Kichi Kichi made their presence felt in Singapore late April 2010 when they launched their first outlet in Citisquare Mall. Fast forward 2 months and they opened their 2nd outlet in Ngee Ann City, along Orchard Road.
Kichi Kichi operates on the concept to diners an ability create their own dining experience by selecting from one’s preferred stock and homemade sauce; Not fogetting the added convenience of a conveyor belt filled with food items , thus removing the need to leave one’s seat!
Pierre Gagnaire.
The owner of the reknowned 3-Michelin starred restaurant in Paris has an outpost in the Mandarin Oriental hotel that I stayed in and I just knew that I definitely had to pay Pierre (which it is called) a visit.
His inventive and gastronomic cuisine definitely delighted my tasted buds while I was there for my Express Lunch; Trust me, the restaurant holds true to their word when they call it an Express Lunch; The 4 course meal took no more than 45 minutes to complete, with each course seemingly appearing right after each plate was cleared, served hot no less.
Readers of this blog would know that I am an ardent supporter of Au Petit Salut (APS) – Not only is it a short drive away from home, parking is in abundance and best of all, free. To top it off, service although patchy at peak hours, most definitely gets the thumbs up from me (Kudos especially goes out to Rabin.) Offering both al fresco and indoor seating, APS’s setting is best described less of a fine-dining restaurant) the likes of Saint Pierre or Au Jardin) rather one where it’s equally comfortable for couples and friends alike to meet up and gather. To clarify, I’m only describing the ambience of the restaurant and not the food and service for what you get on both accounts are nothing less than that expected from a fine dining institution.
P.s. the al fresco tends to be rather warm during lunch, but cooling and rather romantic, if I may, during dinner.
I have been to APS for lunch a numerous times and have blogged two of my visits here (See here and here). I have been here from time to time for dinner but never have I blogged about their dinner / ala-carte menu.
This visit, we ordered from their ala-carte menu. That said, APS offers a 4 course set dinner option for S$98++ per person that comes with 2 entrees, a choice of main and a dessert, which let me tell you, is definitely value-for-money. Portions here, even for the set dinner, are not what you were define as petite.
My Cathay Pacific flight (P.S. they served one of the worst omelettes unfortunately) touched down at the Hong Kong International Airport at 12pm exactly; I was starving by the time that I reached the hotel and completed all the necessary check-in procedures.
Really, that meant only one thing – it was lunch time. I needed to unpack and reply a few important emails; so I did the unthinkable: Order In-Room Dining.
On hindsight, what was I thinking – Ordering in-room dining service on an overseas trip, in Hong Kong no less. By the way, it is times like these when those daily hotel credits come into play!
Thankfully, what I had ordered did not disappoint!
Read on to see the two dishes that I ordered from the menu!
*Note to Readers: This review is from my guest author, CY.
I had the privilege to be invited down to eM by the River to review on their drinks menu and some of their, as they would put it, Bar Grub.
eM by the River is located within Gallery Hotel, and as the name suggests, its right by the Singapore River. It’s a really nice place to have your after-work drink because of its ‘chillax‘ ambience and relaxing music, or you could grab your brunch over here becasuse they have a menu for food as well.
Last month, I had the opportunity to escape the sweltering heat of Singapore for a short work cum leisure trip to Hong Kong! Fine, I shall delude myself no further for it was frankly not much of an escape. Hong Kong was equally as hot as Singapore for the period that I was there.
This marked my second visit to Hong Kong and having stayed in Kowloon on my previous visit (P.s. I stayed at Hotel Panaroma – which I highly recommend as well), I stayed at the vernerable Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong this time around. Most of my meetings that I had planned to attend were scheduled to be held somewhere in the Central area, which made Mandarin Oriental the most obvious choice.
Now for the foodie in me, a 2 minute walk to the Central MTR station proved to be very much useful, especially on days that I had (rather, wanted) to travel out of the Central area in the hunt for local delicacies.
Read on to see my thoughts and photographs of my stay.
It was not too long ago that I reviewed Casa Verde, so I thought it was fitting only to post my thoughts of another one of their restaurants in the same group.
La Strada is their casual Italian outpost located right next to their French bistro-styled Bisto du Vin. Food aside, I quite like the decor of the restaurant – from the wooden flooring to the relatively large dining tables. I could be wrong here, but the decor presented itself in a rather semi-formal setting. But I always say, while the ambience is important, the company and the food plays a much larger role when dining out.
Ah.. Peking duck. I feel deeply in love with them from the moment I visited Beijing back in 2004!
Can Singapore’s Imperial Treasure live up to the ones that I’ve tried in Beijing? Read on to find out! For one, the chef brings the entire duck out and slices them up, right in front of your table. Talk about skills! These guys made slicing the skins off the duck seem like an easy task.
(This was sent via email to Brad)
Hi Brad,
On Sunday night, I wrote a piece on my blog, with regards to a food blogger requesting for a free meal and voiced out my personal opinions against the actions that allegedly took place. For the record, at no point of my blog post did I make any reference to both the blogger and/or the restaurant.
On hindsight, it was my mistake to only hear one side of the story and not to approach you to get the full picture.
As of Monday, 23rd August at 1800hrs, I had closed the comments to my blog post and at 2100hrs on the same day, I had removed the post.
The media, including the article on a prominent search engine, has sensationalized what was a simple mis-communication between the restaurant and yourself. To that end, some quarters of both online and offline media has intruded into your personal space, for which I am deeply apologetic.
For all the inconvenience to you that I may have caused, I sincerely apologize.
Humbly yours,
Glenn
Moving forward, I feel that this is a case best left closed. Let’s all move on from here. I will not be answering any more questions comments on Twitter, Facebook, Email or on this blog.
Casa Verde, essentially means, “green house” in Italian and what an apt choice for a name! Casa Verde is nestled within the Singapore Botanic Gardens close to the Visitors’ Centre, away from the hustle and bustle of Orchard Road, yet with the added convenience of being just 5 minutes drive away. Sitting 110 diners, 80 of which are situated within the al fresco area, Casa Verde is a collaborative effort between the venerable Les Amis Group and Buko Nero restaurant.
Lunch is a semi-self service affair, where you go over to the counter to place your order. Dinner, on the other hand, is slightly more service-oriented where the order counter is shut and you have wait staff coming by to take your order. I am pretty sure many will shun going there for lunch but really? I really much preferred it to remain this way – the whole idea of queuing up and placing an order at the counter just seems to fitting for the environment. Casual, relaxed and where company takes precedence. P.S. Pets are allowed in the al fresco area!
I’ve been here for both lunch and dinner due to its close proximity to home but make no mistake,on each and every occasion, both the service and food seemed rather good, self-service or not. They topped up the glasses without being asked and always seemed to be around yet being non intrusive.
