August Babies Birthday at Shashlik Restaurant

Yup, you've read correctly. It is "August" as I'm perpetually updating backdated entries.

For HS and WY's birthday last August, the F4 gang met up at Shashlik Restaurant after work. The restaurant which is located at Far East Shopping Centre, serves traditional Russian and continental cuisine.

As per every meet up, Em as usual was the one who suggested eateries we could check out. Most of the time we would not have heard of those places she suggested, only to be immersed in good food/good ambience once we were there. This time round, we were all familiar with Shashlik for we heard and read good reviews about this place.




Shashlik is famous for their borsch soup and we ordered 2 bowls to share. The thick soup came with a generous helping of chunks of beef, carrot and potato as well as shreds of cabbage and onions. A dollop of sour cream was added on top of the soup for extra creaminess.

We could not help taking pictures of us with the warm, soft and fluffy bread that went with the soup.




Em was telling us that she read about how the restaurant was set up in 1986 by 9 Hainanse migrants in 1986 after being laid off at Russian restaurant Troika and that the menu had remained the same for the past twenty years. [text information taken from a HGW review by stargirl]


Here are all of us with our mains.



My Beef Shashlik looked kind of bare and naked right? That is because the photo was snapped before the sides were added onto the hotplate. If you don't already know, Shashlik is a form of shish kebab aka skewered meat. In this case, the meat was removed from the skewer onto the hotplate by the server upon serving.


We also ordered appetizers (which I could not remember their names) to share.




Even though the restaurant is famous for their Shashlik, we were not too pleased with the meat served that evening. The beef was a little overcooked or maybe because I did not eat it quick enough as it sizzled on the hotplate. Another possible explanation could be my love for medium rare steaks. The chicken smelled really funky; it was as if the meat had been stored in the freezer for too long. Em thought she was being fussy but the 4 of us tasted the meat and agreed. When we politely gave our feedback to one of the older female staff, she seemed annoyed and insisted that the meat smelled fine. Other than the meat, we weren't too pleased with the service.


Everyone asserts that Shashlik has got the best Baked Alaskan ever and of course we just had to try it out. It was really interesting to watch the waiter preparing the dessert in front of us. I'm sure the boy sitting diagonally across our table found it interesting too.




We also ordered Banana Flambé to share.




After eating, it was time for presents and cards presentation! The pre-presentation phase for this group of gal pals is always the most hilarious. The 4 of us usually would not have time to meet prior to the actual meet up. Hence, we had to write our well wishes on the birthday card(s) on the meeting day itself while the birthday girl(s) sit around and try not to peek. This time round, Em bought the gifts while I settled the cards.


HS and WY were obviously delighted at having received 3 cards each.




Of course, Em had a great sense of humour when writing on the gift card tag.




I love you gals!




Even the "non-birthday" gals got to take home something-- interesting egg tart flavoured Collon and shark's fin flavoured Pretz from HS.