Last week, I went with Mum to Shimbashi Soba at Paragon! It's quite difficult to find vegan restaurants in the Orchard area (☹), and most eateries only offer 1 or 2 veg options (or none at all!) This is one of the few restaurants that has quite a good selection of vegan food!

This menu board was prominently placed at the entrance of the restaurant! ^^ Everything looks super pretty and yummy! I've not had Japanese food in ages, because authentic Japanese food that's also vegan is rare.

I read about Shimbashi Soba from Amanda of SGVegan and Luke of Hungry Ang Mo! :)

As I've read from Amanda's blog, Shimbashi Soba uses the same oil to fry veg and non-veg items. But I was fine with that.

Sadly, there were no vegetarian lunch sets!!

But the selection of vegetarian food was surprisingly quite extensive - there were a whole 3 pages of soba, shokado set, sushi and dessert! 

Okay, maybe you wouldn't consider 3 pages to be extensive, but it's definitely enough for a few more trips to this restaurant! ^^ 

From what I know, though they say that it's vegetarian, the food's all actually vegan! 

While we waited for our food, I went to see the chef make noodles! Ooooh. 

The noodles are all freshly milled, freshly made and freshly cooked! ^^ It's not gluten free though, for according to the sheet of paper on the table, it's made with 'a special blend of 3 types of soba flour', wheat flour and water.

I took this photo from this side because obviously you can read Japanese.

The first item that was served was Yaki Miso ($5.80). It's grilled miso and it's actually a really tiny piece stuck to the wooden spoon.

The taste and texture was really interesting though! Mushy with crunchy bits. Reminded me slightly of Wang Wang rice crackers (you know, those round ones coated in soy sauce and seaweed flakes?). It was not too salty, and it was fragrant. According to Luke, there's walnuts, white leek and Japanese rice crackers in it. No wonder! 

Mum was concerned about the burnt bits being cancerous LOL. But since it was expensive we scraped the wooden spoon clean. ^^

Next up, we had the Veggie Chikara Soba ($17.80). 'Warm soup noodle with rice cakes, seasoned beancurd, mushrooms and vegetables'

The soup stock is made with konbu (kelp) and soy sauce. It was nicely flavourful! The rice cakes were deep-fried and very chewy. The soba was delicious too! I also liked the presentation.

We also had the Vegetarian Shokado ($25.80). Expensive! Haha.

Soba, three side dishes and dessert.

This is a small bowl of soba with seasoned beancurd and wakame seaweed.

Vegetarian sushi (cucumber, avocado, tomato and shiitake mushroom) with pickled ginger slices. There was soy sauce provided, but no wasabi. I'm curious why this is so o_o

Something I learnt from Mum that day:

This is nigiri sushi, where the seaweed is wrapped around the topping and ball of rice.

Gunkan nigiri sushi (subset of nigiri sushi) is where the seaweed is wrapped around the perimeter of the ball of rice and topping. How interesting. Haha I hope what I'm saying makes sense.

5 kinds of vegetarian tempura. There was pumpkin, lotus root, yam, mushroom and cucumber (I think). It was too greasy and oily, I felt. Or maybe that's just what tempura is supposed to be like. This was to be dipped in the matcha powder provided - first time having tempura like this!

Vegetarian salad. There was avocado, tomato, lettuce, jicama shreds and this intriguing purple sea plant that was bouncy and chewy! There was balsamic vinaigrette to go with this.

Homemade green tea jelly topped with peanut powder, in a brown sugar syrup. The matcha taste was quite prominent, and it had a texture kinda like mochi, but smoother. The peanut powder complemented it really well! 

By the way, Mum says this is the best way to present food - 'Angel Wings' LOL hahaha.

Oh yes, according to her, all of the deep-fried food has a taste of... Japanese oil. Like not Chinese oil. But Japanese oil. o_o  I wish I had fantastic tastebuds haha.

Then, we had dessert! Which I was most excited about! This is Soba Kashi Moriawase ($6.80). Clockwise: there was the homemade green tea jelly, deep-fried sweet soba, gluten cakes with sweet red bean and soba balls.

