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Sunday, March 22, 2015

An Italian Feast - Basilico at Regent Hotel

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Cold cuts section - Freshly sliced ham
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Cheese Platter section
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Fresh lobster & sashimi
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Head Chef Angelo proudly showing how to serve Melon with Parma
Regent-Hotel-1-2 Regent-Hotel-8-2 Regent-Hotel-9-2 Regent-Hotel-10-2 Regent-Hotel-12-2Since I came back from Italy, I haven't had Italian food for some time as the flavours here simply can't compare to Italy. Italian food to me is hearty, comfort food, since Italian cuisine tend to use extremely fresh ingredients, retain its original flavours and if cooked, it's cooked with gusto. Food, especially in the South of Italy, is celebrated and there's nothing better than having freshly made pesto or homemade bolognese sauce.

I jumped at the chance to try Basilico at Regent's Hotel, which was known for its amazing buffet spread. I simply couldn't contain my excitement when I saw the authentic Italian spread! They have everything from cold cuts, to seafood, to sashimi (italiano style), cheese platter, salad station, fresh mozzarella balls and multiple varieties of tomatoes... I was just totally blown away by the freshness of ingredients.
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Oven baked Focaccia with Black Summer Truffle & Rabola Cheese
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The mains
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Tiger Prawn Risotto with Lemon Zest & Herbs
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Roman Style Roasted Pork Belly, Amarone Wine Poached Quince Apple and Minted Fava Beans
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The dessert table did not disappoint either. It was a beautiful spread of Chocolate Mousse cake, bread pudding, creme caramel, Dark chocolate torta, Carrot Cake, Pistachio cake... besides this dessert island, there was another section of chilled dessert and homemade gelato station as well. So, for all those sweet tooths out there, there are more than 10 different options! My absolute favourite was the Dark Chocolate Salami - perfect for the intense dark chocolate lovers out there.

As for the mains, they felt a little heavy for me, as I am not a huge lover of steaks. But allow me to rave about the Tiger Prawn Rissotto with Lemon Zest - it was fragrant, with just the right amount of stickiness and chewiness in each Carnali rice grain. The perfect rissotto should have the rice grains slightly undercooked, just like pasta should be al dente and this one hit the mark for me. The starter, Oven baked Focaccia with Black Summer Truffle & Rabola Cheese is a must-order - the truffle is freshly shaved on top of each baked slice of Focaccia bread and the cheese simply oozes out from its crisp corners.

Suckling pig lovers should also definitely try the Roman Style Roasted Pork Belly, it was roasted to perfection with a crackling skin, slightly melting the layer of pork fat underneath, giving the pork much flavour on its own. The rest of the mains we had were Grilled Angus Beef Tenderloin with Braised Artichokes and “Norcia” Black Truffle Sauce and  Tuscan Style Roasted Lamb Chops. Both of these dishes were beautifully done with premium cuts of meat - I enjoyed the Angus Beef Tenderloin more as the artichokes and truffle sauce gave a very interesting flavor contrast.

Basilico changes its Seasonal A la Carte Menu periodically to rotating ingredients featuring different regions of Italy. Every quarter of this year features a unique menu that is created by chef Angelo to give you a complete Italian dining experience. This month features Central Italy - known for its meats - Can't wait till the next time to be back for some heavy authentic Italian feasting!

Thank you to Regent Hotel for the invite. 

3 comments :

  1. Hi Vera,

    We had what I thought was a rational conversation on the issues present in social media and the importance of businesses - especially start ups - putting research into whom they sponsor. After our conversation I was honestly impressed with how you handled it - until you completely undid it all by blocking me and deleting my comments, I don't know how many people's comments you've deleted, but by doing that, you basically confirmed the worst we thought of you.

    My question to you is: if you cannot stand constructive commentary - why strive so hard to be a blogger? As a business owner myself, I have actually approached you before to sponsor you (via Instagram DM, which you didn't see), but rescinded it the moment I saw your followers grow unnaturally - more than 20,000 followers within a matter of a few days.

    The reason I initially approached you was because you did have good content and a great Like-to-Follower ratio - 10% in which 300 Likes for 3000+ followers. Your dishonesty and inability to deal with facts is the exact reason why bloggers like Xiaxue came down hard on bloggers that inflate their statistics. It is dishonest and a form of misrepresentation, akin to a company saying it earns 1 billion dollars in revenue to attract investors when in fact the number is much less. I certainly hope you don't use this sort of policy of inflating statistics in your real work place.

    There are probably many companies out there that would have been willing to sponsor you, even with only 3000 followers. It is a pity you did not have more confidence and patience to grow your followers organically, and I am guessing that you have thus lost out on a lot of potential sponsorships and genuine followers because any company that has done it's ground work can see exactly who you are, but thank you for confirming it for me today.

    And based on your previous behavior, I am guessing you will be deleting this comment since you don't like feedback, but don't worry - I've screenshotted it.

    And yes, I also screenshotted our Instagram conversation. Evidence is always important as I mentioned earlier :)

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    Replies
    1. Hi Monica,

      I think you have a misunderstanding here.

      To address your concerns, I deleted your comments on Instagram because I feel that it is negative and it’s not an accurate representation of my work and what I have done thus far. I don’t understand why I would need to post up a screenshot of Instagram featuring myself as a suggested user, just to prove “hard evidence”. I also don’t understand why I would need to delete my account and lose my old photos, which I value.

      You sounded like you were just straight on accusing me of buying followers unless if I had something to prove. The fact is, I don’t have to prove anything because I have nothing to hide since I have never bought followers in the first place. And secondly, I also don’t go around touting to companies that I want to be sponsored because I have xx number of followers. So, in that respect, I don’t think its fair of you to compare me to Gushcloud, since I have never misrepresented myself or attempted to claim that I am very popular, or present false statistics to companies.

      I didn’t think that by becoming a suggested user, I would grow to 20k followers in one week. If I knew that would happen, actually I wouldn’t have wanted to be a suggested user because it was never my purpose just to get ghost followers. I would like to connect with people on Instagram, and that is what makes me the happiest when I comment and read comments on IG. So right now, you are making things personal by saying that I do not have the “confidence and patience to grow your followers organically”, when all that has happened was that Instagram featured me. That is a very hurtful and unfair statement to make.

      I may have lost out on potential sponsorships which I don’t know about, but that doesn’t affect me because I’m already thankful of all the continuous relationships I have with my existing sponsors, and I honestly have enough and don’t need a lot more. I said before, I was never in it for the money anyway.

      Anyway, my friends who have been featured on IG as suggested users are @superhap and @redrangefinder, and they also now face the same problem in terms of followers to likes ratio. I don’t think it’s fair that you say that this is their fault and that they are misrepresenting themselves?

      And no, I won’t be deleting your comment away from my blog. I hope that explains a lot of things.
      I just want to be blogging and doing my own thing, and I hope you can allow me to do that.

      Cheers,
      Vera

      Delete
  2. Italian food is yummy and healthy too. The best in the worlld, but I'm not objective ;)
    Kisses from Italy
    Valentina
    http://www.mybubblyzone.com/

    ReplyDelete

I would love to see what you say!