Mr Liu!

So today, i met Mr. Liu Yuhong to bid him farewell before he leaves to Shanghai for his Overseas Industrial Attachment Programme for 22weeks. wow, wont be seeing him around already. but then again, not like i'll be able to see many of you during my attachment. oh well, this is life i guess

so, i happened to meet yuhong on the train, den we headed down to CityHall from which we crossed Raffles Hotel and into Purvis Street *note: it was pouring damn heavily =(*

so reason for going to Purvis Street? To hunt for authentic good thai food at 23 First Thai *restaurant name* at this red building. do try it, it's simply fabulous.
Brief info about the restaurant background: It has a lunch hour and dinner hour. If im not wrong, they close at 2pm and start dinner service at 6pm. Dont ask me anymore on that because IDK. This is an authentic thai restaurant, meaning real thai people speaking thai will actually serve and cook the food you eat. Much better than Thai Express and cheaper too. The ambience is quite unique, it's not exactly a restaurant-restaurant, but rather a road side shophouse similar to those Tze Char you find outside. The tables can be seen through, Yuhong claims that it's bought from IKEA. There are pictures of thai people *royal family etc* hung on the walls.

One intriguing thing. During lunch, we were wondering why the staff were sitting down having their meal, and staring into a cupboard next to them. Then Yuhong realised there was a television inside, and they were watching some thai show. lols =)

So then we ordered a couple of dishes and shared them, and boy it was good!


so first up: Pineapple rice. With raisin, sausage and pork floss


Seafood Tom Yum Soup: oh my, fantastic. look at the colour. it isn't reddish, yet the soup packs a punch of spice and sour. prawns are extremely fresh


Prawn Cake: Initially thought it was just an ordinary flour paste with prawn, but boy was i in for a real treat. this is really quite crispy esp when eaten hot. A mayonaise-like dip comes together with it. It doesn't have alot of flour and you can actually taste the prawn!


Fried KangKong: A little to my dismay, we didn't see any sambal kangkong on the menu, so we ordered this. Though it looks like kangkong with sauce, which is really is, it isn't quite as simple as that. the sauce isn't spicy, yet it fills your senses to the brim. Extremely tasteful


Ice Milked Tea: Yuhong told me it is a Must-Try! so we had one each. The taste is really unique? Because it IS TEA, just that i dont know how to put it.It has a weird taste which you would get used to soon. downside is that it is really really sweet. good for those with a sweet-tooth, bad for diabetics.

how could we leave out the desserts?


so... Sticky Rice with Mango: I took this one. Though the sticky rice wasn't as hot as i wanted it to be, but i guess it will still do fine. The rice has some nuts or something, im no expert cuz i know nuts *pun intended*, so when you check on the sticky rice, sometimes you get the crunchy bits. The coconut is really delightful and the mango is sweet! extremely good mango!


Red Ruby: Yuhong's dessert. Bowl full of coconut and ice, yet extremely delicious, i tried it. Red Rubies are the reddish things you see below, which is actually water chestnuts so it's abit chewy/crunchy. The coconut is very very good, but i think you can only got for one bowl, anything more will lead you to a heart attack. Though there's alot of ice that camouflages with the Atap-Chee, they still give a good amount of it. Perhaps 5-6 Atap-Chee for a $3.00 dessert

Total damage for 2: ~$43
So Yuhong my friend, all the best to your future endeavours and your trip to Shanghai. You will be gone for 6 months, so do take care. Remember to look me up when you're back in Singapore, then we can go on food hunts again =) Hope to see you soon