aldora: Levant Exquisite Middle Eastern Cuisine, Bukit Timah

Sweetie Muffin's Birthday Celebration 2014

Note: Levant Exquisite Middle Eastern Cuisine is recommended by Da Rabbit for being one of the most romantic restaurants in Singapore with great ambience and good food (http://musings-of-a-rabbit.blogspot.sg/2013/12/singapores-20-most-romantic-restaurants.html).

I was racking my brains hard on how to celebrate Muffin's birthday... It seems that most of the Romantic Restaurants recommended by LadyIronChef were not to our liking in terms of taste and budget (no offence, but we really did not enjoy the food served by most of the restaurants he recommended). Restaurants with good ambience normally comes with a hefty price tag and hence I did put in some effort to find a conducive dining place that is pocket-friendly to ease my finances a little :)

I was googling on "Exquisite Dining" and Levant Exquisite Middle Eastern Cuisine came into the picture!

Levant Exquisite Middle Eastern Cuisine, Bukit Timah

The restaurant's name - Levant means "The Sun Rises in the East" and it serves exquisite Middle Eastern cuisine at very affordable prices!

Restaurant Name: Levant Middle Eastern Restaurant
Website: www.levant.com.sg
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/LevantSingapore
Location: 8 Greenwood Avenue, Singapore 289198
Tel: 9640 4866
Operating Hours:
Tuesdays - Thursdays, 11:30 to 15:00, 17:30 to 22:30
Fridays - Saturdays, 11:30 to 15:00, 17:50 to 23:00
Sundays, 11:30 to 15:00, 17:30 to 22:30
Highlights:
1. Complimentary Valet Parking Available Daily
2. Belly Dance Performances from 20:00 - 21:00 on Saturdays

Le' Ambience

Located near the Bukit Timah area and in the midst of private estates, the restaurant is not considered very accessible as you have to walk a distance after taking a bus. For those who are driving, free valet parking service is available on a daily basis :)

The restaurant is not very big but the ambience was really good with all the nice yellow lightings from the exquisite looking lamps which are similar to those sold at Arab Street. I had a fetish for the lamps but Sweetie Muffin warned me against having such lightings to spoil our new house's décor.. Meh ~

Bar Counter Area :)

Paintings hung on the Red Brick Wall

Close-Up on the paintings ~

According to the online sources, the restaurant's furnitures and cutlery were imported directly from the Middle East.. It certainly felt great to be dining in the Middle Eastern setting with air-conditioning and ambient lightings ~ awwww that was GREAT!

I also liked the idea of using mirrors to give the illusion that the premise was more spacious than it seems.. The entire place looked really grand and we enjoyed admiring the paintings hung on the wall as well :)

A row of mirrors on the other side of the wall...

Le' Menu

Levant Exquisite Middle Eastern Cuisine, Bukit Timah

Menu

The Menu is available from the website @ http://www.levant.com.sg/menu.html

Anyways, since we were not familiar with Middle Eastern Cuisine, it would be great to just take something standard - the Set Dinner @ SGD30.00+!

The staff was being very friendly and attentive to us and came over to explain to us the details on the Set Dinner Menu :) We appreciated it lots because after all we are not familiar with all the dishes besides Hummus - my favourite dipping sauce!

Set Dinner (SGD33.00 Net / pax)

Do note that the Set Dinner is only available from Tuesdays to Thursdays. And... Sweetie Muffin's Birthday falls on a Wednesday! So I was lucky that my pocket was saved!!!

Appetiser

Dip of the Day with Labanese Flat Bread
Soup of the Day

Main Course Choice

Shish Tawoog (Chicken Thigh)
Chicken Yoghurt (Breast Meat)
Samak (Fish)
Lamb Koobideh (Minsed Ground Lamb)
Halabi (Minced Ground Lamb with Parsley)

**Complimentary Glass of House Pour Red or White Wine or 330ml Beer

Dessert of the Day with Coffee or Tea

**Vegetarian Option is Available too :)

In addition, they are introducing their Set Lunch @ only SGD15+!!!

