MacDonald's Singapore new system… Fail!

I seriously feel like boycotting McD in SG until they revamp this bloody order-then-collect system! 😡 

More training is needed for staff to better equip them with the knowledge on what to do! 

In no order or importance:

- Label trays or take-away packages with the receipt/collection number. Because the one to assemble the food order is different from the one who call out the number for collection. I've seen staff having to re-check the orders to verify which number it belongs to.

- Person preparing drinks should see if it's a sole drinks order and serve the drink right away. Many times I've spotted a grumpy person standing near the counter, waiting ages for that ONE cup of drink.

- What's up with the numbering system?! Person in front of me is number 267 and me behind her is 159? Huh?! Sure, numbers are not in sequence but they should at least make sense! Some blur person may thought they've missed their order or someone may be frustrated to see a much bigger number collecting first! 

- Staff preparing food to help pack/gather orders when there's a backlog. Food ready to be served 10mins ago are STILL THERE. Shouldn't their alarm bells start to ring? Where's their sense of urgency?! But they just work on…

- Label drinks that have been dispensed. Many times I see the persons assembling orders having to double-check what drink that is. It's not easy to tell Coke and Lemon Tea apart, I must say. 

Seriously, all this checking back-and-forth is time consuming and exhausting. Staff need to communicate more and practice better initiative to help other sections out. They rigidly remain in their specific station when they could help dispensing the order or something. Especially when there's an obvious backlog. 

And us as customers, we don't patronise a fast food outlet to be made to WAIT very long, especially when we could have gotten our food at half the time with the previous system.

Worse, because of the failed system, we got served food that's soggy (fries made to wait too long), burger less warm with greens all wilted and drinks with ice all melted. Even worse if you order the frappé. You can see that the bottom part is already watery. Eugh!! 

The fact that all new and revamped outlets have a layout that would have made implementation of the previous system impossible so I really hope they buck up and make this system work for them… and US. 

Peachy's In The Secret Hideout

Today, on the way to work; my colleague informed me that the juniors are back at site again. Pfft.

If they informed us earlier, we could have ordered Lean Bento yesterday! Then it crossed my mind that it will be a very looong time (if ever) that it'll just be us 3 seniors for the day. So I suggest that we eat out for lunch. Somewhere 'far'.

By 'far' well, the furthest that we dare to go is really the Bugis area. There's a bus from our place. Best part is, we still have not decided.

Where do we dine at for lunch??

I pointed out Peachy's in the Secret Hideout to my colleagues and then we also saw The Ramen Stall. In unison, we seem to decide right there, that we want to dine at The Ramen Stall.

Thankfully, some folks were boarding the bus right then so we hurriedly alight.

But then… The Ramen Stall was closed. 😞 So the next best option was Peachy's.

It's open, thankfully. The place is rather small and can seat ard 40, maybe 50 pax at most. Interior seems rather cluttered. Almost dingy.





























Drinks menu.

A bit or warning, though. Drinks served will vary from what you see in the pictures.

Melon and strawberries in your Mojito? More like melon or strawberry SYRUP. That's why prices can be kept low, at less than $6.





























Food menu

We were pleasantly surprised when we looked at the menu. The food here is reasonably priced or what? Mainly in the range of $8-$10 for the mains.

And when we saw food being served to others, we realised that their portion is huge too!

But you can see they're more or less the same things, spread over 3 variations of being served with either Spaghetti, Fries or Omurice. Plus some additional spaghetti varieties.



Beverages


In the foreground is my Melon Mojito. In the background is my collegue's Minty Mojito.



Buffalo Wings

I recall that some folks were raving about their buffalo wings and it was well recommended.

And yes, one of the better Buffalo Wings that I had. Addictive!

Reasonably priced, too! 5 wings for only $8. And since they cut the wings it looked like the 3 of us had to deal with 10 pieces instead!



Cheesy Chicken Cutlet Omu

Since the first time I discovered their menu, months back- I knew that I've always wanted to try out their Omu (Japanese omelette-wrapped rice).

I also want something cheesy. And nowadays, I've been very much into chicken. Fried chicken, in fact.

So it was easy to choose the Cheesy Chicken Cutlet with Omu, only $8.50! 😍



Just look at all that cheese!! 😘

No sliced cheese here. They obviously use grated mozzarella and cheddar. And baked to melty perfection!

And that hefty dollop of coleslaw. The omelette was peeking out on the right of the picture.

The rice was so delightful! I wannt try cooking it myself!!

So, so very satisfied! 👍




My colleague Roza also had the Cheesy Chicken Cutlet but with spaghetti instead ($9.50).



Another colleague, Sri had the Cheesy Chicken Chop with fries ($9).

