Leecher's Birthday 2014: Superstar K2 Korean BBQ and Ippudo

 

It has been a long while since the last birthday post. Last month, we celebrated Leecher's birthday and it dawned on me that I have yet to document his 2014 birthday celebrations, oops! I drafted this way back in May last year, but never got around loading the pictures from camera/phone for this entry -- testimonial of my procrastinating nature.

 

Before his actual birthday, we had a pre-birthday celebration with Kaiwei over Korean BBQ. Being the birthday boy, Leecher had the honour of picking the restaurant. Without any hesitation, he walked into a Korean BBQ, Super Star K2 Korean BBQ restaurant located along Amoy Street. The place was bustling with diners, despite the fact that it was almost 9PM. Almost every table was occupied and it took almost 15 min before we could grab a table. 

Having dinner with the boys. Yanni was busy with work in office, thus she couldn't join us in this korean feast. 

Before his butt even touched the chair, alcoholic Leecher immediately ordered 2 bottles of soju and 1 bottle of makgeolli to kick start the evening. I used to have a preference of soju over makgeolli. On this day, I decided that I should stick to makgeolli. 

Appetizers to start the meal: Korean seafood pancake and steamed egg soon arrived. The egg was so fluffy that it looked like a gigantic yellowish cotton candy. I couldn't polish this on my own since I was saving my stomach space for other food. 

Once charcoal is being placed, you know that it's time to start to ball rolling. The highlight of the meal arrived shortly. They have a variety of beef, pork and chicken. Price starts from $18 onwards. We had a go at 4 of their meat before deciding to order more. I much preferred spicy chicken over the other cuts/types of meat. Pork belly was awesome too.  

We were given a metal "tray" each with 5 compartments. Leecher & Kaiwei commented that this reminded them of their army days, where they have to take the trays and queue up in  the canteen during meal times, lol! You get your own set of condiments - bean paste, garlic, salt/pepper and onions. 

Let the feast begin (^^)

Superstar K2 Korean BBQ Restaurant

155/157 Telok Ayer Street 

Singapore 068611

Tel: 62212639

 

On Leecher's actual birthday, he had cravings for Japanese food. Even though I hate going to town during weekend, we headed to Ippudo @ Mandarin Gallery for dinner. We spotted the long queue while heading up the escalator, but Leecher insisted on joining the queue. What to do, birthday boy is the "biggest" on his day. 40 min later, we finally got a table, putting an end to my misery for I was in high heels :)

 

Birthday boy did the ordering: drinks, appetizers and mains.

The huge array of sake available on display. I was pretty certain that Leecher would definitely order a bottle to go with his meal.

Well, he proved me wrong by ordering Choya cocktails. We had Mandarino and Aranciata Rossa (Red Orange) mixed with Choya to kick start the evening. I was pretty surprised by his mild choice of drinks!
 

Love the vibrant colour. I was never a fan of choya. However, I was tempted to get a bottle of choya and recreate this drink at home. If Choya is not your cup of tea, you can always head for Umeshu cocktails that comes with tonic, cranberry, sprite or soda.

Leecher trying to get an instragram-worthy shot of the drinks, lol!

Appetizers consisted of beef tataki and spicy shrimps. The prawns were lightly battered and deep fried to a lovely golden brown, served with home-made spicy mayonnaise dip. The dip wasn't spicy at all, it was in fact more tangy which helped to whet the appetite. 

Akamaru chashu, topped with a tamago. This refined, modern-style ramen orginated from Hakata, where the broth is enhanced with special blended miso paste and fragnant garlic oil, served with thin noodles, pork belly, black fungus and spring onions.

 

I had Spicy Black, which was a mixture of tonkotsu and miso based broth mixed with chili oil and black pepper for that extra oomph. There was a range of ramen toppings to select from, but I always think that a bowl of ramen only looks complete when there is a tamago in it. I have a personal habit of saving the tamago for the last bite too.

 

Saving the last of our stomach space for Leecher's mini birthday cake. Happy birthday, my dear! 

Ippudo @ Mandarin Gallery
333A Orchard Road #04-02/03/04
Singapore 238867
Tel: 6235 2797

Guesthouses in Seoul, Korea

When it comes to booking accommodation for our trips, it has to fulfill some requirements like the location must be in a safe district, clean room with attached bathroom and lastly, fits within our budget. While I'm always tempted to stay at posh hotels, I can't bring myself to pay the hefty price tag. The money saved can go into our funding for more shopping or activities. During our recent visits to Korea, we opted to stay in guesthouses instead. Most of these guesthouses are located to major tourist attractions and conveniently accessible by public transportation. Best of all, they fit into our budget for being reasonably priced and come equipped with basic amenities. 

