Night of Wine and Dine

Bottom left picture - from left:
Pathy (sommelier, Table@7)
Daniel Chathiard (owner, Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte)
Eugenia & Karl (owners, Table@7)
Clinton Ang (owner, Cornerstone Wines)

It is a stretch to find me at wine-pairing dinners. For the simple reason that I am allergic to alcohol.

But because it is the folks at Table@7 who asked.

And because we have fond memories of our dinner at the Chateau Smith-Haut Lafitte.

We went.

It was, of course, another thoroughly enjoyable evening at our favourite restaurant, with some of our favourite people in the F&B industry...

His BigSixOh

On the occasion of his bigsixoh, we threw the best birthday dinner party we knew how.

Not for this man the usual grim and glum food and drinks with the folks, young and old. And talk about the good old days.

Because the good days are not in the past. It is in the here and now.

And so, with the support and help of talented friends, we got ourselves a night of

*fine dining ( Table@7),
*great wines (private collectors),
*mesmerising bellydance (special appearance by G)
*dazzling burlesque-cabaret show (my fabulous showgirls),
*memorable keepsake of the night in pictures (amiphotography)
.
I'd like to think that the fun and friendship will last for a long time after the party is over.

I know I will remember all of you. Especially the friends who made it possible.

Cabaret Night at Table@7

The restaurant is new. The players are not. Their culinary expertise is firmly established but their gastronomic creations continue to surprise with new dimensions.

Table@ 7 opened to rave reviews in April, and its popularity continues to grow from strength to strength.

We've been to the restaurant too many times to count, with too many friends to mention. Each time, we come away happy.

So it went without saying that the man celebrated his special birthday dinner party at this special restaurant.
The restaurant worked closely with us in every way to make the party exactly as we wanted it.

We wanted cabaret. We got cabaret. Heh.

Table@7 is located at:
7 Mohamed Sultan Road,
S 238957
Tel: 68366362
Mobile: 8338 6362
website: tableat7.com

Bellydance Night@Shiraz

I will remember this night for a long time to come. The reasons were many:

The place is Shiraz. They do decent, even good, middle-eastern food. The service staff are always willing to accommodate special requests.

My favourite people - bellydancers - perform every night of the week. I love that they do multiple sets throughout the night. I detest places where the dancer does a single set of 3-songs and immediately leaves for another gig elsewhere; there's no satisfaction from eating or entertainment, just interruptus of the most annoying sort.

The evening provided the rare opportunity to catch up with friends who I otherwise do not get to see.

This time, the limelight shone on Fatema and Katerina Shereen. Both performers saved the very best - the forkloric danceforms - for their last sets with Fatema ending with saidi and Shereen finishing with khaleegi.
I stayed to the very end. The reasons were many.

Coffee with the Imp

Many years ago, we would see each other at the few smokey pokey pubs and clubs. So smokey that even the smokers had to step out for a breath of air; so pokey (no pun intended) that sharp elbow jabs stab into your rib cage all night long.We would exchange a smile and a wave, occasionally we managed a quick catchup over the din.

It was just that kind of a place so we had just that kind of a acquaintance.

At some point, I quit the scene. And I sort of followed her comings and goings through the grapevine.

Then I came to know about her blog, and quietly followed it for a while. Where I had once thought her intelligent, I now come to appreciate the breadth and depth of that intelligence, and her critical open mindedness about things she is not certain about.

At some point, we decided to meet up again because, well, it seemed like a good idea. We finally did.

I am happy she made the time to meet me. I see in her everything I already expected. And more, much more.

I see a beautiful, confident, caring and insightful young woman. Someone I am happy to have met and kept in touch with. I wish for her a life filled with meaningful endeavours. I know she will have that.

Even if I had first met her in some smokey pokey pub :)

SinLady, Happy Birthday

Sometime in my early 20s, I stopped celebrating my birthday. I learn to avoid mentioning my birthday so that over the years, people start to forget about the day.

It isn't that I don't want to celebrate my birthday with friends; I just find it terribly awkward to walk into a party that celebrates ME.

I took to looking up certain special people in my birthday month, and ask them out for a quiet dinner or coffee. To have some "only for ourselves" time again. Some sort of renewal and re-affirmation of all that is good in our lives, you know.

Because of the recent sad medical news of father, I have been keeping a low profile this time. I just do not have the energy or enthusiasm to look up anybody. I had in fact cancelled a few engagements because I didn't want to put a damper on our meeting. You know who you are, and I appreciate your understanding. I will see you again in happier times.

But, some friends gave me a birthday do anyway. And to you, I say Thank You. For the friendship you give me. For the thoughtfulness you show me. For the happy times to remember.
p.s. check out what's written on the cake! I love it!!!

