Bangkok Pratunam: Day 2

I AM SO PISSED WITH BLOGGER AND MY PHONE. GRRR. TYPED OUT A WHOLE DETAILED BLOGPOST AND THOUGHT IT WOULD BE SAVED BUT IT'S NOW ALL GONE AND I HAVE TO RETYPE ):

Woke up early in the morning for breakfast at the hotel lobby- courtesy of glow hotel ;)

Baked beans, sunny side up, pineapple jam on toast and grilled cherry tomatoes. Apple juice at the side //round 1

Fresh seasonal fruit- really juicy and sweet and plain yoghurt //round 3 (round 2 was a salad but no one likes looking at pictures of veggies right)

Following this we went for a walk at the adjacent Pratunam market until it closed (strange opening hours: 4am-9am- like who would wake up at the crack of dawn to shop for clothes?!)

Custard apple bought from a street fruit stall//darn good

Snapshot of mom and dad holding hands strolling down the streets of Bangkok; heheh. (Edited) 

Following that we went back to the hotel and dad and the bro decided to rest while mom and I went shopping :)

Dragon Beard Candy: DIY! Wrap your own candy floss in the popiah skin; bought from a street stall //20 baht

Then at about noon we took a taxi to Chinatown, where I had read online about a good dim sum restaurant. The traffic was horrific, makes me glad I don't live here haha. 

Finally after a long walk, we managed to find the restaurant- Canton House!!!

Oh joyyyyyy

Drinks that we bought: (from left to right)// lemon grass, tamarind, and 2 identical glasses of chlorophyll juice (which is basically wheatgrass and does not magically make people photosynthesize or anything amazing like that ): )

Pretty good kway teow//

About 1/2 of the spread! We ordered practically everything (except fried food hoho) from the rather limited menu (in the sense that they didn't have common dim sum delicacies such as egg tart and xiaolongbao). It was really cheap, about 20baht per long (~<$1) and we ordered like 17 altogether! 

Steamed custard bao// not to be confused with liushabao, this is made with pure custard and isn't meant to flow . This was soooo good eaten when warm , I think I've fallen in love guys ;)

Black sesame bao// the sister of the custard bao! Not as amazing but still pretty yummy.

This was well worth the money and though there weren't much choices, the food was fresh and served steaming hot :)

Chinatown had a few shops selling bird's nest so dad decided to let us try the well-known expensive delicacy!

It was really good! The bird's nest bits taste like jelly. However I don't think I'll be willing to pay such money (the price for 2 bowls was about 5/6 of our dim sum meal O: ) for something that won't be make me magically grow boobs or thick shiny hair or things like that.

We took a tuk tuk to Siam mall from there and walked around for a while..

#boss

Following that, we walked back to our hotel and decided to buy crepes that we've been wanting to try from a street stall nearby. And oh boy I'm so glad we did....

BECAUSE THESE CREPES ARE FREAKIN' AWESOME. Look at the spreads and fillings available! Customers are allowed to customise their own crepe  fillings, ranging from pork floss, crabmeat etc to more common ones like Nutella, peanut butter and various fruit jams.

Our selected combination 1// Pork floss with raisin, drizzled with mayo and chilli sauce. Fantastic combo; don't judge.

Served steaming hot with the edges still crispy.

Quite a sizeable portion!!

Our second combo was more of a sweet one// pineapple jam with banana and cashew nuts. Again, don't wrinkle your nose in disgust cos this was the bomb. The crunchy cashews were a nice contrast to the otherwise too-sweet nature of this combination.

Give me a crepe a day and I'll be happy for the rest of my life :)

Pardon this gross shot; but this is just to illustrate how thick the fillings in the crepe are!! This was taken in the hotel room when we were more than halfway done eating it.

After resting in the hotel room and doing more afternoon snacking, we were off again!! Walked around a little to wait for our stomachs to settle before going for - yup you guessed it- MORE FOOD. We went to an apparently famous chicken rice store which was packed to the brim with people //sorry no pictures// and we managed to find a seat out of luck. 

Fried tilapia served with a sweet and sour sauce. Fried food never tasted this good.

Spicyy thai green papaya salad!!! I loved this. 

Le spread. I honestly wasn't very hungry but damn, these were good. 

Half a chicken// which was so juicy and succulent// and (don't freak out girls) the dark stuff is jellied chicken blood. And yes I dared to try it!!! Tastes like tau kwa hahaha. Rather flavourless otherwise. The rice that came with everything was also very flavourful, but other than that it tastes like any very good chicken rice.

