Just like Paris

Just like the movies set in Paris, a couple of people sipping tea under the mild sun with the Eiffel Tower painting a beautiful backdrop. A waiter in dark slack and white top hugged by a black vest serves you tea, and then some pastries while you sit to a table under a gigantic umbrella. This humble cafe set up by a french lady in Bukit Timah never loose that touch. Instead of sitting with tables under giant umbrellas, you dine indoor where the air conditioner cools your food as you enthusiastically fire snapshots of the neatly decorated dishes.

I made my way through the closely arranged tables and chairs to hunt for a seat in this crowded cafe, and I am lucky. I always get the last table available, and then someone walks in and realize he needs to wait. He shall linger around the walkway to pressure a table to settle the bill as soon as they down that last piece of delightful pastry. Choupinette is a cozy cafe packed with wooden furniture dishing out delicacies with not a very friendly price.

I saw no locals in the whole cafe, mostly caucasian. I browse through the simple four page menu that looks like its done using Microsoft Word's word art overnight. I settled for a brunch set that consist of Eggs Royal accompanied by a cup of tea and a fruit juice.



The apple juice that have nothing to cheer about, it must be a Cold Storage packet drink in a fancy glass.



Took a few sips, and I am right. Its nothing special, just to sweeten your morning bland tongue.



Tea arrived sooner.



I have to admit ever since I been to TWG, I am paying more attention to teas. I held the hot pot while letting the string of lemon and ginger flavored tea to fill up the cup.



I tried to have a sniff first, but sadly there was non. Reality strikes back, "Andy, this is not TWG Tea." The lemony essence was lacking, no wonder I never felt the tickle at the sides of my tongue. The disturbing ginger which I dislike since young was not strongly present too. This tea is not a failure, but for the flavor it disappoints. A cup of decent tea it is, the lesson learned was to not compare this to TWG.

Egg Benedict is a dish I look up on the internet. That is if you are a curious cat like me to wiki it to know about the ways to cook an egg, there are too many.



At last, the main attraction was placed in front of me. Reviews floating around the internet are having sky high praises on this, and that made me very excited.



This plate has generous drips of hollandaise sauce over layers of great texture. Slices of smoked salmon cushioned comfortably in between a mixture of a soaked thick toast and a fragile poached egg. Accordingly, this are not market eggs but expensive eggs. But is the difference necessary enough to be mentioned?



Give those fragile eggs a poke and let the runny egg yolks roll out and interfere the hollandaise sauce. This achieved a nice combination, the silky egg yolk with the sourish lemon and butter sauce. Then dip it with the toast and smoked salmon, you shall let your taste bud savor the variety of tastes as it differentiates in your mouth. Luckily, the smoked salmon was not overpowering. While allowing enjoying the different type of texture and taste at one go, you will appreciate that you never substituted the salmon with the usual ham. If you did, that will be a different ball game. Now the disappointment of not getting the gentle tickle from the lemon and ginger tea is all right, because this was more satisfying. The ticklish hollandaise and fragrant smoked salmon is great. And this rich playground of flavors repeated it self for the consecutive bites.



Mrs Egg Royal, I am a fan.

Then I went up to the dessert counter for a dessert to clear my richly pampered palette.



Spot the obvious mickey.



I have to admit the rich dose of eggs benedict was awesome. The hollandaise had its generous amount drizzled across my plate and I finished it all, but I am still up for something lemon. Therefore I settled for this lemon meringue tart. I have no idea about the fillings but the title was the main puller.



I fiddled around the tart with my fork and learned that a lemon meringue tart has a base of pastry filled with a soft lemon curd filling and topped with whipped egg whites and sugar(meringue) hence the name of the dish. I assume the meringue are skillfully flamed lightly at the surface to give a delicate crisp brown burn.



At first bite, let the strong lemon stubbornly pinch you, while the fluffy meringue smooth out the difference between the crispy tart pastry and soft textured curd. But the lemon in this dessert was too much for me to take, half way through I wish I had someone to share this with. But I endured as the over powering lemon curd does its duty. Half a serving of the pleasure was enjoyable enough. But the goal of getting lemon to disturb my taste bud was accomplished.