Mahjong and Satay

They tell me when I left town, I left two "foreign" experiences to remember me by.

The first is mahjong, which they continue to play one afternoon a week. They tell me the weekly game cemented their friendship over the years.

The other is satay which I made for them before there were Singapore/Malaysian/Indonesian restaurants in California; before pre-mixes for satay marinade and peanut sauce were available in Asian grocery stores. They tell me they have not tasted satay that come close to what I make.

Now that I was in town, could I do satay dinner one night? And this time, one of them was tasked to learn the recipe.

Mahjong, with satay on the side. That's my contribution to this group of friends in this town.

I am proud of that :)

Special People

My visit to the US is all about seeing the special people again who played a role as friend and mentor, shaping me into who I am today: someone I like.

I hope to be able to visit often, and look forward to many home dinners, just like the old days.

A night@Shiraz with Angelina

They are new bellydance students looking for a chance to try out their newly acquired bellydance skills.

Because I really like these girls. Because I want them to stay interested and enthusiastic with the dance. Because I believe to grow in the love and learning of dance, it has to be experienced outside the confines of the dance studio.

I wanted to make it a girls' night of dinner and bellydance. I need food, drinks and a professional bellydancer.

The perfect restaurant is Shiraz - the women loved their dinner, desserts and drinks.

The perfect bellydance professional to show and lead them is Angelina Tay.
Thank you again, Angelina, for taking care of the girls and giving them so much of your time. Bringing hip scarves for all of them to get them into the mood was a particularly thoughtful gesture.

Everything went very well. The girls came away inspired and in awe of bellydance and the bellydancer :)

I know we will be back again very soon. And the group will be even bigger.

That PR dress

I just fell in love with this dress at Paul Ropp's.

I got one (two?) for myself, and one for a very special girl friend.

And if the dress doesn't drape her long lean body perfectly in the most beautiful way, she will just have to change whatever is necessary with her body. LOL

The school friends

Many batches of visitors came through Singapore these past weeks. Some were friends from long ago, some were friends I got to know in recent years. Some are not even friends in any meaningful sense of the word; others are people I knew from long ago and wish I never met.

Then there is this very special small group of women from the earliest school days. There is a lot of shared history among us. We have seen each other through heartbreak days, harrowing experiences, and celebrated the little victories in between. These days, we only meet up when we have an old friend visiting. Those occasions are few and far in between, and I treasure every moment of the little time we have with one another before going about our lives again.

I often think I might like for the ones living here to get together more frequently. But we never tried. Because I think it is precisely because these opportunities are rare that they become all the more special.

And so, until I see them again, I will remember the open laughter and conversation we shared this one afternoon.

The big dinner

We do three big dinners in the year for the friends and family: the Chinese New Year round up, Christmas and New Year's Eve.

After many trials and errors with choice of food and mix of dinner friends, we more or less have our act together.

The huge spread of food got to the table with minimal hiccup, and the humans got along nicely.

There was even a little surprise birthday celebration thrown in the mix!

It was a lot of work, but we got a lot of help from the friends throughout the evening with putting away dishes, refilling drinks and making merry.

And so it came to pass; we had a grand time celebrating the first of three big festivals of the year.

The friends, the family, the food, the drinks. Everything was right.

December

was the month
filled with festive cheer and celebration.

I coped well with the cooking and baking duties for the many dinner parties by refusing to over-extend myself. I was surprised, and then pleased and grateful, that I stayed pain-free through the busy month of cook-by-day and party-by-night.

I am happy to see the friends who took time from their block-leave for coffee. I am happy to have time with friends who came through here on their holiday tour of Asia. And I am happy that on the last day of the year, I was with friends and family to see another good year out, and wish for them that the new year will be good to them.

And somewhere in the back of my mind, I am aware that I have not seen or heard from Mother this whole month. And then, as quickly as the thought came to the fore for the moment, it got pushed right back to oblivion.

For this shall remain the month of festive cheer and celebration.

Dimsum conversation

After doing all the Christmas food, there is something comforting about sitting down to a lunch of dim sum with friends.

Feeling their excitement as they flesh out plans of their new project in a new place. It is a hare-brained idea, and an oft-traveled road to frustration and heartbreaks. But it is futile to point out the flaws.

And so, keeping my own council, I let them happily paint their perfect picture for me.

I want to remember happy optimistic moments with friends in these last days of the year.

The Perfect Peach Garden

They are special friends. This is a special visit for them. The friends here want them to remember their first visit to Asia as truly special.