A nice note: have fun stretching all that gooey cheese!!! Yumz!

Peachy's In The Secret Hideout
803 North Bridge Road
Singapore 198771
Tel: +65 81007284

Opening Hours:
12:00pm - 10:30pm

Open Crumb Cafe

Accompanied my colleague to settle some admin issues at her child's new school and we visited this pretty new cafe in this quiet neighbourhood.

Open Crumb Cafe is an offshoot of a pretty well know bakery, The Bread Project. Apparently helmed by a Le Cordon Bleu graduate?

Should I keep my expectations high…? 🤔



The sight of freshly baked loaves greet you at the entrance... Mmmmm...!

Interestingly, they use baby pictures to adorn the walls, much to our amusement.



More baby portraits. Ladies will definitely loove this! 💖👶



Knick knacks, condiments and confections filled the shelves at the counter.



More confections and chilled cakes on display.

The free-flow of water and syrup is a plus! 👍🏽



More baked goods. Pastries like croissants, danishes, tarts...

On the lower shelf, there are traditional Christmas goodies like Panettone (fruitcake loaf),Stollen (another type of fruitcake loaf), gingerbread man/woman and Pepernoten.

I got one of the Chocolate Croissants. Can't resist!



Our table with cutleries readily available on the table.


Menu


Pasta menu


My drink order

My iced coffee with milk and a couple of pepernoten ('pepper nuts'; super crunchy Dutch spiced cookies). Curious me asked what those pepernoten are and they kindly let us have a taste.

These babies are super crunchy (bordering on hard) but I think they will go oh-so-well with hot drinks.

And I love my iced cuppa (with milk)! Right balance of coffee and milk and thankfully I poured just the right amount of syrup! 👍☕


Pink Cream pasta

My lunch mate's order. Basically, chicken in creamy tomato sauce.


My 'Messy Beef' sandwich

Slow roasted beef doused with gravy on soft brioche. Ermm… 😐

Maybe I've been seeing to many of those 'Cubanos' pulled beef sandwiches and got my hopes high for this. Beef strips are dry (where's the gravy??) and brioche is soo reminiscent of generic white, sliced bread.

Cassava chips, cranberry salad and sauerkraut served on the side.


Gingerbread cookies

Got a pair of gingerbread cookies for both my kids who totally adored the Gingerbread Man story on that Pink Fong app.

Hope they like this!


Key Lime Pie

Shared this delish Key Lime pie with my colleague.

We both adored Key Lime Pies and will try to buy whenever we saw one.

This one here is not too sour, maybe the tartness got offset by the nib sugar on the rim. Love the base, too. Nice! 👍

My kids and their gingerbread cookies

I let them savour their cookies while watching… The Gingerbread Man on the Pink Fong app.

Felt almost… morbid. :P

Naturally, the cookies weren't to their liking. Gingerbread is really an acquired taste. Munchkin ate off all the limbs and left the torso for me.

Kiddo meanwhile, was more sadistic. Pretended to be the crocodile (who ate the gingerbread man) and broke off various parts of his Gingerbread man.

... Didn't even take a bite.

And who eventually finished up the cookies?? *🖐🏽hands up🖐🏽* Who else…??

PS: I had the chocolate croissant for breakfast the next day. Warmed it up. And it tasted sooo heavenly! The buttery, flaky pastry and the generous chocolate fillings. Sorry, no pic. Super hungry!

Gonna go back there for their baked goods. That chilled chocolate ganache tart on display and the danishes!

Open Crumb Cafe
342 Ubi Ave 1
#01-931
Singapore 400342
Tel: 67450649

Opening Hours:
Mon to Fri: 9am to 8pm
Sat: 9am – 3pm

Sinseh : The Grocery

At The Lab SG, when we were making our orders and payment at the counter; the staff informed us of their new offshoot called 'Sinseh'.

We were like, "Sinseh? Selling what? Medicine?" Heyy... you never know!

Apparently they've started a new ice-cream/dessert bar and a hipster sort of grocery shop. You know, those vintage/shabby-industrial chic/gourmet kinds of stuff..? Oh, I've also asked if they're selling cakes too since it's a desserts place after all but nope, cakes will remain in The Lab SG.

Out of curiousity, we trudged down the street to the said shop; located a few doors away beside Pho 4 All. I know that we've already had our dose of ice-cream, pre-dinner but we're just curious…


Menu boards 01 & 02


Menu boards 01, 02 & 03

Floats & fusions.

The watermelon lime spritzer is calling my name!


Cute 'mascot'


Awesome service

The guy tending the front of the shop was very candid and entertain our every queries. He even excitedly let us in on his various experimentation with various foods/flavours and finalising the items that will be offered there.

