september sessions

My family always marks the start of September by celebrating two significant events.

September 1 - my mum's birthday
September 5 - my sister's birthday

Last Thursday, the family went to the Hilton's Harbour Grill for some meat and shellfish, as my mum wanted to try their oyster bar.

The restaurant is in serious need of a facelift.

It's not decaying or falling apart, it's just stuck in a time warp.

Stepping into the restaurant takes one back a couple of decades, back into the 80s. It's white, expansive, with faux french windows and wooden floors. It conjures up an image of Don Johnson in his white suits. I can just see women with big hair and shoulder-padded jackets and miniskirts fitting in oh so comfortably here.

But dressed in my black top, amber skirt and heels, I felt a bit out of place.

And when I opened up the menu, I felt like running to find another restaurant. There was nothing much to the menu, which despite its hefty size, had few interesting options. Pricey too.

A duck consomme with enoki mushrooms went for $20 and a lobster bisque for $25.

Steaks were a bit more decently priced I suppose, starting from $40.
(That was until the rib eye came and it was a quite small piece of meat that one)

My prime rib was $50.
But it was a decent hefty thing, although the tips were a bit too dry.
And nothing too spectacular.

My parents ordered some oysters as well. Each oyster goes for $7, or $13.
That's per piece.

However, they do have some specials where two oysters are paired with an alcoholic beverage, like a Vodka Martini. Strangely, these oysters don't come in their shells.

My sister had some scallops with risotto and a champagne gratin.

I was half expecting a mound of risotto all smothered in cheese, but the plate contained two lonely scallop shells with the risotto, scallop and cheese filling it. Needless to say, she was still hungry after.

We passed on dessert as nothing was enticing enough, and headed home for the tarte tatin, which ended up being decent I guess.

On Saturday we had a far better birthday celebration, although an early one.

Parking was a pain though, cos we were headed to Original Sin at Chip Bee. Ended up parking at Holland Drive, but it's really not that far, plus it was a cool breezy night.

We started off with the Mezze Platter - falafels, pita bread with hummus, tzatziki (love that word!), something that was prob eggplant, and a pumpkin mash. Oh and a bit of salad with feta cheese and olives. Lovely. The starter size is plenty for four people to share.

My main was the er... something Misto. Essentially spinach, tofu, chives and I think ricotta cheese patties, breaded with er almonds and sesame (as you can tell I was paying close attention to the menu description) topped with some rocket, asparagus and drizzled with some plum sauce. Delicious.

My sister's filo pie was good, as was the lasagna (sauce was a bit sweet tho). but the so-called Magic Mushroom of portebello and some kinda tomato sauce and cheese wasn't that great.

After all that we were just absolutely stuffed but I felt that we couldn't leave without dessert.

So we ordered the chocolate mud cake with vanilla bean ice-cream. Lovely ice-cream but cake was a wee bit dry for my taste, so I piled on the ice-cream. But four of us, we are very small eaters and only managed 2/3 of the cake.

It was a longish walk back to the car but I sure needed it. Too too full. But a good sort of full.

I'll be back!

Oh, Friday night after work I just needed some red wine. Couldn't figure out which other wine place would still be open at 1230. So ended up at Vino Vino again. Somehow I miss going to the Wine Company, but they close too early. Vino Vino's wines are decent but not as extensive. Service is good though and there's always a couch available to lounge on whenever I'm there so it's not too bad. Plus En is just next door, in case there's a need for late night sashimi.

So that's my weekend update.

Sunday is being spent at the office as usual, where I hung around the gym for 10 minutes trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with the treadmills. Only two of them seemed to work and people were on them before I got there. The others, while plugged in and all, just couldn't be turned on. So I had to wait a bit till one of them finished. Fortunately there are more people at work today, unlike last Sunday, so things weren't piled up when I got back.

Oh and a few minutes after I get into the office, the strap on my sandal breaks and i have to wear my running shoes around instead. Sad sad day for my yellow shoes. What am I going to wear on my feet that's yellow now? I have green, orange, red, black, brown, gold, orange and yellow, blue, beige, but no yellow! Now I have to go find myself another yellow pair.

Also on Saturday, a new addition to my wardrobe - a pair of non-yellow shoes and a dress.