The Marmalade Pantry

Dear fellow tasters,

This is one extremely belated post.  It was a Friday evening after a grueling working week and I just felt I should at least have a decent dinner to celebrate Free-day.  I ended up in Plaza Indonesia, already a regularly-visited shopping mall for me but there are still many places I haven’t got a chance to try there.  My feet took me to The Marmalade Pantry, a Singapore franchised Western bistro located on Level One of the plaza extension.  50% off food credit card promo and happy hour pay 1 for 2 for cocktails seemed like a good deal to me.

JackRabbit

Dear fellow tasters,

The buzz around JackRabbit and the rise to fame and celebrity chefdom of its Chef de cuisine, Junior Rorimpandey or popularly known as Chef Juna in currently airing reality show Master Chef Indonesia, has more or less incited my curiosity about this culinary-slash-party establishment.  I actually couldn’t care less about the chef or the MCI, but I was still pretty excited when a friend finally asked me to go there for lunch, such a perfect escape from a dreary Wednesday office monotony.  After double taxi rides due to map misinterpretation, we managed to reach the front door and stepped into the cool shade of the entrance canopy bearing huge neon-light letters spelling out its name.

Monolog

Dear fellow tasters,

From Hacienda, my friends and I wandered around Plaza Senayan just for the sake of feasting our eyes after a feast for our bellies.  We ended up in a recently-opened coffee shop, Monolog or Monolog Quality Coffee Co. in longer version, which is located on the revamped ground floor car parking.  For a new coffee-offering place, it appeared pretty popular judging by the flocking crowd that occupied the elongated cafe bar and lounge area that holiday afternoon.  Ambiance was sleek, minimalistic, urban-meets-rustic but no less warm, cozy, and inviting.

White Hunter

Dear fellow tasters,

Once upon a time, not long long ago but in the near past, not in a far far away kingdom but in the moderately-distanced South Jakartan Gandaria City shopping mall which I rarely visit,  my favorite couple and I were looking for a lunch place and we happened to decide on White Hunter.  Taglined ‘Ribs Grill Bar’, this restaurant is apparently managed by the same group from Han Gang and it features ribs, steak, pasta, and other selection of western menu.  Our orders that day: hubby – tenderloin steak, wifey – fajitas d’mezcla, me – sausage and dry chili spaghetti but eventually I got a great share of the fajitas.

Potato Head

Dear fellow tasters,

This post is from my mobile photo archives and I found some from a new year’s brunch with my favorite couple friends.  The place was Potato Head at Jakarta’s elite shopping mall Pacific Place, subdued and homey semi-outdoor colorful-wooden-windows-accented restaurant by day, cocktail-serving beat-pumping club by night. 

Magnum Cafe

Dear fellow tasters,

There’s a rave going on at Grand Indonesia shopping town level 5.  Magnum, a widely- known ice-cream product by Unilever’s food brand, Wall’s, is opening its three-month-only-pop-up cafe, the Magnum Cafe.  Queue is merciless, it feels like queuing for ‘sembako’ during famine.  

The Apartment

Dear fellow tasters,

Dine and drink in the comfort of ‘your’ homey apartment couldn’t get any better than at The Apartment, at least when compared to my shabby humble dwelling.  Located in Menara Gracia, Kuningan area, this restaurant offered a unique concept where you can experience eating out in different parts of an apartment, apparently even the bathroom and jacuzzi, how cool is that?

The Connoisseur Concerto

Dear fellow tasters,

Continuing my one day Singapore culinary journey, after browsing around and a little bit of shopping at Borders and Ion Orchard, I decided to rest my feet at a coffee shop slash bistro restaurant inside Ion called The Connoisseur Concerto or simply shortened to ‘tcc’.  What I ordered was the promo high tea set (which I knew from a friend’s facebook photo and also tcc website), actually for two, but what the hell, I thought I would just finish them all myself *grin*.

Bibliotheque

Dear fellow tasters,

It was another birthday dinner and my friends and I were pretty excited to try Bibliotheque, which is located on Sampoerna Strategic Square and supposedly one of the coolest place in town.  We arrived a bit early that evening and were welcomed by the friendly waiting staffs into the relatively quiet dimly-lighted high-ceilinged lounge.  To say cool was probably an understatement, impressive was more suitable to describe it.  

Kitchenette

Dear fellow tasters,

Behold one of the latest additions to Ismaya Group, the company that proudly bring us Social House, Kitchenette – Restaurant & Crêperie, recently open on the ground floor of Plaza Indonesia Extension. With its open view kitchen and open dining area, Kitchenette is supposedly just like what the name says, an experience of dining in a heart-warming kitchen.