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Sport & Recreation
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1=SGD 0.0587
A reunion long awaited. Been pushing back a revisit to Keyaki because of time constraints and partly due to them being full on most weekends.
Served steaming hot with a lid, the Age Dashi Tofu carried itself relatively well with its smooth textured interior yet not too thick and slightly crispy skin. The sauce was light on the palate but overall the dish, while good, failed to impress me. I've had better for sure.
Now this is where Keyaki shines, for this visit at least. The Ebi Tempura was definitely one of the best that I've tried so far. Gone are the memories of bland batter and tasteless dips from Sun with Moon Japanese Dining. Keyaki's batter was light and flavourful - not the MSG induced kind of flavouring though and good enough to eat on its own! The prawns were huge and fresh and I could taste the sweetness of the prawns, barely though. The accompanying sauce was robust and added a lingering salty dimension to the tempura.
Teppanyaki is purportedly the forte of Keyaki and after my last visit there, I'm most inclined to agree. The garlic fried rice was fragrant and fluffy, with each individual grain of rice throughly fried. Coupled with lots of fried garlic pieces and egg, it made for an enjoyable side. The asparagus were a little too overcooked though.
The Prime Beef Tenderloin Steak is certainly drool worthy. Succulent, flavourful and fragrant. Only gripe I had was that it came medium well instead of medium rare which I had requested for. Nevertheless, very little quality was lost and the beef certainly made my day.
The Ebi Bacon Maki was nice without being too overwhelming on the flavours. The bacon wasn't too salty (read: Hua Ting) nor was it overly fatty and the prawns were fresh, though not as succulent as I would have liked it to be. Overall a rather dry dish.
The Tori Tsukune or Grilled Minced Chicken Balls were a little too soft, lacking that quintessential firmness and bite that I usually associate with meat balls. Decent though.
The Yaki Tori or Grilled Chicken Cubes on a skewer reminded me uncannily of kebab. Drizzled with loads of sweet teriyaki sauce, the chicken were well grilled but did come across as a wee bit too dry. The vegetables were a little too charred for my liking.
Not much can be said about the Ebi Tem Maki as it wasn't remarkably good nor bad. The rice's composition was good and didn't come across as too sourish while the prawns were crispy.
Dinner for 2 cost just slightly over $160, which threatened to run me dry. But then again, the food quality is evident, with the exception of the Robatayaki. Service is impeccable and reservations are highly recommend if you are going during the weekends.
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Rating given:
Read some favourable reviews about The Garden Slug somewhere and sought out to try it with my gf since we were really undecided where or what to eat for dinner.
Located within the private residential estate of Telok Kurau, locating it certainly wasn't a walk in the park, at least for me, a hopeless driver. But if you drive past it, you certainly won't miss the huge catchy signboard with a picture of a slug in it. First impressions, it really looked like a nice place to chill and hang out over some grub and drinks in nothing more than a t shirt, shorts and slippers. Sort of a homely kind of feeling which gets you settled in real fast.
Well for starters, we had the much touted (in the menu) Wasuga Wings, which were supposedly marinated and grilled for 48hrs. The 48hrs thing sounds rather dubious and I honestly hope that it isn't true as the wings gave no hint whatsoever to the long grilling hours. Texture and taste wise was pretty normal, just that I could taste the rather strong marination in the wings. It wasn't particularly juicy either. However I must commend the delightful tomato puree - chilled with a mild tomato taste. I dare say the tomato puree was the sole saving grace for this dish.
With a name like The Steak, it doesn't seem to suggest much and it certainly didn't taste like much either. This ribeye cut was done a little too rare with a tad too much fat around the edge, coming across as a little too chewy and rubbery. But still a decent cut of meat with fairly decent cooking skills. The final verdict? A slightly above average dish.
A signature dish of the place, Pasta with roasted Pumpkin & juicy Prawns was great during the initial few mouthfuls, after which it started getting a little too heavy, especially with the sweetness of the pumpkin. Just think a sweet version of the carbonara.
