Baikohken, North Canal Road

If you're wondering about the amount of golden yellow at the top, this butter corn shoyu ramen from Baikohken (7 North Canal Road, tel: 6534 3808) normally doesn't come with so much butter. I had topped the bowl up with extra butter, corn and an egg. I did manage a couple of spoonfuls of the broth before everything was mixed up. Found it to be both less robust and salty in comparison with those at Ramen Santouka. The thick sliced braised pork was also rather lean. It was also soft that there were several occasions, I thought that it could have been tuna as ther meat crumbled rather easily. This was quite unexpected. As usual, I found the noodles to be too soft for my likings.

What I did like was their charshu don - a bowl of rice with generous chunks of the braised pork topped with scallions. Turned out to be simple yet tasty comfort food. Didn't see this rice bowl coming from a ramen shop becoming what I enjoyed the most. Am pretty sure I'd come back for this again. Even if the soft crumbly pork tasted like tuna.

Handlebar, Gillman Village

Some years back, I used to work around the vicinity of Alexandra and it was only today that I've visited Handle Bar (1 Lock Road, Gillman Village, tel: 6475 9571) for the first time. The affliction of looking far out ahead instead of just simply forward is a curse that plagues many, myself included. Now that this location is truly out of the way from any place that I may be in most circumstances, I've chosen to take notice and visit it. But it was a pretty decent place. At least for steaks and beers with friends it is.

The food was pretty decent I must say, if a little pricey in comparison for the ribeye which I had. At almost $40, one gets a decent 350g slab of fatty beef - but I didn't think they got medium rare right. It was definitely more cooked that I had wanted and I guess that the bright side was that it would have been worse for it to be undercooked than over. There was an amusingly named "Silence of the Lambs" rack that came thickly cut and in generous proportions, but was unfortunately lacking in the natural flavours of the meat and further drowned out by the wine sauce. Stuffed jalapenos were quite good actually. I'm not an expert in those since I don't eat them often at all, but I though those cream cheese stuffed chillis were rather tasty with a noticeable bit of spicy kick.

Coming back for the steaks and beer is definitely not out of the question.

I'm lovin' it. For real.

In spite of the insidious smothering cheap evils of fast food, the greatest of them all came out with something that had gotten me enthralled. A long time ago, it was their biscuits. Today, it's McGriddles. Their very recognizable breakfast chicken patty with a disc of egg and salty cheese snug between two slices of corn syrup soaked hotcakes. A simple yet yummy marriage of sweet and savoury. I think I'll be making efforts to go for breakfast more often.

Hotshots Flame Grilled Burgers, Lau Pa Sat

This stall which makes flame grilled burgers came from a chain in the Philippines and has made its debut here in Lau Pa Sat. I read that they started off as a stall in a car park and has slowly grown into the chain it is today. A little voice in my head told me that this was likely to be better than another burger stall with a weak knockoff for a meat patty. To fast forward into retrospection, this wasn't too bad at all. What I got from the ultimate cheese burger ($8) were two slices of quarter pounder beefy tasting patties marked quite distinguishably with the charred flavour of real flame grill. In line with the guys working at the stall reminding us that Rome wasn't built in a day and that their flame grill burgers likewise took time, it did take a while for the orders to arrive.

My gripe was the cheese sauce. While that was tasty in its own ways, didn't feel adequate for a cheeseburger. It had melted to the point that barely any of that cheese could be seen. Or registered. I saw a blue cheese burger in the menu so maybe I'll come back another time. There's also some Irish nachos thing which seems to be criss cut fries with beef chilli and cheese which wasn't yet available.

Popeyes Chicken and Biscuit, Changi T3

Happenstance that brought me to Popeyes (65 Airport Boulevard, Basement Level 2 South, #B2-LF1 Changi Airport T3, tel: 6247 5521). I had originally intended to visit Brewerkz at Terminal 3 but I hadn't realised that it was not accessible for the public so plans had to change.

Their fried chicken weren't too bad if a little expensive. I had never been much of a fan of KFC or most fried chickens in general; so apart from Waffletown and those from Ikea, I don't really have much basis for comparison. These though appeared less oil soaked than the KFC ones and their spicy crispy batter was quite good. They do charge extra if you decide that you want to specify which parts of the chicken you want though.

The other thing I found appealing were their flavoured fries and the biscuit that came with their fried chicken meals. A little bit of extra flavour that did a lot of good for the fries these tasted like the ones at Long John Silvers. There was some fruit jelly/jam for the biscuit which made them a lot easier to eat. Those might probably be a draw for me if I ever come here again. The dried looking rice with beans on the side taste tasted absolutely microwaved so you might wanna stay away from that. It was amusing that they actually provided plastic sporks.

The Lord of Terror returns!

[fanboy mode]ZOMG!! Blizzard is releasing Diablo 3!!! [/fanboy mode]

I was thrillingly and unexpectedly usurped by this piece of news, strangely, on Camemberu's blog. Seriously, I haven't been so excited in a while. Having been entrenched deep in the predecessors, I admit to being a huge fan of the game and have wasted countless hours into the ungodly hours of the night button mashing my mouse to death and risking permanent injury to my wrists for it. This is something to look forward to apart from eating, lol! Oh, for those of you initiated Diablolites, remember the theme song at Tristram? It's gotten loads sexier.