“.. something old.. something new..”

something borrowed.. something blue?

the something old AND blue... Old warrior my lumix.. still have it on me almost all the time..ALMOST.

Lol
Quickie updates..

Accompanied Syida on a camera hunt Friday night. Target was a Nikon D60.. the deal didn’t go down.. but i came out of it with my bag a wee bit heavier.. Got a free book ,Snakes & Devils:A History of the Singapore Grand Prix. And …also.. with… something new..

Something new..Sony 50mm f1.4.. Taken with the something old and blue

So after went for like a belated birthday treat lah.. Went where?? Hooters .. Perfect scenario for a first shoot with the 50..

some sort of dance routine.. kinda tacky if you ask me.. secondary school got better standard

food's here.. !!

some unfortunate chap getting married in two weeks .. kena sabo by his mates..

Had a little walkabout after din dins..shot a few…

from the other side of clarke quay..I like the colours. so purrrty..

I like .. I like… now to get my Kenko Tubes.. and a 2x TC hur hur..

“.. clearing my memory card..”

somewhat..just clearing my memory card of last weeks take.. not much..

Me and Reets ate out last Friday night.. We broke our fast at Marine Cove.. After much thought.. we settled on the Kebab Station..

Lamb Shish.. with rice..

Reets had the Lamb Shish with Rice.. pretty plain lah. but the meat was okay .. very flavourful not too tough.. then again I am a carnivore so a little biased.. my threshhold for “bad meat” is quite high..lol ..  I had the Seafood Roll Kebab.. heheh.. FORGOT to take picture.. the dressing was tangy.. very sharp.. but very nice and i was very much tempted to order another.

The Mixed Dip

We also ordered the Mixed Dip.. Essentially it’s an offering of all the dips (Hummus, BabaGanus, Eggplant, Crabby, Salsa, Avacado, Cacik) they have. Served with fresh Pita bread.. This .. I Like.. very much a bread person I am yes.. The only thing that was a downer here was that when I asked for a serving of Garlic Pita bread.. what came was just regular pita.. but all in all the experience was ok.. Friendly crew members who were also breaking their fast while serving us… I give the joint a .. hmm 3 burps..

Still on Friday night, Reets had to make a quick stopover at Mak Ja’s.. I don’t know what I was thinking (maybe i needed a dengdeng fix).. we decided to walk into the Geylang Ramadan Bazaar.. wahh tight squeeze i tell you.. got a few shot’s off.. just barely..

The gantry.. lucky NO ERP!

Sloppy work lahh.. the lights were not uniform

This year’s lightup seemed very .. err.. muted.. like the designers ran out of ideas like that..

Goodness the crowd!!

Baju kak.. bajuu...

Have footwear.. will travel

Shot this one, no look, off the hip.. Do you think the guy noticed?

Soon the crowd really got to us.. and we’d finally bought we came here to get anyways  so that was that …lol..

Oh yeah.. the Changi beach pics..  lol.. from this post..

The sun didn't want to come out and play

Passing ship.. lol what else WAS there?!!

The Aircraft Fuel ship at the jetty

well that’s about it….

till next time….

“..El Sheikh@Pahang St..”

Reets had a night out with her SGH ex colleagues the other night and she invited me along.. I had Diaz with me and had planned on a beach walk/shoot on the way home. I thought why not..Since the girls wanted to hit Arab St., it thought maybe i could shoot some there. I was held up at work.. so yeah.. late.. Dinner was at El Sheikh Restaurant .. but first.. introducing your foodies..

From Left to Right: Reets, Haidah, Fiqa aka Minah, Grace aka Minah Ching Chong, Hana

Ok.. A little background on El-Sheikh. It’s a 3-storey joint, the third floor being an open roof terrace. They serve a largely Lebanese fare. They are located Pahang Road.. two doors down from Amirah’s Grill . Doing some research on this handy little thing called the Internet, I found that there were many favourable reviews for this joint.. but.. ok lah we move on..

Typical Middle Eastern fare consists a lot of grills and roasts. The menu here is no different. First up the Kafta.. Lamb Kafta to be exact.. Upon sampling (one bite only lah) the mince meat is nice and tender and juicy.. You can taste the different spices in the mix..very nice in fact.. my only gripe is that the accompanying sauce/dip is a wee bit light.. It could be me but it might be a generic gravy used on all servings.. Hana had her Lamb Kafta with rice.

Lamb Kafta... X marks the spot!

