I think I’ve probably been shopping and eating out too much lately. Although I was good and went to Aqua-Gym this morning and had a really good workout. Afterwards I headed to the IMM Building (for the second time this week) with Gladys and Neha.

First thing we went to get something to eat. We ate at a place in the corner of the food court called Cafe Red Ginger. I tried the Lontong special for $3.50 a bowl. It’s slices of pressed rice with a curry vegetable soup served on top. The rice itself is very bland without the curry but I enjoyed the curry very much and the dish was very filling.

Close-up of the lontong (pressed rice cake)

Lontong served with curry veggies and one boiled egg.

I visited the store Daiso again and bought a few things now that I knew everything only cost $2 each. I especially wanted to buy a new knife since the ones provided by the landlady are not sharp at all.

Afterwards we headed back down to the food court to buy some goodies for Ariana’s (also a partner and famous chef) surprise birthday party tonight. I ended up buying these Japanese snacks called konnyaku. The chef said they are made of yam powder, sugar, and fresh fruits.

Pretty, eh?

I also got some breakfast for tomorrow. At eDonuts they had these that looked like it was made from donut holes in the shape of a flower. I bought strawberry and kaya flavors.

Strawberry

At a place called Roti Mum, I bought a coffee bun since I read about it in that sweets book I got from INSEAD. Apparently it has a pat of butter melted in the middle.

Coffee bun (with pen on the right for size reference).

We left IMM around 3:30pm and arrived home around 4pm. I had a bit of time to rest before heading to INSEAD for the surprise party at 5pm. She was really surprised too. Gladys told her a good lie to get her to come to INSEAD. She made up some story about her credit card being rejected for the trip she was taking this weekend to Malaysia for scuba diving. So she said she needed to give her new credit card to pay before she could leave tonight for the trip. Ariana was shocked to see us all in the cafeteria waiting for her with chocolate cake and candles. It’s fun to participate in a surprise.

We stil had more to do tonight as it was Friday Foodie Night as well. The plan was to visit this place called Chin Chin Eatery on Purvis St for their famous Hainanese Chicken Rice. The place is near City Hall MRT on this small side street. The restaurant was pretty large itself as it was able to fit 4 large tables of INSEAD students.

This sign made me laugh: No Smoking Unless you are on FIRE!

Plain old boring rice? Just wait… (but actually it’s not boring, it’s cooked with chicken stock so is quite good by itself).

Starting from 12 o’clock: ong choy, prawn roll, Hainanese steamed chicken, kailan, Hainanese pork chop

I highly recommend this restaurant. The chicken was really tender, even the white meat which I usually don’t like. The sauce for the chicken and the rice was really good too, a little sweet and salty. We were really stuffed but still had another birthday to celebrate, so we headed to the rooftop bar down the street called Loof.

They had this really cool tea cup by the entrance of the bar.

I had Krishna stick his head in the shot for reference

They had some cool drinks like the following called “The Tom Yum”. If you’ve ever had Tom Yum soup, you’d recognize the spice right away. The drink description is: Vodka infused with Tom Yum spices, calmed by fresh lime juice and a dash of coconut liquor. It was quite refreshing because of the lime juice but had that little spiciness. It was served with a red pepper though (I didn’t eat it, I was afraid of the hot seeds!).

Another of their cocktails is the “Poached Saffron & Pear Martini”. Their description is: An ethereal mix of vodka, Swedish pear cognac, poached pear juice, twirled with vanilla and saffron spices. It was a bit odd tasting as there was a cinnamon stick in the glass and it tasted a bit like a gingerbread cookie. Someone said it tasted like Christmas.

Many of us left when the birthday boy had enough as it had already been a long day for the students with early morning class and an evening review session.

I can’t wait to try my donuts in the morning.