Sea House and Poppadums (and our kitchen!)

Morning people! It's a bright beautifullll day and I'm in a verrry good mood. I am glad that so many people visited the Democracy Fair at Dharubaaruge and enjoyed it (and boogywoogied to the Olympians' music). I am also glad that the vote of no confidence against the Foreign Minister, Dr. Shaheed, did not pass (because he knows his stuff, and we all know what that is). And I am more glad that the current opposition just keeps on getting more ridiculous everyday (besides, I find the notion of them being a productive and sensible opposition ridiculous itself).

Sin is still too busy to write anything, so here I am again. Ah, bear with me :)

Last weekend Sin and I stayed up to watch movies. We watched Numb (starring Mathew Perry, and not as funny as we'd thought it'd be) and Money Talks (old one starring Charlie Sheen and Chris Tucker, and quite comical). So anyway, we got hungry at around 4.30 am and headed off to Seahouse, the infamous 'happening spot' over the Hulhumale' terminal (thank god that place stays open all night! I've lost count of the many, many times we've run there starving in the middle of the night). It was still a bit dark and the streets were almost empty and so peaceful. There was a nice breeze, and when we drove past the sea looked so beautiful i wanted to go in for a swim.

There were just a couple of people at Seahouse at that time and the music was soft and subdued. We ordered 2 frech toast breakfast sets (eggs sunny side up, sausages, juice, tea or coffe and french toast drenched in honey) and coconut pancakes (strangely they didn't have the normal pancakes on the menu so we decided to be bold and try the coconut one). The french toasts were yum and the pancakes, to our surprise, were big and scrumptious. They looked more like rolls than pancakes though, but the coconut filling went well with maple syrup. We'd recommend the french toast set at Seahouse for a filling breakfast, especially if your tummy starts rumbling in the early morning hours when no other places are open! The french toast set gets a 7, and the coconut pancakes get a 7 as well. I'll make an extra note of the surroundings there because it was so lovely to have breakfast while watching the sun rise and the world waking up to another beautiful day. You could even see some really enthusiastic people jogging (that is what I call dedication! it amde me feel slightly guilty hehe) and some at the 'masveringe park' enjoying a bit of fishing in the morning.

After the breakfast and a little drive around Male', we slept all morning and woke up later in the day. After the usual household chores of laundry and cleaning (or trying to atleast), we had a half hour debate about lunch. Finally we agreed on Indian and ordered garlic naan, mutton rogan josh and chicken tikka masala from Poppadums, this Indian restaurant on Ameer Ahmed Magu, somewhere near Majeediya school. Since they don't do delivery (ahhh they should!) we went by to pick it up. We thought 5 would do for both of us, but that was way too many. 3 naan would do for 2 people I think. The mutton rogan josh was really really nice, with a spicy thick sauce. The chicken tikka masala was quite hot and Sin's eyes got all watery (Sin's not much of a hot spice person), but it was delicious with the naan. I would have liked the naan to be just a lil bit more crispy, so I rate it at 5. Chicken tikka masala gets a 7 and mutton rogan josh gets a very well deserved 8. Overall, the whole meal turned out very well indeed. The portions were generous and the prices reasonable. If you're in the mood for Indian food, we'd definitely recommend these dishes from Poppadum. We're not very enthusiastic about sitting there and having a meal as the set up is not so, well, pleasant... so we'd say take out is a better option. However if you do end up eating at the restaurant, do try the mango lassi. It's divine and gets an 8.

In the evening we went shopping to Fantasy store because I really really felt like cooking. We couldn't find much variety of meat or juices or milk (the tasty ones) and were quite disappointed (we also note that Fantasy is relatively pricey). We ended up just buying bread, parsley and oregano leaves, an assortment of nuts (i luuuurve nuts and seeds and dried fruit and all such things) and some frozen veggies. Next we headed to Agora where we got meat, bread, milk, juice and baskin robbins iceacream (honey and nut crunch flavour).

Cooking is quite an exciting thing for both of us, since we're so new at it and the whole process always ends up like quite an adventure (mostly a hilarious one!). We defrosted 3 chicken breasts and diced them. Then we covered the pieces with spice ('lonumirus havaadhu'- i wanted to try the tandoori masala but Sin vehemently disagreed) and a little bit of flour, and fried them in olive oil. By the time the chicken was done we'd decided to make the rest of the meal simple. We made noodles with veggies and a bit of soy sauce and chicken stock. The noodles turned out more salty than we expected and we had to squeeze in some lime (oh well, we tried :) ) but the chicken was quite yummy. Topped off with orange juice (the brand we like is called Faragello - I think it's Egyptian, and its avbailable at Agora)and some ice cream, the home made meal wasn't all that bad and we were quite pleased.

