22 Oct 2009

The day before we left on our trip, DD and I snuck out after putting Noey to sleep to have dinner, just the 2 of us, to celebrate our wedding anniversary. Because we knew we would be having a late dinner, we made reservations at one of favourite restaurants in the neighbourhood -- Valentino's.

I love the place, not only because I can still have dinner at an acceptable time after putting Noey to bed (and having peace of mind in that respect), but also because it reminds me a lot of the eateries we went to in Italy, and Italy is my favourite holiday destination. The decor here is as authentic as it gets here! And the service, while not the best I've had, is undeniably warm. And of course the food is great.

Clockwise from top-left: Seafood Soup, Pan-fried Buffulo Mozz wrapped in Parma Ham, Squid Ink Fettucine with Crabmeat in Tomato-cream Sauce, Me and my portion of Spaghetti with Bottarga (Fried Tuna Roe)

One thing I appreciate is the fact that they will help you split the food into two portions if you're sharing. We did just that and each got two half portions of pasta as our mains. The Spaghetti was Bottarga was my adventurous choice for the day and it certainly wasn't what I would usually order, with a giam-giam and somewhat fishy taste (which they warned me about). Interesting, but probably not for me. Everything else though was reliably good.

And for the first time we stayed on for dessert! Decided to go the whole hog and get a fudge cake with ice-cream and zambucca flambe.



Maybe we were a bit too enthusiastic in that respect cos the shot of alcohol was really quite strong even after the flames died down!

While we were making our way through our meal we spied: Truffles!



Later in the evening, we saw the chef and his dad shave truffles over ice-cream to eat, which I thought was rather interesting. They told us to come back and try it -- it's apparently truffle season now -- so maybe I will. If I can get a reservation, that is, since it's ridiculously hard to get a table at short notice. We'll see.

Apart from the food, we had a nice evening, just being ourselves. It's not so often that we get to just BE these days so I appreciated the night out.

And oh, we also managed to sneak out in the afternoon to gallivant around Ion. I even got to enjoy a huge ice-cream all to myself so I was a happy camper! It would have been better if I was actually able to buy some clothes/shoes etc. when shopping but it was not to be. Maybe next time, whenever that may be!



(There, just felt I ought to post something without Noey's face in it for once!)