It was a fruitful Sunday as I was honoured to be invited for food tasting at Noodle Around at Bugis Cube. It is accessible by Bugis MRT and also buses. There is one bus stop just right in front of the restaurant. It is a walking distance once you tap out of Bugis MRT and cross the road which is same row heading towards Liang Seah Street.

We started off with appetizer, Salmon Salad and also seafood salad. It was served with beautiful colour presentation combination of green lettuce, red tomatoes with chuncks of salmon. It is made with special dressing sauce and it was recommended to taste it originally without the lemon squeeze followed by the lemon squeeze. I would prefer the original taste once i taste the difference. Nevertheless both taste gives a different tastebuds.There are chicken wings and their signature tofu which has the combination of smooth inner with fish paste and the cripsy outer part. Everyone gives a praise on the signature tofu.

Prawn Noodles with strawberry sauce.It's a great innovation works. It does not taste sour or too sweet at all. It is surprisingly nice.Seafood Platter Noodle-combination of crayfish with prawns and mussels. There are very generous with the portion and they uses the prawn soup base which blend well with the juicy seafoods.I love the desserts served. This is one of my favourite- chrysanthemum jelly with wolfberry. I ate the chrysanthemum flower with the jelly!Smoothing throat and you can taste the wolfberry too!One of my favourite and choice for the dessert. Jelly with Ice Red wine which gives everyone the expression of 'WOW' when they put the ice cube red wine and jelly into their mouth. The ice cube red wine melts into your mouth with the lemongrass jelly taste blends perfectly well.For durian and cheese lover, you can try Durian Cheesecake which uses D24 durian to make. The durian taste is surprisingly not too strong and you can even taste the cheese taste after the bite.

The environment is good with the friendly staffs and chef. It is an open kitchen concept and we can even see what are the chefs cooking on the spot. Each table was labelled with the wi-fi password for customers' convenient too. The place is suitable for gathering or bonding place as well.

For more information and reviews, check out my blog : http://hazeldiary.com

Thanks to the social media exposure, I get to know about the opening of Bottura which happened last week. Few days old Italian café, restaurant and retail concept is located at Level 2, North Wing of Suntec City Mall. The place is spacious enough to cater for more than 100 seater with casual dinning design style. Bottura offers wide selection of antipasto, pastas, pizzas and gelato. There are all handmade from the scratch by the chef to provide the authentic Italian cuisine for the customers. What’s more you can enjoy the dishes with affordable pricing. If you walk around the restaurant, there is a corner where they display the dry products and wines from Italy for sale.
As we were browsing the menu and deciding what to have, the staff is kind enough to suggest us to try their Degustation Menu where it is customized with 6 types of fresh pasta with a choice of traditional condiments S$18.00 and include a glass of Italian red or white wine. All of the pastas are served in 6 different plates with tasting portion. So, here are the 6 types that I tried:-Foglie di polenta con ragu e besciamella – Polenta lasagna with traditional ragu and béchamel sauce (Normal serving S$18.00)
Nidi di rondine – “Swallow’s Nest” –fresh pasta rolled into a spiral, filled with béchamel sauce and ham (Normal serving S$14.00)
Spaghetti alla carbonara consists of egg, bacon and parmesan (Normal serving S$12.00)
Ravioli panna prosciutto e funghi – Ravioli with cream, ham and mushrooms (Normal serving S$14.00)
Tagliatelle conragu tradizionale (Normal serving S$15.00)
Penne al tonno con capperi di Sicilia e acciughe- Penne with tuna, Sicilian capers and anchovies (Normal serving S$14.00).
Of all pastas, my favourite is the Nidi di rondine and Ravioli panna prosciutto e funghi. I love the chewy texture of ravioli. It reminds me of the Chinese mee hoon kueh texture in a way. The sauce has an unique taste that compliment well with the pastas. We were told that perhaps the next round when we order again, the 6 pastas served will be different. It’s all depends on the chef’s preparation of the day. I personally feel that this menu idea is brilliant for those who wants to try everything in a bit. People like me definitely will order this to get a taste of the individual pastas.Gelato is also one of their selling point here in Bottura. We decided to try their signature Spaghetti Gelato S$7.00 where the chef will choose the flavors of gelato to serve. We had the custard flavor with wild berries sauce and sprinkle some icing sugar on top of it. One glance, you will thought it is a spaghetti. I find the gelato taste creamy and sweeter as compared to other places. But it’s all depends on individual preferences. Their signature gelato is the smurf flavour in blue. Interesting bubblegum flavour but I tasted like fanta taste though.We had a wonderful dinner here with affordable pricing and delicious meal. The staff is friendly and approachable with explanation of the dishes. I find it good in a way that customers will have better understanding on the foods served on the table and know more about Italian cuisine. I will definitely be back to try their other dishes in the menu. All prices exclusive of service charges and GST.