If you were wondering what makes the mickey mouse's ear, it is the mini macarons. These are shaped to the size of a fifty sense coin. I told the waitress to give me the best two, hazelnut and peach that is. I tried very hard to not let the bad reviews I encounter online to interfere with my attempt of being a complete stranger to this macarons.

I took the hazelnut first, the round pillow like pastry had a pinch of hazelnut fragrance in it which was not sufficient to dominate the flavor it stands for. Sandwiched in between was chocolate ganache, a more chim term for Hershey chocolate syrup available from the supermarket shelf. But it is no doubt that chocolate and hazelnut makes a good combination, which saved this macaron from getting a big "F" label.

Next up is the peach. It was all right. This also had chocolate ganache in between, but I have to agree that peach and chocolate don't get along well in this experiment. Chocolates are still the best companion to any type of nuts, but only a few type of fruits can befriend it. If you are looking for great macarons, you can try TWG tea infused macarons or line up at Bakerzin for the 1$ per macaron offer.

One must know their way around this menu in order not to get disappointed by the attractive fancy french names crowned on this dishes. But I had an enjoyable lunch, especially the egg benedict that is prepared skillfully. The delightful dessert that concluded my meal was not bad too. But I am still uncertain about the excitements generated so far are enough to bring me back to Choupinette that soon.



A picture to prove my point that this cafe is full of caucasian.

By the way, *adorable ang mo kid alert*

If you are tired, stay tired.

Right now, you stare into that glaring screen of distraction, with an untouched minimized work window, and a cluttered desktop of conversations and sites. You can't blame your self because you were equally distracted all this while. If you were to punish your self, would you?

Week four, where foul language plays accompaniment to verbal frustration. And that red bull as a delusional energy source. Not forgetting those potential addiction which lies shallow within your clustered desktop to complete the equation of procrastination.

I can hear a voice, telling me to halt for a second. I have not touch my draft since its amazing two hundred words accomplishment. A thousand three hundred more to go, I will be back if I reach another enlightenment of four hundred words.

I became braver to dine.

An aquarium structure sits majestically at the more quiet upper layer of Orchard Ion, where big brand fashion boutiques are in sight, no wonder this big brand tea company deserve a spot here too.

TWG Tea Salon and Boutique, an unknown brand to me three weeks ago, a place I would love to go back tomorrow.

If money does fall from the sky, I would have ordered the Yellow Gold Tea Buds.

I step into this shop three weeks ago to buy two pieces of macaroons.


By the next week, I was there buying a present for my grandmother. And today, I went in giving an excuse to my self that I wanted to taste the tea I bought, but the real reason is as follow. I wanted to try the tea, have a taste of their finger sandwiches, and their best seller "Singapore Surprise" which I will surprise you later.

By ordering it individually, it will burden me with the total cost of my meals from Monday to Friday, so I decided to go during the 3pm to 6pm interval, where my to-eat-list of food comes in a set plastered with a cheaper price which makes me feel better. So, that's how you outsmart the menu. Go for the set meal! If the set meal exist that's it.

While waiting in the human chain, I saw my new classmate, which I never say "Hi" to, oops. I was seated fast, because I was alone. A table for one is easier to find, compare to a table for five for a group of aunties in front of me. And to my realization that most of the tables are set up for two, and a table for more than two is only achievable by joining tables the kopitiam style and grabbing the chair opposing me politely and squeeze it into the other table to make a table for five.

Okay, I am not here to bore you with my fascination.




This is the boutique area where a handful of good looking french men splurge their knowledge about tea on an amateur customer like me. Though non are in sight in this picture.


And the salon area, where your lips are inseparable from the tip of the cup, sipping the pumping hot tea and constantly serviced by a group of smartly dressed men with smiling faces as their pleasant cover.

I sat down and blinked through the extensive tea list. There are 400+ teas all together, ranging from 6 SGD per pot to wallet-boomz effect price.

I settled for the afternoon tea set called Chic.

