Recently, my friend and I are on the lookout for the best xiao long bao in Singapore which is why we went around trying different restaurants xiao long baos. Our next stop happens to be Paradise Dynasty, which, if I am not mistaken, is the restaurant that offered the colourful xiao long baos first. The tray of 8 xiao long baos, consisting of 8 different flavours: original, black truffle, cheese, garlic, ginseng, foie gras, crab roe and szechuan, costs $14.80. There are eight different flavours and we each ate 8 of them by ourselves. Personally, I felt that the taste of the different xiao long baos are not very distinct for certain flavours. If I were to eat the xiao long baos blindfolded, I wouldn’t have known that it was a different flavoured one. That said, certain flavours are more distinct. I loved the Szechuan and crab roe best. The Szechuan flavoured xiao long bao has a nice spicy taste to it which I love since I enjoy spicy food (though it is just a little hint of spice). The crab roe xiao long bao on the other hand, is especially fragrant as it as a hint of savouriness and sweetness from the crab roe. I found the cheese flavour to be distinctively weird as I felt the cheese did not go well with the soupy xiao long bao filling. I would say once you found out which flavour you enjoy, it will be better to just order one tray of that flavour since some flavours are just off.

Itacho is one restaurant which I like to go frequently for my cravings for japanese food. It helps that there are more outlets as well. Just a few weeks back, I went to the outlet at Plaza Singapura. I ordered quite a few items and I must say everything that I ordered is up to my standards. My favourite is the green tea cold soba with scallops. The soba is very refreshing and the scallops are sweet and full of flavour. The price is also very reasonable with the amount of scallops in the dish - it costs $8 for this green tea soba. They also have a special menu which features a few sushi items at discounted prices, so it is worthwhile taking a look at the menu.

My friend and I are shopping in Plaza Singapura and our tummies are growling at the end of all the shopping. It is still too early for dinner, so we had dessert first. We went down to the basement where Ji De Chi is at for our desserts. It has been a very long while since I had peanut paste, hence I decided to order that for a change. The pastes are served very quickly, and luckily both my friend and I ordered that. The peanut tastes very nutty, thick and aromatic. The paste is not too sweet, just of the right level of sweetness and it is very nice. I probably enjoyed it so much because I am hungry and I havent had this for a long time. Nonetheless, it is money well spent as I finished every drop of the peanut paste.

My friend and I decided to try Salted Caramel for their ice cream as we have tried Udders before and we thought of trying something new. Besides ice cream, I was surprised that they have coffee as well. All scoops cost the same regardless of flavour and if you get two or three scoops, it is slightly cheaper. We ordered two scoops of ice cream at $5.60. We are free to sample the ice creams before buying and we eventually settled on the early grey ice cream and rum and raisin ice cream. The rum and raisin is rather good though we both agreed that the rum and raisin over at Udders still wins our vote for a stronger alcohol taste. The early grey is rather light with a nice tea aftertaste which somehow makes it seem less sinful a treat. The ice creams are quite worth it as the scoop is rather large.

My mum and I went to the nearby hawker centre for our dinner as she did not cook. I spotted Astons and immediately knew I am going to order that because I had a sudden craving for western. For a change, instead of ordering the meats with two sides, I went for the Salmon Spaghetti which costs $8.90. The spaghetti does not come with the two sides but instead, it comes with a soup and a slice of garlic bread. Overall, still quite value for mone though I would have preferred the sides since there are more varieties. The salmon spaghetti is tomato based and it is rather savoury as the tomato sauce is flavourful with a slight tartness from the tomatoes. The spaghetti is also smooth to the bite from the use of a little oil in tossing the spaghetti before the adding of the tomato sauce. The salmon is quite alright, the meat is not too tough since it is not sliced too thickly. The portion of salmon is just a little on the less side, but otherwise, it is a pretty good meal.