Cranky Domestic Goddess

About 2 months ago, YP, L, P and I went to Villetta, an Italian restaurant in Helsinki. It’s located right in the heart of the city. It was my first time there, so you can imagine me losing my direction going there because YP had an earlier engagement, therefore, she couldn’t be my walking navigator for that day *haha*

Happy faces:

Anyway, I ended up 20 minutes late because I lost my way and finally had to resort to calling L so that she could give me the correct instruction. I was actually just one block away from Villetta. Duh! And that took me 20 minutes to realize it.

It’s always fun to go out with the gals! I truly enjoy the chat and food. I hope we could do it again before the baby arrives next month. Geeeeee … 3 more weeks and the baby should arrive … yeah … the truth? I AM FRIGGIN’ NERVOUS! Ok, back to Villetta.

It’s a nice, small and cosy Italian restaurant. The interior design is nothing to shout about. But knowing how passionate the Italians are … we had top-notch service from the “WAITERS”! Our waiter was a stout looking average kinda middle-aged Italian man. Absolutely friendly and was teasing YP the whole evening. He gave us very good recommendation. Of all of us, L had the best - SPAGHETTI FRUTTI DI MARE. It’s of mussels with garlic tomato sauce. LOL! That lady! She only finished the mussels and left the noodles to waste =D

P had PASTA NORMA - a vegetarian pasta which has a unique blend of “terung” aka eggplant. Really authentic. Of course, Mr Passionate recommended and she took it right away! As for me, I had FILETTO DI MAIALE ALLA PANNA - pork patties with a special Italian cream sauce and french fries. Guess what? L just loved my french fries that she kept eating and ignored her spaghetti *muaaahahahha* She’s funny!

YP had the most special one - SALSICCIA GRIGLIATA - Italian sausage with yummy salad and wedges. The sausage looked normal but the taste was superlicious! Her salad enticed me … *slurp*

After dinner, we went for hot chocolate near the Oopera House by the bay. We walked there as YP wanted to digest her food fast … *haha* typical woman!

SPAGHETTI FRUTTI DI MARE

PASTA NORMA

FILETTO DI MAIALE ALLA PANNA

SALSICCIA GRIGLIATA

If you fancy passionate dining service and good food, try them out:

Villetta Ristorante & Pizzeria
Ruusulankatu 8
Helsinki
Tel: +358.9498960

Website: villetta.fi

PS. Better make reservations for weekends. It’s a small restaurant. So the tables are limited. It’s quite a popular place.

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When mom and bro visited, my dad-in-law treated all of us to Huviretki. It’s not the cheapest place but the food is good and the portion is big. At first, we thought it’s gonna turn out to be like those “French” portion. Must admit, that’s not good enough to fill up the stomach. Boy, were we surprised when we saw how big the portions were and we truly enjoyed our dinner.

Both hubby and I have been to Huviretki a few times but we definitely do not recall how the food were served =D I guess we’ve been to TOO MANY places and most places only served kecikx2 portions. So, we were really surprised! Service is satisfactory. What can we really expect nowadays, huh? At least, they have had coloring tools for my boy when he got impatient and began screaming out of boredom!

Two handsome gentlemen

Kiddy meal - Makkara and mashed potatoes

Mozzarella Chicken - Grilled chicken fillet toppled with mozzarella cheese and served in red wine sauce, roasted veges, cherry tomatoes and french fries - Bro and I

Grilled Beef - Beef sirloin steak 150g/200g with seasoned butter, roasted veges and french fries - dad-in-law 200g and hubby 150g

Barbeque Chicken - Grilled chicken fillet with bbq sauce, smetana, potato and jalapeno croquettes, and potato waffles - Mom

Esquire’s Steak - Beef sirloin steak with read wine sauce, toppled with blue cheese, deep fried onion rings, grilled tomatoes and french fries - sis-in-law

Mom, bro and dad-in-law

Hubby had to juggle between food and effort to keep N quiet

I would rate Huviretki - 4 star

Yesterday, I went to de-stress with my friends. We went to a Malaysian restaurant in Helsinki and had sweet & sour pork ribs Malaysian style, sizzling claypot tofu with seafood - huge prawns and sotong *yummmmmm* Malaysian style also and butter garlic shrimps - utterly delicious! After, we went to Cafe Java for a long chat and had hot chocolate with cream - *melts*

Stupid me forgot to bring my camera because I was in a hurry to go out. So had to capture our food with my W850i. Not very good quality cuz I forgot to turn on the flash - duh! =S

We also have our VIP seating, a quiet corner which the owner reserves for his VIP customers. In this case, L is the VIP customer =P Thanks to her, we didn’t have to get sandwiched between those noisy and hungry finns =D Ooooppppss did I mention noisy?