- TWG tea from our extensive tea list

- A selection of 3 fine finger sandwiches from the list below
- Foie gras
- Chicken with Comptoir des Indes Tea infused cream fraiche
- Smoked salmon with Mascarpone and chives
- Green asparagus and whipped cream sprinkled with chives
- Roma and Moroccan mint tea infused sauce

- A choice of 2 homemade scones or muffins served with TWG Tea jelly and whipped cream or 1 patisserie from our trolley

The tea came first.


This special looking pot is meticulously constructed with the suitable materials to secure the temperature of the tea. The tea will diligently stay warm even after an hour.

I took a sip of my grandmother's to be birthday present, Green tea with ripe fruits. The fragrance of the ripe fruits triggered my senses, and I thought this was gonna be promising. But oh my, the pinch of tea's bitterness was there. But after resisting my temptation of sugar addition, it was lovely. The required sweetness was perfect to not remind you that you are sipping on tea. This is not any ordinary sugar from the kopitiam for your coffee.



In contrary to lipton tea where you can add the whole can of milk. Crystalized sugar is offered to satisfy the sweet tongue, and to protect the tea's taste from alteration. Adding milk like the uncle who runs the tea stall is a big no no too.

After a few torturing sips for the lip, the tiny sandwiches arrived.


I settled with the smoked salmon - my favorite, chicken - recommendation from waiter and foie gras - my excitement. And the menu never mention about this.


Green salad with a clown nose sized cherry tomato tossed with house vinaigrette, which I believe is also tea infused type of dressing.




For the smoked salmon, the bread are toasted lightly which achieved a delicate nutty crust on its surface. Smoked salmon has moist content, but the moisture is controlled to ensure the bread stays crispy.

I grab the chicken next, it was all right. No hard rock texture, very pleasant and doesn't taste like rotten chicken as I thought.

As a stranger to foie gras, on the first bite, I was blew away instantly. By the third bite, I wished all 3 sandwiches was foie gras. The great soft texture eases the melting in your mouth along with the fragile nutty crusted bread. What a great taste for a small piece of controversial meat. The salad tasted okay too, which plays second fiddle to this plate of minis.

Then my surprise, "This is it" I whispered to my self as the waiter place this in front of me.



The Singapore Surprise, I took a bite first only to realize I need to take a picture. The excitement grew, this is must try in TWG, I have seen good reviews about it, and I am pretty confident that the truth dont lie.

This jewel has a thin layer of torched caramelized sugar on top, berries cushioned within a custardy vanilla bourbourne tea infused mouse and the bottom layer of something mysteriously crispy. The texture of different layers vary, which might be a turn off. But the real surprise is that everything melts, the strong sense of vanilla explodes, and the diabetic potential of this masterpiece rise instantly. The different layers disintegrated just right, the custardy texture was major. This worth every penny you need to fork out. Its also listed as one of the most expensive cake in Singapore on soshiok.com




Just stare, picture speaks better than my long winded explanation.

While calming my excitement in this up class salon by sipping the best tea and being surprised, my butt was nailed to the chair for one solid hour mumbling away on the paper for my first draft of creative writing. A very productive afternoon tea session for me, while other tables was productively chatting, and a group of tai tai surrounded by an army of shopping bags gossiping.


You will never miss a glimpse of this shiny weapon for a cup of good tea at every table. And a few glass teapots are in sight too.

Keep a look out for this.

This is the first piece of the puzzle to a great tea experience. The puzzle will never be completed, because the crave for TWG tea will strike you back. It might not be the tea for non tea lovers, but the sinful pastries have a big potential to cling on to your cravings.

I walked out of this aquarium with a smile, but there was a bucket of satisfaction buried deep in me. "I will see you soon" I told to the friendly waiters who thanked me for coming.

The art of serving tea is delicately crafted here. The selection of tea leaves are chose from a handful of tea harvester world wide, to the type of pots to keep your tea warm as you chat away, or in my case as I scribbled. The education on tea was a bonus for me.

Serving tea is easy, but to serve the best tea is a delicately planned process.