Missing Paddy

Here he is after we visited the vet to kill his tick infection. We took him to the park and had juice and iced coffee and he had some water.

The tick infection made the darling lose weight.

J would squish clusters of ticks - 4-6 each time - I'd sweep my fingers through his fur and point out the ticks, and then J would remove and squish them, yielding quite a lot of blood each time.

The vet prescribed antibiotics.

Wild Boar Sighting

The other night, in Singapore, we took the Old Upper Thomson route home, hoping to glimpse some wild monkeys (the ones the huge signs warn you not to feed), as there usually are quite a few along that route.

Suddenly, we saw a whole herd of these things Charge across the little road from the side with the houses, straight into the jungle!!! It was like - !!! what ARE those? we kept driving.

And then, just after the Prata coffeeshop row and before Upper Peirce Reservoir, we came across another herd - all 9 of them, just ruminating on the side of the (back) road. It must have been a different herd because it was quite a distance between the two sightings.

I was too scared (in case they erm, charge towards the open window??!) to roll down the window too much to snap images of them, but managed to get some quick ones even though it was really dark. There were adults and babies, all sniffing and scratching away.

Did a quick google search and apparently these sightings are irregular but have happened before.

For the rest of the trip, we kept driving by hoping to see them again - we didn't. Guess we got lucky that one night.

Oh Singapore! A Parade of the Bestest foods on the island

I guess I didn't know what I was really missing until it was no longer in my backyard (or a 15-30 minute drive away).

Born and bred in dear Singapore, I'd taken the smorgasbord of fantastic local delights for granted, until it was no longer Just There.

I'd been actively, greedily, obsessively craving all the delicious, yummilicious, non-replicable foods of my home for weeks, and since J and I confirmed our trip back, been researching madly on the internet - primarily on ieatishootipost.sg and corroborating/getting more details from other online resources that showed up.

The following is a selection of the best of the best to be found in Singapore that we chomped, slurped and devoured during this whirlwind trip in early April.

Fried Things!

From top left, clockwise:

- Oyster Omelette (Orluak) from Ah Chuan Oyster Omelette at Toa Payoh Lor 7 Food Centre. We also had Orluak from Ah Hock Oyster Omelette at Whampoa Hawker Centre. Those who like their Orluak crispy would enjoy both tremendously - we did, but I wished there was just a little more more gooey mianfen (flour) bits. 

- Fried Carrot Cake (ChaiTaoKuay) from Sembawang Hill Food Centre - not sure how ieat may rate this, but I loved its fluffiness, and how the bits of radish cake was not broken up into teeny pieces but were large enough to chew and swallow

- Hokkien Mee - we tried both stalls at Whampoa Drive Food Centre - the famous Singapore Fried Hokkien Mee (pictured) as well as Qin Li's, which some netizens say is much better than the famous one. We preferred the famous one - it was a lot more flavourful with rich prawn and lard undertones, and the pieces of lard (you have to ask for it) scattered on top made it so much more shiok.

- Fried Kuay Teow from Hai Kee Char Kway Teow at Telok Blangah Crescent Food Centre - I remember queuing up patiently when this uncle would fry each plate individually (even if you order 5 plates, he would still do each one separately) at the Margaret Drive hawker centre. This hawker centre was quieter, and more than half of the stalls were closed when we went around 8pm - they probably open in the day. As moist, rich, sinful, and chockful of "harm" (blood cockles) as I remember. Sooooooo good. We also queued up (ok I queued up while J patiently sat and waited) for 45 minutes for Guan Kee Char Kway Teow at Ghim Moh Food Centre - pretty good but I preferred Hai Kee's for its generous cockles and more robust depth.

Sweet Things!
There was also a slew of sweet local desserts I (I say "I" because J somehow didn't enjoy the sweet local things that much - silly silly) gobbled up.