Fiqa ordered the Shish Kebab. This one was a little poser. In many of the reviews of this place I’ve read, the shish kebab came with all the trimmings from the roast (e.g the onions and some vegs). This didn’t.

Sheesh!!.... it's Shish Kebab

The Beef on this dish is on the slightly dry… and tough side. I think it’s the general consensus that the girls prefered the Lamb Kafta over the Shish Kebab..Oh yeah.. you had the choice of having rice or fries with your order.. annndd.. still that same sauce (more on that later) but it made the beef bearable.. Ok Ok only lah

Reets and Haidah had the Mixed Grill..

The Mixed Kebab Grill is where I got the sample taste of the Kafta and Shish Kebab. It also had Chicken (i think).. and the chicken was soo damn dry I wouldn’t want to eat any even if you paid me to..All the samples were taken from Reets’ Mixed Grill. More like she was feeding me bite sizes because my food was late.

Grace's Shawarma Plate..

The chicken here looks nice and juicy innit? Didn’t get any samples of this one so, Grace, if you’re reading this give me a review aye?

Fillet Veau Veal.. *rawr* It's beef babes.

When my food finally arrived, I was slightly dissapointed. When the plate was set before me I could see the gravy sloshing all over the place and the meat was very well done. A bit cair you know.. runny.. The beef was lying on a bed of button mushrooms. The menu describes it as “Grilled fillet veal in a provocative Lebanese Mushroom sauce”. It was mushroom sauce? Swear to god I couldn’t tell. But where it counts the meat was good albeit I prefer my meat slightly rare.

Sultan Mosque

The girls decided not to have dessert there.. so we walked for a bit.. Dessert ended up to be Almond Magnum’s all around (yum) while I took this picture

In conclusion, I give this place 3 burps out of 5. Maybe the cooks had an off day. Or Maybe there were other factors.. The food wasn’t bad..it was good.. but not as good as what a lot of reviews say it was.. Maybe I need to really go there again.. you know .. to confirm ..

Till next time

“.. It’s Flamin’ CHICKEN!!..”

Somewhere in some obscure part of Ang Mo Kio.. pple are enjoying good food.. apparently they have enjoyed the fare since February. I’ve been told the place was featured in 8 Days and other various publications. I was blog-hopping when I came across a foodie review.. it didn’t take long for me and Rita to actually decide to give the place a try , especially since it was just down the road from her place.. so then.. tucked away at Block 608, Ang Mo Kio Ave 5.. last night.. we had dinner at Charco’s..

Do not expect any fancy frills at this establishment, in fact it’s actually part of a Kopitiam. And if you’re there at the wrong time you might have to wait a little to make your order.. But the queue moves pretty fast

The line formed AFTER we made our orders and settled down..

Price wise.. well it’s definitely cheaper then SOME Rotisserie/Grills outlets.. you can expect the prices to be about the same (if not slightly higher) then your typical run of the mill western food stall in a kopitiam.

The first thing you would notice..well the first thing I noticed was the salad bar..Charcos offers a selection of 8 cold salads..(coleslaw, caesar’s, potato, seafood, avocado chicken, egg, tuna pasta.)

The Salad bar

There was a fresh batch of Potato Salad when we arrived..

Then I saw the chicken.. to be honest i thought the chicken were a bit on the small side lah.. but that’s just me..

Chicken come’s in two varieties.. Charco’s chicken and for a dollar more the Portugese Chicken (slightly spicy)

I had the ribs…

Reets had the Portugese Chicken + 3 salads set.. and I had the Rack of Ribs (lamb) + 3 salads.. Also tried the lamb kebab..The Portugese chicken at first glance looked like it was slightly overdone and burnt on the outside. Surprisingly it is quite tender and you can really taste the spices… My ribs.. in my opinion they were a little tough but still to die for.. best when it’s piping hot.. The salads were quite good. The seafood salad was a bit too chunky and could do with smaller pieces and more celery (but hey that’s just me). The Chicken Avacado was ok but the avacado bits a bit hard to find lah eh.

The Lamb kebab however was a dissapointment. It was dry and I was expecting it to be rolled nicely. By comparison even the “wraps” at LJS were better done. It was ok enough to eat when you got to the middle where there was lots of dressing and i might come back for it(cuz i like lamb). But all in all the kebab could be better.

In conclusion, I think I would come back for more.. I liked the whole experience overall.. quite worth the money lah.. not too expensive.. and ..It being near Reets’ place also helps. LoL ..

 

*Burp!*