 Namsan Guest House

Namsan Guesthouse consists of 5 guesthouses which are within walking distance from one another. Every room is equipped with private bathroom, air-conditioner, cable TV and ondol system (Korean floor heating system). Conveniently located in Myeongdong, the guesthouse is located around 150m (up-slope) from the subway station and 10 min walk to Namsam Tower. Starting price of 55,000 Won for 2 pax.

Suitcasers

Suitcasers is located at City Hall station, one of the best location that you can ever find. You can walk to Deoksugang Palace, Cheonggyecheon Stream, Namdaemun and many others. You can reserve the portal wifi egg from them (complimentary) when you confirmed your reservation. The basic services includes breakfast, international calls, printing, cable TV etc - all free of charge as long as you are a staying guest. Starting price of 70,000 Won for 2 pax. 

Banana Backpackers

The Banana Backpackers is easily recognizable from the windmill outside the building. This guesthouse is strategically located to tourist sites like Insadong, Bukchon Hanok Village and Changdeokgung Palace. The staff are friendly and very helpful when we wanted to order Chinese takeout from the nearby restaurants. Starting price of 50,000 Won for 2 pax.

Haemil Guest House

 

 A traditional Korean house (Hanok) situated close to Changdeokgung Palace and Jongmyo, both of which are designated as UNESCO World Heritage sites. At Haemil, you will get to experience sleeping on their ondol heated floor, with traditional korean blankets & mattress. In addition, guests get to start the new day with either traditional Korean or Western breakfast prepared by the lovely hosts. Starting price of 100,000 Won for a room.

 Mago Guest House

 

Mago Guest House is centrally located near Chungmuro subway station and Namsangol Hanok Village. The place is designed to feel like a traditional home but with modern amenities. Offering a mixture of korean ondol rooms and modern rooms, this is the place to go if you like to experience the different styles without moving to another location. Starting price of 62,000 Won for 2 pax.

Psst .... detailed posts will be linked once completed, stay tuned! 

 

Jang Won Korean Restaurant & Just Want Coffee, The Garden

Whenever the convoy heads to JB, we'll end up going to Jang Won Korean Restaurant for a hearty meal (previous visit here). We have yet to come across another place that can rival the wide selection of banchan (반찬) at Jang Won. As usual, Joseph is our defacto order-guy, so we just need to concentrate on filling up our mouths with food while he shouts out the order list in the background. 

 

The Sisters untie! You can probably tell that this is a backdated entry given that I was still spotting my bangs, lol! Seriously trying to catch up on lost time heh.  While the others went for a "break", we spent time taking pictures, lol! Joycelyn is now a mummy to a sweet baby Valerie while Eunice has upgraded to Mrs Lik :) Will blog about their overseas wedding in another post when I sort out the pictures. 

 The mandatory group picture. As I coined it, this is attendance taking - proof of who joined for the gatherings.

Jang Won Restaurant

K3-211, 2nd Floor, Block C

Kompleks Perniagaan, Taman Stulang Laut

Jalan Ibrahim

Johor Bahru 80300

Joseph, being the 地头蛇, brought us to a cafe to chill. Before we departed Jang Won, Joe gave his smug look that the Sisters will love this cafe. We didn't believe him initially, but when Eunice also gave her nod of approval, we became excited. Sorry bro, we have more faith in your wife's taste. 

 

Located in a residential estate, the cafe is housed in an actual housing unit with its own garden! As soon as we got off the car, all the phones/cameras came out and the girls kept snapping away. Eunice showed me a picture of the exterior during day-time and mentioned that this cafe reminded her of our love nest, lol! 

Googled for the day picture (credits to owner of pic). OK, I want to go back again during day time and re-take all the pictures. Little did I know that this was just one of the JWC theme cafe outlets in JB. When I have the time to sort out pictures from the SD card, I shall blog about the JWC visit in another entry. 

Welcome to my The Garden. Both indoor and outdoor seats are available; given that it was a rather cooling night, we decided on outdoor seats to soak in the atmosphere. What a pity Leecher didn't join us for this outing~ I snapped lots of pictures & tapped on their free wifi to send those across to Leecher. 

 No one helped us to arrange the tables, so we had to self-service. Since too many cooks (will) spoil the broth, we decided to make ourselves useful by snapping pictures/looking at the menu first. Eye-power at its best! 

 

Love the simple floral arrangement :)   

They serve mainly desserts, pastries and beverages like coffee/tea. The sisters headed indoors to look at the cakes on display. However, there wasn't much choices left, so we can only make do with what they had to offer. Meanwhile, we spotted the hardworking barista at work. 

 The guys mass-ordered cappuccino (RM$11) for their caffeine fix.

