MasterChef Dining & Bar in Singapore @ Ash & Elm, InterContinental Singapore.

If you are a fan of the MasterChef series, you must.. must.. must.. have heard of the MasterChef Dining. The wife and I were strolling in Sydney way back in 2011 and we saw a huge MasterChef Pop-up at the St Mary's Cathedral Forecourt. We managed to take a photo with Adam Liaw, but sadly it was a sold out event so we could not dine there.

(Photo of Marco courtesy of MasterChef Dining / Saffron Comms)

MasterChef Dining and Bar is coming to Singapore from 25 November till 9 December 2016!

Chef Marco Pierre White is coming to Singapore and a few other MasterChef personalities from around Australia, Asia and United States of America will be coming to town. It is the first time Marco will helm the MasterChef Dining and Bar Pop Up.

Oh yes, the MasterChef Dessert Guy, Reynold Poernomo (left, photo courtesy of MasterChef Dining) from MasterChef Australia Season 7, will be here too. I love watching him plate Desserts. He reminds me of Marcus Low from MasterChef Asia. I wonder if Marcus is coming too. Marcus and Lennardy were two of my favourites! I read that Reynold has opened KOI Dessert Bar in Sydney. Reviews vary, but when he's here, I am sure it will be top notch as he will be here in person!

For the MasterChef Dinng and Bar Pop up in Singapore, Ash & Elm, at the InterContinental Singapore would be hosting it. It will be in an open-kitchen restaurant setting so we will get to interact with the Chefs.

The ticketing details:

20 October at all Sistic outlets.

Early bird pricing for purchase of tickets between 20 October - 27 October
$138+ (Lunch) / $248+ (Dinner)

28 October onwards:
$168+ (lunch) / $288+ (dinner)

Daily lunch sessions will feature a 4-course menu while daily dinner will be a 6-course affair. There are only over 200 seats available for the 15 day pop up event. (I read the pop up in London was sold out in 4 days when it was first launched in London).


For IHG Rewards Club / InterContinental Ambassador Level members:

You would have received the non stop announcement pop up (every 2 minutes) on your phone app! I did! You would also have received an email about it.




If you are a fan of Marco, you have 48 hours earlier (i.e. 18-19 October) access to buy the tickets.
The early access code is in your IHG App notification / Email.
The code also allows you 20% off the normal price even if you missed the early bird. 

(I bought mine tickets first (yes, I paid for it), before I blog about it. I am nowadays only blogging about things that interest me a lot!) 


Update (26 Oct):
3 More MasteChefs will be at the Pop Up!
Audra Morrice, Luca Manfe and Woo Wai Leong!

All MasterChef talents would be here for the entire event with the exception of Audra Morrice [25 Nov - 3 Dec] and Reynold Poernomo [4 - 9 Dec].



For latest updates:
Visit their website at: www.masterchefdining.sg
Official Facebook page: www.facebook.com/masterchefdiningsg

Nando's Singapore @ Bugis Junction

This meal was eaten in May! Momo and I met with two other friends for dinner. We shall call them "CanDo" and "LittleYellowCar" here.

I can't remember now the details, but somehow we ended at Nando's. I guess we all wanted to try it out. You would need patience if you wanna try the food during dinner hours. The wait was very long the night we were there. It took us about nearly an hour of queuing before we got our seats. We joked that if we went to Johor Bahru branches, we could get to eat quicker!

***

What did we eat? Since there was the 4 of us, we had the Peri-fect Platter. $43.60
It is a full chicken with 4 large sidelines. For the chicken, we had Mild.

(We figure that the hotter sauces are on the tables, so if we want more fiery chicken we could add in the hotter sauces)


The chicken was really well marinated and we all enjoyed the flame-grilled chicken. The sauce and the chicken were quite addictive!

***

For the sidelines, we chose the Cous Cous Salad. I think Cous Cous is an acquired taste. Not everyone appreciated it.

***

The grilled vegetables were a hit though. It was so colourful!
It was soft enough but not mushy.

***

The 3rd sides we had was the Old Style Chips. We loved the chips and wallop it all in no time!

***

This was the Peri Potato Salad. I love the taste of the potato salad!
I know it's full of sauces but that's also a reason why it's delightful to my tastebuds!

***

LittleYellowCar said she wanted to try other stuff as well. So we ordered this.
It came served in the most interesting serving vessel. It was covered so you got to open it.



Inside, it looks fabulous doesn't it?
This was the Cataplana. $18.

It had spiced rice below it. On the top, ther was the chicken thigh grilled with Peri Peri sauce, tomatoes, eggplant, onions and peppers.

