SC's Epic Birthday Dinner at Hong Kong Mandarin Grill

SC's birthday is just my annual excuse to splurge on dinner ^_^
I've asked for recommendations from my crazy foodie friends, one of them (that's you, Gary) even suggested that I made a poll to see where we end up dining in. I loved that idea, but in the end was too lazy to execute the poll. Heheheh.

Finally, I picked Mandarin Grill. I've heard so much about this place (thanks, Jason!), and because I heard the dishes are a lot of fun (SC loves creativity) and very photogenic too (this is for my benefit).

Did we have a yummy night?
When considering which tasting "tour" to order, I asked our server, "Are you sure we'd have enough to eat if we ordered tour 1 from the tasting menu?" - he was a bit taken aback. I bet he couldn't believe I was even considering quantity and worried that I wouldn't be full ^_^'

Anyway... here we go.

This was not the first dish, but the picture comes out first, because... doesn't it look gorgeous? Heheheh... I am superficial like that. This is the salad, it's a flower pot.


We "watered" aka "dressed" our salad. Too cute!


The edible soil. Adore the idea, but this soil is very filling. Just have a couple of bites and leave it. Don't feel "ng dai" (not worth) or you'll have no room for the rest of the meal like SC ^_^' heheheh.


Can you see the heart shaped shadow on it? Cute huh? (This is my code for - I can't remember what they were but I just remember they were tasty)


The bread basket.


The selection of olive oil. I chose fruity (second bottle from left), SC chose peppery (second bottle from right). I never thought that I'd love peppery more than fruity. But seriously, the one SC picked's awesome.


Again. Too cute! This is not a pear (duh!)


The softest shade of pink inside!


You can spread the "pear" on these bread.


Savoury cookies. Yum.


Liquid olives. I love. And no, it doesn't taste like you're swallowing olive oil.


Succulent scallops. I munched on an oyster leaf that tasted like the sea at the beginning of this dish. I am not a big fan of the greens that tasted (a tad too much) like the sea, but the scallops were lovely.


Sirloin steak with baked potatoes in edible "foil" and edible "charcoal". The charcoal turned out to be cassava (server said tapioca) covered in squid ink. The cassava part cracked me up, because I am from Indonesia and we eat singkong (cassava) a lot back home - never thought it'd ever make its appearance in a fancy schmancy restaurant.


The steak came with this pot of very lovely sweet corn. Buttery, fragrant, and oh-so-sweet!


The dessert, Oreo. It's cookie crumbs, vanilla ice cream, & hot chocolate - I don't know how to call it - thick foam? It's very very rich. I love that feeling of a-kick-in-the-gut richness from chocolatey desserts, and this particular one kicked ass. Love it. It is a bit too rich for summer though...


For the gentleman, a chocolate cigar.


And a make up powder for me, with a cotton candy puff too. The cotton candy's so sweet, I couldn't taste the powder anymore. The idea's cute tho.


Of course SC had to "light" his "cigar".

And for the birthday boy...

.. a chocolate birthday "candle".
Actually we've pretty much maxed out on chocolate after 1/2 of the Oreo dessert. So we just had fun with the petit four and the candle.

Overall, it is a fun dining experience!

Tour 1 - HK$1,188 per person + 10%

Mandarin Grill

Coca Cola Lime Prawns - Eat Your Drink

It's been a longgg time since I made prawns, and I was suddenly craving it when I saw my colleague brought tomato sauce prawn as her lunch at work. Finally, I managed to make prawns tonight!.
I used Coke & lime this time, I love cooking with my favorite drinks flavors. Sweet, savory, & sour at the same time! It's light too, perfect for summer.

Recipe
- 12 pieces large prawns
- 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
- 1 onion, thinly sliced
- 1 cup of Coke
- 1 lime
- pinches of salt
- a dash of Worchestershire sauce
- olive oil, butter
Melt butter & olive oil in a frying pan, add garlic and onion, saute until fragrant. Add prawns, and quickly add coke and pinches of salt, tasting as you go. You gotta be quick so that the prawns wouldn't get overcooked. If you want, you can mix the "sauce" in a bowl first until you get the desired balance of sweet and salty. Finish with lime juice.

Don't forget to suck all the tasty goodness out of those prawn heads. Lip smacking!

Peanut Butter Brownie

Sigh... if only every failure looked this good!

You may not believe it... but I failed this brownie recipe. This was my second attempt and I still failed.

