MORE ON KOUFU

@ Beverage: Indian Tea

Fresh Salad: Only Veggies

MIX VEG RICE: Ahh a healthy alternative for spicy Indian food

Nasi Padang.

Fruits and Juices: Any Day

These pics were a long due. Got busy with work , lots of work. But kept my eyes open. After all good food means good life. Food has always been central to judge a place, its beauty of its ugliness.

There was a time when I had almost given up on Koufu and Singapore for vegetarians. Today, its so much better becoz of there are places and one only needs to find them. And Koufu has stood the test.

Its raining outside today....

its time for lunch.

OLIVE COVE @ E2, FoE

Salad Bar

Veggies

Apple salad and pasta @ 2.80 sgd

After a cold and boring workshop in FoE, that too in on a rainy morning, it looked all dim and lazy until I came across this cozy place on level seven of FoE. It said, E2 Cafetaria.

Its name is Olive cove and seems to be a Thai restaurant.

A smiling lady welcomed me in and I went on to survey the place.

They have vegetarian food and a Plate of Rice and three veggies cost u 3.50 SGD.

What caught my mind was their salads.

they have three types: Apple salad, potato salad and pasta....all vegetarian and you can pick a combination of two for SGD 2.80.

The ambience is cosy and the salad (i picked apple and pasta) was quiet good.

I spent some 45 minutes there eating and studying the place.....and returned with a bright mood...good bye lazy morning.

Thanks Olive Cove, you made my day.

Boiling Daal in Microwave

The latest experiment in my kitchen was preparing dal. Having got bored with eating rice and sabzi, I needed to expand my menu for dinner. Given that Dal can be a pain to boil especially without the pressure cooker and having never tried it boiling in the microwave, I thought it was high time I proceed with this one.

So having picked this one Kilo packet of arhar dal and taking the risk of wasting it if my visualised process did not bear fruit (can always take it back to India, I thought, if things didn't work), One evening I proceeded with it.

Just do it I said to myself. And Lo, here it was my first dal in singapore. Successful, aromatic and ofcourse right for my taste bud.

Boiling dal:

Soak Dal in water for atleast half an hour till the dal becomes soft and breaks into two.

Take a microwave- safe vessel with a lid, preferably if its a rice cooker whose lid can be sealed.

add dal and water (1:3 cups)

boil it for 15 minutes on high.

One needs to check in between if additional water is needed. use your own measurements looking at the depth of the vessel used so that the water doesnt spill out much.

Once the dal is cooked, its ready for further treatment.

temper it oil, zeera/ mustard , crushed garlic, turmeric powder, tomatoes, onions....curry leaves etc etc etc...all in different ways we know and cook in India.

(while you heat oil, be very careful and it should be under extreme supervision. Over heating may catch fire....just warm it, dont make it very hot. 30sec -45 sec is enough for a TB spoon of oil in MW.)

garnish with finely cut corriander. Dont forget to add salt.

serve hot with rice and ghee. Or roti. or just the way you like it.

INDIAN @ THE DECK, FASS

Now this one, I am sure, would not have escaped your eyes.

One of the most popular counters in The Deck @ FASS plus very much popular among all Indian food outlets in NUS.

The Food is good in taste and texture (though you get almost the same dishes in all indian counters across NUS, this has something that they dont have. You should discover what it is.)

The People at the counter are nice.

The Openness of the Deck itself adds to the experience.

The Afternoons are pretty crowded and the Indian store usually has a long line.

The Deck it seems was chosen the best canteen in NUS last year.

So go ahead and relish Indian Vegetarian food @the Deck.

NAMASTE INDIA @ Little India

Having tried much of south Indian food @ Little India and not very much happy with the same, We decided to try on some north Indian. We went to this place called Namaste India. Two men called us in, probably they owned/ managed the place.

We ordered Tawa Roti and Veg- Kolhapuri (sounds very deccani) and mix veg raita. Thought we could order the rest later after tasting the food.

The roti was hard.

The sabzi had no fresh vegetables. The beans looked dead which was just immersed in the spicy gravy and served.

The raita was not that bad.

It reminded me of those many restaurants in and around delhi which weigh on the gravy to get their profits....the bad southindian food I have been having in Little India now seemed much more better than this.

We paid the bill and got out after the first of our rotis were over.

Bad day.

As we walked on the road, we found many small hotels , very much like in small south Indian towns, crowded, platefull and brimming with aroma. The next visit would be to these inexpensive places which remind me of those days where food was displayed in wooden-glass counters and served in banana leaf....probably these could be the earlier ones, much before brands like Saravana Bhavan and Sagar ratna came in...

DIM SUM @ Koufu, U Town

And  like many, I too waited for the Indian food outlet to open at U Town Koufu and almost never ventured into the already happening place. My discovery of the food court only began after the official inauguration of the Indian stall. And lately I found many many things better here than the only thing I was waiting for.

Most recently, my favourite snack stall is Dim Sum. Began with a question, do u have anything vegetarian here a few days ago....and today went on to discover a range of things in their window apart from my favourite Curry Puff ( stuffed with potato) and veg Spring Roll: Peanut Sesame Ball, Mushroom Pie, Cheeze bo lo Bun, Vegetarian Char Xiu bo lo Bun, Green Bean Sesame Ball,  and Carrot Cake.

What adds to DIM SUM's image and food is the friendly staff. Very friendly and hospitable.

