Hippopotamus and new hair!

The other day, I was hanging around Marina Square and spotted a new restaurant and it was none other than…

Hippopotamus Restaurant and Grill

And since I was having a massive steak craving, I decided to try this place out. Hippopotamus is actually a French steak place so they serve many different kinds of sauces and side dishes along with your meal and judging from the menu, prices are quite reasonable. There are different price points starting from $15.90 for a set lunch all the way to $39.90 (if I’m not mistaken) for a more atas meal complete with beverage, appetizer and dessert.

The restaurant was really welcoming. I like the bold reds used in it’s interior design and the napkins too. It makes the place feel more alive. And as with every French tradition, meals start with bread and butter.

Bread was warm and moist and they gave salted butter which is a surprise. Most places give unsalted butter but I’m not fussy so I wasn’t bothered. Then the motherload arrived…

Every main course comes with a choice of 3 sides and 1 sauce. My friend and I deliberately ordered different sides just so we could taste them all. Lol. I’ve personally never tried ratatouille before but this here tastes like pasta sauce with lots of veggies in it. Not bad, I would say, but not quite the sides the I would have chosen. Baked potato tasted like the Jack’s Place one where the potato is baked hard (unlike the fluffy ones of Aston’s) and the sour cream was just nice. Not too overpoweringly sour so I enjoyed that. Long beans were overcooked imo. I would have preferred it to be crunchy instead of flaccid, fries were crisp and nicely salted and potato gratin was alright. Nothing much to whoop about.

Ok, enough with getting sidelined. Let’s focus on the big picture. How was the steak? Well, I thought it was gorgeous. Mouthwateringly so. I’m usually quite a small eater but I finished everything off my plate. First off, they gave us a good cut of steak so it was well marbled, easy to cut and juicy (I eat mine medium rare and they got it just right). And I love the sauce that it’s paired with. Apparently it’s a white wine and butter concoction but I can’t taste the wine at all. Nevertheless, the buttery sauce matched the steak really well. My friend ordered a cheese sauce but it was too overpowering for my liking. I’m pretty sure they used blue cheese in that. But on a whole, I had a wonderful experience and I would definitely go back. Especially since the bill came to about $30 each inclusive of GST and what not. Which is quite reasonable I felt for the amount and quality of food provided. Sides aren’t too spectacular though, the main highlight is really the steak so please try if you are a meat-lover.

Hippopotamus Restaurant and Grill is located at 6 Raffles Boulevard #01-204/205 Marina Square. Tel: 63385352. Opening hours: 11am-10pm daily.

Also, I finally got my hair done! Ruth had some discount coupon for REDS where it’s $195 for cut, colour and highlight and since the coupon was going to expire at the end of the month and I wouldn’t have time to use it once school starts in a week (NOOOOO…..) I decided to just go for it and I must say, I’m quite pleased with the result.

Waiting in trepidation

End product

As you can see, I didn’t make any drastic changes because the stylist said that the previous stylist cut my hair too thin so she told me to grow it out a little. But what I liked, was how she made my hair look voluminous (because I don’t have thick hair) not just with blowdrying, but with the choice of color and highlights. Burgundy was chosen as my base colour and a copper red as my highlight (sorry you can’t see it here, it was a rainy day with little sunshine). But instead of doing streaks on the top part of my hair, which will look awful once my roots grow out, she did the highlights inside. So every time I swish my hair now, there’ll be that little flash of red. So exciting! lol.

I’m loving my new hair colour because it gives me that sense of mysteriousness and now I can use darker shades of lipsticks (I’m using a dark nudish brown here) and blushes to create a Fall look! 

Playing around with instagram. Love photos with that aged look

Umbrella: i-deco (Christmas present from Ruth)

Top: Zara

Culottes: catwalkclose

Open-toe sandals: Bata