I'm no expert on Pear Williams (what a name) so please do correct me if I'm wrong. I personally found the sauteed pear a tad too soft and soggy with the taste of white wine almost nonexistent, with the exception of a few areas. Now this leads to another problem - heterogeneous preparation. Good Pear Williams should have all their pears homogeneously sauteed. The hand churned vanilla gelato was quite a pleaser though. Not too sweet and very full bodied. A note on the excessive cinnamon powder sprinkling at the top though.
$45 can get you quite a bit of stuff and in this case, it was the cost of our dinner. Expensive? Not really, but then again, it doesn't fall into the realms of cheap. I would probably classify it as averagely priced with good service but average food. Would I go again? I don't think so, not with so many good restaurants out there for the same price and the distance from Telok Kurau to my home.
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Rating given:
Inagiku or 稲 ぎ くis purportedly one of Singapore's finest and also Raffles International's sole flagship Japanese restaurant. Known for its exquisite Japanese food that can even placate the most discerning of tastebuds in a classy environment no less, Inagiku is unfortunately known for its extremely steep prices to boot as well.
Centrally located in the heart of town, on the third floor of Raffles City Shopping Centre, Inagiku is settled in the far obscure corners of the mall, providing a tranquil respite from the mad crowds that throng the area, especially during meal times. A simple yet hush hush interior greets you as you make your way through the seemingly small entrance and into the confined carpeted area filled with expensive wooden furniture. Personal conversations here can be quite impersonal, given that the tables aren't exactly very far apart from each other.
The Hotate (Japanese for scallops) really redefined the boundaries of size in my tiny world of scallop consumption. It was huge and I mean big as a saucer kind of huge. Okay I exaggerate but I've honestly never seen a scallop of such a size. Superbly fresh without the rawness of fresh seafood and sweet with a pleasantly smooth texture, the Hotate was nothing short of excellent, which explains the price tag of $26 for 2 pieces of it. Oh and then we have the rice which was not too sticky and wet yet lightly sour with a little bite.
Tamago - This is actually a very common dish and is present in most, if not all of the Japanese eateries/chains in Singapore. What this means is that most of the time we are subjected to a varying standard depending on the place we choose to eat. I personally sweared off Tamago for a while due to the multitude of bad experiences I had from various places. Inagiku's rendition renewed my faith in this dish. Aesthetics wise, it was already a winner with rice stuffed neatly into a slit in the egg and topped with huge fish roes that reminded me of little colourful pearls. The egg itself wasn't too sweet and the roe added a dimension of taste to the dish. A simple dish at its finesse.
I'm sorry but my picture really doesn't do justice to the Tempura Moriawase, but then again, it didn't look the bit impressive when it was served, all jumbled up and scattered around the platter. Please do not be mislead by its disheveled appearance though as Inagiku is very well known for its Tempura and rightly so. The batter was light as air and seemed to melt upon contact with my tongue. Amongst all, the Ebi Tempura stood out with its fresh and succulent meat beneath the excellent batter.
With the repertoire of stellar dishes being served up, I had expected the Kurobuta Tonkatsu to be nothing short of excellent. But it was not to be. I was sorely disappointed with what tasted like a piece of meat being cooked in second hand oil. Sure, being Kurobuta pork, the meat was tender but the oil taste from the batter was rather overwhelming.
I personally consider the Lobster with Inagiku Original Golden Sauce the epitome of my dining experience, or the Pièce de résistance if you wish, at Inagiku. As with the Tempura Moriawase, my photos certainly do not do it justice (time to get a new cam). The lobster was quite a size, weighing in at more than three quarters of a kg (for the price, it better be!). Ocean fresh and sweet with the flesh nicely grilled till slightly burnt and complemented by the excellent Inagiku golden sauce, which tasted very rich in flavour and a little creamy. Add the fact that the lobster was topped with molds of roe and you have a must have try dish. Watch the price though.
