49 Seats, Bugis+

We came upon 49 Seats when we were looking for a place to eat in Bugis+. 49 Seats is located at the top floor of Bugis+, right outside the verandah. But diners don't have to worry that the restaurant is hot because it has its own air-conditions instead of adopting al-fresco style. 

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49 Seats serves mostly pasta and I don't know why, it seems that 49 Seats adopted prison style because they served the pasta and the drinks in metal utensils. I ordered the smoked duck spaghetti carbonara and the carbonara comes like a soup instead of pasta sauce. While the smoked duck taste not bad, I would prefer my pasta to be more on the al-dente side instead of soupy side. 

My friend ordered the tom yum seafood spaghetti and well, seems like the soupy sauce is the trademark of 49 Seats. The taste of the tom yum can be tasted and it mixes quite well with the seafood and the spaghetti but once again, can the sauce be less soupy? 

I would not even be wondering if I start to hear someone slurping the pasta sauce because well it does come out like a soup. I wonder if the other branch of 49 Seats at Orchard Central fare better but for now, I think I will give this place a skip. Unless I have no other choice. 

American Diner at Overeasy, Liat Tower

Overeasy occupies the space which is used to be occupied by Wendy's in Liat Tower. The place is frequently flooded whenever rainy season hits Singapore but let's hope that the drainage system has been improved so that Overeasy will not suffer the same ill-fate.

Anyway, since it has not rained that frequently nowadays, we figured that it is time to go to Overeasy, which seems to adopt American diner style, just like TGI Fridays. As how the rest of American diner goes, Overeasy offers a various type of burgers and sandwiches.

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We ordered the burger which is named "The To-Die-For" because well, it seems to be a nice cheeseburger from its description. Cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, and the special sauce. Hmm, no idea about the special sauce but we went for it anyway. The burger tastes quite nice although it gets pretty dry if you leave it out for too long. 

But I love Overeasy's Mac and Cheese. The taste of the Mac and Cheese is just right, without being too much. I will probably come back here for its Mac and Cheese. Hahaha. 

Overeasy has another location at Fullerton Hotel but the one located at Fullerton Hotel seems to be catered for fine dining instead of casual family diner. 

Turkish Dinner at Hamandali Restaurant, Cappadocia

After going through the process of carpet weaving in one of the weaving schools in Cappadocia, we were supposed to make our move to our dining venue, Hamandali Restaurant, which is located quite near to the school. However, we were still quite early and the restaurant is not ready for dinner yet. We had no choice but to linger around the yard for a while. 

Thankfully, there are a lot of beautiful flowers to adore while waiting for the time to pass. And to take picture with. 

The Turkish flowers look very beautiful from closer look too. I seldom see flowers in my daily life inside the concrete jungle and hence, the excessive adoring mood. Hahaha.

My brother had his silly and yet creative idea of making the flower fashionable. =P

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After half an hour, we finally boarded our bus and went to the restaurant. Hamandali restaurant is popular amongst tourists because it is actually a cave restaurant. Yes, you will have the experience of eating inside a cave. First, there is this potato souffle kind of pie. 

And the spinach mushroom soup. 

The main courses are then served together with rice because we, Indonesian, can't survive without rice somehow. Hahaha. There are pasta(s) too and all kind of grilled meats. 

The food served at Hamandali Restaurant is not bad and once you are full, you are not supposed to leave the restaurant immediately because Hamandali restaurant also offers Turkish performances such as belly dance and sufi dance. 

Carpet Weaving School, Cappadocia

In Cappadocia, there is a vocational weaving school which employs hundreds of women in entire region to learn how to weave a carpet or rug. Visitors are welcomed to visit the school and see how the carpet is being made. These local arts are dying so it is recommended for visitors to come and see the process while it is still around. 

The teacher/ owner of the school gave us a tour on how to make the carpet. Apparently no one knows exactly when the technique of carpet weaving first appeared but the oldest surviving carpet in the world is made in the Turkish style of a double knot. First, we were brought to the area where the silk cocoons are boiled. 

Once the silk cocoons are "cooked" to the correct form. They allow them to dry for a while before the next process, spinning the cocoons. 

Once the silk cocoons are spin, you will get the wool which then tied into a double knot and hence, the name, double-knot style. 

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The double-knot wool is now ready for some coloring. The coloring material is boiled in the big pot and they just put the whole double-knotted wool inside the pot. Each pot is used to store different color. 

Once the material is ready, it is now time to weave. There are certain patterns to follow like how you normally knit. But looking at the pattern, that carpet does not look easy to make, really.

