Don Quijote

Once again, and thanks to the generosity of Denise and the Spanish Tourism Office in Singapore, we were invited to a fabulous dinner in a new Spanish restaurant in Singapore: Don Quijote. What a great name for a Spanish restaurant! As many people said before, it is not easy to get to this restaurant, but you really get a big piece of Spain after having dinner here.

When Xavi and I got there, there was only Vien and Ken in the table. We chatted for a while with Ken, the owner of the place, who has another homonym restaurant in Macao. This interesting and funny guy told us the story about the place, the first months and even the future plans :). Good conversation to start with some openings, like the bread with olive oil and tomato butter served with some very good sangría. "More bread more bread" we shouted to Ken, who was amazed by the speed of bread eating! That is something I miss in other restaurants of Singapore, and that was available in Don Quijote: bread and olive oil... mmmm... Oh, something great we heard during this conversation: this Spanish restaurant only serves Spanish wines. Check other Spanish restaurants in Singapore and compare.

We asked Ken if he could give us some different dishes so that we could try a little bit of everything. And what a wonderful job by the chef. We started with some really good cheese, chorizo and jamón de bellota. Then we had some garlic fried shrimp rolled in eggplants, clams in garlic, onion and white wine, fried buttered squid (great!), more garlic fried shirmp, spanish omelete (could be better if they fried the potatos) and oven backed eggplants. Those were the tapas for the day.

But we couldn't leave the restaurant without tasting the meat and the rice. So we could eat some juicy Stewed pig feet, and the two stars of the night: Paella y Fideua negra. The paella had great flavour, some really good seafood, with big and tasty shrimp, and a well cooked rice. The fideau had also a great flavour, but i would go for shorter noodle.

When we thought that everything was over, the deserts came, and as we said, "esto no es lujo, esto es lujuria" (This is not luxury, this is lust!). We had a tasting of three deserts, with a great cheesecake, a delicious bread and butter pudding and another star of the night: warm chocolate cake made with Spanish chocolates and served with vanilla ice-cream. The service was good and the staff is really nice. As I have said before, I keep thinking that Singaporean restaurants should spent some more money on the toilets :/. Oh, and we had some good coffee too! (even if it is Italian... hahaha, I know we can't compete against them in that :P)

Calificación:

Tel: (+65) 6465 1811
17 Lorong Kilat, #01-09. Map here

Los amantes del Círculo Polar

Last night, thanks to the kindly invitation of the Embassy of Spain, we went to the official opening of the 4th Spanish Film Festival of Singapore. We got to the Arts House at 6.30pm and there was a cocktail with Spanish wine and Asian food. That is a good combination! We had time to chat to Mr. Ambassador and to some other fellow countryman in Singapore.

The film that had been chosen to open the festival was Los amantes del Círculo Polar (Lovers of the Arctic Circle) by Julio Medem. This movie tells the story of two kids that grow up together as step-brother and sister and who fall in love without their parents knowing it. They have spent their childhood thinking about the midnight sun of the Artic, so when they grow up they decide to meet in the forest of the Lapland after not having seen each other for years.

The movie has some surrealist moments and they photography shows us a world of greys and blues, that combined with the extreme aircon of the screening room (I don't think the Festival did it on porpuse... but it help to make the atmosphere), transported us to Lapland. Great movie to open a Festival that will bring Spain and Singapore together even more.

4th Spanish Film Festival

Tonight we have been invited to the opening of the 4th Spanish Film Festival of Singapore, that will be showing movies for all the Singaporean Spanish film fans from the 13th of February to the 24th of February 2009. The title of this year's festival is SEVEN. 7 movies will be shown, 7 different moods, 7 dreams, 7 loves...

There will be a special screening of movies by the outstanding Spanish director Luis García Berlanga: Bienvenido Mister Marshall (Welcome Mister Marshall), Todos a la carcel (Everyone to Jail) y El Verdugo (Not on your life). The other movies shown will be Mataharis by Icíar Bollaín, El séptimo día (The Seventh Day) by Carlos Saura, Planta 4ª (4th Floor) by Antonio Mercero and Los amantes del Círculo Polar (Lovers of the Arctic Circle ) by Julio Medem. As it is said in the brochure, "the 4th Spanish Film Festival will provide Singaporeans a new opportunity to be acquainted with the Spanish cinema and culture."