I think I'd rate our chicken a 7 and the noodles a 5 n half. Orders anyone??

The Aioli Experience - 7 Nov

Last Saturday, Sin and I went to Aioli for lunch. It was rainy and cold and I felt like soup. We got honeydew smoothies and pumpkin soup. At Aioli, you can't go wrong with the honeydew or rock melon smoothies, they're yummmm. And if you're feeling a bit under the weather, try the Immune Zoom - I dont know how it happened, but it zoomed up my system when I had the flu - twice! That coupled with the really filling fruit plate is absolutely refreshing [if you happen to be a fruit lover like me]. Coming back to the lunch, the pumpkin soup was thick and creamy and just how you'd expect it on a cold, rainy afternoon. mmmmm. So it all started well.

We decided to be a little adventurous and order something exotic. In the seafood category we found 'Whole Barramundi fish Thai style' and we went, ooooh this sounds good. It came with a portion of rice - we were told one wouldn't be enough for two people. So we ordered the fish and two portions of rice, and waited excitedly, for quite a while infact. And with all the waiting, our expectations were rising....

The food came. The rice was too sticky for my liking, and one portion would have done for both of us. No, we are not usually light eaters as one might assume. The fish did not look appetising, but I didn't want to judge. To put it simply, it tasted like garudhiya and rice, and although Sin likes it, I'm not a big fan of garudhiya [though I absolutely love rihaakuru!]. Soooo, it did not rate well with me. We felt the fish was not that tasty and the chilli paste (for which we had to remind twice) looked and tasted like lonumirus. If you're looking for something similar to garudhiya and lonumirus, this is a good choice. NOT if you're looking for something different, as we were.

We rate the pumpkin soup an 8. The Barramundi fish and rice dish scores a 4. We're not recommending it. But, if you are looking for something nice delivered from Aioli, we would recommend their Tasty Beef Pizza. Had it delivered last week and it was yes, a very tasty beef pizza indeed. Will give a rating of 7. I'll try to get pics of the food we eat uploaded here too to give you a better idea of what they're like.

Also, I've always wondered why they had to hire foreigners to work there at Aioli? Initially I thought it was meant to provide better service, but it actually doesn't. Maybe it's to attract Maldivian men who might be impressed with the East Asian girls? I have no idea. Since I'm a strong advocate for hiring locals, I am not impressed about it.

If you happen to go there, do not miss out on the smoothies. Or the really rich chocolate mousse [that I would rate an 8], if you're feeling decadent.Toodles!

Kicking off!

Helloooo people. This is Shine (aka the pretty half of Sin and Shine :p ).

Sin and I were wondering the other about what to blog about, since we had set up a blog... and then got too busy to do anything about it. I thought today is a good day to start, since I'm hyper like a 5 year old on a sugar high, and Sin eagerly agreed, probably to get me out of his hair and let him get his work done.

Anyway, we decided we'd start off with food. [I'm also hoping to include shopping (cool clothes and shoes, shoes, shoes!) and interior design later on... and I'm really set on convincing Sin to share some of his awesome style wisdom with the gents!... but that will have to wait]

Soooo, talking about food is a good way to kick this off I guess, since we're both foodies. And finding a place to eat out in Male' is always, always quite a drama for us, which is quite ironic since there isn't actually much choice... but we still mullll and lingerrr and mullll some more.... and then end up going to a place we've gone hundreds of times before, and maybe even swore never to go back again. And then we say, why doesn't anyone do a food review here? And then yesterday we went Hey, why don't we do a review on our blog? So here we are... yay!

We felt there's bound to be many, many people out there who'd go through the same thing as we do, not knowing where to go and what to eat and what to order and what places do delivery yada yada. We figured we'll blog about all the places we go to, what we eat and how we rate the food (and the service, because service matters! Are you listening, management??) Follow us on our quest to find yummy food (hopefully at reasonable prices - without being ripped off with water bottles that cost 40Rf - i mean, seriously??)!

I shall be back soon with the first review.... hold your breath :) ... toodles!