Dining With Jewelle

We did that a few weekends ago for lunch and I’m planning to avoid taking them here for a while - just until I think the staffs have forgotten us.

It’s not that anything happened. It’s just that Eu and especially Qi as usual managed to distract/attract the attention of perhaps the whole floor staffs.

The whole night. It doesn’t help as there were few tables occuppied.

This time, my husband and I decided to take beef and while I had the beef rice set, he had the beef noodle. By the time my rice set came, I was quite full from my vegetable tempura and salmon sashimi that I hardly touched the rice sprinkled with sesame seeds (?).

My black pepper beef was okay and the noodle was good too. My husband also ordered and took from the train a couple of plates of sushi but I can’t remember if I had any of them…

One of the difference between this place and the other popular Japanese eatery in Brunei is the wasabi. Diehard Japanese food folks told me that the wasabi here and at Excapade is different not only in terms of taste but also where you get it from.

The silver canister on the train is where you get the wasabi in this restaurant.

As usual, we’re happy with the food here although this time, with our beef order, it was a bit more expensive - a total of $50+ for just the two of us.

And as usual, the voices of Eu and especially Qi’s took over the whole place once in a while - and that was only because there was a lot of sussing and threatening from us.

It helped that Eu was distracted by my camera and there were a lot of self-idolatry pictures of her puckered mouth, nose, eyes and everyone else.

But there were also exceptional shots - considering she’s only 4 years old - such as this one.

In fact, come to think of it, judging from the picture, even the shot of the wasabi canister was probably taken by her. Time will tell whether it was the camera or she really has an eye for photography.

As for Qi, if we could eat free for the times when she charmed restaurant staffs - we would be eating free ALL THE TIME.

As you know, we went to Singapore a few weeks ago. On the first night after we arrived and as soon as we checked into our room, my husband went for a walk to find the nearest 7-11 convenience shop.

At 10 p.m.

In less than 30 mins, he came back with some magazines and packets of food.

In 30 mins!

Apparently, our hotel was connected to another hotel called Allson Hotel on Victoria Street via the second floor and outside this other hotel was a 7-11 store on one side and a food court on the other side.

Because this food court was so close by, we regularly bought food from here for tea time snacks and the one Indian food stall there served dishes that suits my taste bud - even Eu loved their Garlic Naan bread (even though she hates garlic). My husband also bought me Bak Kut Teh from one of the stall here but it was terrible - all I could taste was white pepper.

This place seemed to be packed every night and I like the Four Faced Buddha altar that is in front of the food court - which on this trip we saw two.

The only time when we actually went there to eat was on Easter Sunday after Church. The place was empty and some of the stalls were closed as this is a 24 hours joint and I supposed, those are the night time operators.

The stall that we picked specialises in “Specialty Noodle” which my husband ordered. But we didn’t see what was so special about it except that it came with huge fish balls. I ordered the “Laksa” and I thought it was good but my husband thought the coconut milk overpowered the rest of the taste.

This place also have dim sum stall and one stall looks like it serves the full range of a typical Chinese restaurant. I don’t know if I overlooked it, but I didn’t see any stall that sell chicken rice or herbal soup here.

Although I do enjoy the idea of scones, brownies and such pastries to go with hot coffee, I would take banana fritters or goreng pisang any time over them.

Back in Sabah, we have our dinner late at usually after 7 pm. That is why, we would always have some heavy tea and my mother would sometimes fry local cakes and everyone would usually be munching on these snacks as we chat or watch whatever is on TV around 4 pm.

But the thing about being in a Chinese family is that our dinner time is early. So in Brunei, we very rarely have heavy tea except perhaps some biscuits or fruits.

So one afternoon, as we made our way to the beach, we dropped by a local store for some ice creams. When I noticed that the next door snack stalls were frying some goreng pisang, I immediately bought some. But the girls have taken their father’s taste and I ended up eating this bag all by myself.

By the way, after I read some forwarded emails about hawkers who allegedly coated their goreng pisang with melted plastics, I’m not sure about buying anymore soon.