Sweet & Sour Pork Rib Malaysian Style

Sizzling Claypot Tofu with Seafood Malaysian Style

Butter Garlic Shrimps Malaysian Style

We’re going out soon again … can’t wait. This time for some good finnish food! We’re a bunch of crazy chatters. We laughed til we teared … I guess those finns who sat around us were kinda disgusted. We didn’t give a shit to them, anyway.

Not forgetting two leng lui(s)

Anyway, we left around midnight and walked a good 10 minutes in the drizzling and windy weather to fetch our cars.

Eh I used babel fish to translate this entry - can someone tell me if it made sense?

昨天, 我去de 注重与我的朋友。我们去一家Malaysian 餐馆在赫尔辛基和有甜& 酸猪排Malaysian 样式, 烧得发嘶声claypot 豆腐用海鲜- 巨大的大虾和sotong * yummmmmm * Malaysian 样式并且和黄油大蒜虾- 完全地可口! 以后, 我们去咖啡馆Java 为长的闲谈和食用了热巧克力与奶油- * 融解* 愚笨我忘记带来我的照相机因为我急忙将出去。如此必须夺取我们的食物与我的W850i 。不非常我忘记打开闪光- duh 的优良品质cuz! = S

我们出去… 无法很快再等待。这时刻为一些好芬兰食物! 我们是一束疯狂喋喋不休。我们笑了直到我们撕毁了… 我猜测坐在我们附近有点儿被憎恶的那些芬兰人。我们不会在乎他们, 无论如何。

无论如何, 我们离开在午夜附近和走了好10 分钟在下毛毛雨和有风天气拿来我们的汽车。

YP and I went to Dong Bei Hu at Museokatu 29 in Helsinki for dinner a few evenings ago. Boy, was I glad we went there because the food was excellent. It’s not any typical Chinese cuisines especially tailored made for the finns - it’s PURE and ORIGINAL northern China style cooking!!! We had Chinese sour cabbage casserole and kung po chicken in cubes. They were exactly the taste I hoped for. I must say this is the only restaurant in Helsinki that serves typical far eastern taste.

The lady owner, Lisa, is warm and friendly. We had excellent customer service. In fact, she is a very honest person. I ordered Peking style hot and sour soup for appetizer. She reminded me that the cabbage casserole comes with soup. So, she told me it’s not necessary for the soup! Wow! Can you imagine that?!

Another thing they defer from the rest is that instead of serving plain tap water, they serve hot jasmine tea in a pot! What’s more?! It’s free!!! If you’re heading to Helsinki and having a crave for pure authentic northern Chinese food, try out Dong Bei Hu, ok?! The price range per dish is the standard 12-13euros - ala carte. They also serve lunch which includes soup of the day, main course, water and tea or coffee. It’s priced at an affordable 7.60euros. YP told me that it comes with a huge portion. Now, I can’t wait to try their lunch!

Two weeks ago, my friends and I went to Bossa & Boteca located at 21 Annankatu Helsinki for a girls’ night out. It was also a pikku-joulu for us. It’s been a while since we last had a gathering. I think the last time we were out all together was on Chinese New Year where we had Yee Sang at YP’s place.

Bossa Boteca hosts a varied choice of Brazilian dishes. From the menu, we know that tapioca is a main food staple for Brazilians - just like rice to Chinese. I had deep-fried chicken with steamed/ boiled tapioca. It may looked like a simple main course - dang! It was sure filling! Seija and I both had the same. YP had grilled lamb ribs, P had vegetarian and L had the best of all - beef steak! It was a large portion and considered quite cheap for just 25euros. The portions may seem a little small but it’s really filling.

The atmosphere was not so inviting. A bit too simple and doesn’t carry a Brazilian feel. The setting of the tables was quite disappointing as we had to squeeze ourselves and sat bump-to-bump with patrons seated behind of us. Service wise, we’re very happy about it. Our dinner was overly delayed. I think we waited like 45 minutes for our main course to be served - so you can imagine the hang of it right after some mouth-watering appetizers. Our stomachs were already screaming for MORE … We had the waitress over a few times asking her when our dinner would be served. Then I quickly added that we shall all be compensated with desserts for the long wait. WOW! I got it for us. We had yummy yummy desserts, tea, coffee and espressos after the dinner. The girls had red wine during the meal while I only had orange juice - I’m allergic to alcohol! How pathetic!

Too bad, there isn’t a site for Bossa & Boteca yet. It’s newly opened and it’s first premier was 29 November. I’m sure they will have a website coming soon! And oh by the way, I don’t recall the name of the food. Was too busy snapping pix of the food without thinking of a pix of the menu. Anyway, here are some pix:

Here’s the website of a sister restaurant in Turku.