)

Whisk the rice vinegar, sugar and salt in a bowl until everything has dissolved. I made a huge batch and stored in the fridge for future FOREVER ALONE sushi parties. I can’t say how much sushi vinegar you should put in your cooked rice because it depends entirely on your concoction and the amount of rice you’ve got. I eyeballed my measurements as per usual which on most days works pretty well but the universe decided my overconfidence towards cooking needed a shake-up so I ended up adding a little too much vinegar to my rice. Bleh ._.

Thankfully I discovered this was easily remedied by adding a few tablespoons of water to the rice. Of course as I type this, I can already imagine the many Japanese sushi chefs sharpening their knives, ready to make sashimi out of me for smearing their craft. The big deal? Well, you’re not supposed to add too much liquid to the sushi rice or it’ll get too sticky, making it hard to work with. But whatever man, as explicitly stated in my title this is totally not the real way to make sushi ;p Plus: sticky rice >>>> sour rice. Yep, I am clearly not striving for perfection LOL.

Rolling without a bamboo mat.

Honestly, after coming up with my method of rolling makis without the prerequisite bamboo mat – I don’t think I’ll ever invest in one haha! It’s just so easy to do it this way, this might actually be the start of a new way of making maki rolls 8D All you have to do is leave a gap at both ends of the seaweed square as seen in the first photo (when making rolls with a bamboo mat, one only leaves a gap at one end) and you can start rolling! Just tuck in the clean edge of the seaweed in and rollllll bb. Ah, I desperately wanted to make a lame joke about a particular Adele song but I shall refrain from doing so.

Cut your roll!
Take a very sharp knife, wet it to ensure the rice doesn’t stick to the steel and trim off the edges. Then simply cut your roll into pretty maki circles!

VOILA! My spicy salmon, avocado and furikake maki roll!

Best served with some awesome raspberry lemonade, of course. Get some rice, rice vinegar, seaweed squares, your filling of choice and start making your own maki rolls! It’s really not that hard as long as you don’t try to sell them 8D

I haven’t been here in more than a month, omg. I just got a little caught up with my mid-terms, such a killer D: I have missed this blog terribly though, hopefully no one’s thought I’ve abandoned it. But I’m sure you guys are used to my disappearing acts, non? ;p They’re not pleasant but it’s something I have to do when school morphs into a clingy, possessive boyfriend. Anyway, I’m not feeling well so I’m going to cut this entry short. Good night and stay safe, everyone! x

P.S In other news, my bff got invited to the exclusive Louis Vuitton opening preview party at their new Maison store at the Marina Bay Sands, SO JEALOUS OMFG WHAT IS THIS. Read about it on his blog here! Admittedly, I am not a die-hard LV fan like he is but that’s a place I’d love to check out when I fly back in December!

Ramadhan
The ninth month of the Muslim year.

Perseverance triumphs the callous sun
that bruises thirst
in throats pained by sea’s amnesia.
Poised empathy:
“It was written down upon you
as it was upon those before you.”
You shall not eat nor drink in the day.

We have our first meal balancing on threads
of after dark and before dawn.
But it is true dusk that awakens the hollow’s pulse.
The mosque clambers to prepare for Iftar
where the people, penniless or rich, feast together.
Honor the poor:
Pick the flesh off a Medjool date,
and dine on porridge.
We are equals.

Again, we rise to wed hunger with faith,
charting the bones of humility
for thirty nights, in thriving modesty
breaking the stasis with rapture’s Eid.

- For my late grandmother.

Poetry Final Collection of 10 poems, 22.04.2011

Man, I’ve waited for a long time to publish this ;p Patience is not one of my greatest strengths but imma try this holy month to be less of a chocolate cake abuser and more of a warm cup of milk + a Medjool date sort of girl.

But who am I kidding? I’ve already got next week’s dinners planned out in my moleskine: Beef lasagne topped with the ultra french bechamel sauce, creamy artichoke and shrimp linguine when Yumi hangs out at my apartment next week (WB SOCIAL LIFE!), honey braised chicken – just to name a few. Of course while I still plan on indulging in my habitual greedy affair with food, I will try to get rid of some bad habits and maybe birth some good ones. In any case, I’m thrilled Ramadhan is here again. This is the best time to do some soul cleansing and grey area detoxin’ (if you get my drift). Ramadhan Mubarak to all my Muslim readers!

My move to Melbourne has not helped my sometimes frivolous fixation with bread. Well okay, my blog is an obvious testament as to how much passion I have for food but mmm bread, I just go crazy for bread. I could be heading to one of my dream locations in the world: the Louvre or the Blue Mosque in Turkey, but if by some half-baked chance (baha a pun!), I see a bakery just short of entering the Louvre – sorry Titian, Caravaggio and Da Vinci, you guys gotta wait 15 more minutes before I get my art appreciation skillz on.