You might disagree with this fact as to how does staff matter and how does it anyway influence the food. I strongly believe and would love to argue that the aspect of emotion and attitude in work and especially in food, matters a lot and influences how our mind/ body takes in and reacts to it. Bad emotions create bad food. Good emotions  produce good food. No wonder even after eating in the best of places we may develop bad stomach, food poisoning. At times becoz of bad staff we may decide never to go there. At times good looking food might taste bad.  Might as well sit in our body like a heavy something for hours because of mysterious reasons.

Am I speaking in air? try out yourself....

till then, let me discover more things for you....

29th August 2011.

a surprise

Vegetarian snacks in City Square Mall, Farrer's Park MRT.

Dough Culture located in Basement level of City Square Mall provides vegetarian snacks like spring rolls and samosas and many other things.

what makes it special is unlike many other restaurants that have indian vegetarian (they have non-veg items as well) , this one has only vegetarian eatables. something very rare in the city's landscape. secondly, I doubt if its an Indian outlet. If my doubts are true, it shows a fine example of cultural synthesis.

Thanks Dough Culture.

27th Aug 2011



Simple and straight

What happens when you have potatoes and several other veggies in the refrigerator and you have no desire to get out and have dinner?

My flatmate had eventually called me back seeing one of my calls that he had missed.
"whats up for dinner?" I asked. 
"Am in subway. What abt u?"
 " Ahh ...no subway today....may be I will have something at home...
" But what?"
 "If you havent yet bought anything, just come, we will work out something, we have veggies in the refri."
 "Ok, I will get bread"

So, till he arrived, I cut the veggies into pieces and boiled them in the microwave.
soon with other ingredients like spices and butter we had an end result called Bhaji....yes, the same bhaji eated with pav.

Simple to cook, tasty  and ofcourse better.

(a must: Butter, pav bhaji masala and tomatoes)

Having bought some veggies last week as a trail run for cooking at home in the MW, the evening confirmed/ rather propels me to go for shopping groceries regularly.

 Little India is a good place to shop as you get many known indian vegetables there plus spices. Clementi  too has vegetables, esp the heavier ones (like potatoes, onions and tomatoes) can be bought from there.

Gurkha@ Little India

It was Menusha's Birth day.

Party time? yeah, it was lunch at Gurkha Restaurant in Little India.

Gurkha is a Nepali restaurant and the food was awesome. Though many dishes just looked pretty familiar. But thanks to my friends, one more option to the list of food venues.

One might say Little India has to have lots of veggie food but not all places I have tried were good. Many were sheer disappointments, even though their brand names have been very popular in India. I remember having curd rice in one of the famous brand- restaurant chains in Little India and it was bad. Probably something to do with the Curd's consistency . It tasted bad. Almost unacceptable. Another place with very big name and so with a big size of their hoarding, had bad dosa, rava dosa and uttapam. Of course not that it was stale or gone bad, but the taste was sad. All three that we friends had ordered looked a disappointment.

But dont miss a restaurant named Delhi. Its again awesome. I am sure you will love to go there the second time.

VEG PULAO

The class is over at 9.30 pm and I am rushing back to the subway. pretty hungry. Ohhh the staff says they are closed....Gosh...the food court is also closed at 9.00 pm. Would it be sandwich again? or maggie? or just tea and biscuits.

I come home and decide to cook rice with whatever is available in the refrigerator.

I have cooked rice once. tried and tested it. the rice, I had picked up at mustafa on my last visit. Plus some spices and veggies.

with plain rice, do I cook veggies seperately? no, let me do some experiments.

and what comes out????

VEG PULAO

very modest but good, in taste and looks. that too in a microwave.



recipe ? if u request, I shall pass it on to u.

24th august 2011
**************************************************

Food Court is Open : KOUFU

Kimchi Fried Rice (minus eggs)

Nasi padang

Now thats a great news . After much waiting, its august 1. The food court is open and that brings life to the U Town. No more running to YIH subway to eat the Veggie delite.

Nasi padang and Korean Kimchi fried Rice is what I tried out  of compulsion, on my flatmate's behest on different days.

And both were good. For the Korean Rice, I had to request a No- egg Kimchi fried rice. 

BUT WE ARE WAITING FOR 15th AUGUST for INDIAN FOOD OUTLET TO OPEN!!! DESPERATELY!!!

GRADUATE RESIDENCE @ UT

Wow U Town. we are the first residents of this magnificient residential town. Everyone from the university is excited about its opening. For me it would be a residence for a semester or two or beyond.

They have four bedrooms and a common hall, Kitchen and bath/ wc. Great....Kitchen wow...I can cook my own food.

Oh Alas, there is no Gas stove....only a microwave.  How can one cook Indian in a microwave.....

I moved in on 23rd july 2011. the smell of fresh paint is strong. The next day my two lovely flatmates join me.

its fun.

My first Lunch@ NUS

MY FIRST LUNCH @ NUS

looking for a veggie food and finding nothing independent of meat, I was lost, hungry and invain. when finally saw the universal M at technoedge ....overwhelmed for a veggie lunch

But alas I had a burger at MacDs only to find there wasnt one.

BUT THEY PROVIDED A SPECIALLY MADE VEG BURGER MEAL

the usual burger minus the meat (cabbage and tomato and cheeze between the buns) + fries+ coke

I was somehow saved.

21st july 2011 

INDIAN-VEGGIE at NUS

Food would be such an uniting force with the city u  live in, i never knew this. The first day I stepped in NUS as a new student , I thought I would not gastrically survive here. Thanks a Lot to Time, Today its a happy journey in exploring food options especially if you are a veggie and from India...thats what is my types...lol...

hello everyone.