Honestly, would you pay close to $400(without discount) for such a meal? You can clobber me and I'll still say no. However, I can take scant comfort in the fact that it cost me $192 after a 50% discount, a price which is definitely more affordable but not something I'll be willing to pay unless I strike it rich of course.
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Rating given:
Ate at Iggys for lunch.
Located at the posh and exclusive Regent Hotel, it appears unassuming and rather boring from the outside, nothing to suggest its grandeur or exclusivity. Walk through the small passageway and be ushered into a tiny space (of almost claustrophobic proportions) which doubles up as a bar counter seating area and a small private enclave. (Un)fortunately, we got a table in the private area which was fine by us as it was really cosy, but a tad stifling if you ask me. The bar counter seats would have been better though, as you get to see your food being prepared by the chefs.
I was quite impressed by the Sakura ebi cappellini with konbu and home made scampi oil. The cappellini was cooked to perfection with the right about of bite and the tiny but fresh sakura ebi, together with the scampi oil, provided the necessary saltiness and fragrance. Just a short introduction about sakura ebi. It is a tiny shrimp found exclusively in the waters of Suruga Bay in Japan, which explains its price. Overall an excellent dish, but I must say that it reminded me uncannily of maggi mee, albeit a finer version.
Wagyu beef and white truffle sabayon - now that combination is enough to make me dribble all over my shirt. Sadly, it didn't turn out the way I hoped it would. For one, the wagyu beef was minced up and made into a patty, which is a sheer waste for such an expensive beef. I honestly couldn't taste any difference between the wagyu patty and a normal beef patty. The white truffle sabayon didn't impress me much either, coming across as rather tasteless. The bread was nice and evenly toasted though.
Top marks goes to the side of thick cut fries though, which were nicely stacked up and a tad hard on the outside yet moist, steaming and smooth on the inside.
On a side note, the burger was really small and reminded me of a toy burger. Such was the size of it and its colour homogeneity.
Baked chocolate molten cake with Java vanilla ice cream - The chocolate cake was very spongy yet compact and came across as light on the palate. It could do with more molten chocolate in the core and a more concentrated one at that. I personally found the Java vanilla ice cream quite good as it had a tinge of the Java bean. Nice and smooth as well.
The lunch bill for 3 pax came up to about $157, which is ridiculously expensive for the portions of food that we ate. Food quality was definitely quite good, but I don't think it was good enough to deserve its ranking. Honestly we went to Iggy's hungry and left hungry. The free flow of Olive bread didn't help. But its an experience nevertheless, an experience I wouldn't want to relive, unless of course I'm insanely rich.
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Rating given:
Grand Shanghai's exterior doesn't garner much attention but step in and be transported back in time to the 1930 - 1960s where nightclubs were a rage. Everything from the tables, lamp shades, dark wood flooring and two blade fans down to the toilets, were reminiscent of a typical nightclub. Pretty much like those you see on TV when Shanghai Triad was aired. Completing the picture was a beguiling songstress belting out a repertoire of popular tunes from that era.
A cold dish always gets the appetite going. Consisting of a slice of chicken, half an egg with roe, deep fried eel and strands of jellyfish, it was just short of terrible in the presentation department. There was no proper placement of the food and no colours to bring out the dish. No garnishes, nothing. That aside, the chicken was cold and rather normal, but nothing to shout about. The deep fried eel was crispy and sweet, which was a rather good way to start things off. A pity about the minimal portions though. The jellyfish was springy and tasted strangely like eating a softer version of beef tripe. Not that its bad, but its just slightly different. Last but not least, the egg. I had problems with this one although I'm a big fan of eggs. It looked every bit a hard boiled egg, just that the egg white was softer and more jelly like. The egg yolk, on the other hand, was a gooey semi solid mass which reeked strongly of raw egg. Top it up with loads of fish roe and you get something that's unbelievably raw and has the occasional pops (I just love biting into the fish roe). I believe (I'm just speculating, don't quote me) that the egg was boiled at a temperature of about 60-70 degrees Celsius for a moderate period of time to achieve such a texture.
