whine & dine

&

A bunch of Bunny’s ex-colleagues and friends came over for drinks (and housewarming of sorts) on Saturday, and because they’re a particularly greedy bunch (don’t any of you dare contest that if you’re reading this!), I decided not to do a sit-down meal, and just prepared a whole slew of finger food and canapès for them to go with a couple of bottles of wine.

Most of the food was inspired by various recipes in various cookbooks, including Donna Hay – Instant Entertaining (my valentine’s day present from Bunny), The Cook’s Book (latest addition to my cookbook collection), and browsing through the Jamie Oliver cookbooks that I own.

On the menu for Saturday was Smoked Salmon on Egg Frittata (pictured above), two types of crostini, and Chilli and Lemongrass Chicken which I served on endive leaves.

I also made a bunch of Paper Thin Crisp Bread using a recipe for soft white bread (plus a lot of oil, plus a lot of folding, working, and stretching) in The Cook’s Book, which I served with hummus, and finished off the evening with Vanilla Bean Panna Cotta, topped with strawberries that I’d left to “soak” in icing sugar in the fridge.

It was a really good experience for me, seeing as how I’m thinking of starting a catering service of sorts in the near future, particularly catering (pun unintended) to the needs of people who want to host small drinks parties at home, but don’t have the time/energy to do up the food prep on their own.

Anyway, if any of you have the need for such a service or any feedback/thoughts, leave a comment or send me an emiao.

Having recently moved out of Club Street (surrounded by masses of awesome food – Senso, Ikukan, Maxwell Food Centre, Telok Ayer Market, Ka Soh, the little kopitiam in the car park, fries at Union… and more), bunny and I have been itching to go back. The plan was to avoid Holland Village on Saturdays when it’s at its most stifling, and run away to former haven Club Street and all it’s Chinatowny glory. The only problem with the plan was that we didn’t forsee ourselves being booked up for over 3 consecutive months of entertaining on Saturday evenings (and/or Sunday afternoons).

Last Friday, we finally got a chance to go back and revisit our old haunt. One of the reasons why we’d been so eager to return was a little Japanese shop-and-restaurant called wacha, that we’d spotted on the day we were handing the key over. Through the windows, we spotted delicately crafted lacquerware, miniature bonsai, and a tiny counter dining area. The entire restaurant couldn’t have seated more than 20 people or so. We were intrigued.

In actual fact, the restaurant could hold about 25 – two four-seater tables each in the front and back dining areas, 5 counter seats, and an extra four-seater table in the basement. But it’s a good thing I remembered to make reservations, as a number of people strolled in only to be turned away.

wacha has a rather tiny food menu in comparison to their extensive ocha, sake and sochu offerings. A handful of items are offered ala carte, and they only have two non-descript set menus, each containing a basket of appetizers, a simmered dish, a grilled or pan-fried dish, and rice, priced at S$30 and S$38 respectively. The only difference between the sets lies in the way the rice is prepared, and ours (we both had the S$38 menu) came with green tea fried rice which was served with a clear soup with mushrooms.

All of the food was impeccably prepared, and it was especially rewarding to be seated at the counter and be able to watch one of the staff whisking the matcha for us. My highlights from the dinner were probably the egg salad and tamago in the basket of appetizers, and the green tea fried rice.

This cosy, little enclave is definitely going to become one of our regular haunts. I’ve already told a whole bunch of people about it and can’t wait to go back! Now, if only I could afford the delectable lacquerware sold there too. :\

(The rest of my photos from the evening can be seen here.)

wacha
14 Ann Siang Road
#01-01
Singapore 069694
Tel: +65 6438 1553

So the baking stone was awesome, and the pizza was deeeelicious (especially our impromptu asian version with maling hurhur). The only disturbing part was how the two guests, once done with dinner, promptly fell asleep on the beanbag and on the couch, leaving the bunny and I with no choice but to retire to the bedroom in order to find some space to recline after having done the dishes.

It was also a bit peculiar how in order to get them out of the house, I literally had to lure them out of their resting places with a bottle of (orange flavoured) yakult each.

Anyway, the next time I do pizza at home, I think I’m going to try the thin-crust recipe which takes about 3 days to prepare (from refridgerating the flour overnight to refridgerating the dough overnight again), but I think should be rather rewarding. Only that’s going to have to wait till I have something to mix it with (which preferably has an attachable dough hook). I also need to brush up on my pizza-peel-skills (or figure out some way to get the pizza to fly off the peel onto the stone). Perhaps putting less toppings might be a better idea……

Anyhoo, it’s off to Pepper Lunch I go now! More yummy food ahoy!

So on the 24th of March, when I’m in HK, there’s going to be some horrific BYOK* kitchen-stadium-esque cookout. That’s right – for some reason I’ve been included in this 4-chef-extravaganza. One’s a pasta-specialist, one purportedly pan-fries foie gras to crisp-exterior and molten-interior perfection, then of course there’s uncle, and lowly, lowly me.

I need to find a knife case.

^{*bring your own knife}

I’m gonna test out my new baking stone (and pizza peel) on either Monday or Tuesday (‘cos bunny’s on holiday and mucking about the house with me) so if anyone wants to come over and get a bit of pizza love, give me a buzz!