Verdict, it was nice!



If you have visited them recently, is the queue still so long?

I just have to mention this, though I might sound a bit petty:
They do not serve 'tap' water. You need to purchase bottled water, even if you purchased other drinks.
What we noticed is that the menu states they serve 600ml bottled water ($2.50!), but when it's served to you, they give you the 500ml bottled water instead. (If you are wondering what water, it's the usually 'on sale' 40 cents bottled of Ice Mountain you get in the supermarket) Nope, we did not bother to argue with them for 100ml difference. Don't want to ruin a good meal with that. ;-)



Nando's
200 Victoria Street
Bugis Junction #01-85/87
Singapore 188021

Hours: 10 am - 10 pm
Tel: 6338 6555

Ministry of Food の My Izakaya @ Bugis Junction (Desserts)

What we liked about this place is the desserts :-)

You can order 1 scoop of the gelato like this Green Tea Gelato. $3.50
Made from Hokkaido Milk. Yum...



Or order these darlings that it is famous for.
The Macha mixed Imo $6.50

You would like the deep fried sweet potato and yam. It goes well with the ice cream.



Any red bean person would love this. The Macha Zen $4.00
Red Bean Green Tea Ice Cream and dango staying afloat red bean paste.



The Macha Kakigori $3.00
The Japanese style 'ang tao peng'. :-)



The desserts here are as good as the conversation we had with out new friends :-)

Ministry of Food の My Izakaya (Bugis Junction)
200 Victoria Street
#02-45 Bugis Junction
Singapore 188021
Tel: 6338 6466

Ministry of Food の My Izakaya @ Bugis Junction

Last Saturday night, Momo and I got to meet up with Teckiee and XLB, food blogger friends from KL. We were suppose to meet at Ma Maison as recommended by Uncle Nic. (but he was not here, he had to go back to KL)

But... due to super long queue and non booking, we had to change venue instead. The 5 other new friends who was there earlier, found MOF. The kind people at MOF arranged for a table of 7 amidst the peak hour traffic.

It was interesting to finally meet people whose blog we read. We were listening to stories of KL good bloggers. Wow, they do have a good life there. They have almost weekly food outings!


Anyway, here's what we ate. We ordered some sort of mains for each person, and share other stuff, so we can try more things. :-)

This is one of the maki that we shared. We had one salmon cutlet maki and one karaage maki. $8.80 each.



This is the wasabi seafood salad for 3pax. $7.80
When the wasabi sauce is poured over, it is quite delicious. If the wasabi is more hair raising it would have been even better. :-p



This is the seafood toji set. $18.80.
I am confused, I can't remember who ate what. We were all busy chatting!






But I do remember what I had. This is the Tonkotsu Ramen $8.80 that I had.
(I think I prefer the black pork version at TomTon :-p )



The Tan-Tan Ramen. $8.80
Momo had this.



This is the Seafood Cold Ramen $9.80 that Teckiee and another friend had.
(There was a few other of teckiee's friends. They have been eating all day it seems)



The conversation was better than the food. LOL.
The desserts here are much better. Look out for it tomorrow.

Ministry of Food の My Izakaya (Bugis Junction)
200 Victoria Street
#02-45 Bugis Junction
Singapore 188021
Tel: 6338 6466

Sakae Teppanyaki @ Bugis Junction (Part II)

Hi again! I am not going to bore you all with the cooking process, but here's what we ate. We had 4 persons and we ordered 4 different sets. So that we can try all the different types of food. We had Chicken Set, Turkey Set, Seafood Set and Beef Set I think.

It's interesting sitting and looking at the 2 different teppanyaki chefs cooking in front of you. You always wonder who's meal he is cooking next and when it is done, you wonder... is it going to end up in front of me? haha....

Well, the following 7 pictures ended up in either of our plates.
The seafood fried udon. The cooking process sure is interesting. We were so glad it ended up on our plate. haha...



This beautiful chawanmushi like thingy is made of an onion as its 'container'. It was made from scratch and 'steamed' in front of us. It has an onion-y taste but it's not bad! Pretty too!



These scallops made us drool a bit while the guy was cooking it. They were taken apart out of the shell and cooked. Then more garlic was stir fried at another spot and the whole thing assembled back onto the shell that was sizzling. You got to try it!



Some sets came with fried veggies too. Not sure which one but we all shared anyway.



The tofu pieces were cooked very slowly at each side to make it brown nicely. They seem to be forever on the teppanyaki surface we were wondering when will it be done????
Patience paid off when it ended up on our plates.



We had chicken which I am not posting up. This is the turkey meat. This one shows it a bit charred, but removing those little bit, it taste good.