The heavyweight dish of the set menu. The Braised Superior Shark's Fin in Brown Sauce alone costs $45 in the ala carte menu! I'm not sure if there's any difference though because I haven't tried ordering it ala carte yet. But it was good. The fins were of moderately good quality and were rather plentiful. The brown sauce was light on the palate and not too starchy. The accompanying plate of beansprouts (with fried Yunnan ham I believe) tasted best when eaten with the soup and not alone.
A rather humble dish, but the Braised Spare Ribs "Wuxi" style's beauty lies in it's simplicity. A single rib served with a stalk of vegetable and a bread stick man tou. The meat came cleanly off the bone without much resistance and was tender. The gravy played a key role in this dish without it coming across as too strong but instead played on its subtlety, allowing the meat to slowly soak up the essence and diffuse through with every bite.
The Deep Fried Cod Fish with Sweet & Sour Sauce and Pinenut wasn't too fantastic. Sure the batter was nicely done and tasty, but it masked the sweetness of the cod fish, which was really a pity. It would have probably tasted the same if other types of fish were used.
The Shanghai Fried Rice wasn't spectacular at all, even though it was one of the recommended dishes. The rice tasted strongly of pepper and nothing else. The ingredients didn't provide any visual appeal nor did they add any taste into this dish. So basically its bland plus bland, which still gives you bland, save for the strong dosage of pepper.
The Shanghai Pork & Crabmeat Dumplings aka Xiao Long Bao got me really excited as I had heard much about them. My expectations proved to be this dish's undoing as I didn't find it good, much less fantastic. For one, the skin was a little too thick and it just didn't have that explode in your mouth kind of feeling. Decent, but I've had better.
Mango Sago - A pretty much standard dessert everywhere you go. This one was a little different in that they added milk into it, making it a little more coagulated and sweet. A small but nice twist to the this very common dish and a great way to end dinner on a high note.
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Rating given:
Dropped by an old friend since my gf and I were in the City Hall area and our stomachs were crying out loud from lack of food. The old friend that I refer to is none other than Szechuan Court, which I had the chance to do a writeup on some months back courtesy of my friend who works at Raffles.
One of the more traditional Chinese restaurants decor wise, that I've been to, Szechuan Court has nice booth seats shrouded by thin translucent curtains that can be drawn to create a more intimate eating area amidst a third story view of the neighbouring Esplanade (Its quite good actually!). Coupled with a lush red sofa and red film partitions, it shouts oriental through and through.
Braised Homemade Egg Beancurd with Shredded Abalone - Whenever I see the word homemade, my expectations inch up a notch, for better or for worse. In this case, it was for the worse. The beancurd was smooth and silky but barely tasty. Texture wise, it tended more towards the Tau Pok side, which I personally don't really fancy. The accompanying gravy was thick and starchy but I couldn't hardly make out(both visual and taste) the dried scallops
Camphor Wood and Fragrant Tea Leaves Smoked Duck - I remember ordering this dish the last time I was here and was very much unimpressed by it. This time was no exception. The duck, though crispy, was way too dry and didn't have any tea taste whatsoever. The meat this time round was a little too overcooked as well, unlike the previous visit where the meat still retained a reddish hue.
Cod Fish Steamed with Superior Soy Sauce - The fish was fresh and sweet but a little too soft. I would have personally preferred the meat to be a little firmer. Another thing which I didn't really like was the fact that the fish came with its skin attached. I know that most fishes are served with their skin intact but this is probably the only place I know of that does it with cod fish.