It gives me the kicks to pick a loaf of bread from the local bakery I’ve never tried before. I guess I’m still not used to the exceptional range of breads we get here. It’s a nice change from the mass manufactured sliced white bread I get back home. Singapore definitely needs more artisan bakeries that don’t extort money for a simple loaf of rustic sourdough. It’s just one of life’s essentials, you know? Pick a beautiful loaf of bread and already, the thought of waking up early for breakfast becomes quite appealing.

Cut two slices off your pane di casa, melt some tasty cheese sprinkled with italian herbs (cheap and quickest way to making your own herbed cheese!), bulk it up with some baby spinach + rocket leaves and top it off with slices of smoked salmon. I was introduced to sliced beetroot here and while I would normally shirk at the idea of stuffing a vegetable I’m unfamiliar with in a sandwich, dayumm it tastes fine. My Singaporean readers, you should try it some time ;p I always find it hard to limit myself to one slice of smoked salmon per sandwich but when money is tight, you gotta do what you gotta do girl.

Still, I must confess: even when I’m down to my last few dollars, I will fork out everything I’ve got for a small bottle of Japanese matcha powder. Once you’ve figured out the right ratio of matcha, sugar and milk – you can say goodbye to Starbucks forever. A cup of warm green tea latte and a sandwich made with my bread du jour. This is my ideal breakfast, what’s yours?

I love it when my girlfriends and I get together for dinner. Somehow the best conversations always seem to be formed during the great wait for your food to arrive from the kitchen. The other night we were trading relationship horror stories (the ones where you start with “omg you wouldn’t believe what this douche did to a girl I used to know”) and a friend who’d never dated before exclaimed that hearing all these stories made her fear relationships even more because everyone seems to get hurt/cheated on.

She does have a point. The stories of ever after and true love have become less apparent, less heard of, while botched fairy tales where the girl gets dumped have quickly risen to become a staple topic at girly dinners. But honestly, I think getting dumped may not necessarily be as terrible as it is made out to be. Of course, if your ex-boyfriend was a lying, cheating bastard who dumped you for another girl, then yes, I will be signing my name on your petition to have him sterilized and sent to live among sheep.

But what if he broke up with you because you weren’t the greatest girlfriend? And that you weren’t the flawless female you thought you were? If that is the case, then the break-up serves as a way to re-examine yourself, to discover the flaws you subconsciously knew you had all along but never took notice of – I mean, who likes admitting they have flaws right? You can cry for a month but you have to realise that there has to be a reason why your boyfriend left your purported perfection to cruise the highway for singles once more. And while it stings like a mother to admit that you were the main cause of the break-up, good news is you finally have time to work out what actually went wrong, to brush away the thin shroud of denial that once comforted you and slowly, work on diminishing your weaknesses.

Being in close contact with a person gives you awareness of how you behave in private: you show a ‘secret’ side of you, a certain vulnerability that your family and best friends never get see – I think this is the ultimate reason why even the most mutual break-ups hurt. But it’s okay. Every break-up we go through only serves to make us stronger and a little closer to figuring out how relationships work. And slightly twisting a song title from Daft Punk, we all emerge hardened, better, faster and stronger. Whether your past relationships have been happy or progressed into grisly horror flicks, I think we all can learn a lot about ourselves from being romantically involved with a person. Of course, I am in no way recommending that you throw yourself on the next available guy mmkay!

Ok is this blog turning into a relationship advice column or what lol? I have to apologize, some of my girlfriends flew in from Singapore last week and god, it’s been so long since I’ve had a girly dinner with people my age so the stuff we talk about is bound to end up on this blog ^_^; Oh and one more thing I like about girly dinners? The bitching fest that comes with dessert 8D

Some photos from last week:

1. My vegie burrito from Vegie Bar: Refried beans wrapped in a tortilla and nacho chips with sour cream and guacamole.

2. If these blended fruit juices had come in shorter glasses, they would’ve deceptively looked like potent cocktails.

3. My friend’s wild mushroom risotto from Vegie Bar.

4. Coffee stop at the Sensory Lab.

5. Showing my friends from Singapore my favourite graffiti wall in Melbourne.

6. Chicken paella at the Morrocan and Spanish restaurant, La Paella, off Sydney Road.

7. With a name like Van Gogh, this has to be the prettiest cake in the world.

8. Is it safe to say we will never run out of cakes in Melbourne?