SO INTERESTING OMG

The deep-fried sweet soba was coated with sugar and it was deliciously crunchy! Breaks many of my 'food rules' though (which I often don't care about when I'm eating at a restaurant). 100% sure that 4 out of 5 people I know will be shocked to know that I enjoyed eating deep-fried and sugar-coated food. Hahahaha

The gluten cakes with sweet red bean looked so pretty and cute! ^^ The green cubes are coloured with wormwood, and the yellow ones are coloured with millet, according to Luke (I believe that it's the same gluten cakes as in the Dengaku Fu). The mochi-like cubes itself were quite bland, but they were nicely balanced out with the red bean paste. 'Gluten cakes' sound really intimidating though. Like they'll cake up your intestines with glue. 

Just kidding.

We spent about $66 in total, so it's not really an 'anytime' place to eat. Well, you could just have a bowl of soba for under $20, but how can you stick to just that where there's so many wonderful things on the menu?? The food will have you going SO INTERESTING OMG. (Okay, that's only if you're a frog-in-a-well like me.) Hehe. It's a great place to eat if you like Japanese food and you feel like treating yourself! ^^

My parents and I went for a picnic dinner yesterday at Labrador Park! I think it was Dad's idea initially, then I kept on harping on it LOL. My parents aren't vegan, but everything they prepared here is :')

We each took care of different things. Mum made the salad and heated up the satay, Dad made the pasta and tofu stew, and I made the drinks and dessert (not pictured).

We brought many many containers LOL. Not all of it is shown here! Our picnic mat is in the design of the movie 'The Hedge'. From a few years back. I can't remember what it's about.

The salad had a head of romaine lettuce, a crispy & sweet Honey Belle pear, a whole avocado, and a large handful of cherry tomatoes. The dressing is a tahini lemon sauce - raw tahini, lemon juice, plain stevia, water.

This doesn't look really appetising, but it was GREAT! It's Green Curry Coconut Milk sauce for the angel hair pasta. With melt-in-your-mouth eggplant slices, mushrooms and mock chicken drumsticks which are storebought and made of taukee (beancurd skin). They even have a popsicle stick in the middle to imitate the 'bone' LOL.

That's the Tofu Stew. The tofu's hidden under all the other ingredients! There were potatoes, carrots (both cooked until really soft ^o^), black fungus, button mushrooms, chinese black mushrooms (I had to google to find out what these were called), and pan-fried tofu. 

Satay with peanut sauce. Storebought. These are chewier and tougher than most other satays, and mum says that this makes them taste more 'real'.

Time to eat!

Sitting amongst the chaota (burnt) grass - it's not rained in weeks. There were short periods of drizzles earlier in the day, but luckily it didn't rain while we were eating!

The picnic mat's really quite small. We need one at least twice the size!

Yum yum!

It looks like I'm trying to advertise the black pepper hahaha. That, together with the green curry paste, coconut milk and angle angel hair pasta, were free from a polyclinic event I helped out in. Yay for free food!! ;D

Angel hair pasta is so much nicer than spaghetti! :)

This was simple but delicious! ^^

I did a fruit-infused coconut water. You can't really see all the fruits, but there's lemon, blueberries, pomegranate seeds and kiwi. I added 1 can (530ml) of pure coconut juice (with pulp) in and filled the rest up with water. 

It was refreshing!

Then it's time for dessert! I made simple Chia Tarts. The crust is made with storebought puff pastry, and I filled it with chia pudding (chia seeds, sweetened almond soymilk, psyllium husk) and topped it with raisins, pomegranate seeds and hemp seeds.

Really simple because I was trying to use as little of the kitchen as possible, since Dad was using it.

A shot I took at home!

Dad opened a coconut with a pocket knife.

Fresh coconut juice tastes sweeter than canned!

A photo taken by Dad because he says that I take too many photos of food and not enough of the scenery. Haha

It's like autumn in Singapore.

But of course it's way too hot.

It looks hazy because my lens was dirty -_-

It was a great family day out! ^^

[Orders Closed - Thanks for your support!!]
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Would you like to buy some QUINOA GRANOLA CLUSTERS? ☺

Vegan.
No added sugar.
No added fat.
Great at breakfast or for a snack! ^^
Allergen info: May have traces of gluten from oats. Do not purchase if you're allergic to nuts/seeds.

NOTE: I AM RUNNING OUT OF JARS (OMG)! ORDER ASAP OF YOU WANT ANY, FIRST COME FIRST SERVED.