Once you have finished the "tour", you will be invited to look at the end result and even, try to walk on it. They really feel so smooth and you can buy them at cheaper price (thanks to Government's subsidy) here. You don't have to carry it on flight (because that will be too heavy) as the store will deliver it to your house in whichever country you are coming from.

Zelve's Fairy Chimneys, Cappadocia

After our visit to Goreme and its Open Air Museum, we went to visit its neighbouring area called Zelve. The drive to Zelve was pretty near, I think it lasted around 10 to 15 minutes.

Zelve is located quite tucked away out of sight off the main road. It was a living community until the year 1952 where ordinary locals went about their daily life, grinding bulgur (re: cereal) at the mill, pressing grapes in the saraphane (re: winery), rearing pigeons for their manure for fertilizer and bedding their animals down for the night in the cave-cut stables. 

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Zelve is also famous for tourism because of its soldier's rock or fairy chimneys. There is an open air museum (albeit smaller than Goreme) in Zelve. 

Folklore says that long time ago a prophet was on the run while soldiers were chasing him. He was trapped in Zelve canyon and started to cry to God asking Him for help. He asked God to either turn the prophet into a bird so he could fly away or turn the soldiers into rock (now that's a very specific request in time of needs..lol). God, in His grace and mercy, decided to turn the soldiers into rocks and today, visitors can see these amazing soldier-fairy chimneys when they visit Zelve. 

Sunday Lunch Date at Dazzling Cafe, Capitol Piazza

The last time I ate at Dazzling Cafe was the night before typhoon hit Taipei back in summer 2013. My friend visited me and as what most locals do in Taipei the night before typhoon, we...spent our last few hours before typhoon came in shopping mall. And we had a good time sharing our honey toast back then.

Determined to share the same experience with another friend, I visited Dazzling Cafe again two years later...in Singapore. 

Dazzling Cafe has opened its branches in Singapore. The first is located at Capitol Piazza in City Hall while there is another one coming up at Orchard Gateway. I came slightly before lunch time on a Sunday and I have to wait in the line because the whole restaurant is packed. Oh well, at least I was the first in line and there are only two of us. 

15 minutes later, the waiter ushered us in and we made our order swiftly. I miss the taste of the fruit tea served at Dazzling Cafe in Taipei. The fruit tea served in its Singapore branch tastes pretty similar I think. A refreshing choice for a hot summer day. 

Despite the heat, my friend still need her coffee hot. The hot latte came up quite pretty. I guess that's a good decision to order your coffee hot for Instagram purpose. 

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We ordered the buffalo wings and it comes in five meaty pieces. The buffalo wings taste pretty good and I love the BBQ taste that it gives. 

We only ordered one main to share amongst the two of us because we wanted to leave some space in our stomach for the honey toast. My friend wanted to order the seafood marinara pasta. I am usually getting pretty irritated when the amount of seafood that the restaurant gives is too little for the price tag. But Dazzling Cafe provides a reasonable amount of seafood in the pasta dish and so, I am a happy customer.

Finally, here comes the main star of our Sunday lunch date, the honey toast. There are so many different flavors you can choose for the honey toast. Our Black Chocolate Honey Toast looks pretty mild compared to the Matcha Honey Toast. So if you want your toast to be dramatic, go for the matcha. The waiter or waitress will give customers a moment of food-photography before offering his or her service to cut the toast. 

Overall, I prefer the honey toast flavor sold in Taipei because they really come like a huge tower of toast and ice cream and ice cream sauce. And the price tag in Singapore is pretty steep for the honey toast (average SGD 15). Since I have no other choice, I think I will still come back every time I have a crave for honey toast. 

Yummy roasted chicken at Poulet, Vivo City

Poulet claims to be the first French casual dining restaurant chain concept in Singapore. I have to admit I seldom indulge myself to eat in French restaurants because they tend to use everything which sounds French-ish to hike up the price. Poulet states that it adopts a modern French-themed bistro offering affordable French classics to the mass public. Let's see how true is this statement.

I ordered a quarter roasted Chicken in mushroom sauce. I love the mushroom sauce and it really suits the roasted chicken well. The cost of the meal still comes at the higher end for me even though I suppose SGD 17 is already cheap compared to those "higher-end" French restaurants. 

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I had no time to take picture of my dinner buddy's chicken but they are basically the same except for the sauce. Her roasted chicken is served in brown sauce instead of mushroom sauce. She claimed that hers taste better but mine is nice too. #personalpreference 

If you are looking for a casual French dining experience, you can visit Poulet. They have quite a number of branches scattered all around Singapore's shopping malls like Raffles City and Vivo City. 