The national dessert: Mango glutinous rice!!! Bought from a nearby street stall (pictured below). Generous portion of mango and sticky rice drizzled in a rich coconut sauce. Couldn't stop eating this even though I was stuffed to the gills, the mango was SO JUICY AND SWEET AMD AMAZING.

Went back to the hotel cos my brother had business to do and visited the gym which was so posh. I want a gym...

//side note: everyone's mugging like hell while I'm playing here haha. Sigh needa start asap when I get back, but for now I'll just enjoy myself ;) //

Bangkok Pratunam: Day 1

Whoohoo thank god for the blogger app on phones! So now I can update stuff about my trips with ease :)

Anyway shall attempt to make this post a brief one because I'm very tired from a whole day of shopping and eating (yes as enjoyable as the both of them are, they still sap the energy outta ya)

Started the day early, reaching airport terminal 1 at about 5.30 am (our flight was at 7.40am). Had an early breakfast #1 (there was later breakfast #2 on the airplane which I forgot to take) ; of kaya toast slathered with butter and toasted to crunchy perfection.

Fast forward to a few hours later, after a brief 2 hour flight we finally reached Bangkok and sat a taxi to Glow hotel which is located on the 7th floor of a shopping mall!! How cool is that!! The hotel is rather new so it looked really chic and posh from the lobby :)

Waiting longue

We were served a refreshing small glass of (way too sweet) cranberry juice while waiting for the room to be registered. As we could only sign in at 2pm and there was still a few hours till that time, we decided to make our way to Chatuchak Weekend Market, one of the most largest and most famous markets in Thailand. Apparently one would need to spend at least 4 hours walking around the enormous market, according to a website I checked out before coming 0:

We sat a tuk tuk there which is a thai open-air taxi :)

Onward to the food!!! Chatuchak is known for its numerous stalls selling everything ranging from handicrafts, fashionable clothing, and food. Basically everything under the sun! The cup above is a refreshing grass jelly with natural brown sugar which is a welcome respite from the scorching heat. 

Salmon puff pastry bought by dad to share.  Then we decided to go for a proper lunch, and stopped by a random stall selling fried pork and chicken etc.

Guy came by with a tray of food for us to choose from! The white stuff is sticky rice; which is basically glutinous rice :)

Fried chicken; fried pork served with a sweet chilli sauce.

Awesome minced pork vemicilli. This was sooo good, seasoned with lime and chilli. 

Looks like fishcake but it isn't! I think it's a chicken cake coz the meat used certainly isn't fish.

First Tom yum soup in Thailand; pork cartilage soup!!! I love tomyum so even though the weather was killer I still drank lots of this zingy spicy goodness ;)

The famous coconut ice cream! Quite a few stalls selling this; 35 baht for a portion (~ S$ 1.50) topped with your choice of attap seeds, nata de coco etc. Dad chose pumpkin and corn. It comes with a complimentary free small cup of refreshing young coconut juice :) SUPER NICE. Really authentic ice cream with non of those artificial sweeteners that make normal ice cream taste like crap. I really liked this :)

Ok there were a zillion stores selling all sorts of fashionable clothes (like Bugis Junction x100) but it was way too hot for me to bother taking many photos.

We passed by this section for pets!! So many dogs and pets that were so adorable!!!

Oops I broke the rules :/ #whocaresi'matouristandidowhatiwant. 

SO FLUFFY IM GONNA DIE!!! If I could ill take a gazillion more pics of these balls of cuteness.

Nice pineapple shake, a bit too sweet but well worth the 40 baht paid :)

We took the BST ( thailand's MRT) back to our hotel ( we used the wrong mode of transport and ended up having to take a taxi but that's a story for another time cos I'm way too lazy too type!)

I'll just fast forward a little here cos I really want to sleep hehehe

Yummy multi-coloured corn for about 20baht for a whole stalk! I love this, first tried this in an Asian supermarket last year in USA but pity I don't really see in in Sg ): It tastes like mini balls of mochi- chewy but with a natural corn flavour. Told my parents to buy this everyday while we are still here ;)

By the way this is the inside of the hotel room! Nicely furnished right! :)

View from the hotel room

After checking in we rested for a while before heading to Platinum Fashion Mall opposite for a bit of shopping before going for dinner at the food court on the sixth storey (yes the mall has freaking SIX storeys crammed with stalls selling all the clothes one could possibly wish for). WARNING: FOOD SPAM AHEAD COS MY FAMILY CONSISTS OF MAJOR FOOD LOVERS.

Starting off healthy with spring rolls wrapped in various fillings such as tuna, chicken and crabmeat. With an addictive green sauce that I ABSOLUTELY LOVED. I'd say the sauce made the dish.