The venue of the Festival will be the Screening Room of The Arts House in 1 Old Parliament Lane (map here). The tickets are free, but they need to be reserved. If you already have a reservation, just go to the ticket office of The Arts House 30 minutes before the movie starts and get your tickets.

We want to thank the Embassy of Spain for the special effort they put on this Festival and for inviting us. The Festival is supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation through the Agency of International Cooperation.

Mambo Jumbo at Zouk

This entry has a counterpart in Spanish. Trying to keep a multilingual blog :)

I am going to start a serie of posts about my favorites in Singapore: my favorite cafe, me favorite place for the first drink, my favorite place to relax on Sunday... But I couldnt start this posts but with my favorite place to spend Wednesday Nights: Mambo Jumbo at Zouk

Zouk is not my favorite club in Singapore. I think that the music is way too hard and I dont really enjoy it. However, on Wednesday it changes and music is more melodic, with hits from the 80s and 90s. So they will mix Africa (Toto) with Wannabe (Spice Girls) or the infamous ...Baby One More Time (Britney Spears). I have to admit that I feel like a little boy with this music and with all these hits.

I dont want to finish without saying that the most shoking thing about Mambo Jumbo is the way people dance. It is so curious that even English Wikipedia has an entry for Mambo Jumbo Special Dance Moves. Everyone (and when I say everyone I mean the whole club but me and my friends :P) dances as if it was a coreography where they already knew what to do at each move. They have special movements for "love", "heart", "time", "touch", "you", "me"... Tons of fun!

I haven't behaved lately...

I haven't behaved lately... 3 school nights in a row that I have been out at night, and this is really wearing me down. I won't say that I don't have fun when I go out, but I kind of keep forgetting that the following day I have to work. Well, tomorrow I don't have to work, so I can go out without making myself forget about work :P.

Ladies Night in Singapore

Singapore is well known for things such as been a financial hub, having a big airport or owning some of the best shops and restaurants of South East Asia. But there is always this thing around: Singapore is boring, it should be called Singabored, there is no night life... I am completely against those statements. And to start changing your mind I am going to talk about Wednesday night out: Ladies Night.

What is this Ladies Night about? It is the night when girls can go out, and drink for free. Yeap, free entrance to the clubs and free drinks. In some clubs it may be just one kind of drink, in other every kind and in some they only get a certain number of drinks (don't worry, Asian girls will be drunk with the second drink). Don't you think it is amazing? I feel so jelous of my girl friends! As you can see this is a pretty clever promotion by the owners. Guys wouldn't go out on Wednesdays. But since there are girls out, they go out, they spend a lot of money, and it is profitable for the owners to give free drinks to the girls.

Tonight, we are thinking about going to The Butter Factory. Wanna come?

The Age of Innocence, by Edith Warthon

Today I finished reading the first book I bought since I got to Singapore: The Age of Innocence, by Edith Warthon. I was looking for a 300-page cheap book, and the edition of Vintage Classics was perfect to fulfill my requests. I also chose it because I had seen the name of the book in several lists of the best novels of the 20th century, and I thought I couldn't go wrong with it.

The Age of Innocence was first published in 1920, and it won the 1921 Pulitzer Prize. The story is set in upper class New York City in the 1870s. It depicts the love story of Newland Archer, a succesful lawyer, and May Welland, a beautiful young lady from an important family. But there is no interesting love story without a third wheel, who is played by Countess Ellen Olenska, May's cousin. It is not just a love story, but a reflect of a society that lacks comprehension, that acts superficially and that can protect you today and kill you tomorrow. I liked the book, but I would never read it again. I think that the vocabulary was way too complicated (that hadn't happened to me in a long time) and the story wasn't captivating.