Thing like the bagel ice-cream sandwich, they eventually reveal it on their FB page. Very interesting, I must say.


Ice-cream!

The top 3 are the premium flavours like Honey & Fig, something-I-can't remember and Spicy Apple Crumble.

I bluntly remarked that I've had the Honey & Fig and Spicy Apple Crumble before, at Flavour Flings. He did mention that he sourced them from somewhere.

We gamely tried many flavours. The Thai Milk Tea & Lychee-Lime sorbet is yummers! The dark brown one is Chocolate-Oreo and beside it is Hazelnut Choc (I think?). There's also Mango Lassi, Durian, Bandung and of course, Vanilla bean.


Toppings

For their soft-launch, they offered free toppings so we went into the shop to choose.

I have to admit that their waffle machine makes me a wee bit excited. Hoping they can match those by Creamier!




'Atas' grocery items for sale

I spot compartments for (in-house) baked goods like breads, brownies, biscottis and cookies etc. There are canned items like tomatoes. Jars of salsa, sauces & pickles. Jelly beans! Nougats. Organic/healthy food items etc…

Some things are truly unique and hard-to-come-by so if they really pique my interest, I don't mind buying.


Our chosen flavours

Tim had the Spicy Apple Crumble, topped with ice gem biscuits.

Myself, I had the Lychee Lime with strawberry wafer biscuit. He asked me if the strawberry biscuit matches the ice-cream I had. I just shrugged. I should have turned back and tell him that they complement each other!

That spoon... I did point it out, "Ehhh.. your spoon. Soo not classy, can?" Hurhur.

He told us that they didn't plan to sell the ice-cream yet but since they already arrived- he thought, "Why not, right?" So he went across the street to some plastic-ware shop and got any spoon that he can get his hands on.

Wait... did we just have another round of ice-cream…??

Erm... Hey, there can never be too much of desserts on a Friday night! *peace*

Their details:

The Lab SG

As I've mentioned previously, this was a spontaneous affair where it was a Friday and I feel the urge for some night out (blame it on PMS).

My cousin Timah was free that evening and we discussed about possible eateries to check out. It was between Peachy's In The Secret Hideout and The Lab SG. However, the pics Tim sent over from her previous experience at The Lab SG really did me in.

The only issue would have been the crowd (that's how we end up having some pre-meal ice-cream, in the prev. post).

While waiting to get into the cafe (it's a hipster joint, what do you expect?) we browsed through the menu. This place is popular among the Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Food must be pretty good!


Menu 01

This page from the menu shows the side orders. Guess what we chose?


Menu 02

This page shows some of their burger collections.

Guess what was ordered out of these?


Menu 03

Some of the mains in the menu. What was selected…?


Menu 04

Which drink was selected from here?

And just what do those 'syringe' symbols mean? 💉


Menu 05

What fruity concoction was chosen from these…?


Timah's drinks order

The Hazelnut Chocolate. And those 'syringe' symbols literally meant that a syringe will accompany your drinks.

Inside is syrup so you can choose how sweet you want your drink to be. Oh the novelty! 💉

There's one drink that has blue curacao syrup inside the syringe.


Squirt

Adding the syrup into the drink.

Trying not to have dirty thoughts there…

After this novel beverage my order of 'Fiber, My Dear' - a cold-press juice concoction of carrot, orange, pineapple & pear is just… boring.

Maybe that's why I didn't take any pic.😐


Rusty Chicken

Our chosen side order. Rusty Chicken (Ayam Karat).

Grilled mid-joint wings that's been marinated in honey & dates (how interesting!) with tangy sambal kicap (tastes like that) as a dip. 👍

I would prefer my grilled chicken to be more crispy and charred but then again it's just my preference.


The Lab Burger Stack

My order. The Lab Burger Stack.

Homemade beef patty and plump portobello mushrooms with melted mixed cheese and Danish blue cheese aioli.

A messy affair. Slurp! *licks fingers* 👌

This reminds me just how much I love, love, love sweet potato fries!! 🍟

Dipped in the accompanying salsa… Mmmmm…!



Side view

Various items being stacked between two buns… Indeed! 🍔


Inside

That blue cheese aioli is so shiok, can?!


Poulet

Roasted chicken leg (with awesomely thin, crispy skin!) with French garlic thyme Veloute sauce dreaaaamy… sigh. Accompanied with roasted baby potatoes, baby carrots and (regular) broccoli.

Oh, I got to eat the veggies, of course! Thanks, babe. That's what I love about dining with this cousin of mine.