Le' Food

Birthday Boy waiting eagerly for his foodie to be served ;)

House Pour Red Wine

First to come was the 2 glasses of chilled red wine.. They didn't taste sweet enough to my liking but they definitely tasted better than the ones served @ Crowne Plaza Hotel for their Wedding Banquet.

2 Complimentary Glasses of Red Wine

Intoxicated by the Red Wine...

Soup of the Day: Ginger Soup

Soup of the day was ginger soup and mutton soup. We opted for the ginger one as it was cool indoors.

The soup had a ginger flavour to it but it was not too over-powering.

Ginger Soup

We were surprised that they served bits of vegetables and carrots in it too! Reminded us of our Chinese-style ABC Soup just that it had a ginger taste. This soup is really great for driving away the flu monster in Sweetie Muffin :)

Check out the Bits of Carrots and Veggies swimming in the Soup!

Dip of the Day with Labanese Flat Bread

The dips of the day was Hummus and Eggplant. We opted for the Hummus dipping as Sweetie Muffin hated Eggplants...

Hummus with Labanese Flat Bread

Both of us agreed that the appetiser was great - not too filling and yet appetising :)

Hummus Dipping

Main Course

Chicken Yoghurt (Breast Meat)

I liked my Chicken Breast Meat dish as the meat did not taste too dry and tough like Kebabs. Instead it tasted rather tender and tasty.

Also, it comes with a spicy dipping sauce for the meat and the red tomato sauce is for the rice as per the staff's advice.

Chicken Yoghurt (Breast Meat)

Initially, I felt that the spicy dipping was no kick so I actually scooped a big spoonful of it to ingest with a piece of my chicken.. And it so happened that I scooped the chilli seeds too and my mouth was burnt to the extent that I almost lost my appetite! Boo Hoo Hoo ~

Artistic Close-Up :)

Halabi (Minced Ground Lamb with Parsley)

The presentation of their main course is somewhat similar, just that the meat is different this time round. We wonder if this is the Middle Eastern version of sausages?

Halabi (Minced Ground Lamb with Parsley)

Close-Up

Dessert of The Day

Mango Sorbet

The desserts of the day were Lime Sorbet and Mango Sorbet and we chose the Mango one because we did not want something too sour ~

Mango Sorbet

The dessert was indeed refreshing after our main course!

Coffee or Tea?

I think the staff forgot to serve the coffee / tea to us but it didn't matter because we do not have the habit of drinking coffee / tea after a heavy meal. The portion was just right for us without the coffee / tea anyway :)

Le' Total Damage

It is only SGD66 (within my initial SGD100 budget). Muahahaha!

See how affordable it is to dine there?

Overall

We were very satisfied with the food and service rendered and will definitely return to try their other dishes. We strongly recommend this restaurant to those who want to try something different and yet do so within their budget :)

Pricing: ★★◐☆☆
Food: ★★★★☆
Ambience: ★★★★◐
Service: ★★★◐☆

Sweetie Muffin's Surprise (Sponsored)

I have been thinking of customising a birthday cake for Sweetie Muffin since April when Petite Patisserie collaborated with me on the Mousse Cake Giveaway Event...

I was really blessed that their parent company - The Patissier was so nice to sponsor me 2 nicely decorated cupcakes for Sweetie Muffin's Birthday!

Sweetie Muffin's Surprise

As Sweetie Muffin and I were great fans of the LINE Characters - Cony and Brown, I have decided to have LINE Character themed cupcakes for Sweetie Muffin's birthday. Due to copyright reasons, The Patissier cannot reproduce the LINE Characters for their cake decoration and hence I resolved this problem by getting them by myself instead :)

In my previous blog post on LINE's Pop-Up Store @ Wisma Atria, I have secretly bought these cute Cony and Brown iPhone Ear Caps from there too - for the purpose of poking them onto the cupcakes!