The Handburger (313@Somerset)

I've always wanted to check this place out and there was an offer on Groupon ($15 for a $30 voucher) so I immediately bought it.

Really, I should have bought the $60 voucher, considering the prices here. $30 was barely enough for 2, let alone 3 people! Each burger cost like $15, not including drinks. Of course, there was a lunch offer for $10.80 (burger + side + drink) but they didn't allow people to use the voucher for it *headdesk*.

mfw

Since I had already bought the voucher and didn't want it to go to waste, I decided to try the burgers that were not on the set lunch menu.

The Works ($17.80). 150g of prime beef with battered onion rings, bacon, sunny side up egg, cheddar cheese with sweet onion jam and handmade barbeque and aioli sauce.

Although I still feel this seems like a lot to pay for a burger, this one was actually really good and I would definitely order it again some time. It was even better than I expected. The sauce was frigging delicious and I enjoyed the onion rings. Everything just went so well together.

Happy Lamburger ($17.80). Lamb patty spiced with cumin, feta cheese, sunny side up egg, mint mayo.

Wasn't too happy (haha geddit?!) after trying this one. Idk, maybe it was cause I had tried The Works beforehand, but this one seemed kinda meh in comparison, it wasn't as flavorful. Not too different from the one from EWF imo. Although I did like the mint mayo sauce. The lamb patty also had a very strong... um lamb taste, you know the one. If you don't like that taste, this burger is not for you.

DB Bistro Moderne

 

Went to have lunch at Daniel Boulud's DB Bistro Moderne at Marina Bay Sands on a Tuesday afternoon to try the famed burger. It was actually pretty packed when I went, these pictures were taken when the restaurant was closing for lunch. I like the interior of the restaurant, it has kind of a traditional European bistro look, reminds me of Paris!

Since it was our first time there, we decided to order the burger to share. I mean, the burger costs $38! What if we didn't like it? Then we would have wasted $76 /auntie

I wanted to have it medium rare but the server informed me that medium was better for the burger. He did give a reason but somehow it went in one ear and out the other.

the original DB burger ($38)

The Original DB Burger was a sirloin burger with braised short ribs and foie gras in the middle. Beef with foie gras... that sounds a bit too rich. But I couldn't really taste the foie gras when eating but the smooth texture of it actually complements the braised short ribs and patty quite well. The bun seems comically small on top of the giant patty but oh well, it's not supposed to be the highlight of the dish anyway.

Also, I noticed that other diners were served a bread basket while I didn't get one and I was kinda miffed since I love bread and was looking forward to trying their bread basket. But I asked the server about it and he quickly brought out one with some butter.

Next was dessert, which reminds me of another thing that annoyed me about the service. So I was finished with the burger and was enjoying the fries, and the server came and put the little tin with the fries on the table and left with the plate the burger was served on. And shortly after, the desserts arrived! It was good that we didn't have to wait for long for the desserts but we were only about half way through the fries at that time. And since we ordered profiteroles, we had to start eating them immediately or the ice cream would all melt! Really, service was not horrible or anything, but these little things really ticked me off!!

Ok enough ranting, back to the food...

Profiteroles au caramel ($15)

The profiteroles were awesome which made up for them serving it a bit too early. On the website, it states that they serve profiteroles au cafe on the desserts menu but they only had profiteroles au caramel on the menu in the restaurant. Not that I'm complaining, I love caramel. But I wonder if they tweak their menu regularly? That would be pretty cool.

Warm madeleines ($8)

We were feeling quite full at this point and thought we wouldn't be able to finish what seemed to be a whole lot of madeleines. But once we popped one in our mouths we couldn't stop gobbling them down lol. The madeleines were delicious, once we had tried it we started thinking about returning to have it again! Served slightly warm with a dusting of sugar, they were light and fluffy and had a faint orange taste. Paired with a cup of tea, it was the perfect end of meal treat.

One thing I liked about the tea, which also cost $8 btw, was that they didn't serve it with the tea bag in the pot. Otherwise the tea would taste bitter from being steeped for too long at the second pour.

Morton's USDA Prime Burger

Had an early Mother's Day celebration at Morton's Bar, brought my mum to try the ~legendary~ $30 burger.

Being a el cheapo, I waited till after 8pm to go there since the burger is $5 cheaper then.

Some wasabi mayo thing and ketchup. As you can see, I was too lazy to move the thing over to take a pic lol.

After a 20 minute wait, I spotted the waitress carrying the burger over from the main restaurant!

Burger with Swiss cheese and bacon.

Burger with Swiss cheese and mushrooms for my mum.

And a glass of red wine since we were celebrating Mother's Day.

The beef patty was cooked to perfection, but the bun and fries were pretty average. Anyway, I think the giant, juicy beef patty makes up for the hefty price tag. It really is huuuuge. Frankly, I think we could have just ordered one and shared it between us.

Extra:

Starbucks' Soy Strawberries & Cream Frappucino! A sweet treat minus the guilt (just the guilt of spending $8 on a drink).

EWF @ Orchard Central

I'm beginning to like Orchard Central. Gong Cha + EWF burger is my new favourite lunch.

Green Tea with Milk for my mum and sis.

I wanted to try something new so I had the Earl Grey Milk Tea. It was a bit too sweet and milky, even though I only had 50% sugar.

I felt a little bad about bringing an outside drink into EWF but many people were doing the same thing so I guess it's no big. And I did spend over $20 on the food alone so it's okay right? Right? Right.

Sour Cream & Onion Fries. There's quite a generous serving of fries, this is the half eaten platter lol.

Lamb burger. The lamb is very juicy and flavorful and goes wonderfully with the mozzarella. It's much better than the beef burger which I felt was a bit dry when I ordered it the last time.