Top row, L to R:
- Durian mousse cake from Goodwood Park Hotel - it happened to be the durian festival and of course I had to takeaway several items - had this, as well as the durian puff and the durian crumble. This was The Best. So duriany and melts in your mouth. I want more!!!! The durian crumble didn't taste very much of durian at all. Note that I ate it All By Myself as J abhors durian. More for me!
- Ang Ku Kueh (sticky sweet cakes with various fillings) from Poh Cheu at Bukit Merah Lane 1. There is always a (not too long) queue at this place, and while I'm not a super giant AKK fan generally, we were going for the Depot Road Laksa next door at Alexandra Village food centre (which turned out to be Closed on a sunday - hmph!) so I procured some. My favourite is the green bean filling
- Chendol from Toa Payoh Lorong 7 Food Centre - oh so good. No queue because we went at an odd time mid afternoon, I wanted like, several bowls but stopped myself. Icy, sweet, coconut milky, it hit all the right spots.

Bottom row, L to R:
- Ah Balling Peanut Soup (glutinous rice balls with various fillings in a soup with softened white peanuts) from Ghim Moh food centre. The original one, which my late grandmother loved, and my parents still love, is at Golden Mile food centre at Beach Road - I was glad to chance across this branch at Ghim Moh while hunting down the super long queue charkwayteow. I think traditionally the fillings are peanut, but I much prefer the yam and red bean ones. The other fillings are black sesame (J loved this) and green tea (not bad la)
- Peanut Pancake from Tanglin Halt market - oh boy, ieatishootipost and many others Raved about this - this stall opens at 5am and closes at 11am, and the various comments scared me into going one morning when they just opened. We were rewarded with warm and pillowy peanut pancake, and even eaten cold, they were good.


Other noteworthy eats!
(clockwise from Top Left - main picture)
- Braised Duck from Upper Thomson, along the same row but different block from the famous Ampang Yong Tau Foo: my parents are mad about this, we all enjoyed this together. The powerful chili that comes with it provided the perfect zing to the soft, braised meat, boiled eggs and tofu.
- Chwee Kueh (white flour cakes topped with savoury radish bits) from Ghim Moh food centre. I always forget how delicious chwee kueh is - it's so savoury and salty and soft and I can probably have like, 20 at one go!!
- Meepok with Fishballs at Adam Road food centre - ok this one was not bad but not Spectacular. I include it because it was on my to-eat list.
- Beef hor fun from Hans at Upper Thomson Road: I eat this with chopped chili padi instead of the sour green chili. Didn't get a chance to try the famous ones downtown that ieat recommended, but this one, for a chain/fastfood place, hit the right notes. I like the beef version much better than the seafood (more commonly available?) ones at most cze char places. I try have it each time I come home, and it's always been good except One time some months back when for some reason, the cook forgot to salt it completely... so with lots of soy sauce with the chili padi, it was good again, but otherwise, almost completely bland.

Am writing this just more than a week after returning to Hong Kong, and it makes me wanna race back to Singapore again and revisit (over and over) all this deliciousness!!!!!

Apart from the above, we had other meals at the always reliable Peramakan, Kashmir and PS at Dempsey, oh oh and the chicken wings at Ice Cold Beer!! (always lovely to see dear dear friends - let's eat together again soon!!)

Lastly - almost forgot to mention that we also had the Depot Road Claypot laksa (for some reason I didn't take a picture.....greedy I guess) - even though the general consensus seems to be that the standard has dropped since the original older couple had sold the recipe to the current owners, I still enjoyed its biting spiciness and the thick gravy.

A Cure for Insomnia

These days, my sleeping patterns have been all helter-skelter - when I had a full time job, sleep was always a rare and cherished commodity and I would sleep through the night, no matter what city or timezone I was in.

During my recent trip to the US, I was generally exhausted after cooking and baking all day that I'd sleep by 10pm each night and have no problems rousing around 5-6am.

Since I've been back in Hong Kong less than two weeks ago, my sleep patterns have been here and there. A lot more There than Here. More often than not, I wake up at 2, 3, 4am and have trouble going back to sleep, and if I do, it may last just over an hour before I awake again. Doesn't help that I occasionally allow myself an afternoon nap.

I read on baby websites that apparently insomnia is a regular occurrence for expectant women, in preparation for their upcoming sleepless nights when baby arrives!!!

It's currently close to 6am and I have been up since 4-ish. Munching on a bowl of grapes now typing this. I need to be up early today as will be trooping down to the airport express downtown to check in my luggage - leaving for Singapore for a few days tonight!!! Charkuayteow, Oyster Omelette, Hokkien Mee, everything delicious and local, here I come!!

For now, a mug of warm milk, perhaps?