All veggies & mushrooms end up on my plate! Yummers! 😜

The Lab SG
1 Jln Pisang
Singapore 199069
Tel: 6299 5681

Opening Hours:
Mon-Sat: 12:30 pm-10:00 pm
Sun: 1:00 pm-9:30 pm

FB: https://www.facebook.com/weexperiment/

Happy Rollies

It was a spontaneous affair where I WA-apped my reliable cousin Timah asking if she's free that evening. Spontaneity works well for us, somehow.

There was a long queue just to get into the cafe and there was also some mini food bazaar right beside it (between Jalan Pinang & Jalan Pisang). I think it happens every weekends (seriously not sure)??

We were excited to see the popular ice-cream rolls stand and had this crazy idea to have some ice-cream while waiting.

A cup of large portion cost $5. We can choose 1-2 flavours.
Premium flavours: Brownies/Thai Milk Tea/Kinder Bueno/Caramel Biscuits (Speculoos)
Fruits: Banana/Strawberry/Lychee
Popular: Nutella/Oreo/Milo

Toppings are free.
Can choose 1 sauce: Maple syrup/Hershey Chcolate/Strawberry
And 1 crunch: Cornflakes/Rainbow sprinkles


Mixing

They initially pour some thick cream/milk onto the ice-cold pan (thanks to liquid nitrogen).

Then, they add in 2 of our chosen flavouring item. We chose Kinder Bueno & Speculoos biscuits. They then proceed to mince & mix those items into the milk.


Spread

Later, they spread the well-mixed cream onto the flat base and let it harden up.


Scrape & roll

The hardened cream is now ice-cream and is scraped into numerous rolls and then placed into a cup.


Ta-dahh! End product.

Kinder bueno + speculoos + maple syrup is an awesome combo!

I was told that they do events too. Imagine having this stall at a wedding! Whee!!

Their Instagram

KRAVE

I've heard so much about their famous Chempedak Creme Brulee. That and the fact that this cafe-bistro is helmed by the celebrity Chef Sufiyan Safee got me really curious to check this place out.

Last I heard, they don't allow any walk-ins? Reservations only (they'll only hold your table for 15mins max, so don't be late!). Got my cousins together and just nicely it was a cousin's birthday so we took the chance to celebrate and have a girls' night out.

Got a table at the corner of the 2nd storey and boy, was that place filled with 80% female crowd (the 20% are doting boyfriends accompanying their girls).

This place has been blogged all over so I'll just put up the pics. Lighting was seriously dim there so I had to really edit them pics.

Menu








Sides

Sides to share - Truffles fries and calamari rings (w/ salsa)


Just chillin'

A truffle fry and a calamari ring taking a dip in a tub of salsa sauce.

Mains



One of my cousin's order of 'Kraving Ayam Bakar'

It's really like some kinda' deconstructed Indonesian-style chicken satay served on a plate. Grilled marinated chicken, lontong (rice cakes), onions and yes- satay sauce.


Another cousin's 'Salmon Au Fromage'

Grilled salmon with mashed potatoes and tasty, cheesy sauce. I love those squash (zucchini & eggplant) strips on the side! My cousin can't seem to appreciate that so I gladly lap it all up!


My order of 'Steak N Chips

Truthfully, I order this because I totally yearn to have them chipsss... I really, really miss those chips I've had Down Under and these looked closest to those I've had. Didn't know that the Truffle Fries uses this variant of chips too or I could have ordered another main like their pasta.

But then, I have to admit that they do their steaks pretty well. My cousin did the ordering at the counter and chose for mine to be of Medium doneness (thankfully!) and they did it right!

Pasta






Another 3 cousins had a pasta each and all of them chose seafood pastas, albeit different versions. There's Marinara Seafood, Arrabbiata Seafood and Sambal Marinara.

All 3 plates looked similar to another. Can't figure out which is which, hence no labels. :P

Dessert

Mr Lover Lava

Gooey Belgian chocolate lava cake with vanilla ice-cream and berry compote.


Mars Attack

Deep fried Mar bars with vanilla ice-cream. Always saw people eating the ones from Chippy's. Now I finally get to try.

If I can get the batter right... will try this myself!


Finally!

Last but not least, the famed Chempedak Creme Brulee.

Creamy, fragrant and not too sweet. 3 of us shared 1 ramekin of this. We really want to order more but held back. Next time, ya.


With the man himself

When he came up to greet his customers, the group of girls at the next table were clamouring to have a pic taken with him. When he came by our end, we also ask for a shot, lah.

KRAVE
28 Bali Lane
Singapore 189864

Opening hours:
Monday closed
Tues -Thurs & Sunday: 11:30am - 10pm
Fri & Sat: 11.30am -11pm
Kitchen closed 4:45 - 6pm everyday

Their FB: https://www.facebook.com/Krave.sg/

*FB RESERVATION ONLY*
*3 DAYS IN ADVANCE*