Dessert time!

Nutella Slice.

With cookie crumble base.

It was good but I wasn't blown away by it. I was expecting this to be really good as I've read a number of rave reviews for it, so it was a little disappointing. Probably wouldn't order this again.

Day 8: Harajuku + Ikspiari (Eggs N Things & Kua Aina Burger)

Here we are back in Tokyo again, only 2 more days and it's back to Singapore :(

After checking out and leaving our luggage at the front desk, we set off for Harajuku.

Saw this the moment we stepped off the train, a store selling football kits. Who would have thought I'd see Pep in Harajuku? Lawlz.

Takeshita dori. There was a Wolfgang Puck Express here. If we hadn't already set our minds on where to eat, I'd definitely choose to dine here. Maybe next time...

Off to look for Eggs N Things, a Hawaiian pancake house. According to the map it's somewhere behind Gap. I almost got lost as the landmark Gap store was no longer there! I think they recently closed the store at the beginning of the year. I remember this was the first store I entered the first time I was in Harajuku back in 2005. Back then, we didn't have Gap in Singapore (iirc). Luckily I knew from memory Gap was at the corner of the junction so we were able to locate the restaurant. After a short 5 minute wait, we were in the restaurant!

It looked like it was going to rain at any moment so we were glad we were given a seat indoors. However the menu was all in Japanese and there were no pictures. We called the waiter over and asked him if he spoke English and was going to ask him to recommend something but he helpfully provided us with an English menu, yay!

Inside the restaurant. I thought it was very nicely lit.

My mum's order: mushroom and spinach omelette with a side of pancakes.

My order: Fluffy pancakes with whipped cream and bananas! I was salivating at the sight of the mountain of cream.

The cream was very light and not overly sweet. It was HEAVEN!!! At the side of the table, they had 3 different syrup toppings - maple, strawberry and coconut. The strawberry syrup was not the typical ones that you find on cheap ice cream sundaes. It tasted more like the actual fruit. But my favourite was the coconut one. I'd sell my kidney just to have it again lol.

After a heavy brunch we were off to shop again! Time to work off those calories. The line outside the shop had gotten considerably longer by the time we left.

I prefer shopping in Harajuku than in Shibuya or Shinjuku. It's so much more affordable! Wish I had come here sooner. The best store IMO was Kinji Used Clothing, just outside La Foret Harajuku. They had racks and racks of dresses, shirts, pants and skirts and they were mostly going for ¥735!

Around 2pm, we had to leave as it really looked like it was going to rain and we had to switch hotels. And it was a good thing we did cos it poured almost immediately after we dragged our luggage over to the train station.

Sadly, the rain also ruined our plans to get the After 6 Pass for Disneyland. We had to settle for hanging around the hotel and Ikspiari.

The shuttle bus from JR Maihama Station to Sheraton Grande Tokyo Hotel. I love the Christmas wreath in front. On board the bus they played Disney themed Christmas songs as well.

We got a pretty sweet deal for the hotel, well, in my opinion at least. ¥27,000 for one night plus 2 passes for Disneyland. The pass for Disneyland alone costs ¥5,800 each.

Once we got off the shuttle bus, a porter quickly helped us with our luggage. During check in, the guy at the front desk informed us that he had give us a big room. Things were beginning to look up. The porter brought us to our room and helped put our luggage in the room. And it was really big! It was the corner room and it had 4 beds. I think it's supposed to be a family room and the 2 smaller beds were meant for kids. This is the biggest hotel room I've ever stayed in. Unfortunately, I forgot to take any pictures.

Once the porter had put the luggage down, my mum tried to tip the porter. In Japan, the smallest banknote they have is the ¥1,000 note so we had no choice but to tip ¥1,000 cos it seemed weird to give a ¥500 coin tip. But the guy immediately said no while backing away hurriedly. He seemed shocked that we tried to tip. My mum was like 'really?' lol. I guess tipping is not common practice in Japan. Even in restaurants, from what I've seen, everyone keeps all of the change, down to the last ¥1 coin.

After resting our legs for a while in the hotel, we took the shuttle bus again down to Ikspiari. The good thing about the bus is it comes pretty frequently, once every 15 minutes and there are shuttle buses to Bayside Station from which you can take the monorail to Disneysea. The bad thing however is there is no place to put your luggage! If you have a slightly bigger luggage, you have to drag it all the way to the back of the bus so as not to block the way of the other passengers. The aisle is very narrow so it's not easy to bring it to the back. There's not even sufficient room for a stroller.

At Ikspiari, we had dinner at Kua 'Aina Burger.

Crispy chicken fingers.

Burger with onion rings and fries. The beef was a bit dry but it was still really good! Really loved the onion rings and fries.

Tuna with avocado sandwich for my mum.

Christmas tree outside the Disney store.

It was freezing because of the rain and there wasn't much to shop for so we returned to the hotel again.

Another Christmas tree, this time in the hotel! This one was 2 stories tall.

A small version of the tree. I love my boots! Bought them at Harajuku earlier.

A hotel staff was walking past when he saw me trying to take a photo of my mum and the tree and immediately offered to take a photo of the 2 of us together. The hotel staff were all really helpful and polite. I saw another staff doing the same for some other guests as well. Any time we passed one of the staff, they'd always smile and greet us.

View from my bed. It felt like it was Christmas already :D

The beds in the hotel were super comfy. They were the signature Sheraton Sweet Sleeper beds. In fact, the hotel has received so many requests from guests asking to purchase the beds that they've started selling them. There was even an order form for the bed and its sheets in the room. I managed to sleep like a baby all the way from 11pm to 7am the next day.

View from the balcony.

Day 9