Hin Hollywood Canteen

Wonderful memories flooded to my mind the moment we reached this area tucked away off Tanjong Katong Road.

If you were a stranger to this place, you may not decide to have a meal here.

Small, cramped, untidy, almost dilapidated.

Little would you expect to find a few gems of a stall here in this small canteen!

My colleagues and I purposed to visit this place for lunch as the mostly aged stall owners are counting down to the last few days of their tenancy here…. after half a century of operations.

 

I passed by this ordinary-looking tree situated firmly outside the canteen. Almost every Sunday from the years 1999 – 2002, my church friends and I would, due to a lack of space, set up table under this very tree to have our lunch. We risked falling leaves and bird shit dropping into our savoury bowls and heads! I will definitely miss this tree for sure too…. Nostalgic indeed…

When we reached the canteen at a quarter to two pm, it was still hustling and bustling with the lunch crowd.

Judging from the queue at the wanton mee stall, it must be delicious! Strangely, I couldn’t recall ever having it during those old days. Not a big wanton mee fan anyway…

The char kway teow looked good too but I did  hear of a couple of cockroach incidents related to this stall… You may still want to support this really old char kway teow uncle chef and order a plate for compassion sake! Say your grace before tucking in!

I remembered I only ate 2 things here – Duck porridge/rice and dry ban mian. Many of my friends and I believed the stall here invented the dry ban mian. I don’t really care about its history, I just know I love it!

We decided to order and eat like there’s no tomorrow (true in a sense!). Here’s a feast for your eyes!

Dry Ban Mian.

With fried shallots and anchovies and drenched in a slightly sweet black sauce + chilli.

The soup that accompanied it. Inside the soup are minced pork, vegetables, fishcake, mushrooms and egg.

Duck meat.

Delicious chilli.

Tau pok and egg.

We finished almost every morsel of food on the plates.

Verdict: SUPER SATISFIED!

Some info that you may be interested to know.

• The canteen will shut down by the end of August.
• A few weeks ago, I wanted to come here for a late lunch at 3pm. By then most of the stalls are closing as they had sold out their food… Come early!
• The ban mian & wanton mee stall has no plans of relocation as yet.
• The duck rice stall will be shifting to Sims Place Market & Hawker Centre.

• And here’s the address of the canteen if you are interested to visit over the next few days.

Tanjong Katong

57 Tanjong Katong Road

(S)436952

It’s beside the soon-to-be-gone-too Lion City Hotel.

Absolute Thai at Century Square and Me @ 20 weeks (Halfway!)

Yes, that’s me at 20 weeks! I actually look slimmer in this photo. Many of my friends had commented that my tummy had grown very big, very fast!

I can’t believe it that I am halfway through my pregnancy now. It seems so much faster than when I was carrying Julien!

Next Monday, I will be going for my detailed scan. By then, I would most probably be able to announce or rather confirm the gender of Baby J Junior… Exciting!

Anyway my family recently went to Absolute Thai at Century Square for dinner. It was the first time I’ve ever seen this restaurant. And yes, that shows how long I have absent myself from the shopping belt at Tampines Central.

We liked the ambience and setting of the restaurant.

Part of the pretty ambience… heehee…

And here are the food we ordered!

Pineapple rice.

Appetizers.

Beef noodles.

Tom Yum Seafood Soup with udon.

Red Curry.

Green Curry.

The service at this place was good. Waitresses were friendly (maybe because we went slightly earlier than the dinner peak hours). Honestly, I think the food is only slightly above average. The best tasting in my opinion was my order of Phad Thai which I forgot to snap a picture of!

My future Yao Ming?

Today was the opening ceremony of a new toy for Julien….

The first thing Julien did when I passed him the ball was….

Whoa! Doesn’t he look like he is going to aim and shoot right through the hoop??! He looks pro too! FUTURE YAO MING??! *Heart bursting with pride*

Wait a minute…

Instead of throwing, he started to inch forward…

Hmmm…. Nevermind if he needs to come MUCH closer to take aim…. It’s his first time! Julien looks like he is going to throw the ball into the hoop until

Julien withdraws the basketball and hugs it tightly…

“Mummy, can I just play with the ball? It’s mine… I don’t want to throw it away… Pleassseeeee?”

