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Visiting Greenwich on Halloween

Well, this did not happen exactly on Halloween.
It was 2 days before, but we shall consider it the same.

Since it was a day out and also the fact there was a party that same night AND coupled with Liwan's generosity of giving me a whole box of contacts (those eye enlarging ones) - FREE! I decide that I had to use them; my first ever contacts wearing experience ever.

I had some help of course, namely from the other half instructing me how to balance the perfect ellipse at the tip of my finger and to Keep It There as I angle it towards my eye.... and DON'T BLINK!!!!! being yelled numerous times as I tried ~~push~~ place the lenses.

Managed to accomplish the mission in 10 minutes with only 1 wasted lens.


Behold the BIG right eye and the smaller left!

Yes, I now have ginormous eyes and look so pretty!!

Definitely 1 step closer to be America's/Britain's/Malaysia's Next Top Model.
Only thing left is to gain that model body.
Now, THAT might be an actualy limiting factor.

I guess it is back to being a doctor until that day arrives.


Both lenses in!

To be honest, I am not very sure that it makes a whole load of difference with the lenses in. I might experiment with coloured ones next time. Anyone would like to hand me some free samples?
The lenses were super comfortable and I could not feel it whatsoever. Acuvue brand I believe.

On with the adventure of the day.

Mr TD decided we should travel in style and we took the Thames Clippers from London Bridge to Greenwich. The plan for the day was to raid Greenwich Market for its delectable culinary delights before wandering off to drink in the sights at Meridien Greenwich.

The first foodie place we came upon was this:

You know how when cheese is added to anything, it immediately tastes better?

O M G.

Have you ever tasted something so good??
Gooey, cheesy, meaty .... dripping with calories and fat...
Intravenous statins stat.

Yes, a bit further away from my modelesque body.

Our attention then shifted to these little fried balls that claimed it was stuffed with rice and a choices of fillings ranging from spinach to bacon.

Dry rice, cheese that tastes like...well, NOT cheese and ...
Just
Do
Not
Buy
It.

Our last food purchase of the day was churros.
Who can ever deny churros? Every time Mr TD and I see someone selling churros, we cannot help but shell out cash to sink our teeth into the Spanish creation of crispy dough coated with cinnamon sugar and dipped with chocolate. (In Spain, churros is eaten for breakfast with hot chocolate - or so I rememberd when I went there ages ago, but in London, it is sold everywhere as street food)

The churros sold at Greenwich market is manned by one guy who had to mix the dough, knead it down, let it rest, roll it up again, put it into the machine to churn out its cyclindrical shape and fry it.He then had to coat them in sugar and fill their centres with either your choice of praline and chocolate, and process the fee with a little cashier's register at the back of the stall.

Well, the dough was all ready made.
But the wait in the queue was so long, it might as well be that he had to prepare everything from scratch.

Filling the middle of it with praline and chocolate. Yum!

The market was full of stalls selling everything from clothes to jewellery to candles.

Took a picture of this pretty stall that was selling rather useless items:

The woman was shocked. Clearly.

And another shot of a beautiful flower shop:

Only to be told that no pictures allowed.
Oops. Sorry.
Bet if I bought something you would allow me to snap a photo right!

We then walked on and came to the National Maritime Museum.

After much drinking in of what we can regarding the history of said navy men, we moved onto our final destination which was the Meridien Greenwich.

Only to arrive at 4.01pm and to be told that last entry was at 4pm.

Brilliant.

Grrh.
That means I have to come back at some point in the near future again!

Still, the place gave great views of London.


Canary Wharf in the distance

The walk up the hill

Yup, final picture for effect.
Dressed up and all ready to go out as Ms Krueger and Count Dracula.
Happy Halloween!

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Maze @ Gordon Ramsay

Since I have come to London, trying out new restaurants have become an exciting new hobby. The only limiting factor of this lifestyle modification is clearly the pricetag that comes with it. And I have to say, London IS expensive. Not the regular Edinburgh life I am used to, where I can get by a whole month spending less than £200. Everything in London costs money. The minute I step out of the house, I start paying. Legs aren't enough to get you from point A to B, no, it's the public transport you have to rely on.

But the up side is there is endless deals available online, new dishes and restaurants sprouting up every minute, and if you are smart enough (or kiamsiap enough) you can get away with trying a lot of things for a non extorbitant amount of money outflow.

