My first taste of French cuisine at La Petite Cuisine

La Petit Cuisine is a little French restaurant tucked in the busy stretch of Upper Thomson Road. A friend recommended me this place to me when I said I wanted to try some French cuisine without burning a hole in my pocket.

We ordered two starters with the creamy carrot soup as our safe choice; having soup with a freshly toasted bun is just a great way to wet our appetite. Can’t say the same about the cheese platter with four kinds of French cheese though. I thought it would be fun to try something new because there were two cheese-lovers among us.

(In anti-clockwise, starting from the bottom) The first piece of cheese had a strong flavour but I could still relate to it. The second had strong goat taste which all of us are not a fan of. By the third piece, which tasted like a dead rat, we have concluded that cheese is an acquired taste. The last piece was really salty and we were ready to move on.

The prawn spaghetti was good. Can’t really go wrong with lots of garlic, olive oil and spaghetti. I know spaghetti is meant to be slightly undercooked so that it is a bit tough, but I still prefer it to be softer and more cooked. The best dish was the sausages with salad and french fries! The three types of sausages – pork, beef and lamb – look the same, but they taste so different. It was fun to eat because they have their own unique taste, and I can’t decide which is my favourite.

Our friend had a Creme brûlée which was really small and he said it tasted ok only. I need to try more French cuisine!

La Petite Cuisine
227 Upper Thomson Road
*They have another outlet at Serene Centre 

City Square Mall

City Square Mall is a nice place to hang out with a few hidden finds. It used to be mainly for Vanessa Beauty & Henna Artwork Creations (#B2-28 ) where I thread my eyebrows, but there’s more than that now.

The western food at the Banquet (#B2-01/04) food court is really decent. They are generous with their portions and there’s quite a few to choose from. My favourite has to be the Hawaiian chicken. The slight sweetness from the pineapple sends me straight to the seaside of Hawaii with hula girls dancing in the background. My imagination runs quite wild when food is good. 😉

You should also not overlook Saizeriya Italian Restaurant (#B2-55/56) that’s just opposite Banquet. The outdated deco and low prices (<;$10) are in no way a good indication of the quality of their food. It is actually a Japanese chain of Italian family-style restaurants that serves salad and free-flow drinks with a small top up fee.

I am always a happy camper there because everything is below $10. I can order what I like and also have salad with fresh salmon! The left picture is the normal salad, and the one on the right is with salmon. They are quite generous with their dressing, so you might want them to put it at the side instead.

The dishes taste like homecooked food which is comforting after a day’s work. My favourite spaghetti at Saizeriya is the creamy spaghetti with spinach and salmon. A good mix of veg and fish makes me a happy girl. The spinach was cooked perfectly, not over or under-cooked. It’s a pity that the sauce for the tuna pasta is too diluted, or it would make a good dish. The fungi spaghetti is decent, but it felt like something is missing.

Here’s a picture of the gratin which was not a lot. The cheese was nice, but I am not sure if it’s filling enough.

Another of our favourite find at City Square Mall is Make Shake (#B2-K2/K11). They have a huge list of ingredients that you can choose from to make your milkshake, or choose any of their popular combinations. I really like the fact that their milkshakes are made of ice cream, so they don’t taste too milky or runny. Milkshakes with tiny chunks of chocolates are great desserts that are quite hard to come by in Singapore. 🙂

A piece of my heart

If you are looking for an absolutely sweet gift for a girl, this is it. Seriously, what can be cuter and sweeter than a box filled of jellyhearts? I thought it was something that only exists in Pinterest until my brother’s girlfriend brought us a box of it.

Imagine how much I gushed about it! This box of 20 jellyhearts can melt anyone’s heart. The strawberries are cut to look like hearts and that there’s a layer of cheesecake that’s sandwiched between the cookie crust and strawberry jelly. One piece is not enough!

These jellyhearts can only last a few days, as no preservatives are used. One box of 20 pieces costs $18 and you can order it via this phone number: 9459 7711. I don’t think they have a website or provide delivery, so you have to collect it from Novena.

I feel like attempting to bake this one day. Will share it if it is a success. 😛 Have a great weekend!

Food haven at Upper Thomson Road

Upper Thomson Road has been pretty happening these days. Ice cream stalls are popping out like no one’s business much to my delight! Muahaha I am only a few bus stops away from my earl grey ice cream.

Somehow I can’t decide which I like more.. Salted Caramel’s version was mild and thus soothing, while Udders’s was strong like TWG tea. Another winner was Udder’s alcoholic Bailey’s & Bourbon!

Other things I like include The Prata House, Meng Kitchen’s minced meat noodles (a few stalls down) and prawn noodles at Long House. La Petit Cuisine is nice too if you like to have some French food that’s quite affordable.

I have a special liking for Dino Cake House & Cafe too. Maybe it’s the old good times, or the fact that the fried rice ($4.80) still tastes the way it did 10 years ago. It is a simple dish that is made special by its fragrant balacan chilli and thin shreds of cucumber.

It’s always nice to go back to the traditional desserts sometimes. Nothing too fancy or sweet. Just good old dessert. We went to try a few desserts that day and I thought the rum cake roll ($2.50) was pretty unique. It looks like a traditional cake roll with the cream, cake and peanuts, but it has a piece of chocolate in the middle. Wish we could taste more of the rum though!

The bite-sized apple crumbles ($1) were so cute! As tiny as they were, they had plenty of crumbly toppings and chunks of apples inside. They were not too sweet, so I would have definitely taken a few more if I wasn’t stuffed.

• Salted Caramel – 246F Upper Thomson Road
• Udders – 246D Upper Thomson Road
• The Prata House – 246M Upper Thomson Road
• Meng Kitchen 日夜小厨 – 246B Upper Thomson Road
• Long House – 183 Upper Thomson Road
• Dino Cake House & Cafe – 257 Upper Thomson Road

Mission successful: mango cake is delicious

The midnight baking itch came and we baked ourselves a huge piece of mango cake. This was done with our favourite Fruit Paradise mango tart in mind.

It was just four easy steps to bake this yummy cake for beginners!

1) We used Betty Crockers’ yellow cake mix to bake the cake according to the instructions on the box
2) After the cake has cooled down from the oven, we cut the mango into thin slices
3) Whipped a can of full cream to get whipped cream. (2 important tips we learnt: always make sure your can of full cream is cold and do not attempt to whip this without a mixer unless you want a full 1 hour arm workout)
4) Spread the whipped cream on the cake before placing the mangoes on top.

Looks aside, the cake tastes great! The most difficult part was cutting the mangoes into equal size and placing them neatly on the cake. We are definitely going to attempt this again with other fruits and use a baking pan that allows us to slice the cake horizontally. It will taste even better with more cream and chopped fruits between layers of cake! Hmm maybe we should attempt to add a layer of jelly on the mango too. 🙂

Do drop us some tips/suggestions if you have any!