Dad's birthday

Happy birthday dad! Getting older, but at least you're still very fit!

*BTW: see how magie's foot is just about to go into dad's green dessert? Just after this picture, she kicks it off the table hahaha. Luckily the glass didn't break and pudding just fell out intact!

We went to Wheeler's hill hotel bistro to eat. It was a very good dinner! I had the special steak and lobster for $29. Not a big fan of lobster, but it was nice. Steak was cooked quite well as well. Finally got my Heiniken (haven't had one since Amsterdam) and got another blue something for free with a newspaper coupon. We also got free calamari through coupons. Bless my mum for keeping coupons haha.

teoh,

when cooking

Teoh's cooking tip of the day:

When cooking and you suddenly find that your automatic salt shaker does not work, do not attempt to take it apart right there and then. Because it is most likely that there is a spring inside that shaker, which will most likely pop out when you take it apart. That spring has a high probability of bouncing around. Into your food. Specifically your shaker with your quiche mixture in it.

And springs don't float.

Not that it's happened before. But for future reference, okay guys?

teoh,

Meat & Wine Co Review

It is my dad's birthday on Tuesday, so we decided to go out to celebrate at a fancy place in the city.

Meat & Wine Co is located on Southbank, just near MacDonalds, on Queensbridge street. It is famous for it's wide combination of meat and wine. It features a restaurant with two levels, and a lounge bar which sometimes holds special events.

The Restaurant

I've actually been in this area a few times from crown, and was surprise to find it was not a fancy dress place. No one wore anything more fancy than my own outfit that you can see in the pictures, so it's a very casual restaurant. The restaurant itself is very nice, the bar is quite comfortable, dining tables are spacey enough. The restaurant actually extends out onto the footpath, but you wouldn't be able to tell thanks to tight plastic walls and heaters.
Make no mistake though, the prices are not casual. As you would expect from a meathouse, the prices range from entrée dishes for fifteen dollars to steak and chips for as much as fifty dollars. Sides extra four dollars. Not a place for the tight budget.

Service

The night started off terribly. My brother told them his name and the time he booked, and they could not find it. The lady then proceeded to tell my brother that it was booked for 6PM, not 730PM and quote "you must've misunderstood me". She then rudely gave us a look of 'you are so inconvenient' and told us to wait in the bar while she sorted something out. No apology. No when she'll come up and tell us. Just shoved us aside. I was ready to let loose some Teoh rage at her.

Thankfully, that was the end of bad service. 10 - 15 minutes later, we got a table, where we were served with one of the friendliest waitress I've met. She took care of us like a waitress should, inquiring if we were celebrating and arranged a birthday scoop of ice cream for my dad (then again this could've been a trap: see below). All waiters and waitresses were very polite, with sir's and lady's. Food came at a respectable duration of around 20 minutes.

The service at the table was very satisfactory. Front service, look out.

FoodThe prices drove my expectations quite high, and I can say that they were met in some regards. I had a rib platter ($50), containing beef, lamb and pork ribs and chips. It was huge. 1kg of meat. I managed to get t hrough most of it and it was delicious. The sauce was nice, and the meat was really tender; very easy to eat off the bone. However, it was a bit disappointing that salads were not included in my meal. I felt a bit sick after a while just devouring a whole plate of meat and fried potato chips.

My brother's steak was delicious, the meat was so tender and he got 600g of it. It also cost fifty dollars. I had a nice chunk of it and enjoyed tearing through it like an animal (I used my fingers cause they were already dirty from the ribs). Overall, I think my family was pleased with the food delivered.

The dessert was an apple and rhubarb crumble, which was satisfactory but not outstanding.

Verdict

I would like to re-experience this place again, maybe next year. There's no doubt it is expensive, but the food and nice table service makes up for it. However, the trap I mentioned before: the ice scoop that my dad got for his birthday surprise? They charged us for it, $3. That's just wrong in principle.

I will probably never take my high school friends, as they are both pov and not used to eating that western food. But my workmates might enjoy it. 21st possiblitiy? Only with a few people.

Recommend for steak enthusiasts and those who can afford a nice night out.

teoh,

macho man

Ever since my sister has left to UK, I never get to eat yummy cupcakes anymore. But my mum still likes to bake, so yesterday I decided to help my mum bake some stuff. We made a lemon meringue pudding and some apple cupcakes. The lemon pudding turned out quite nice, zesty and sour sweet, while the apple pies were a bit overcooked as I soon found out at work. Guess we should've kept an eye on the timer instead of watching masterchef haha.

