Life as we don't know it

The Bake Off

Monday, August 13, 2012 @ 11:53 PM PERMALINK

A couple of weeks ago, Ale and I went for The Bake Off. This year's Singapore edition was held to help the Cat Welfare Society raise funds and they managed to raise $4535!

We set out pretty early in the day and with the help of Maps and Ale's pretty accurate navigational skills, we managed to find the place.

The BakeOff was held at Flea & Tree which is a really great shop.

Ale and I went a little bit insane when we saw all the amazing accessories for sale. It is a good thing I hadn't gotten my salary yet. If not, I'm pretty sure I would have spent too much of it there.

We shared a booklet of cookie dollars. This meant $10 worth of baked goods for each of us. YUM.

All the baked goods contributed looked fantastic and it was so hard to figure out what to buy.

Ale decided on a chocolate cupcake and a gingerbread girl.

Yes, baked goods & cats make future cat lady Ale a happy girl

And after a long and hard decision making process, I decided on a bubble tea cupcake, some hello kitty shortbread and an apple cinnamon cupcake.

Amazing earl grey bubble tea cupcake

Isn't the presentation so cute? The cupcake itself was soaked in earl grey milk tea and tasted almost like a bread pudding. It was really scrumptious. I was so tempted to buy another flavour but I ran out of cookie dollars.

How can anyone resist Hello Kitty shortbread cookies?!

Apple cinnamon cupcake

I actually got the name card of the bakers that did this cupcake but I have no idea where I put it. The cupcake was really moist and they were very generous with the apple sauce filling in the cupcake. Yumm.

Shades from Flea & Trees. I really need to go back there to get some earrings

After spending too much of our money on baked goods and shades, we decided to look for somewhere with air conditioning to hide in. We tried a couple of places but they were all either full or closed until dinner time.

We eventually managed to get a table at 40 hands. I know that I should really have tasted their legendary coffee, but it was too hot a day for coffee (iced or not). While I waited for my turn at the cashier, I spied ONE last bottle of cider sitting in the fridge. If that's not a sign from the universe, I'm not sure what is.

Ale had an iced mocha. It was pretty good.

This is a pretty good cider. Not too sweet with a very crisp bite. I actually usually only rave about super sweet ciders that don't really taste like beer at all but this was very refreshing. Perfect for a hot day exploring.

After we had our drinks and recovered from the heat, we went exploring some more. The Tiong Bahru district is really a juxtaposition of old and new. Some of the amazing low rise flats are still occupied by senior citizens while others have been taken over by trendy shops or offices. There are popular chinese restaurants just a road away from the new cafes & bars.

There is real old era charm in the estate though. The huge balconies, green glass windows, not recreated exposed brick..it would really be a dream to live in an area like that. I just googled this though, those flats cost like $1m upward and have like less than 60 years left on them. Boohoo. My dreams are dashed.

We found a couple of cats lying around and Ale was quick to make friends with them.

While the weather could have been heaps better, exploring Singapore is always a fun thing for me and it's even better when I get to contribute to animal welfare and get to go shopping as well.

Labels: Adventures in our backyard, Charity, The Bake Off