Ok…. And after fiddling with the ball and dropping it, he decides to play with the stand itself.

Well, mummy is still hopeful there is some potential within my son to be a world-class basketballer.

We shall not give up!

Family BBQ @ West Coast Park

A couple of Saturdays ago, my very enthusiastic, fun-loving family (Mum’s side), organized yet another family outing – BBQ @ West Coast Park!

I had always enjoyed family BBQs… one, for it’s food. Instead of the usual hotdogs, garlic bread (to stuff u) and chicken wings I get at youth outings, I get to eat sumptuous seafood, otah, satay, curry chicken and MORE!

And of course, not forgetting the social aspect of BBQ! Have I ever mentioned that I have wonderful uncles and aunties and cousins and nephews and niece and Filipino maids of the various families?

A short intro here to some of them:

I have a couple of very interesting uncles…

First up, our family’s very own… Eric Clapton?!

As for the next uncle, when we first sighted him, we thought we’d find gold at West Coast Park.

But we realized later that he probably just wanted to see us better. Hehehe…

(Actually this uncle is our family’s very ‘on’ photographer and videographer. Maybe the head lamp helps to create a better flash function in photos??)

Here are the fittest of the lot – My mum’s brothers. Both swim ALOT, I guess even now. Really put the rest of us to shame.

Here are some of the pretty, well-maintained aunties I have…. yeah, I have to admit this good gene runs in da family.

Me and Julien!

Here’s a pic of how many family members turned up that night… And I can roughly tell, it’s Almost full force!

And Jared had a shocking revelation that night. My 3 other cousins, the only married ones with kids, had among them 5 hyperactive boys and 1 girl…. He is praying very hard THIS doesn’t run in da family!

All in all, this BBQ was really a great time of catching up with my relatives. I really have to hand it over to the few who always organize the family outings, even after Grandma passed away last year. These outings when attended by everyone enthusiastically, really bonds the relatives together.

Looking forward to the Karaoke session next!

(Us 3Js and some of the oh-so-cool cousins!)

*Photo credits: My cousin Teo Sulin.

Lunch @ Todai Restaurant, Marina Bay Sands

My sis-in-law spotted a great lunch deal online. 30% off lunch buffet at Todai Restaurant at Marina Bay Sands!

When I first entered the restaurant, the first thought that came to my mind was… “The place is BIG!”

Here’s one part of the dining area where we sat.

They even have VIP rooms.

Here, you can expect seafood, interesting sushi, Western, Chinese, Korean… kinda international.

Here are some of the food areas…

Cooked food sections:

This buffet is definitely NOT for dim sum lovers…

SUSHI! Very interesting selection of sushi available. Not only do they have the usual raw fish atop the rice roll, they also have alot of Singaporean sushi creations (There was a sushi named “Merlion”!). The use of chilli sauce, cheese wrap, lots of mayo, even a deep-fried sushi convinced me that they are out to win the hearts of the Singaporeans.

Pasta and pizza counter!

And here are some of the food we took.

My MIL grabbed fresh crabs rightaway!

Meats galore!

My favorite food for this buffet…. Sushi yummy!

I seem to have a crazy craving for sushi when I am pregnant… Same when I was pregnant with Julien.

There were only 2 types of pizzas available but they were oh-so-deliciously-thin crusted!

A trio potato. There’s definitely sweet potato in this… but I couldn’t guess the other 2 kinds of potato. The mayo dressing absolutely complemented this petite serving… I felt like I was eating totally mashed up potato salad!

Fresh prawns.

Yummy ribs. Just a tad too salty?

Ok, some vege to balance out the meat intake today.

And lastly, tempura and more meat!

Nice ambience, good and prompt service and a wide variety of delicious food, I should be visiting this place soon again!

By the way, you may be happy to know that MBS offers complimentary parking for 6 hours from 10am – 4pm on Mondays-Thursdays. Just spend S$20 in a single receipt and claim your free parking at the concierge!