And then at work, my workmate aunty nicky brought in her daughter's netball skirt to do some sewing. I teased her, which then prompted her to challenge me in a sewing match. After taking awhile to thread the needle, I actually did a decent job of sewing on a patch.

And then I realised I'm baking. And sewing. Some of the most manly chores in the world. Oops.
Haha, but I don't really mind. I figured I should learn how to do some of this stuff anyway. Mum's not going to sew my jeans back together forever. And cooking is always a good skill to have (although whether baking and cooking are the same thing is debatable). Still I wish I did more manly activities. Like gyming. Drinking gallons of alcohol. Beating people up. Yup, that's the life.

In other news, ling, xuan and I had a DDR session at our normal boxhill location. It's been way too long, and predictably sucked. Still, it's been awhile since I've done that much physical work (haha sad) it was pretty enjoyable. Wish my exam wasn't next tuesday, otherwise I would've went again. We gotta lift our game ling. Beat that Monster Battle Course (or whatever it was called).

Studying is a bit slow at the moment. Can't seem to pick up the pace. I'm sure after failing groundwater next week will prod me into action.

Good luck to all those with exams and curses to all those that don't.

teoh,

oh fritter.

ingredients for a week of uni hell: 2 tests, 3 major assignments, 1 report and no motivation. Serve hot.

so my friend Long just got his new phone yesterday, the HTC Desire. It's pretty nice, the touchscreen responsiveness is about on par with iphones, and since smartphones are pretty much mini-computers nowadays, it's got a mini computer processor 1 GHZ which makes it run very smooth.

So tempting to get a new phone as I've been on an open contract for so long, but I'm also at debate with myself that I don't actually need one. But it'd be sooo nice to get one. HTC Evo has a bigger screen and coming out in July, but really expensive =[ But it runs so fast, and so many apps, first 4G phone, HTC aren't that common (among my friends anyway), oh so cool. But then, do I really need mobile internet? Just one more distraction, more time spent looking at a electronic device. But then it could be useful for like looking up things on the spot, GPS etc. But then money...

My friend simon bought an Ipad from eBay over seas. Very nice, so impressed with the touch interface. The screen is really clear and you can actually type notes onto 'Word' app pretty accurately. Wouldn't mind having one for lectures, make things a bit more interesting. But, with any new tech, I will wait for better generations (I remember buying first gen ipod 'nano', big brick compared to the new ones and no colour)

My mum told me a funny story today, how she had used compost and soil in a part of the garden a few weeks ago before she left for the UK/Malaysia. Then a creeper vine had grown around (not uncommon in our garden) so she pulled it all out...and out...and pop comes out:


aha so cool! Home grown rock melon. Well done mum.

And also, made banana/pineapple fritter tonight. Was a partial success, the batter turned out alright, but the fruit inside wasn't sweet. Had it with ice cream and wasn't too bad though. It's fun deep frying stuff =]

teoh,

p.s while looking at myself at my haircut today, i thought to myself: my face is fat. =[

and so it begins.

Last post for awhile I suppose...I didn't want to neglect my blog completely thought. So a quick update before going back to my panicked studying.

Last sunday my family and I went to J's Surf and Turf, a little shop near Brighton beach. It's basically and all you can eat err...not really a restaurant. Picture two fish and chip shops side by side, and get rid of the wall between them. So it's not the prettiest place to eat, but boy is there a lot of food. It's $28 bucks per person, so make sure you go with people who can really eat (dave, janice, looking at you two)

Like I said, toooons of food. We didn't know what to order, so we got the waitress to rattle off good things to try. And cause it's all you can eat, we just ordered everything she said. So we ended up with a ton of food on our table. I especially liked the fried chicken (KFC, you should do it like they do!) and the tempura stuff.

Anyway, more importantly we had some rare family time. We went to Brighton beach afterwards, where we mucked around and took photos. The sut setting was very nice and it was a fun outing all around, especially before exams.

First exam tomorrow! I'm feeling a bit calmer about it after studying a bit. Hopefully it goes ok. Today marks 21 days until exams finish. 3 weeks seem like aaaaages. I'll post again before it's over..it's simply too long just to study full pelt. I'm pretty sure I'm going to burn out before then.

good luck once again, especially to my civil buddies tomorrow.

teoh,