Aquamarine Marina Mandarin is one of the top few Halal restaurants in a 5-star hotel in Singapore. Located at Level 4 of the hotel, Aquamarine offers a wide buffet spread of International and Asian cuisines.
We were greeted by the smell of seafoods when we stepped into the restaurant. There is a seafood section right in the heart of the restaurant that drawn my attention. Various selections of seafoods are displayed beautifully on the section with labels on the side. Fresh oysters, snowcrabs and fresh prawns are the ones that you wouldn’t want to miss out.Western cuisines and Chinese cooked sections are available at the right corner of the restaurant. Choices for Chinese cooked foods are limited. As for western cuisines, foods such as roasted chicken, pizza and spaghetti are available for serving as well.Indian foods are found in one of the section where briyani rice, naans and various curries are served. I tried the naans and it was quite decent with the mutton curries.There is also hands-on section where diners can customize their version of Singapore Laksa and kueh pie tee. Ingredients are readily available on the display.
Appertizer section that provides the salad selections and various cheeses are available too.
Japanese cuisine section is not a miss when comes to buffet. Fresh sashimi is a must to have for myself. There are three different types of sashimi served that day- Salmon, Tuna and sea bream. The chef will prepare the portion of the choice of sashimi on the spot upon request. I requested for 2 persons and he is quite generous with the portion and end up I didn’t went for the second serving. Tempuras, assorted sushi and chawanmushi are available at the section too.Desserts section was an eye candy for me.The colourful spread of choices which tempt you to try almost all of it. The cakes are in a small portion so that we, diners can try a bit of everything. I think it is a good way to reduce wastage as well. Durian pengat is available too.I am loving it! Freshly cut fruits are available. There is also ice-kacang maker machine available for us to customize. Topping choices for ice-creams and ice-kacang are nicely spread across the section. Nyonya kuehs are found at the other side of the section next to the desserts.Services are good as the service staffs are polite and smile to customers. Foods served on the sections are consistently filled by the staffs promptly. It is quite consistent and I think Aquamarine did a good job on this. Our buffet ended with a cup of tea served towards the end of the dinner. It was a pleasant dinning experience with Aquamarine.

For more photos and review, check out my post :http://hazeldiary.com/aquamarine-marina-mandarin-hotel/

Thanks to my colleague, I got to enjoy the international buffet at Conrad Centennial Hotel’s Oscar’s Café & Terrace We made a reservation for one of the weekday night for buffet session. International buffet is more of quality of the foods served as the value must be worth while to spend. The restaurant is located at the lobby level of the hotel with the warm lighting interiors and lively ambience to dine in.

We were greeted with a smile and friendly gesture. There are sections of different type of foods all around the restaurant which range from fresh sea foods section, cooked foods with different kind of cuisine section, sashimi section and dessert section. We are spoilt with the choice.

There are different kinds of cheese, hams and breads available to start off with the sessions. Customize own dressing for salads are available next to it and it is ideal to have it as appetizer.

The highlight of the buffet is that chef will only shuck the oysters upon request. This absolutely shows the freshness of the oysters.

There is one more thing that amazed me is the Parmigiana (Parmesan) bowl where the lettuce is tossed with the sauce, cheese and other ingredients personally by the chef to present us with a Caesar salad. The chef uses spatula to scrap the cheese from the bowl each time to mix the salad which makes the whole process looks interesting.

Cooked sections are just fine with the available choices. All are kept in warm condition and the foods are well-cooked. One of the dishes that I was quite impressed was Bake Roulade of Salmon with hollandaise sauce. The smooth meat texture which compliments with the sauce makes the salmon taste juicy and addictive.

And they do cut the sashimi upon request by the diners. As for dessert wise, they served wide selections from cakes to cookies and puddings. Chocolate Royal Hazelnut Crunch was one fine cake that I love. The sweetness of the chocolate with the hazelnut crunch really taste sinful. Live section is also available at this section as the waffles were served upon request as well. We get to choose the toppings and mix match the choice we want upon the waffles served. I had it with gelato.

The buffet ended with a cup of nice coffee for my buffet partner and a tea for me. The service staffs are attentive to diners. They will approach us to see what we need on and off and clear the plates promptly before we are back with new foods on plates.

For more photos of the buffet pictures, check out my blog post : http://hazeldiary.com/?p=2199

I have read good reviews of Poulet Bugis+ from social media and long to give it a try. I knock off early than usual and managed to reach Bugis+ around 7.15pm. Surprisingly the queue has not started yet. We managed to get our seats within 10 minutes. Once we are seated, i saw the queue started to line up after 7.30pm.

Poulet is actually a French casual dining restaurant at Bugis+ which is opened by Thai Express group. The restaurant offers affordable French classics to the masses. It is an open concept theme located at level 4 of Bugis+. The restaurant design gives a contemporary and pleasant dinning place for group gathering and couples. We also get to see chefs on action with this new concept.The menu was simple and it has the effiel tower picture to compliment with with concept.Here comes the main course that we ordered. Braise de Canard @S$15.80 which serves braised duck leg in sweet wine sauce on baby spinach topped with cranberry and glazed shallot. The meat texture was surprisingly soft and tender and the duck meat was nicely done. However, the sauce wasn't generous enough as i wiped off the sauce before the duck meat finishes.Here comes the signature dish. Braise de Poulet @S$13.80 which is served slow cooked chicken leg with potato, onion, garlic and leek in white wine sauce. The chicken was slow roast until the skin becomes golden brown. The combination of the roasted chicken with the creamy sauce is splendid.Next we have Escargot de Bourgogne, $8.80.Escargots baked with tomato fondue infused with garlic butter.It was chewy and nice but it has less garlic taste. Dessert is a must after dinner. We ordred Tiramisu @S$7.80. Combination of mascarpone cheese, sponge finger soaked in espresso and rum syrup. The serving is generous and it is just nice for two of us to share. We can taste the tiramisu moist and it is just as delicious as it's look.To summarize, Poulet serves affordable price and decent French cuisine. We paid S$56.73 which inclusive of 10% service charge and 7%GST for 2 pax.The food is acceptable and par value with the price to pay. As for the services, the staff was friendly when we seek for opinions when ordering. They are quite attentive to customers' orders. The serving time was within 10 minutes which is pretty quick. Thus, this explains their high turnover on lunch and dinner time.