bee-day encore

Friday 25.08.2006

another round of bee-day celebration for dear Wilson ... this time, it wasn't a surprise ...

dinnered at Archangel at Great World City ... despite the showy glass-encased outlook, the facade was somewhat dissapointing as the delicatessen had little sitting space ... it was between the 8 seater bar-counter or the paltry 8 tables outside the cafe ... we ended up sitting at the latter .... outside the cafe ... at the walkway ... in the middle of people traffic ... opposite the lift ... diagonal from Jack's Place ... you get the drift ...

and nope, the food didn't exactly save the day either ...

the good : cold meat platter for starters (comprising parma ham, salami, foie gras etc) + dessert (an assortment of cakes, macaroons, tarts ... especially created for the bee-day boy)

the bad : although i enjoyed my smoked duck salad with foie gras shavings ... the other mains were such a let down ... the rest had mashed cod (which tasted like salty baby food), baby squid pasta cooked in barely there pesto sauce (this was too al-dente and tasteless), duck leg in orange confit (looked miserable), some other chicken dish which included a suspicious looking mushroom that resembled a sea urchin (which tasted pretty good in the end ... the mushroom that is) ... hmm, apart from these ... the other normal looking dish was the grilled lamb which looked palatable at the very least ...

bonus : while waiting for the rest to arrive ... i got to try the in-house moon cakes ... a very exotic snowskin foie gras (a very light tinge) + red bean ... it sounds wierd but it had an interesting flavour to it ... anyway, i'll still stick to my fav Champagne Truffle mooncakes from Raffles Hotel ... *drool* ok i'm digressing here ...

verdict : most of the dishes were salty ... portions were small ... prices were high ... think we spent an average of S$40/pax for starters, mains + dessert ... honestly at such prices, we'd be better off eating somewhere else ...

:: the dessert platter - specially concocted for the bee-day boy ::

after dinner drinks were at Bar 84 @ Gallery Hotel ... very nice, quiet, cosy place full of Jap expats ... we were the only Singaporean crowd that night ...

the main draw at the bar was a nightly magic show by Hashi-san ... warm and affable, his less-than-perfect English was such a charm and drew cheers from everyone ... well ... mainly from Keith who was so thrilled at the climax of each trick :)

tricks performed were mainly card tricks which required participation from the 11 of us at one point or another ... the highlight was a disappearing act involving a poker card which Wilson endorsed and was subsequently found folded in a lemon which Wilson sliced open himself ... amazing!!! left us dumbfounded and analyzing how on earth it happened ...

Yiwan also got a fright when a polariod picture of herself showed up a poker card which wasn't there when the picture was taken ... definitely not funny during the 7th month ...

:: to see Yiwan's frightful polariod, click on the picture above to enlarge ::