Sobs. But at least I ended up with......this beautiful failure.
In my first attempt, I mistakenly melted dark chocolate chips into the batter, and ended up with burnt top + jiggly bottom.

In this second attempt, I carefully followed the recipe, covered the baking tray with aluminium foil to prevent from burning. The top's done beautifully, but the bottom was never set no matter how long I baked it for. 

I really don't know what I did wrong...

But rich melted chocolate + savory peanut butter?

Failure or not, still tasted pretty bloody amazing.

Here's the recipe if you wanted to give it a try, many have succeeded, I am sure I failed because of my own stupidity. Thanks Mrs Ergul for sharing the recipe with me. I still licked the tray clean :)

Easy & Tasty Peas & Bacon

I shouldn't call this a recipe. I know. I know.
I don't know why I haven't done this combo before. Easy, simple, and of course bacon and bacon grease make everything tasty. Perfect for a quick lunch or dinner, or serve this as a side dish, or add a couple of beaten eggs to turn it into a breakfast. Easy peasy!

Recipe
- a cup of frozen peas
- a few slices of bacon strips (depends how much bacon you want, I used 3 strips)
- salt, black pepper, lemon juice (optional)
Drop frozen peas into a bowl of hot water for a quick defrost, drain, set aside. Cut bacon strips into small pieces. Throw bacon into a frying pan over medium heat. Once bacon becomes a bit brownish, turn the heat up and add frozen peas. Mix peas and bacon, let cook for about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Transfer to a serving plate/bowl, squeeze fresh lemon juice to balance the bacon fat.

I have a confession to make. I ate mine with steamed rice. How Indonesian of me.

Make Your Own Sandwich DIY Party

Once upon a time... (yes, this happened THAT long ago by Internet standard).
I finally managed to host a small house warming party with my bin tai (twisted) food-mad friends.
It was meant to be a casual afternoon tea party, I planned to make dainty little sandwiches and everything.

But! Somehow, SC made an appointment with our interior designer to have our flat photographed that morning (ARGH!). We thought it's gonna be a one hour affair. Photo photo photo and done, but noooo... the designers moved around stuff and I wasn't able to use my kitchen until right before the party (ARGH ARGH!!!).

Thus, I frantically prepared all of the ingredients to make sandwiches, with the great help of my good friend, Ieie, and decided that all of my guests will have to DIY their sandwiches themselves.

Turned out pretty fun!
Here are the pictures from the party.

The spread
BreadsI prepared an assortment of small sized breads. Mini cheese topped croissant, plain croissant, Japanese chewy cheese donuts, & danish bread.
Fillings
Fried bacon, cheddar hot dogs, cherry tomato-cucumber-feta salad, pineapple-grapes-young mango with lemon honey dressing, Hong Kong roast meats (char siu bbq pork, siu yuk roast pork, & roast duck), Indonesian fried noodles (that's right!), potato chips (uh huh!), and crispy seaweed (ya ha!)
Sauces
Japanese mayo, ketchup, chilli sauce, cream cheese, and if one felt like sweet sandwiches, condensed milk, peanut butter, nutella.
Sweets
Assorted baked goods that I didn't make, and some Indonesian snacks that again, I didn't make (bought from Indonesian restaurant).


Everyone's encouraged to go as crazy (as bin tai) as they could.
Push the envelopes, think outside the sandwich bag!

Here are some of the bin tai sandwiches my friends and I DIY'ed.

Supercharz' creation: seaweed, salad, bacon, & siu yuk in chewy donut. Whew!


e_ting's creation. Bacon, salad, & pineapple in mini croissant. The pineapple made all the diff!


Jasonbonvivant's creation. WOW! Siu yuk, bacon, tomatoes, potato chips, seaweed, & cucumber with feta in a mini croissant.
A tower of yummy madness!


G4gary's creation. Cucumber feta, siu yuk, pineapple & potato chips in danish bread.
Siu yuk (roast pork belly) is a very popular choice huh? I blame David Chang!

Here are mine, and yes I ate all of them.

Bacon, tomatoes, & cucumber with mayo in mini cheese topped croissant. Not too crazy to start.


Huge hot dog, tomatoes and cucumber in chewy Japanese donut with lotsa mayo and cream cheese

Towards the end, I went a bit more mad...

Danish bread topped with char siu, siu yuk & roast duck, Indonesian fried noodles and crispy seaweed.

WE HAD A LOT OF FUN!
What kind of other DIY parties we should do next?