Thursday, August 30, 2012

Singapore: The Food

This is my last post on our wonderful trip to Singapore. It's mostly about the food items I forgot to stick elsewhere on the blog.  I made it a point to try as many different foods that I could while on vacation. I think I did a good job (with the exception of the $30 hamburger).
 
 
Bee cheng Hiang is famous for thier sticky type of beef jerky called bak kwa.
It was very good & very fresh. It needed to be eaten the same day it was purchased.

This is the bak kwa.
It looks like fresh steak here, but it was dried (like jerky). It's covered in a sweet & sticky glaze.

Mmmm. One of my favorites. A simple custard bun.
I bought one & sometimes two of these every morning.☺
$0.55 from The Line restaurant in our hotel.

Chinese hamburger!
This was delicious!! Bbq'd pork & cabbage inside a soft Chinese bread.
Matty & I found this inside the Takashimaya hawker center. It was only $2.60.

Tiny doughnuts.
The bread was soft & steamed (reminded me of a waffle).The merlion was filled with cream cheese & the doughnut shaped one was filled with sweet custard.We bought 4 of each for $5.00
Now to one of my favorite things: a literal ice cream sandwich with bread!☺ I was so excited to try one of these. The bread is pandan bread (vanilla scented herb) & is slightly sweet. I had raspberry ripple ice cream & Matty had chocolate chip. Inexpensive at only $1.00 each.

It was so delicious that I bought a second ice cream sandwich (with mango ice cream).
I wish we had these here. So tasty & so much fun with the pandan bread.☺

This is what my hair looks like when I don't flat iron it. :/
 
 
Indian food from the Ion Orchard hawker center.

 
Mee reesam
Noodles, tofu, green onions, jalapeno & a hard boiled egg in peanut sauce.

Mangosteen fruit.
$6.00 for a bag of 12 mangosteen.

Peeled mangosteen.
It tasted like pear/strawberry/mandarin orange. Super yummy!
 
Mee Siam

This was so good! A sweet & spicy soup with shrimp, noodles, calamansi & hard boiled egg.

Chinese rice noodles with pork.

Egg & potato brioche from Bread Society.

More Bread Society goodies + kopi c from Toast Box.
 These are what Omid claims are the best chicken wings he's ever tasted.
Guess where they are from? IKEA!
In Singapore, IKEA is pronounced 'eeee -kee- uh.'

These next few photos are from the Tanglin Shopping Center grocery store.
This will give you some idea of just how pricey imported items can be in Singapore.


I've never seen this flavor of Boursin cheese before & I hope it makes it way to the US.
I paid $8.98 for this tiny package. I usually purchase a 3 pack of Boursin at Costco for the same price. Ouch. 

Giant Fuji apples. $9.00 for 2.
Omid modeling dragonfruit & mangosteen.☺

$2.90 for one can. Winco sells the same brand for 0.65.


$9.95!!!! Again, Winco sells this for less than $2.00.
 
Betty Crocker can be found for around $0.89 here.
 
 
 
On a sidenote, this trip to Singapore was one of the best vacations I have ever had. It was simply amazing! Thank you Omidjoon for surprising me with this trip. Love you lots!!!♥




Singapore: Chinatown & Little India

Matty & I spent several hours shopping on Bugis Street. I am sorry to say that I don't have any photos. It was so easy to get lost among the vendors inside, that I told Matty he couldn't leave me. I was sure we would never find each other again. Crazy & chaotic!
 
Chinatown
I liked walking around here a lot. It was so clean & the people were friendly.☺


Different view of the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple


Sri Mariamman Temple
Oldest Hindu temple in Singapore.
 





 
Little India
 
Little India was not as clean or as friendly as Chinatown was.  We actually spent a good two hours (maybe more) trying to track down a fortune telling bird (two days in a row!). Apparently there are several of these birds & they are 'world famous.' No one seemed to know what we were talking about & we had no luck at all.

Sri Veeramakaliamman Temple

Ornate gate outside of the temple.




I loved this building! So colorful & happy.☺
Look for it on the corner of Hill & Coleman Streets.



Singapore: Sentosa Island

Sentosa Island was on tap for Day four!  
 
Matty & I started our day out with kopi-c (Singaporean coffee with cream) & Kaya toast. After breakfast, we took the hotel's free shuttle bus to the island.
 
Matty was starving by the time we arrived, so we shared an Indonesian chicken & rice claypot meal. It doesn't look so big in this photo but the diameter of the claypot was about 12". Huge!
 
 
 
Merlion: symbol of Singapore.
This merlion was 150 ft tall & visitors could climb up inside for $8.
 
We rode the Sentosa luge down & took the SkyRide back up. It was a lot of fun! Video coming soon!






After we rode the luge 3 times....we headed to Siloso Beach. It was practically deserted. There were just a few people walking around. I loved it!! We hung out here for a while, just taking it all in.
Frangipani - the scent was similar to gardenia. Loved it!







Peekaboo toes.
After sunning ourselves on the beach, we walked two miles to ride the zip line. On the way, we saw a plant that looked like it belonged in a Jurassic Park movie.

Check out that foliage!

I usually avoid things like zip lines (scary!), but Omid challenged Matty & I to do it. I was not going to back down from this challenge!  I wasn't scared at all until I was  'dangling'  - waiting to be let go, & tried my best to be brave.
 
I will tell you this: I did scream & I never let go of the rope. Matty was much braver & didn't hold on to the rope at all!  All in all, it was a lot of fun. The only thing I disliked was that I spun around & was looking behind me instead of in front. I wanted to see where I was headed! I figured out that if I kicked my legs/pedaled like on a bicycle, then I could face frontwards again.
 



We explored the island a bit more & then caught the shuttle back to the hotel. Matty was craving a hamburger. I told him that we did not fly halfway across the globe to eat American food! He was relentless, so I gave in. We walked to the HardRock Cafe so he could have a burger.

 Guess how much we paid for TWO hamburgers? $60!!!!  
The burgers were delicious, but $30 a burger?! C'mon!