 You can either order the original latte (RM$9.50) or pick a flavour from the list provided at RM$11.50 per cup. The flavour includes rose, roasted almond, masala chai and passion fruit. We didn't want to be adventurous, so we stick to the original latte.

For the non-coffee drinkers, I had to opt for pot tea (RM$18) which contains french rose and hibiscus. There is also a weekly selection of gourmet leaf tea at RM$11.50 each.

Blueberry scone (RM$10.50). This comes in cranberry as well, but it was sold out so we couldn't get to try. 

  

Cheesecake (RM$9) which was average at best. 

Lastly, presenting 2 of their recommended items - Tiramisu (RM$13) and homemade waffles (RM$12). Waffles was average, nothing particular caught my tastebuds. I had my own share of hit-and-misses with tiramisu. I really dislike those with extremely soggy base. The Garden's version was almost my ideal type - not-so-soggy base, the ideal proportion of coffee, mascarpone and sponge fingers. The serving is just nice for one pax, but food always taste better when shared.

Just Want Coffee, The Garden 

Jalan Persiaran Jaya Putra, 

Taman JP Perdana,  

Johor Bahru 81100

Tel: 07-2966530

Opening Hours: Closed on Mondays

Slightly Revamped

I sat in front of the computer today with the intention of putting my limited knowledge of HTML to test in revamping the blog. I gave up after 5 hours and only managed to add a new profile sidebar along with a new page menu. Well, I shall not be itchy fingers anymore in tweaking the blog, lol! Time to head to bed for a good night's rest.

 

Honeymoon: The Palace - Hall of Mirrors

Journey to Palace of Versailles

The Palace - The Royal Chapel 

The Palace - The King's Grand Apartment

*****

3rd week into the new year! Besides the usual engagement with families, I have been busy clearing the house. I'm a hoarder by nature, hence our house is mostly filled with my things, lol! Leecher always lament at the stuff I keep, but I'll always brush him off with you-never-know-when-you-will-need-it hand wave. So over the years, he gave up on asking me to throw things away. This year, I decided to look through my stash and try to clear some space for new things, ha! While I'm dusting around in the house, I also had to dust off the cobwebs from my honeymoon folder, so here's another entry!

 

Framed with an arc ceiling where elaborated crystal chandeliers hung amidst ceiling paintings , the Hall of Mirrors has to be my favourite room in the entire Palace. When I first set foot into this room, the only word that popped out was "WOW"!

 

Get ready to explore further! 

Picture first, talk later! 

Lined with 17 mirror-clad arches that reflect the arcaded windows which overlook the gardens, this is the central gallery of the Palace where the King displayed the royal powers to impress visitors. If I'm not wrong, the signing of the Peace Treaty for WWI was conducted in this gallery.

I definitely fell in love with the many chandeliers hanging off the ceiling. If only I can have my own chandelier at home, but then I reckon chandeliers will only look nice off a high ceiling. It would look slightly out-of-place in a normal HDB apartment.

Initially it was difficult to take pictures in this room, due to a combination of reflection from sunlight + mirrors + chandeliers. You can see spot the greenish specks from the picture. It took us a long time to figure out how to avoid having those specks.

School field trip for the students to learn about history. I attempted to stand behind the group and tried to evasdrop on their lesson, but silly me totally forgotten that the lesson would be conducted in french, lol! 

It was really difficult to capture a decent picture in this room with no one in the background, for every inch of this place is crowded with tourists. I think a lot of people enjoyed taking pictures in this room due to the natural sunlight coming in from the huge windows.

Have to sign off now and head to bed, while watching up on K-drama :) Till the next time!

Korean Dramas - 2009/2010/2011/2012/2013/2014 & counting!

Happy 2015 everyone! We have been pretty busy with gatherings ever since the new year, let me do a count:

1. 31-Dec: Countdown at EK's place 

2. 1-Jan: Reached home at 3AM, nua at home the whole day

3. 2-Jan: Back to work, housewarming party @ Samuel & Angie

4. 3-Jan: Baby niece birthday shower

5: 4-Jan: Cousin's wedding

What an eventful week! My old body can't take such hectic lifestyle anymore, but I have a luncheon next Sunday, sob sob! Can't have a full weekend to nua, I miss being a couch potato!

Yes, that's me during weekend :) Just for fun, I decided to compile a list of K-dramas that I have watched (sorted according to year of release). It's quite a comprehensive list, I must say, given the amount of time I spent in front of the TV, heh! Some are pretty old shows that I have added in for completeness, but my rate of watching them accelerated since this entry.

Korean Dramas before 2009

Korean Dramas, 2009 - 2010

Korean Dramas, 2011

Korean Dramas, 2012

Korean Dramas, 2013

Korean Dramas, 2014

Psst ... you can also click on KOREAN DRAMAS on the blog for the list of shows that I have watched/reveiwed :)