Quinoa, pronounced keen-wah, is a superfood! It's a complete protein, and is packed with monounsaturated fat, omega 3s, fiber, essential minerals, B vitamins and flavonoids. (Source: builtlean)
Granola is such a crunchy and addictive snack, and the addition of quinoa to the granola makes it even more crunchier!
Here I have the Banana Walnut flavour with goji berries and medjool dates.


Selling things for the first time ever! Show some support okay? :) (Singapore only though, sorry!)

I wanted to do this since my last school holidays, but I was too busy to. And this is probably the last time in a while I'll be this free so... I'm glad I'm finally doing it after procrastinating for a bit. It's not really to earn money, but it's more of an experience! Also, if this encourages even one person to make more healthy food choices, I'll be really really glad!! It'll also be nice to meet my Ig followers/blog readers hehe. ^^

I'm using recipes which are similar to others posted previously on this blog (it's my most popular post!), and many who've tried them loved it! I've also brought it to school and my non-vegan, junk-loving friends liked it too.
(Hehe self-praise is awkward...)


They'll be in authentic Mason Jars from the US - choose either Quilted 8 oz ($8.90) or Regular 1 pint ($12.90). Or buy both at $20. The amount of granola in the 1 pint jar is about twice of that in the 8 oz jar! It'll be freshly made to order. ^^ I'll be selling them through meetups only, because the glass jars are fragile and might break in the mail. The decor of the jars will be similar as shown here (ribbons & strings are easily removable).

This is the Regular 1 pint jar ($12.90). 1 pint = 473ml

This is the Quilted 8 oz jar ($8.90). 8 oz = 237ml

By the way, The Living Cafe sells this exact same Quilted 8 oz jar (empty, of course) at $8.95. Just saying LOL.

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♥MORE ABOUT THE JARS♥

Mason jars are wide-mouthed glass jars with an airtight screw top. It can be used for canning, storing dried goods, or preserving fruits and vegetables. They're also very pretty and good for smoothies and parfaits!! ^^


The quilted jar on the left has nice patterns all around it, while the regular mason jar at the right (this is the back view) has cup measurements on one side and rough millimeter measurements on the other side.


The lid has 2 parts, the band and the flat lid.

In case you're curious about how you can use these jars to can...

Seems quite dangerously scary to me ^^;

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♥CHOICE OF FLAVOURS♥

a) Banana Walnut
Ingredients: rolled oats, quinoa, chopped walnuts, banana, sunflower seeds, chia seeds, hemp seeds, cinnamon, dried fruit of your choice*

b) Pumpkin Pecan
Ingredients: rolled oats, quinoa, chopped pecans, pumpkin puree, chopped almonds, chia seeds, hemp seeds, cinnamon, dried fruit of your choice*

c) Mixed (50% BW, 50% PP)

Both are mildly sweet; the Banana Walnut is slightly sweeter than the Pumpkin Pecan. If you'd like, I'll add in some plain liquid stevia.

*Dried fruit as shown below (all except raisins and goji berries will be chopped up)

From L to R: Raisins, dried goji berries, organic coconut flakes, dehydrated dragonfruit, organic dried mulberries, dried cranberries, medjool dates

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♥HOW TO ORDER♥

Email me at serene.sayyian@gmail.com with the following (just copy & paste)! Put the subject as 'I wanna buy some quinoa granola clusters!' or something along those lines hehe.

1. Name:
2. Phone number:
3. Choice of meetup place: Buona Vista MRT/ Harbourfront MRT/ Other MRT stations to my convenience!
4. Choice of Flavour: a/ b/ c
5. Choice of Dried Fruit (pick 3): organic coconut flakes/ medjool dates/ raisins/ dried cranberries/ dried goji berries/ organic dried mulberries/ dehydrated dragonfruit
6. Choice of Jar: Quilted 8 oz ($8.90)/ Regular 1 pint ($12.90)/ Both ($20)
7. Stevia: No/ Yes

Also, drop me an email if you have any questions!

While stocks (of jars) last.
Tentatively, the last day of ordering is MARCH 28 (FRI), last day of collection is APR 1 (TUES).
Rest assured that I won't sell anything that I wouldn't eat myself. Thanks for your support! ^^


NOTE: I won't be selling empty jars this time, but in a couple of months (April - early May) I'll be selling a variety of different jars at affordable prices. :) (I do hope people will buy, and that I'm not just delusional about how lovely jars are hahaha)
Don't let this deter you from buying my granola though hehe :x

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