Szechuan Fried Rice with Shrimp - A most excellent fried rice and definitely the highlight of the evening. Each grain of rice was homogeneously coated with egg and fried till lightly charred, giving rise to a nice and even Wok Hei taste. Thought slightly drier than your normal fried rice, it was a pleasure to eat and didn't come across as too difficult to swallow, especially with the generous serving of prawn cubes.
A still decent dinner emptied our pockets by about $46, after a 50% discount. Take away that discount and I definitely will not return, not for the quality of food. Will you? On a side note, service was acceptable, but could have been better and faster.
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Rating given:
Purportedly one of the top few Chinese restaurants in Singapore that serves Cantonese food, Golden Peony has won numerous accolades and awards over the years for its exquisite food. Weirdly enough, not much has been written or said about it though. To find out if Golden Peony really stood up to its stash of awards, a few of us had dinner there on a late Thursday evening.
Located at Conrad Centennial Hotel just next to Millenia Walk, Golden Peony's interior was reminiscent of Hua Ting's. Everything from the layout to the chairs to the wooden beams were vaguely similar. It's not to say that the interior wasn't nice, just that I wasn't too impressed.
quintessential dish at every Chinese dinner - the ever versatile Peking Duck, where you wrap the skin up with crepes and have the restaurant cook the meat in anyway you want it. We chose to have it diced up, fried and served with lettuce. The result was a nicely stir fried lump of duck cubes with chestnut to give it that crunchy texture and served up on a lettuce. I did find the meat a little too salty, but the lettuce effectively balanced out the salt level. The only other place where I've had it done this way was at Min Jiang at One North, whose rendition was on par with Golden Peony's.
As for the skin, it was crispy and served up with egg crepes, which didn't come across as heavy as I had expected. Light and palatable would be most apt in describing it. Only two gripes though. First, the skin was a tad too oily, as evident by the shimmer on the skin. Second, each of us only got 3 slices of skin. The duck must have been ridiculously small, otherwise can someone tell me what happened to the rest of the skin?!
On a side note, this is the first time I'm seeing a Peking Duck going for a lower price than a Roast Duck. I honestly wonder why.
The general fault with tea marinated or smoked dishes is that more often than not, the taste of tea is lacking. This was the case with the Tea Marinated Pork Ribs. Granted, the ribs were quite a size, tender and savoury from the sweet sauce coated on it, but with no tea taste, it could jolly well pass off as braised pork ribs. Then again, I quite like it, just that the pieces of meat kept getting lodged in between the crevices of my teeth.
Homemade Beancurd with Asparagus & XO sauce - A less than outstanding dish, but decent nevertheless. The beancurd wasn't silky but came across as firm with a pleasant lingering aftertaste. The asparagus was just asparagus, albeit two miserly ones.
Salted Yolk Prawns seems to be increasingly common in restaurants nowadays. But not many restaurants are able to do it well. Such is the case with Golden Peony. The batter, though light and crispy, was a little too bland for my liking. The prawns were relatively fresh but weren't exactly very sweet. In fact, they had this fresh water taste which turned me off quite a bit.
At $20 a pop, Lobster Noodles screams plain rip off. For starters, the noodles didn't seem to be of a handmade nature, more of a machine manufactured product actually. They were a little springy, that's about it. The baby lobsters were fresh but weren't exactly meaty and trust me, you get more shell then meat. Not that they tasted very sweet as well.
Another rip off at $4 for a portion the size of your neighbourhood hawker centre 50 cents Tao Huay. To say the least, the Tao Huay wasn't as smooth as I had expected and the syrup didn't permeate thoroughly, rendering only some parts of the Tao Huay sweet. This definitely pales in comparison to the one I had at Si Chuan Dou Hua.
Sheer disappointment pretty much sums up my thoughts about Golden Peony. I had gone there expecting a fair bit in terms of food quality but left disappointed. Add the fact that the 6 of us chalked up a sizeable bill of almost $473 and you can't help but feel ripped off. Service was generally quite good though. Now heres some food for thought. How did Golden Peony manage to snag so many accolades with its merely above average food?