Toptable was doing an offer on Maze (Chef's Ramsay's latest sensation; French cuising infused with an Asian flair) - £25 for a 3 course meal. So book I did and dine I did with Mr C.

There are 2 parts to this restaurant, one half is Maze itself and the other Maze Grill which is joined to the Marriott Hotel Grosvenor Square.The Toptable deal was for the Maze restaurant itself and I was shown to my table which was squashed between another 2 tables which in turn was squashed between the adjoining tables which in turn...you get the picture.
I put it down to maximal business use per inch square of the area as they are doing a deal on toptable at that time, but surely on a normal day one wouldn't expect to sit like sardines in a can? Who knows.

The menu was understandably a set menu to choose from and with enough choice variation.
Unfortunately, for the life of me, I cannot remember the names of all the food we had, so a short description of what it is will do.

Starters:

Beetroot with goats cheese and pine nuts

Foie gras chicke pate with toast

Comparing both starters, the beetroot and goat cheese option was probably a better choice. The pate was so-so, and it was a terribly small helping. Also, once you have tasted Meat Pie by Heston Blumenthel at Dinner, other pates have a lot to live up to.

Mains:

Duck breast

Szechuan grilled pork belly, which I will simply call 'Siew Yook'

The duck breast was cooked well, and the taste of the rice under it was very heavily spiced with Indian flavours. However, 3 slices was perhapes enough to fill 1/10 my stomach. Mr C's Siew Yook was also above average, but at times like this, think of the best siew yook you've had.... this probably would not be it.

Dessert:

Honestly, cannot remember this. At. All

Elderflower panna cotta with raspberry sauce and ginger sorbet

I think that was what the panna cotta was if I remember correctly, but it was nothing too special and certainly the other dessert failed to make an impression whatsoever. The ginger sorbet was amazing though.

All in all, I probably wouldn't go back to Maze as it wasn't a memorable experience nor was it too exciting food. It was cheap though, £25 for 3courses in a fine dining restaurant is an amazing deal. I suppose being Asian myself doesn't help when my palate is used to Asian food and I found the dishes not as different and tasty as I had hoped it would be.

Oh, also, both of us managed a packet of instant noodles the minute we got home.

Guess I forgot to mention how small the servings were.

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Lake District

One last trip with Mr YaoHoong before he leaves to Hong Kong; earning big bucks along the way and making his name on to the Forbes 100 Richest list.

Lake District.

We stayed in Ellerbeck Manor which is situated in St Bees...

There.
Next to Whitehaven, 1.5 hours drive from Carlisle railway station.

At the edge of the map with what we were hopeful of... close to the sea.
Or so we thought.

A double bed room apartment but can sleep up to 6 with a sofabed in the living room. The description online says, near to white sandy beaches, with under floor heating, en suite toilets...
Sounds amazing.

Not so, as the double beds in the rooms are more like 1.5 of a single bed, the en suite bathrooms are built in a way that when one showers, the WHOLE damn bathroom becomes wet, and no, we did not utilise the underfloor heating.

The rest of the crew went up 2 days before me as I had to work freaking royal wedding Friday and could only train up that evening itself.

Lonely train trip up to Carlisle.

Carlisle.

That is like the town at the edge of Scotland. I had a friend in university from Carlisle. It is 1 stop away from Glasgow.
That's like.... AGES away from London.

And to Glasgow I almost went to as someone whom shall not be named decided to tell me that I had to taxi all the way to St Bees by myself as the rented car had broken down.

Luckily I am smart enough to sniff out a conspiracy theory especially when it is targeted against me.
Knew I was built of good stuff and I had my transport all ready and waiting for me to board it the minute I stepped out of the train station.

Finally got to Ellerbeck Manor after an eternity of travelling by multiple modes of transport and spent the next few days exploring Lake District.

There was the pebble beach, oh yes.

The Rape Seed fields.

The cycling trip at Windermere and crossing the lake to the other side.

Picnic by the lake

The horses belonging to the owner of Ellerbeck Manor.

They eat Polos straight off your hands

The farm where we attempted to fish, only to spend the whole time trying to untangle the string that jammed the fishing rod, and no fish caught obviously.