We were quite full eating the various meats and other things, we thought it is done. We saw the chef stir frying mushrooms and though, if only it came with out set. To our surprise it did! haha...



I think the experience is quite wonderful. We did not really memorize what was in the set, and we were just sitting and looking at two guys cooking in front of us, and hoping it ends on our plates. LOL. I guess if the chefs were not too concentrated in cooking and spent some time chatting with the people they are cooking for, it will be even more interesting.

Eg, when they are cooking your beef, they can chat to you and tell you something about it. hmmm...

Each set range around $12-16. Our total bill was around $60.

Sakae Teppanyaki @ Bugis Junction

We were at Bugis Junction today and discovered that the whole place had changed so much! The makan places in this placed have moved around!

We walked past Sakae Teppanyaki and wondering what to eat, uncle led the way in.. haha. Sakae have recently opened quite a few branches around, but the thought of having smelly clothes after always prevented me from going in.

We were pleasantly surprised we did not 'smell' after the lunch was over! The ventilation and suction power of the teppanyaki exhaust is quite good. :-)



Here's one dish that was cooked in front of us - Garlic Rice.
Here's the humble rice.



With a 'indecent' amount of garlic (the more the merrier!), fried with oil and butter.



With eggs too... And the miracle happens in the hands of the teppanyaki chef.
Dash of sake, and various sauces... it is transforming...



Vigorous clanking of the spatula and some somersault of the bottles of sauces when its being poured. It looks promising!

You could see the rice actually jumping around the hot surface!



Here's the end product.



The tiny shrimps was toasted on the hot surface before being placed on top of the rice.
Want some? :-p

Wong Kok Char Chan Teng @ Bugis Junction (2)

Continuation from yesterday's post....

We had this to share amongst the 6 of us. Sorry, did not really get the name, but it is wrapped with bacon and it taste not bad. It does not really look the same in the menu picture though. haha..



Uncle had this: Fried spaghetti with pork fillet in "hong kong" style. Looks very plain, but he says it is good. (except he is no pea eater... haha..) The pork fillet is mixed inside, the menu had it in a piece on top.



Cousin had braised chicken and potato with shanghai style veg rice.



The cousin we had not met for some time had Cheese baked rice with chicken chop.
He seems to enjoy it, so I guess it's good.



This is what I had: Roasted honey spare ribs shanghai style veg. rice. Pretty decent.



Aunt had Shanghai noodle with minced pork and potato. She said it looked boring. haha..



Sis had HK stirred noodle with honey spare ribs. Very instant noodles right? I think most HK Cafe does this instant noodles thingy.



That's it. Actually, I am now going to have some instant noodles after looking at the last photo above.

Wong Kok Char Chan Teng @ Bugis Junction

This afternoon, we met up with another cousin we had not seen in a long time. Sis also wanted to stop by NLB after lunch to visit her student's pushcart thingy, so we settled to have lunch at Bugis.

Walking around Bugis Junction, we realised that there's lots of chnages. Shows that we have not been here for the longest time. The basement food places have all moved to the 3rd floor!

Anyway, we saw this and walked in. Wong Kok Char Chan Teng.



Not sure if you feel it, all the Char Chan Teng loves exaggeration. tall glasses of cold drinks, big mugs of hot drinks, gigantic toast etc...

Well, we did have tall glass of Ying Yang, mix of coffee and tea.



This is another glass of Fresh Lemon Tea - Cold.



This is also ying yang, but the ice is outside! haha.. This is called the "authentic" version.


I had Hot Honey Lime Tea. I think its quite nice :-)



We saw others ordering the gigantic toast, and so did we.
It's like half a loaf of bread cut into 6 pieces with a scoop of ice cream on top



Shall show some food photos tomorrow.

Ajisen @ Pargo Bugis

Last Sunday, we had lunch at Pargo Bugis. Instead of walking down the basement path where the food court and other restaurants are, we walk on ground level and at the other side.

It's been sometime since we had Ajisen, so we sat down.
We ordered the set meals, which comes with a side dish, a main dish and a drink.

The side dish that came was the Octopus. It has lots of sauce on it right? Is it a bit wrong? But I think I dip my other food in this sauce. (oii.. don't laugh!)




We also had Octopus Balls with benito flakes.



These are the soft shell crabs.



Sis and Aunt ordered the Pai Ku Mian. (Pork rib ramen).
I love the pork ribs, I 'tax' some from sis.



I had Tomato Chicken. I thought it was interesting and I think it is very delicious. I love tomato based stuff. The soup is whitish, but below, there's something like tomato salsa you have as dips.




Have a great day ahead.