An Evening with Lovely Pancakes at Strictly Pancakes, Dhoby Ghaut

"We think all our customers deserve good beating." - Strictly Pancakes

It's been ages since the last time I mentioned about coming to Strictly Pancakes to my friends. We only managed to materialise this intention few months after when everybody have the time. When we came around 5pm-ish, there were practically minimal souls inside the restaurant. But we don't really mind because thanks to that, our orders will come slightly faster. The butter and the maple syrup came first. 

Strictly Pancakes has both savoury and sweet options for its pancakes. Since there are three of us that evening, we ordered two savoury pancakes and one sweet pancake. Our first savoury pancake is called Potatoes Leeking Cheese. We thought the cheese is gonna leaking from inside the pancake but turns out it's cooked together with the leek and potatoes inside the pancake's batter. A dollop of sour cream is given at the side of the two stack of pancakes.

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The second pancake looks smaller in comparison to the potatoes leeking cheese. It is called The Sunny Porker. It is basically a bacon pancake and a sausage pancake served with the sunny sides up on top of both pancakes. The amount of corns at the side is too little for my liking. 

The main highlight of that pancake date that evening should belong to the sweet pancake called Tiramisu. Kahlua infused mascarpone cheese slathered over three chocolate pancakes with a scoop of vanilla ice cream at the side...and look at the amount of cocoa bits. I am in heaven. Chocolate heaven.

How to go to Strictly Pancakes: 

Make your way to the nearest MRT station, Dhoby Ghaut MRT Station and follow the map accordingly.

The restaurant opens everyday.

Goreme Open Air Museum, Cappadocia

Goreme Open Air Museum is a unique museum in Turkey because it offers visitors the chance to see and explore the churches built inside the rocky wall. It is usually the first sight to be visited by travellers in Cappadocia because it is located in the center of the region with easy access from all directions. It is within walking distance from Goreme village center (around 15 minutes).

Goreme Open Air Museum has been a member of UNESCO World Heritage List since 1984. It is not without any reasons. The area covered by the Open Air Museum is known to form a coherent geographical entity and represents historical unity. There are a total of eleven refectories within the Museum, with rock-cut churches tables and benches. You can enter some of the rooms and see how it feels to live literally inside the rocks.

Each refectory is associated with a church. Most of the churches in Goreme Open Air Museum belong to the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries. The churches are built inside the rocks in order to avoid persecution during those times.

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We visited one of the churches in Goreme called Church of Pantokrator. The wall paintings inside the rock church are still well-maintained and in order to preserve the color of the paintings, no flash photography allowed inside the church. 

From one of the windows inside the church, you can see the view outside. The rocks opposite the Church of Pantokrator are also used by different churches and monasteries.

Did you notice that these rocky structures kinda resemble face? Reminds me of Lava in the short-opening-animation for Inside Out. Too bad the rocks here don't sing the Lava Song, oh well, after all they are rocks not volcanoes. XD #pardonmyrambling

Kofteci Ramiz, an outside grill restaurant in Turkey

A few days into our tour journey in Turkey, we were kinda craving for a kebab because we often identify Turkey with the yummy kebab. Turkish kebab, no? But our tour organiser had not fed us any kebab at all for at least, half the trip. At this point, I think I will be happy enough if they give me any grilled meat. Suddenly, in the middle of the road from Cappadocia to Konya (I think...I kinda forgot too because there are so many road trips we made in Turkey), we made a stop to eat. 

During our pit stop, our tour guide brought us over to have meal at a restaurant called Kofteci Ramiz. Okay, based on this tissue box, we are somewhere in Akhisar, I guess. 

As how our meal usually starts in Turkey, the waiters served us...greens. At this rate, I kinda lost appetite toward the salad. The salad made in Turkey is very healthy and by healthy I mean...bland. The only dressing they put on the salad is olive oil and my way of eating salad is by drenching those veggies under the caesar sauce. XD

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I love Turkish cream soup though. Kofteci Ramiz served us the chicken soup. Yum! 

When the plate of the main course arrived in our table, everybody rejoiced. Finally, we were given a chance to try out the grilled meat in Turkey. The grilled beef is served on a pita bread with a slice of tomato. The meat tastes superb (although I suspect the effect is added by the fact we have gone into many days without grilled meats). 

Turned out, Kofteci Ramiz is one of the well-known restaurant chains for grilled stuff in Turkey. Oh well, even though, it was only a pit stop, we were glad to finally able to taste Turkish grilled meat. LOL.