Apparently the mango glutinous rice here is not bad so we ordered a plate! Pretty yummy (but it's the first one we've had on this trip so there's not much to compare with) but the ratio of mango to sticky coconut rice was about 2:1 

Some fried dish with a dark soy chilli sauce. Like the fried version of soon kueh etc, but it's gooood.

Oyster Omelette Thai style! Much crispier and less eggy than the Sg version..not sure which I prefer?

Stewed claypot beef. Nothing too remarkable?

Takoyakiiiiii!!! Drenched with mayonnaise and I don't know what sauce. A huge ball of flour hiding a tiny bit of octopus. 

KWAY CHAPP!! mom spammed too much pepper accidentally so it ended up spicier than it should be. But it's still awesome :)

I literally squealed when I saw these beautiful handphone covers layed out on one of the street stalls outside the mall. So pretty!!!! But I'm probably changing my phone soon so I didn't buy any :/ Mom bought one for her Samsung note though, at 200baht which is about half the price for the same cover in sg!!!

BLUEBERY CRUMBLE CAKE from central mall (oops sorry I forgot to mention we went over there as most stalls in platinum were already closing for the day)

Examples of today's loots! (Among a few others ;) )Damn pretty and relatively cheap shorts! ( all <$10)  my life is (almost) complete hahaha. Anyway looking forward to another day of shopping tomorrow! Gotta sleep so replenish my energy so tata!!!

Selfish Gene Cafe

Realised I haven't been updating for quite a while cos I never seem to be able to be able to sit down, connect my phone to the laptop and start uploading pics and all that. So I guess I'll blog now while on the way to school for math remedial -_-

Anyway! Selfish Gene Cafe! *skip this lengthiness and scroll to the pics below if you can't stand reading long descriptive essays* That's where I went with Tricia yesterday for lunch before we went to meet the people at the Singapore Cancer Society. Both of us didn't know where exactly this cafe was so we relied heavily on google maps, which was not a good idea. We ended up walking quite a few rounds around the same area before ditching the idea of using google maps and navigating the way there ourselves, by using the Pinnacles @ Duxton as a landmark. And we managed to find our way there in the end, NO THANKS to google maps :)  Craig Road, where selfish gene cafe is located, has quite a few cafes that seem visit-worthy so maybe I'll be back again? ;) 

We almost walked past selfish gene cafe because it had such an unassuming exterior! With its sleek glass doors and the name printed subtly at the side, it didn't exactly look like a cafe from the outside. But the inside was totally different! It had such a homely hipster cafe feel, with chalkboards displaying the menu and the counter full of enterprising young adults. It wasn't as crowded as expected, so Tricia and I quickly found a seat below the glass ceiling. We were handed our menus by the friendly staff and decided to share; we ordered a Breakfast Platter ($15.80) and their Roast Beef Sandwich($12.80), both of which were their specialities. Thankfully the roast beef sandwich hadn't sold out as I read the reviews before selecting this cafe to try out and it's apparently their most popular dish and hence runs a high risk of selling out during lunchtime. We sat down and took a few pics while being judged. I went to the toilet which was comparable to any high class hotel's; so clean and just brimming with class!! Do visit their toilet's if you go there (haha just kidding) 

The Roast Beef Sandwich arrived first in a pretty short time but we waited for the other dish to come too before tucking in #lifeofaninstagrammer. 

The Breakfast platter finally arrived so we immediately divided the portions and tucked in!! The BP consists of two slices of thick fluffy brioche toast, toasted with butter to perfection (this was so good I could buy a whole loaf if they had- it tasted so light! Especially with a spread of strawberry jam: carby pillowy perfection). It also came with a sausage (pork?beef?) which wasn't too salty and tasted authentic, as well as sautéed cherry tomatoes and mushrooms (both tastes really fresh and the tomatoes were so sweet omg), honey baked ham (meh- not a big fan of ham), and runny creamy scrambled eggs which I ate with my brioche. 

After devouring the BP, we started on our halves of the RBS which came with a side salad! (Consisted of lettuce with a refreshing citrusy sauce). The roast beef was supposed to be 'rare', and came with caramelised onions and veggies on a sundried tomato focaccia bread. all homemade apparently!! I liked the bread, although it was too chewy and hard to be cut by a knife, but that made it well-suited to be held by hand without crumbling apart. The beef was great too, tender and juicy. And the sweetness of the onions complemented well. But I think I prefers the BP more :/ 

When we left the cafe the staff still said bye to us!! How nice!! 

This was a great cafe and well worth getting lost for. Shall visit more cafes in the future!! :))

Pictures all below cos I'm using my phone to blog.