After a week of furious recce of highly reviewed restaurants helmed by Michelin-starred chefs with inflated egos, we settled for the only restaurant worthy of the label "fine dining experience".
A tastefully appointed private dining room at Peach Garden. On the 33rd floor of the bank building where we get a breathtaking view of city lights along the river.

An extremely capable banquet manager worked with us on a customised menu that highlighted the finest of Chinese cuisine. Each dish is given a light touch of exotic Asian garnish that tempted the palate to want to know more of our exotic flavours. Every course individually plated so beautifully that it is a feast for the eyes before it becomes food. Attentive servers who took care of our table efficiently with not so much as a whisper of intrusion on our total enjoyment of this magical place and occasion.

The carefully considered selection of fine wines is a perfect complement to the fine dining.
I dare say this will be an evening that we will remember fondly for a long, long time.

This NY's Eve Dinner

She is a very dear friend.

She and I have a long shared history through the years - first jobs, string of lousy boyfriends, early married life, living abroad, raising husband and children, coming back to Singapore.

Back then, she was a vivacious, fun, funny woman who was delightful to be around and to have around.

These days, she is a slave to husband, two teenage boys, siblings, their spouses and children.

She asked what I'd be doing New Year's Eve. I said I might be invited out, and asked about her plans. She said she's fishing for an invite from me. The sons have parties to go to; she and husband will be on chauffeur duty.

Sigh. She is looking for a place to park herself in between driving the sons all over town all night.

I told her I will be invited out.

She is a very dear friend, and many things I will gladly do for her. But I cannot let her trash my dinner party with my family and friends on New Year's Eve.

Her Love Affair

I love hearing about love affairs.

So I listened with rapt attentiveness and watched the warm glow cast across her face as she re-lived the high, the rush, the exquisite anticipation of their trysts.

Then, as can be expected of affairs, the lovers were caught out and the illicit relationship came to an abrupt and devastating end.

Her husband demanded a divorce. She was left with no financial support even for their two young children. Her lover returned to his wife hoping to repair their marriage

She managed to get her professional life back on track, and essentially raised the two children by herself. Along the way, she found love again.

And right when the new love proposed marriage, the old lover ended his marriage and came back looking to resume their once-ardent and desperate relationship.

She now has to choose between two very desirable men - the old flame who once filled the void of empty days and loveless nights and the new love who was there in the years when she struggled to put her life back together again.

I didn't know either men; I wouldn't know who I'd marry if I were her.

But choose she did, and I met the husband for the first time last week. I adore him, and I have never seen her happier.

Isn't this a cool love affair story????

Who did she marry? Make your guess before looking up the answer here.

Answer to Her Love Affair

She married the new love; she decided she could not hurt this man who has been so good to her and for her all these years.

I still don't know who I would have chosen. What about you?

A good screw up

They are a dread couple from KL who blow into town too many times in the year.

The one is a poor excuse of a former BBC correspondence who never made a dint in his time. We are just tired of his braying insults at everything and everybody in Singapore (including us). The other is an insufferable shameless name dropper.

They always look us up to be wined and dined. We sometimes indulge them and end up wanting to kick ourselves for having been duped one more time. At other times, we make up excuses to not see them, like everyone else who have their wits about them.

We made the bad decision this time to take them out to dinner. Then the man's back went out on him and we called off the dinner.

An old schoolmate is in town with her husband whom we've not met. We had arranged for them to come over for dinner the day after we were to see the dread couple. Somehow, the schoolmate messed up the date so we decided we would go ahead and have her and husband over anyway, even if the man is in pain. We spent the better part of the day scrambling to get the home presentable, and put together a dinner of steaks with all the expected trimmings.

It turned out to be one of the best evenings we've had in a long while. We actually liked her husband!

By evening's end, we even agreed to visit and stay at their home in the country sometime soon.

After they left, we looked at each other and smiled. Sometimes, screw ups really work out better than the best laid plans.

I love a good screw up now and then. Heh

Night of Chili Crab

We had planned a Chili Crab night with the friends but it was a long time coming because of busy work/travel/social schedules. Finally, it was D-Day.

It was such a biggie with the guys. A whole week before the date, the man went every day to the crab vendor to check on the supply of fresh crabs. The man's BFF said if there were no crabs at this one location on the day, they will both source from another vendor across the island.

Thankfully, picking up the crabs did not pose a problem. In fact, the crabman helped us select the crabs.

Then the furious cooking among the friends. The final spread - freshly rolled Vietnamese spring roll (not featured in picture), sambal prawns, fried bee hoon, chili crabs. We actually had to struggle to put away some of the cakes came dessert time.

We had a grand time putting the dinner together. But, oh the work!

I think we will let the Chili Crab restaurants do the cooking the next time Crab fever hits.