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Rating given:
Changi Village is probably one of the last remaining rustic, laid back places in Singapore and from the gateway to Pulau Ubin. So it is not surprising that many seafood places have sprouted up at this seaside enclave over the years, one of which is Ubin First Stop Restaurant where we opted to have lunch at one sunny weekday afternoon.
This seafood place is sandwiched between Changi Village hawker centre and the open air carpark and is reminiscent of an old kampung with its main structure elevated on low concrete stilts. The open air kitchen sits in a small seperate shack just outside the stairs leading to the dining area. Very nostalgic.
Soup of the day - This was a simple winter melon soup (if I remember correctly). A tad bland and a little oily. But easy on the palate.
Stir Fried Kang Kong - Nicely fried with a hint of wok hei. Not too limp from overcooking as well. Just watch out for the overdose of fiery chilli. But then again, it could be that none of us at the table had a high level of tolerance for spiciness.
Fried Fish - The fish was deep fried and drenched in a semi viscous salty gravy but still managed to maintain a mild crispiness on the exterior. Flesh was relatively fresh and firm and quite an enjoyable dish overall.
Thai Style Fried Chicken - Too much flour, too much thai sauce, rendering this dish rather unpleasant. The taste bud killer sauce also ensured that there was no chicken taste of whatsoever, just a glob of flour laden piece of unidentifiable meat.
Deep Fried Prawn Ball - Another flour obsessed dish - so fluffed up until I had problems locating the real prawn meat. Okay I am exaggerating, but 50% flour and 50% prawn just isn't funny. It was so gross that none of us wanted past our fair share of this dish, which meant leftovers.
The set lunch cost the 5 of us about $51, which isn't too expensive honestly. But factor in food quality and I'll probably take my chances at Macdonalds instead. Rice was free flow though, if that's any consolation.
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Rating given:
Took Jetstar to Taiwan this year May. Price was $424 which wasn't what you will consider cheap. The usual complaints like cramped seats, no free meals, no entertainment and the too expensive coke. These are however, not of importance, hey~ its a budget airline, you can't expect too much.
They currently have add-$18-for-more-leg-space-seats which are quite bo liao. If I'm a Daddy long legs then perhaps I'll take it, otherwise no point spending the money on a short flight.
The only thing I have complaint about is the spoken English and Chinese on board. Even though its a budget airline but I do feel that passengers have a right to know the correct method of using the safety devices like life vest. With the don't-know-what-kind of accent the crew use, the incorrect pronounciation and the real muffled PA system, none of us really understood what they were explaining about.
Cramped seats or not, safety is more important to me.
Rating given:
It was dinner at Miyabi again. We didn't have a reservation but as they had just opened for business, we managed to snag a table in the main dining hall without much difficulty. The interior was quite simply done up with 2 side stalls for teppanyaki and the rest of the area for ala carte dining. Nothing too spectacular.
Chawamushi - The chawamushi was not very smooth, leaning towards a firm custard like texture instead. Flavour wise, the egg taste was apparent but did seem a little bland overall. Still decent though.
Sushi & Tempura Combo - I can't deny the aesthetic attractiveness of the sushi but found the rice to be rather loose and lacking in vinegar. The relative freshness of the raw seafood made it more bearable though but probably not something I would order again.
The tempura batter was a little too frilly for my liking but on the upside, it wasn't overbearingly thick and the prawns were sizeable. Decent enough.
Apparently there was a promotion going on for the sirloin, which could be done either teppanyaki style or grilled with teriyaki. We chose the former and opted for it to be done medium. Although the meat came a little overcooked, it was still tender and juicy, which was rather surprising. That said, it wasn't sweet and I could only make out the strong taste of the garlic. Rather disappointing.
Food quality was average but definitely better than the likes of Sake Sushi. However, pricing is slightly steeper as well, at about $120 for the 3 of us. I definitely won't be back in a hurry.
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Rating given: