Superfluous Cacophony II

I like this term. I think I shall use it.

I like eating good food. And I like eating. And I like. Cooking. Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction. I can cook. And I think for a guy who has no previous training other than the food channel, I think I'm pretty damn good too. I want to take this time and talk about the people that have taught me the most about cooking.

Due to my love for Italian food. Lydia Bastianich is one of the biggest influences. I love watching her cook because if I was Italian, I wish she would be my grandma! She cooks simple Italian food and her food philosophy is simple. Love cooking and cook for the people you love. The show I believe is taped from her home and I wish that my kitchen was like hers! Her son is also partners in the restaurant business with Mario Batali (see Superfluous Cacophony). Someone should buy her book! What better way to learn Italian cooking than from an Italian!

Emeril Lagasse: Sure he had a failed TV show, who doesn't? But he makes cooking fun. He adds pizzazz to cooking. I was so influenced that I even bought his Emeril Spices which works wonders with meat as well as bought all his pasta sauces. They are all good. Sometimes he does go off on a far far away tangent on food, but I think most of the time he is sane. His cajun cooking is brilliant and it is because of him that I started trying cajun and creole food. And I love it.

Tyler Florence is the last guy on the right in the black sweater. Initially, I always thought the guy was a poser. A little bit like Rachel Ray. Looks cute, can't really cook. On the tele for some eye candy for the home makers. But after watching some of the "Tyler goes to ... " (this is the name that I remember the show by, not neccsarily the name of the show), I became a convert. I have always believed that the true essence of cooking is making something simple tasty. It sounds simple enough but I think when it comes to cooking, less is more. The flavor of the meat should be the center of the dish and not the garnish or the spices. We only add the marinate and spices to accentuate the taste of the meat or dishes. Watching him cook makes cooking interesting. And it makes me want to cook.

If ever someone from the Travel Channel or Art Central ever reads this blog, televise their shows. Their good and fun to watch. You learn so much more from them than many other chefs.

Superfluous Cacophony

I have always wanted to use those words in a sentence! Superfluous, for those whose vocabulary is as good as mine and a cunning linguists that I am. Superfluous in German means uber-fluous. Used in a sentence: That was superfluous!

Cacophony on the other hand is more of a literary term. Its a mixture of cocoa and some music. Hence, cacophony. Used in a sentence: You Cacophony! Or : That Cacophony was delicious!

The reason I am writing this is because I realized that I have not been writing for a week. As explained in my previous post, I have not been eating in restaurants recently because my wife has not been in town. So I have been eating nothing but the good old hawker food. But going beyond what is required to review the local restaurants and since my wife is in New York, I thought what better way to write on this blog but to tell people the few of the best restaurants I have been to in the world and I hope more Singaporean restaurants follow suit.

My favorite Italian restaurant in the world is Babbo. Located in the Village in New York, and a rumored waiting list of 3 months, this is I think one of the last bastions of truly authentic Italian cooking. Living in the United States for awhile, I realized that the Italian food scene there was much more "Americanize", than Singapore. I still remember eating at the first ever Pasta Fresca in Boat Quay even before there was a Boat Quay and Pregos when it was on the 3rd floor of Raffles City. They were fantastic and it left a great impression on me of what Italian food really is. Even though as time progressed, both their food standards went down the drain, I have personally thought that the Singaporean Italian food scene was much more dare I say authentic? But my trip to the United States last Christmas changed my mind. I was in New York for a week and after seeing so much of Mario Batali(pic above), the chef of Babbo(pic above) on the tele, I thought I had to try his food.

It was as if it was written in the stars. My wife called the restaurant and she was told that there was no space left. It was only a week before! Our choices were only the bar, which thank goodness we did not pick because it was just too darn packed! In the same phone call, the server told us to wait and someone on that very same minute cancelled their dinner appointment and we had a table! Yay!!!!!!

The restaurant is small. That's the way I like it. It was dimly litted and the tables were small but functional. The service was exquisite. Okay, there was this really annoying man that was bitching to the waiter (who would later serve us) about the food. Our table was right infront of the bathroom which could probably fit about one person, and I had a hard time turning 180 degrees in the toilet. It was that small. Our server was a bespectacled balding man with a very pleasant and sincere disposition. He was cool. He told us what to order and what was good. The restaurant even served quarter bottle of wines! Great! Why doesn't Singapore Italian restaurants do that? So we ordered our lobster pasta, a guinea fowl, some antipasto, a quarter bottle of red wine and the free flow of bread. It was heaven. The food was exquisite. The taste scrumptious and delightful. My mouth was bursting with flavor and awe of Italian cooking. I don't know what that annoying British man was bitching about his food but I thought it was fantastic! My wife who never liked wine loved the Italian wine and the food matching was superb. Great date! Drunk with Italian fervor and drowning from the rain that was pouring outside on that Winters day, I was consumed and renewed. I love Italian food again! Not that I stopped loving it before. But it was a renewal of love!

I think I should go buy the cook book. How cool is it for an Italian chef to have a pony tail and wears clogs.....

A Long Walk by the River

As I was saying, myself and tasty bites took a walk around town and we were wanting to eat some good food after picking Mrs. Tasty Bites up from Daimaru. I didn't want to go to Clarke Quay because I'm not a tourist. Instead, we headed out to one of most favorite noodle places in Singapore at the Gallery Hotel. Its a Japanese restaurant called Miharu Japanese Noodles.

Placed in an understated corner of the hotel. One would think that it would be hidden away from the public blocked by all the alcoholic bars around the place. But thank goodness for all of us, it is not. It has an understated and casual manner about the restaurant that I really like. It's small. Which means I like it even more! I remember the first time I came here with Tasty Bits (before he was Mr.Tasty Bites) the night before his wedding. It was a quick dinner and we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. Fortunately this time, it was still pretty early in the evening and there wasn't a lot of people.

There aren't many choices like one would expect but that's a good thing. I have always been told that the noodles in this restaurant have to be eaten in 10 minutes because that's how the noodles were meant to be or it might get too soft after soaking in the soup for too long. Whoever told me this was correct. And especially for this store. It made even more sense. We ordered 3 different ramen noodles and they came back with the food in 8 - 10 minutes. Service was brisk and fast. Polite too actually. We were sitting down and contemplating life, but before we could get too far with finding out the meaning of life, the noodles came. Humans are so easily distracted! I tried my best to emulate the feat of 10 mins. Me and Tasty Bites finished in like 8 minutes flat. Mrs Tasty Bites was still having a go at it and trying to tame the noodles. It was good. It was delicious. The noodles were excellent and safe a few slurping noises, I actually thought that the noodles were from Japan! Which I think they are from Japan!

The total bill was $47. I thought it was reasonable. Mrs Tasty Bites wanted to eat her dessert now and she suggested that we go to Canele Patisserie. I have never been there. So I thought why not?

Walking between Gallery Hotel to Robertson Walk was a short 10 mins walk. We could digest the food in due time and we could catch the sights along the drain, I mean the river. While discussing the idea of buying the apartments along the river, we passed several other Japanese restaurants that looked Japanese, which made me want to go back and try the food, and bars that made me want to puke. Before long and without puking, we were at Canele.

The place was empty. So I thought this must be a pretty bad place. Tasty Bites reading my mind told me that it was still early, that was why it was still pretty empty. Earlier in the day, I already went to a pretty "she she," place in Menottis for a business lunch. The ladies outnumbered the men. I wasn't bemused as much as terrified at the amount of unattractive ladies in Singapore. The place was empty. We had the choice of any seating. Service was bad because there was only one person serving and there would be a lot of people walking into the place later. Mrs. Tasty Bites and myself were scanning through the layout of cakes and pastries and chocolates they had on the counter. As we investigated each item, they all looked sexy. The desserts called out to me, wanting to be eaten.

Dying from symbolism and praying for my lack of imaginative writing, I decided that we try a sample platter that contain 8 miniature pastries and desserts. We sat down, ran through the menu and ordered 3 more things. All with ice cream because allegedly, they only serve ice cream on Friday and Saturday. By the time all our desserts came. I could tell that Mrs. Tasty Bites was about to have a sugar high (lucky Mr. Tasty Bites!) and I have to say they were great! Borderline fantastic. I for one never really have a sweet tooth and I can live my life without eating too much sweets, but this was just a bombardment of flavor. It wasn't just the sweetness. It was a constant attack, in a good way of the complementing flavors that accompanied the sweetness of sugar. Be it the sourness of mango and the richness and texture of melted dark chocolate, or the frosted sugar shaped like a marsh mellow around a decadent rum and raisin ice cream with strawberry sauce. This place wreaks of nothing but a pre sex meal. The owners might as well would have named it Aphrodisiac restaurant. If you were to die there, you would die only after having an erection. A gastronomic erection that is. Don't let your mind wonder too far.

Just hanging out with Mr and Mrs. Tasty Bites was already great. The dessert made it better. And tasty bites was right, the restaurant did get very crowded. And it was filled with a lot of women. Something interesting to note, they now not only serve desserts and pastries and chocolates, they now are trying to bake bread. I think it makes sense. Its the post sex meal right? How can they have pre without the post? Anyways, I am definitely bringing my wife here for dessert sometime. DEFINITELY. I think you should bring your wife, girlfriend, date there also. They'll love you more after it.

Miharu Japanese Restaurant - a great place for a quickie lunch.

Food: 7/10
Service: 6/10
Value: 7/10

Canele Patisserie Chocolaterie

Food: 8/10
Service: 4/10
Value: 7/10

Hope this helps.

Excuse me ....

Excuse me, I know not many people read this blog (thank goodness!) but the reason why I haven't been writing is because I haven't been eating at restaurants the last week. The reason being since my dear wife is not in town, I will be saving lots of money and eating hawker food! My first love! And of course, I will be trying the Pan Pac Indian Buffet! More details to follow about that!

I always cotradict myself. Some of my friends consider me a big contradiction. But I consider myself a walking oxymoron, just without the oxy. I will be meeting tasty bites in the afternoon to convince him to contribute to this page!!! He needs to work!!!

Some food for thought: Nigella is hot!

Swiss Baeckerei at Frankel Ave

This review is about one week late. So forgive me.

I wanted to go somewhere new with my wife for breakfast. We thought of somewhere in the east and during my reservists, a guy told me that Frankel Ave had a few nice places to try. And so we did. The after my reservists ended, we went to Frankel Ave to have breakfast.

We walked in to the cafe, it maybe had 8 tables maximum, the smell of fresh bread permeated the place. I liked it. My wife ordered the eggs and sausage, I ordered the special veal sandwich with melted cheese on the top. Let me just say that I am not a cheese person but I thought that my sandwich was fairly good. My wife liked the eggs and sausage as well. They have this gargantuan $23 sandwich that my reservist mate told me about. I actually wanted to try and order that, but decided I didn't want to kill myself so early in the day.

Service was slightly disorganized but still okay for a small restaurant. We even ordered some sausages and ham which were excellent and bread to go. The total bill was about $45? But I thought it was alright considering all the food we bought for the next few days. It was a good experience. To our surprise, there was even a Cedele's there on the stretch and a seafood restaurant transplanted from Clarke Quay called Blue Lobster. I should be going back pretty soon.

Food: 6/10
Service: 5/10
Value: 6/10

Bring your wife there for a quiet breakfast or the after sex meal in the morning....

Hope this helps.

PS Cafe, somewhere in Singapore

PS Cafe is neither the post script cafe nor the poser synonymous cafe. (Thankfully at least). A long time friend of mine was finally having her birthday and she wanted to share this special day with her friends. Another friend of mine, who was also a friend of the birthday girl, and a good friend might I add, so good that their boyfriend's name sound almost too similar if you ask me in more ways than one, anyways, she decided that PS Cafe would be a great place to go to for her birthday dinner for 13!

So after leaving my wife at the airport with a broken heart, I rushed down and managed to catch a ride with my great and also long time friends at their home in the east, strategically placed near the airport, and together we left for the dinner in eager anticipation of where this place was. I have to say that when we got there, we were impressed. I was not so impressed by the fact that I had a SMS a day before being told that I had to abandon my berms and t-shirt; things I do for friends. I was impressed by the setting. It was like a restaurant in midst of a forest. The glassed exterior and the yellow lights made the restaurant shine in the darkest of places. Immediately, I thought this place was classy! And I should bring my wife here the next time.....

Only God knows why the long time friend who suggested this place wanted to sit outside, at the huge varendar of the restaurant. As you walk through the sexily lited wooden walkway of the restaurant, I was thinking and so did my buddy's wife, a free meal for mosquitoes! When we entered the restaurant, it wasn't as sexy as I thought. Sure they had low couch like sofas and short tables for those who want drinks and nice dark wooden tables with nice chairs, inside of the restaurant. One wall of the entire restaurant was filled with chalked writings to the day's menu, specials and wine list. I was impressed again. Chalked writings on the walls is a sign of a great restaurant is it not?

Fortunately, there was no Lord of Flies. There was no mosquitoes! We sat outside and it was nice. The ambiance was fantastic and company lovely. Once everybody got in. We ordered. I skimmed through the menu hoping that I wouldn't order the same thing as my buddy and his wife. True enough, we thought of the same thing. He wanted to order the steak sandwich, and his wife the flamed prawn pasta. I had no choice but to order one of the specials of the day, one chicken wrapped risotto with a shrimp scampi. Wait, my chicken wrapped risotto is also wrapped with bacon. So its double wrapped. People around me ordered similar things. The mousakka, or what I call the Greek lasagna, the steak sandwiches and beef ragout, which some members of the party pronounced it as rag-out. But I digress.

I ordered my drink of crushed mint and lime soda which tasted like soda water and some lime with lots of leaves inside. We even ordered dips to share. They offered the humus, some chilli padi thing, and some bean like humus thing. Imagine red beans, but mushed. Anyway, the pita bread that came along with it was lovely while it was warm, and no one touched the chilli thing.

So my special came. Okay, not that special. Sexy looking though. We tried a little bit of each others dishes. The steak sandwich was pretty good, the pasta was average, my special wasn't very special but okay, the ragout was somewhat dry, but that was just me. People started talking about this blog and I felt uncomfortable. I guess because some were wondering what I would write about the restaurant. Then all of a sudden, I was thinking, tonight isn't really a night for reviews. It was for friends.

We ordered desserts, the mango and apple crumble and orange cake to share. The birthday girl had a nice chocolate cake and ice cream. The service was pretty good even though it was hard to manage a 13 person table. They even made the birthday girl do a stunt, as vaguely as possible, imagine a bench with the husband at the end and his zipper down. Insert shot glass half filled with baileys in pants, where zipper is open. The bench is lined with whip cream from where the husband sits till the end, and the girl has to lick the whip cream from one end to the other and finishing this entire stunt by drinking the drink in the husband's pants without the use of her hands. My wife would so do this but not because she loves me. But because I think she might love whip cream more!

It was a fun night of catching up with old friends. It was a night that I realized that time was catching up with me. I do over senitmantalize things but I do think that as I get older, I love my friends more. And sometimes going to a restaurant is not really about what you eat, it is more often who you are with. And this night was one of those nights.

Value: worth the $50 bucks per person for this kind of friends.
Service: things I do for friends: not wear berms on their birthday
Food: nothing to crow about food does taste better around great company.

Bring your friends there.

Sunset Bar and Grill

Legend goes that there is a need for a place that not many Singaporeans know. And this is the place that we should sup. I believe this place is Sunset bar and grill.

Probably well known among pilot cadets or Seletar East Camp NS men, Sunset Bar and Grill is a rustic and quiet. My table seated at the platform facing the run way was way cool. I loved the ambiance. It was nothing fantastic but it was just something about the place that I liked, that casual be yourself type atmosphere is both endearing and engaging. My friends ordered the fried chicken wings which were pretty good, and the level 2 buffalo wings which were already very spicy. For those Jessica Simpsons out there, buffalo wings are not from buffalos. Its chicken wings , which is shaped liked a buffalo. Don't ask me why, but this is what I have heard. And by the way, chicken of the sea, isn't really chicken either, its tuna.

As I was saying, we ordered also the hamburger with bacon which was just okay, a BLT sandwich which my wife liked, Nachoes and cheese and fried Calamari. Yeah, we ordered quite abit of finger food. But it was all good. I would have preferred sitting inside to escape the mosquitoes but outside was fine. The boys downed some beers and the ladies adhered to the soft drinks.

I left the place reminiscing my flying days. The days when I was care free and dumb .... Even though I have never flown a plane before, or flown like Superman before, what struck me was that food goes well with flying .... Just a thought.

I wouldn't mind going back again. Even though we did pay $13o for finger food and drinks. I thought it was worth it. This is a place to DEFINITELY bring your girlfriend. Lots of makeout corners in the camp.

food: 6/10
service: 7/10
value: 5/10

Hope this helps.

Hanabi at Odeon Towers

It was Father's Day some time ago, and since I wanted to celebrate Father's day, I decided to bring myself, my wife, my mum, and last but not least my father for a meal. I decided on Hanabi because I read quite a few things about it, rather inexpensive, and the week after I decided on the restaurant, the Straits Times did a review about it.

One of the things that I have learnt since I have been back in Singapore is never trust their sports news and the other thing is their food review. Their reviewers either have dead taste buds on their tongues or they just think that if the food looks good and if they are served well, damn it. The food IS good. I have been to many Japanese Buffets before and this one was no different. I called earlier in the day and managed to make a reservation for the family.

When we got there. I liked what I saw. The place was pretty with darkwood furniture and pretty lanterns. My parents were as usual late and when they got there, we started the ordering. We ordered a lot. A lot of food. Sashimi, sushi, their grilled items, tempura and all that good stuff. The food was average at best.

Their service, the thing about Singapore ala carte buffets is the fact that the management tries to manage the customer TOO much. What I mean when I say this is that if I were to order the second round of Sashimi, there will be a marked decrease in the number of slice fish. In fact, it was a marked decrease and an incessant effort to "forget," what we ordered. That bothered me quite abit. And to a point, I felt that I was talking to the server's hand then to the server because when ever I would want to order something, they give the hand. I swear its the registered response in this restaurant. Not only did it bother me that the server that took our orders was sniffing away and using his hands to block the mucus from running down his nose, oh wait, the same hand that I believe served us the food, but the hand,that bothered me.

I mean the restaurant isn't very big and it was crowded, but the server to customer ratio was pretty good I thought. But the servers at some times were no where to be seen. hmmmm ...

Food: 5/10 same old same old Japanese buffet
Service: 3/10, the hand thing drove me nuts ...
value: 5/10, can't complain about average mediocre Japanese food not meant to offend

Maybe I shouldn't be bringing my parents out for meals after this 2 horrific mother's and father's day experience? ahahahahhahaha ....

Hope this helps.

Pizza Walker at Wisma

Pizza is something I enjoy every once in awhile. When I was in the United States, the every once in awhile meant every week. So when I say once in a while in Singapore, its about once every 2 - 3 weeks. Some days, I get so desperate that I even settle for the not so good Canadian Pizza and the plastic tasting Pizza Hut. We were out walking around shopping in Orchard when I felt like Pizza again. So we went out to Wisma, as we were at Taka to try this Pizza Walker.

I like the location. You can be seen. So advice for young couples if you want to look cool. You will be seen here. If you are like me, one who enjoys the quieter life, then I say don't even think about it. We ordered 2 small, I mean 6 inch pizzas. One was the all mushroom pizza and the other is the parma ham pizza. The service was pretty good. Being as annoying like I usually am, I wanted to test the service because they had this $6 continuous iced-tea refill when one glass was $3.50. I had like 3 glasses of that within the first 5 minutes. And each time, the server came and was nice about it and kept refilling my drink without complaints. I was fairly impressed. I had a total of like 7 glasses in the 30 minute dinner.

The pizza was average I thought. Nothing to write to mum about. But the great thing about this place was that you can people watch and comment about what they are wearing, this was something Kelly and I did to our fullest, which was fun. The total bill came up to only about $35 which I thought was reasonable.

service: 7/10
food: 5/10 - its pizza, you can't go THAT wrong.
value: 6/10 - quite okay for something in the middle of town.

Hope this helps.

Oscar's at Conrad International

The missus wanted to have some buffet breakfast on Sunday morning. I did a brief research on the internet and thought that maybe we should give Oscar's at Conrad a try. When I say brief I mean go through 2 web sites and look through for 10 mins.

When we got there, we were surprised. It wasn't EXACTLY a breakfast buffet. In fact, it was a Sunday brunch buffet. Which means they didn't have the bacon and eggs and waffles and the breakfast stuff. What they had was the lobster, the sashimi the works. My wife asked if we should go to another place for breakfast food but I was too lazy and the weather was getting dark. She knows that I get grumpy when we go to a buffet like this and she doesn't eat the expensive stuff, I get mad. Seriously, if I am paying $70 for her for a buffet, she better eat the money's worth! Sure, call me stingy but what about the kids in AFRICA?

So as per every other buffet, I hit the expensive stuff first. I went for the lobsters and oysters. Kelly went for the breakfast stuff first i.e. the egg station, Danish, and some juice. The oysters and lobsters were fresh. By the way, when we arrived at the hotel, we even got a brief introduction of where everything was; which was nice. Kelly loved the breakfasty stuff. She loves breakfast. Our usual Sunday breakfast is MacDonald but today was different. It was breakfast with an edge. It was highly entertaining personally that my breakfast on this day was lobster and sashimi. Unlike the many other buffets that I have been to, this place had quite abit of sashimi. Besides the regular salmon, tuna, squid, there was the 2 other meats whose names that briefly escape me, they were fresh, tender and scrumptious.

My wife then decided to make my day by taking half of a Boston lobster. I couldn't help but have a smile on my face. She was so sweet. Anyways, back to the assault! Even though this was a buffet, I was thoroughly surrounded by foreigners and I have to say that the service was excellent. They cleared our plates promptly, continuously refilled our water, and even advised on what was the best thing to eat at the buffet. I was actually impressed with their service!

I have learnt from my many buffet tour of duties that one should never take food from the section where nobody ever goes. The pre-cooked section. However, this time I was a little curious. They had some curry there and I felt like curry that morning. The chicken curry was average but somehow the pampadam was fantastic. I just didn't know why. Kelly took a slice of roasted ham which she thought tasted a tad bid dry, it looked dry, thats why I never took it, some tim sum which was pretty average. Later, she attacked the fresh unadulterated cheese, which she loved and bread, which a basket of these fine babies were placed on the table. Ahhh, how clever I thought. Trying to carbo load the customers so that they can't eat too much! I wasn't fooled! Actually, I was. Kelly and I finished all the bread because we loved the bread.

Anyways, to top off everything, I tried foie gras for the first time. Foie gras is something that I have always seen on cooking shows like Iron Chef but never thought about trying. Tasty Bites loves foie gras and lives each day to eat it. I am exaggerating here but I say this with love and compassion in my heart. The lady at the egg station was also responsible for the foie gras. I have to say. It was fantastic. How can something so bad like duck liver taste so good? I sms'ed Tasty Bites and he told me to remember the taste because I will be wanting more in the future. The foie gras was smooth, tender, sweet and dare I say melts in your mouth. I expected liver to be like those we eat at the coffee shop chicken rice store. Alas, how wrong I was!

The dessert was very good. Kelly and I hit the crepes, the ice cream, the brownies, the sherberts, the special conrad chocolates, and the waffles. Advice: don't try any other ice cream but the vanilla because it was heavenly, and save space for dessert at Oscar's.

Before I forget, I even had time to try a brief bowl of bak kut teh which I thought was very well done. The soup was eu naturel, no msg, it was herbal and delicious but not overly pungent but the pork ribs were slightly overcooked in my opinion. There was even some musical entertainment that I could barely make out. This is because the singer had a pretty bad enunciation problem singing hits from jobim. She wasn't bad. Its just that was she sang girl from Ipanema, all I could hear was wah wah wah, like those Charlie Brown cartoons. But I have to say that the guitarist was excellent.

This a place that I would recommend for people wanting to impress your clients or future in laws. Future because once you seal the deal, just bring them to the coffee shop for some local breakfast. Go there in the late morning and stay to 3. You'll have a good meal, great ambiance and you can impress the people you need to impress at the right time. The total damage was about $150. It is expensive for a brunch but I don't eat like that so often: having lobsters for breakfast.

Food: 7/10
Service:8/10
Value:6/10

I would say one of the best expensive hotel buffets around.

Billy Bomber's at Century Square

My wife wanted some burgers for the day so instead of sticking to Mickey D's, we went to Billy Bombers. What I have always liked about the place is that it is trying to be an American burger joint. That's cool. Their burgers are above average and reasonable and service is reasonable as well. I love their MALTs. One of the best Malts in Singapore. I can't deny that. But this time, I was bothered by something else.

2 annoying racists and vulgar young Singaporean Chinese men were sitting behind the wife and I. They were going on and on about America and how they were going to say the N word that ends with digger but without the d when they were in the south. I am not American. My wife is. But being educated there, I have to say that those 2 were an embarrassment to Singapore and I was thoroughly ashamed. My wife gave them a look and they knew it, and they still carried on talking about it. At this point in time, I wanted to ask the kind servers to change our seats but my wife didn't want to. She is kind of confrontational like that. But that's the way I like her.

When our food came, the cowards promptly left. And while I was eating my semi-delicious burger, those 2 annoying young men were walking in front of the restaurant peering in to look at me. They looked not even 21 and those idiots were acting like the biggest pricks in the world. Sorry, didn't mean pricks. I meant dick heads. Wait, didn't mean that too. So sorry. I mean mother f***********************************************sonof a************************. Well, you know what I mean.

Even the great tasting malts could not take away how irritated and ashamed I felt for those ugly Singaporean men. The portions were as usual huge and food was above average. I think that sometimes food can be affected by the ambiance around you. I think so even more after this.

food: 5/10
service: 6/10
value: 6/10

Chippy's at Raffles City Basement

Brief post: I was there yesterday with my wife. I thought I wanted some good British fish and chips after I walked by the store a couple of times. The server got my order wrong. That's okay. But they charged a small plastic container worth of ketchup and what I believe to be Mayo for $1. I think its ludicrous since the fish and chips cost $4.15? By the way, I also ordered the fried mars bars.

Bad service and it left a bad feeling in the tummy the whole night. The food didn't sit well. I think the owner of the store wanted to test the stranglehold those other little Taiwanese stores have around Singapore. But I do hope that their quality of food and service improves. I like the place and its in a great location but something just doesn't feel right. Oh wait, that's my stomach.

Food: 4/10
Service: 4/10
Value: 6/10

Hope this helps.

Menottis at Raffles City Inside Esprit

I was bored and I wanted to bring my wife some where new to eat some pseudo western food. I have always liked the deco for Menottis. I have been there once with Tasty Bites, but it wasn't memorable. So I wanted to see if things might have changed.

Service was average. I can't complain too much. My wife ordered the eggs benedict and I had the warm parma ham sandwich. I downed my food with some hot earl grey tea and and my wife ordered a latte and later the classic chocolate drink. I have to say it was average. The egg serving was huge and my sandwich was actually warm! Which I liked of course. It was an unfortunately ho hum meal. There was nothing wrong with the food, absolutely nothing. Maybe I was expecting abit more but I personally think I left Menottis the same way I went in. The place isn't memorable.

Sometimes in life I wonder if we already have pre concieved notions and we just do things to re-affirm those values or do we have no pre-concieved notions and we just live life finding out what they are .... just some thought. I personally think its abit of both but thats just me.

This is the place where you can bring your date. For sure. Great place to bring your date. If your date doesn't mind average food and just want to be seen, even better. But just keep in mind that your date is most probably a show off or just don't know much about food.

Service: 5/10
Food: 5/10
Value: 5/10

Hope this helps.

A Brief Thought About Starbucks Coffee

I have never been a real big coffee drinker. So one day, I decided to try the single shot espresso at my favorite Starbucks at City Hall. It was actually pretty good. Oh wait, I had my first expresso at Tampines Starbucks but now the espresso is my most favorite coffee drinkso. It helps cleans the palette and it leaves a good taste in the mouth. My wife thinks it stinks of coffee but I beg to differ. Its a thick cup of cuppa and I can't wait ....

I am an addict ....

Morton's at Oriental

I LOVE BEEF! So every year, I tell myself that I shall have beef once a year and it has to be good. So for this year, I thought I should go try Morton's at Oriental Hotel. This beautiful trip was suggested by Tasty Bites and Mrs. Tasty Bites. Before I continue, I lied. I already had steak when I was in Vegas but in my defense, it was free because somebody paid for it, so you can't count that. The attire for the restaurant is smart casual and I wanted to wear a hat with my shorts and t-shirt. Thank goodness Tasty Bites reminded me of the dress code!

The service is EXCELLENT. No wonder you are paying so much for the food. I think they are probably the most engaging and friendly servers I have met in Singapore. They are prompt. Water is always refilled. They are informative, and they give you good relevant advice for the food to order. I really wish that WDA go pay them a visit to ask them to conduct customer service courses. We ordered the double porter house, a bone in prime rib. Sides of mashed potatoes and friend spinach and mushrooms. The wives ordered their cocktail drinks, and all was good in the world.

The ambiance is fantastic. I didn't think I was in Singapore at all. Well, being surrounded by Ang Moh helps. I was thinking that the restaurant had probably the most ang moh per square foot in a restaurant that I have ever seen! Not that any restaurant should have this kind of a statistic, but I thought it was interesting. The lights were dim and yellow, the dark wood furniture made the surrounding comfortable for fine dining.

The warm bread was delicious. It was big enough to feed the 4 of us without even ordering starters which I was actually quite tempted to do. We chatted and laughed about everything under the sun, then the food came! Stunned Silence! The friggin thing was huge! The double porter house could have fed 3 lions. Instead, it was a lot for 4 people. All the meats we ordered were all medium done. My advice is that because the double porter house is so big and thick, order it medium well. It might take a little longer but because it is SO thick, it might actually come out medium. I didn't particularly like the double porter house. I guess because there wasn't much beefy flavor in the beef. It tasted great mind you. It just didn't feel that it was aged enough .... That's just my feel. The boned in prime rib on the other hand was flavorful and tender. The fat and juice was succulent, and I scoff at vegans when I was chewing that piece of steak because they sure don't know what they were missing. The prime rib was done very well. We even had the server cut the meat for us!

The desserts had to be pre ordered 40 mins before because they were freshly made. They weren't fantastic. But they were good. We got the hot chocolate cake as well as the apple pie, the pie was without the crust but it was good. Both came with a side serving of vanilla ice cream. I didn't really concentrate on the dessert because I think the wives were. I was already too full from the beef and Tasty Bites was gnawing everything off the bone. HE THE MAN!

The total bill came up to be about $433. I thought that the amount was just about right. It is worth it if you have steak once a year, or twice, wait, I think this is the third time I had steak this year! Anyways, my point is that if you love steak, and only try a once in your life in Singapore. Have it at Mortons. Its the BEST STEAK IN SINGAPORE. NO DOUBT ABOUT IT.

If you want to go to the United States to eat steak, then give me a call and I'll tell you where to go.

Service: 10/10
Value: 7/10
Food: 7/10

P.S. This review sounds like Hammy from Over the Hedge talking .... My mind is all over the place today.

TCC at Raffles Place MRT

I don't like this place at all. Okay? I like the finger foods, I like my tea that I ordered and I like the furniture at the place, love the ambiance, hate the Art. What I don't like is being told that I can't sit at a table with 3 chairs instead of 2 because they are afraid that they might lose some customers. Love the customer service when the place measures cost effectiveness over customer preference in a freaking half filled place. What is this world coming to?

Instead, I had to be put together with ladies around me sipping their tea and listening to them complain about their husbands or work to one another. Why? Why? Why?

Service: 6/10
Food: 6/10
Value: 6/10

Don't go to the place because it has the sign of the devil. But it was actually pretty nice.

Yan Palace Tim Sum at Hong Lim Complex

My Mother is Cantonese. So I would like to believe that my taste for the Cantonese cuisine has to be pretty good. At least I think so. I have never been a big fan of Chinese food in particular and can live without it for a very long time even though I am from Singapore. What has actually started me to eat tim sum often is because my lovely wife has suddenly fallen in love with "char-siew."

We have been to many places for Tim Sum but the one place that I have always liked is Yan Palace at Hong Lim Complex. It is a pretty old style restaurant. Old wooden chairs with those big round tables. It even smells like an old restaurant. It feels like another country inside. The wait is always long on weekends and the tim sum crowd is pretty huge there. Sure, this place doesn't have the push cart type of tim sum but they make it up with the quality of the food. I always somehow go there in big groups and order 2 of everything. I love their char siew bao and char siew pastries. They taste fresh! Their century egg porridge is delicate and their lotus seed bao is something I dream about sometimes.

This new thing that they have, the banana and shrimp combo wrapped in a type of white skin is fantastic, their roasted meats taste great. The har gao and siew mai always heats up my cold body and the chee cheong fun is pretty good as well. I don't like the chicken feet but have been told by my friends who have tried it there that its pretty good.

Don't expect too good a service at this restaurant. But the quality is something you live by if the food is that good. The last thing is to expect the restaurant to be very noisy and you can't make reservations over the weekends.

Food: 7/10
Service:5/10
Value:6/10

One of the better Tim sum places to go to in Singapore.

Hope this helps.

Super Sandwich

I absolutely love sandwiches. This is one of the best things ever invented from America since the hot dog, and my wife. I read a review about this place from another website and decided to show up with a couple of my long time buddies for lunch.

I was 45 minutes late for the appointment but both my friends were very nice. They already ordered their food and one already finished his. So being late, I ran everywhere and still could not find the damn place. The funny thing is that when you actually find the place. You're actually surprised that its there. Not that I wasn't expecting it there but this place is literally "around the corner," at China square Central.

I put down my bag and ordered. Well, not really ordered. I took some suggestions from the counter lady and she was nice enough to have me order the Texas sandwich. Its a roast beef sandwich between 2 slices of untoasted white bread. She insisted untoasted because she feels that I can taste the sandwich better. I feel that toasted bread is better simply because it doesn't stick to the top of my damn mouth. Anyways, I relented and for $12.80, I got a side pasta salad as well as a cup of lemon tea.

Its a small place. Not cozy, but "apple-esque," white furniture with made in China plastic feel. Anyways, I liked it. I was surrounded by a handful of white people in the restaurant. The food was served to me after 5 minutes of my order and I finished it in less time than that. The sandwich which contains melted cheese, lettuce, Mayo, roast beef, and tomatoes. It was a good sandwich. Its definitely above average. I wouldn't say its the best sandwich I have had, but it was pretty good. If only I had it on semi toasted bread!

Food:6/10
Value: 4/10
Service: 6/10

I don't know if I would pay $12.80 for that sandwich. It might be a little on the high side for food that is going to be stuck on top of my mouth.

Cheese Cake Cafe

I don't like cheese and neither do I like cheesecake. In fact, I would never eat cheese alone. It's that bad for me. But cheesecake? I might. Depends on how good it is. I think the best one I have ever tasted is the one at Carnegie Deli in New York. Creamy, smooth, sweet, delicate, grounded with the right amount of crust and topped with freakin huge strawberries.

Cheese cake cafe is nothing like that. In fact, I would say that the cheesecakes served at this cafe are different. Good different? I would say yes. The cheesecakes here are smaller, taste a little bit more like ice cream and not as creamy and smooth. No crust is involved except the American cheese cake. There are distinct variations of the traditional cheesecake. Things like Rum and Raisin cheesecake, chocolate cheesecake, I remember they even had the green tea cheese cake. I like variety like I like women. That sounds weird. But the bottomline is that variety is good.

I love the ambiance of the place. Its well but dimly litted. The furniture are teak and Indonesia/Bali style furniture. The service is always fantastic. Always might be an exaggeration, how about most of the time if not nearly all the time?I wouldn't normally pay $1 for cheesecake, but here I would gladly pay five over dollars per slice. The tea that you order is refillable and I even get a 10% discount using my UOB card. There are tons of the latest magazines for you to read.

We ordered a tiramisu, a oreo cheesecake and chocolate cheesecake with camomille, Darjeeling and a latte. The damage was $41. A little bit rough but I think its worth it every so once in a while. The great thing for me is that not many people know the place YET. So its still pretty cool in my book. I was once asked what is the difference between having coffee at starbucks and coffee at a regular coffeeshop. I was thinking about this when I was sitting in the cheesecake cafe last night. And I thought to myself. There is a heck of a difference! Whether you want to admit it or not. Anybody wants to be seen in a place like cheese cake cafe. Its cool. It exudes cool. It tells people you're in. A great place to bring a date and a great place to go after dinner! You want to be seen just like you want to be seen at Starbucks. Is the coffee better at starbucks? Not necessarily so. But it is better to sit on a comfortable couch than at a sweltering coffee shop.

If you love cheesecake like I like my women? You would be remissed to miss this place.

Another gem in the east!

Food: 7/10
Service: 8/10
Value: 5/10

Hope this helps.

Blooies at Jalan Tua Kong

For some of you who have been paying attention to this blog, you might already know that I live in the east. I am an East Coast kind of guy with a West Coast attitude. If that means anything. Last week, I went to this place to collect a pair of speaker stands that I purchased online. That restaurant caught my eye because it was really unusual.

When you turn into Jalan Tua Kong, what you see initially is a small coffee shop on the left and just a bunch of terrace houses. What most people don't know is that after the row of terrace houses, there is actually a restaurant and its called Blooies. I have to say, I thought the title reminded of boobies, but that's just me. The entrance is lited with some tiki torches and immediately you think its a beer place. I was seated with the bar behind me and a wall filled with what I think is pictures of happy and satisfied customers on the other wall, fenced by a lot of branches. Its pretty much an open air place but it is strangely cool. The place is of an average size, not too big, and the ambiance was perfect for the food it was serving. It was calm, relaxed, a wee bit noisy and a good mix of the hip East Coast crowd.

We ordered burgers. All 3 of us. My buddy ordered the mushroom cheese burger, the missus ordered the bacon cheese burger, and I ordered the wrong thing. At least I was told that way. I asked for a double bacon cheese burger, but its actually called a double cheese bacon burger. I thought the name was strange because double bacon denotes 2 slices of bacon, whereas double chess would mean 2 slices of cheese? But my burger contained neither 2 slices of cheese nor 2 slices of bacon. What it had 2 slices of was 2 slices of beef patty. Semantics? Maybe. I was curious after I was corrected by the server.

Talking about the server. I have to say that this place needs more servers. There were only 2 ladies serving what I thought was about 25 people. Service was abit slow and the food took awhile. I am okay with waiting for food if the restaurant is cool and there were 2 televisions there. So time passed pretty fast. Everyone around me was ordering steaks and ribs. So maybe this might be a good place for those some other day? The servings also looked huge. So I was happy.

We got our half dozen of mussels in tomato sauce as appetizer. It was alright. Nothing to tell mum about. The sauce was a little spicy and mussels were very mussel like. When the burgers came. I was ready. Have you ever picked up a burger and realized that you can't put it down once you pick it up because its either so darn thick and so darn big that if you did put it down, everything was going to fall apart? My burger was THAT burger. @ thick patties with cheese and bacon. No ketchup and mustard, those condiments are self served in a basket on the table and filled with lettuce and onions. Once I picked it up. I had to keep knowing at it. The burger was done medium well, everything was dripping, but the burger was juicy and tasted like a real burger. I liked it. The buns were nice and warm and were done just the way I like it, which is slightly toasted. The Cajun fries were perfect. Hot and spicy. Just like the Cajun fries I have had in Louisiana! The only downfall for this burger was the inclusion of coleslaw on my plate. I don't understand why there is coleslaw on the plate. COLESLAWS DO NOT GO WITH BURGERS. I left it untouched showing what I thought of it.

My buddy and my wife enjoyed their burgers. They didn't love it. But they thought it was pretty good. Burgers. Love them. I thought this was one of the better burgers I have had in Singapore. I would recommend this place to people. Bring your date. Its a cozy place and it'll make your date think you're in the know for,"cool places." Overall, the damage was about $69. My wife had a Mai Tai and the rest of us had water. My double something burger was only $16.

I think its good to come to a place like this every once in a while. Don't expect gourmet food. Expect good grilled burgers, steaks and ribs with fine ambiance.

Service: 5/10
Value: 6/10
Food: 7/10

Hope this helps.

Fei Fei Wontan Mee at Joo Chiat Road

I have only been working for the last 2 years and I have discovered that there are a few things that I can't live without through the work week. One is to skive from work and the other is won tan mee at Joo Chiat Road. Not any other wontan mee stores, but in particular Fei Fei wontan mee.

I have been patronizing that store for the last, many years. I have been there since I was dating, many girlfriends ago. Anyway, what always attracted me to the store was that it was deep in the middle of Joo Chiat that not many people knew where it is and the wontan mee is actually pretty unusual. Its not like the traditional wontan mee that is mixed with dark sauce, this wontan mee is actually pretty pale in comparison but makes up for it with its taste. My boss, literally, is from Kuching and loves this wontan mee store because it reminds him so much of the wontan mee at home. I reckon this wontan mee store is a beg away from a bad Oliver Twist movie.

You have 2 choices of wontan mee, small or big. Not the bad sizing Mickey D's does with their small, regular and large. Here, small is $2.50 and the large is $3. You don't get soup with this wontan mee and it is served in those old school bowls with fishes decorated around the bowl. Its THAT type of store. The noodles on this day were average. A wee bit dry, maybe not enough oils and sauce. Wontan was fantastic. Char Siew was right. And vegetables were, vegetables. I don't normally take chili so mine is usually mixed with tomato ketchup. I have been told that the chili for the wontan mee is potent. So be warned!

Don't be confused. There are actually 2 Fei Fei wontan mee stores along Joo Chiat Road, and they are just 150 meters away from one another. There have been many stories circulated about why there are 2 stores and what have you but this is not a website to do that. The store I always go to with my colleagues is the 24 hour one. Its the earliest store that you see when you enter Joo Chiat Road from Still Road. The coffee shop serves one of the best otah I have ever tasted, so you can try that, and its serves a variety of small side dishes like Ngoh Hiong, Fried fish cakes, and friend wontan. On this day, the sides dishes were bad. My side order of fried wontan were tremendously small, and very countable. The ngoh hiong was great, but I have to say that it keeps shrinking everytime I go there. And because our wontan mee doesn't come with soup, we had to order an extra bowl of wontan soup. The soup broth is okay. Average. The wontan, was great! Its so contrasting that it actually puts the entire focus on the wontan. Brilliant! Maybe. Is this by design? Definitely not.

If you are not ordering the wontan soup, you have to take your finished bowl of wontan mee, and bring it back to the chef, if you can call him that, and ask for more. More? Yup. You have to beg for soup at this store. I remember when I was young, I was so afraid that the guy would reject my requests and always made my parents go get the soup. Sometimes the owner made a face, now its more of a known fact that you have to ask for soup. Fun!

Service: 5/10. Its a small coffee shop!
Food: 7/10. Just order the wontan mee and otah. Don't order anything else.
Value: 8/10. Just order the wontan mee and otah. Don't order anything else.

Besides this store, the other famous wontan mee store is actually on an adjacent road from Joo Chiat Road called Tembling Road. And that wontan mee store is fantastic also. Its called Ang Moh wontan mee. But I guess that's enough wontan mee for now.

P.S. If you're still hungry, there's still a very good ZANG or rice dumpling store further down and good karaoke if you really want to hang around little Vietnam.

Bring your in-laws, they'll be impressed.

Hope this helps.

AMALFI Restaurant at Clarke Quay

Before I begin my objective review of this place, I only have 2 words for you. Don't go! I decided on the restaurant the night before after the FA cup shenanigan with Tasty Bites and some other buddies. Honestly, I was lazy. I just went to the UOB and Citibank credit card websites to see where I could bring my mum, and save money at the same time. The AMALFI Restaurant looked interesting. And it was open early. So I decided with my missus to bring my mum there for an early lunch.

Went there around 11. First clue to a bad restaurant, emptiness. I forgot, second clue to a bad restaurant: only patronized by tourists. You ever been to a foreign country and got stuck in a tourist-centric place? They charge you a ridiculous amount for mediocre food? This sentiment best describes how I felt about the restaurant yesterday. We entered the restaurant. Found a seat. And decided to order. The server was cute, and polite. But I have to say her command of English just wasn't there for some reason. My dad wanted to order a sandwich, and in the menu it states that we have a choice of bread. So my dad decides to ask the nice server what choices he had, she initially thought that the sandwich was just white bread, but she later decided to seek a second opinion, and true enough, my dad had no choice of bread. There was only focaccia bread. Sigh. I then decided to see how bad the restaurant was by asking for the Antipasto sampler. Apparently, on the menu it states that I can get one of every kind. Alas, the Antipasto is only available after 6pm. Third sign of a bad restaurant: the restaurant cannot deliver what it states on the menu! So in total, we ordered a farmhouse salad, a very bad salad, a side order of bruschetta, a Roma pizza, topped with ham and mushrooms, a side order of fried scallops and my dad's sandwich.

The bread that came with the bruscehtta was cold. My dad's sandwich bread that he had no choice of was cold, the salads were bitter. The pizza was abysmal. How wrong can you go with pizza? Its the food that every tourist place has! EVERY! And that was bad. For a mother's day lunch, it was bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. I wouldn't recommend this restaurant to my enemies. Its that bad.

Value wise, its okay. With the 15% discount, I managed to escape the penitentiary of bad Italian food with a $70 bill. Don't bring your date there. Don't bring your parents or out of town guests there. I always thought Pasta Fresca was the new low for local interpretation of Italian food. I guess, I change my mind after this experience.

Food: 2/10
Service: 6/10
Value: 5/10

Hope this helps.

Prata Cafe @ Evans Road

The wife woke me @ 1030am on a Sunday morning whilst I was barely recovering from the previous night's soccer shenanigans held at a friend's cozy apartment. She was craving for some prata so I told her to go look up the internet for some recommendations on where to eat good prata. I didn't feel like Jalan Kayu Thasevi - too far lah. After sifting through some search results, we decided on Prata Cafe as it was within reasonable proximity to our abode.

As it turned out, Prata Cafe just happened to be one of those places where I've travelled past on numerous occasions but never really bothered to give it a try. Sitting just a stone's throw away from the Botanical Gardens on what used to be the old Eusoff College, Prata Cafe reportedly serves the "best kambing soup" and other local indian muslim fare according to some local foodie forums.

Ok so expectations were running a little high based on the existing reviews. The parking is kinda "illegal" along Evans Road so being the quintessential Singaporean motorist, we parked at a "good spot" where we could watch the car with hawk eyed dillegence in case the little white lambs on scooters were circling about.

This place has got both indoor and outdoor seating. They even sell the daily papers which were conveniently placed on a rack next to the main entrance. The menu contained the usual indian muslim fare of mee hoon goreng, prata, nasi lemak, briyani etc along with the standard teh tarik, teh halia and a myriad of milo concoctions.

I was eager to try the soup kambing but was told that it wouldn't be available till sometime in the afternoon. We ended up ordering 2 plain pratas, 1 egg prata and 1 mutton roti john. The pratas arrived 7 minutes after we placed our order and came on a silver plate with 3 compartments in which one contained the curry.

The plain pratas were quite disappointing. Firstly, it wasn't piping hot, crispy and fragrant. In fact, it looked like it had been sitting around for abit before arriving at our table! I was hungry anyway so I had to take a couple of bites. Left it to the crows after 2 mouthfuls.

The egg prata on the contrary was fresh. At least this one looked like a proper well fried prata and tasted quite alright on it's own. The curry is a tad salty with no chunks of meat/vege in sight. The cheese prata was also freshly made but did not have enough cheese filling to warrant a decent thumbs up.

The roti john looked the part when it first arrived. Crispy on the outside with a decent egg and mutton batter and 1/2 cm chunks of onions. Oh and it had a good squeeze of mayo in figures of 8 on the top. Strangely, there wasn't the customary sweet chilli sauce in sight. I guess it tasted alright - not great but yeah... OK. So we worked our way to the other end of the loaf and found that the batter was only applied to 3/4s of the roti john! 5 uncoated pieces of bread mate.. geeze.

We were left thoroughly unsatisfied and disappointed. I mean bro you gotta get the basics right!!!!!!



Verdict

Food - 5/10 *the egg prata saved it from a sub 5 rating*

Big Fish at Siglap

I had to collect a pair of speaker stands for my about to be purchased bookshelf speakers for the bedroom. I secured the help of my long time buddy from secondary school to accompany me in this egregious task. The collection point was in Jalan Tua Kong and after we successfully found and collected the stands, the quandary of where to eat was next. We decided on BIG FISH at Siglap. Not to be confused with the over advertised over marketed over fried Fish and Co, this is a totally, well, not totally different type of seafood place.

We walked in at around 9 at night and it wasn't that crowded. My buddy was single so I suggested to him that he should bring his future dates there. There is just something about the place that I like. Its small and cozy, service is okay. The most important thing is that the ambiance fit the food we were eating. My wife as usual ordered the Fish and Chips and my buddy and I shared the seafood platter - which was a combination of grilled fishes, prawns, squid, mussels, scallops, some greens and butter rice. I call it pilaf but I digress. Out of itchiness, I ordered a side order of seafood anitpasto.

What is the value of an appetizer if it is not served first! Unlike many other restaurants in Singapore, BIG FISH actually serves the appetizer first. That made me happy. There was a combination of smoked salmon, grilled prawns, some kind of lobster salad, squid in smoked bbq sauce with grilled red and yellow peppers in the middle. I can't complain about the food. It was alright. It wasn't great, but it did stir up some appetite.

Then came the fish and chips. My wife commended that the fish and chips were smaller than before. And I agreed with her. Not that they're tiny, but they were much smaller in volume than before. But it was still as tasty. It was fried just right and chips were done perfectly. When my seafood platter came, I was happy as well. My buddy and I chowed down the entire platter in 10 mins. Man, I just salivated. Anyways, the seafood was good. There are potentially so many ways to screw up simple grilled seafood, but this restaurant did not. The prawns were proper, the mahi mahi fish was seasonsed perfectly, the squid and mussels were a lovely combination with the pilaf and green salad did not look out of place at all. The fries were in tip top condition.

The service was good. I think we spoke with the owner a little. I don't know if he is the owner but it was a big white man from Croatia that studied in the United States. I think. At least that was where the conversation went. The water was refilled on time and the food came out at the right time.

The total meal was $92. It is a little on the steep end but I think if we did not order the Antipasto, which wasn't great, it would have been just right.

This place is great for a date. Come either really early before dinner or have a late dinner. Its quiet, its cozy. I think its a hidden gem in a very crowded restaurant scene at Siglap. And I hope it stays this way.

food: 7/10
service: 7/10
value: 6/10

Hope this helps.

Waraku at East Coast Park

In the eternal battle for supremacy of the median Japanese Restaurant in Singapore. I have to say that I always knew who the winner was going to be. It all started at a dinner a couple of years ago at the Long Beach Seafood Restaurant at East Coast Parkway. My friend had a boyfriend who worked in Japan and could read and speak Japanese fluently. After the sub standard seafood dinner at Long Beach, we walked out and he said "hand made noodles." And I was like, "what?" Alas, he was talking about the sign above the restaurant called Sento, which shared the same car park as Long Beach.

That was 2 years ago and well, this is now. Sento is no longer there and now its called Waraku. The menu has changed several times for the better but the restaurant's service and quality remains the same. A couple of close friends and myself decided to have some Japanese food, and I managed to drag my beloved wife along. Got in slightly after 6 because it wouldn't be that crowded and we panned through the menu. We noticed the new menu and I have to say the food looks better in the menu now! Not that it was bad before, but now it just looks more sumptuous!

Seduced by the new menu, we ordered: an order of agedeshi tofu, chawanmushi, grilled mackerel, cod fish Kaminabe with spicy soup, claypot seafood noodles soup with beef, grilled chicken on leaf (that never burns!) A sukiyaki don, a sushi and udon set rinsed down with a couple of green tea and yogurt floats. Wow, that was a mouthful when the server repeated our order. But we were satisfied. We became even happier when the food arrived. I have to say that the portion in Waraku is huge! Bigger than most other Japanese restaurants like Sakae or Genki Sushi.

The food was very good. It was not fantastic like I wished it was but it was very good for the price we were paying. The chawanmushi was sweet and smooth with a hint of gentle delicacy. The agedeshi tofu was outstandingly crispy with its tofu skin well fried but the tofu was soft and slippery in the mouth. The claypot seafood noodles with beef was both soothing for the soul and fulfilling to the stomach. The handmade noodles were done al dente, and the mixture of both the seafood and beef made my day. The grilled chicken was sweetened with terriyaki sauce and was succulent and juicy. The kaminabe was slightly spicy and not as searing as we expected it to be. It was heavenly none the less. The sukiyaki don was well done, the beef was sweet and the mixture of the onions and rice made it not perfect but just right. My soft shell crab handroll was both warm and tender, the softshell crab was still warm unlike other places and the lettuce and mayo combination was spot on.

The ONLY bad thing about my whole meal that I want to complain about was my sushi. The rice kept falling apart. I didn't understand why but it did. I just felt that the quality of the sushi was not there. The raw fish was okay, it was the rice that fell apart. Now, you must be thinking maybe it was the way I was holding my chopstick. But the truth was that I tried many different ways, but each time it fell apart literally. In the end, I had to resort to putting the soya sauce and wasabi on the sushi instead of dipping my sushi into the deadly dark mustard combination.

Service was good. The servers were prompt. Kept a good pace on the refills and were polite. The total damage was only about $90 and I have to say it wasn't that bad, we could have done a lot worse for much more.

I would totally recommend Waraku to you. Bring a date. Bring your family. They even have those traditional rooms where you can sit on the tatami mats while your legs dangle under the table. Its worth every cent.

Food: 8/10
Value: 8/10
Service: 7/10

Waraku is the BEST chain Japanese Restaurant in Singapore. That's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.

Hope this helps.

Hog's Breath

I was thinking about having a Burger with the missus on Friday night and I have to say, I have heard some things about Hog's Breath that made me want to try. So we went there at Chijmes. Immediately, I was confused by their confusing deco. They had a mixture of license plates. Not that there is anything wrong with displaying license plates but imagine with me if you will, a row of Australian and American license plates, in dispersed with several pictures of old time Singapore. And that was just on one side of the restaurant. I couldn't help but notice this because I was facing this side of the wall.

By the by, the service was average. The servers were really young and I thought that the exam period for school wasn't over yet. Anyways, we ordered an appetizer combo as well as prime rib for my wife and their Double Hog Burger for myself.

Appetizer Combo - For $17.50, you' d expect more than just 3 potato skins, 3 chicken tenders, 3 chicken wings and some pieces of fried calmer. Sorry. But the appetizer was borderline atrocious. The bacon on the potato skins wasn't fully cooked through, and hence not crispy. Calamari was okay. Chicken tenders, I thought was fish sticks initially didn't taste that bad after I discovered that it was chicken. You can't really go wrong with chicken because everything taste like chicken. Chicken wings were bleargh ....

My Burger: First off, I realized that the burger that was served to me had no vegetables. Now wait. Before you judge me, let me be the first to say that burgers need at least a slice of lettuce, it had none. What it did offer was a side of mixed salad, again its my guess because the restaurant was kind of dim, mixed with Italian dressing. I don't know if this is a burger served in Australia or the United States, but I thought that was totally weird. With all this factors, I didn't expect my burger to be any good. So when I took a bite out of the burger, I was rather impressed. This burger was saved by the bread! Its sesame bun was very tasty. I don't know why. But it was done just right. Slightly crispy on the outside, soft on the inside and warm! The burger patty was strangely decorated with what I think was BBQ sauce and 2 slices of cheese. It made an unusually strange savory meal. I mean take away the bad Italian dressing with what I still thought was salad; and add the above average fries. Its a meal. The beef patty was juicy, not the juicy that just drips all over the plate, it was made just right. It was cooked medium well and the bun and patty made great synergy.

The Prime Rib: I have never understood the Singaporean mentality of eating a steak. We as a people have this annoying tendency to pour a whole bunch sauce on the meat, and all you taste is the sauce. Unfortunately for me, Hog's Breath was no different. I thought I avoided the sauces when we chose not to pay $3 and add pepper, mushroom and some sauce to our steak. Instead, we forgot that since we ordered the hickory marinated prime rib, so it was smothered in hickory BBQ sauce. My wife could not finish the steak so I helped her clean out half of it. After clearing away all the sauce, I have to say that the steak was actually pretty good. Even though the steak came as medium rare when my wife asked for medium well and you could sense that the marbling of the steak wasn't that fantastic because in the middle of the meat, there were huge chunks of fat, the meat was succulent and you could almost taste the charcoal grill.

Just like Luke Skywalker and Obi Won. I remembered the words of tasty bits as I chewed down the Prime Rib. "ONLY ORDER THE PRIME RIB," he said. Alas, I finally remembered what the master has told me. And he is right.

Value: 5/10
Food: 5/10
Service:5/10

P.S. I actually swore to myself last Christmas when I was back in the United States to only eat beef once a year, and only when I am back there. I think I should stick to that rule.

What I think about Food Republic at Wisma

I am an old fashioned kind of guy. I think that in Singapore, the older the market, the better the food. I always love going to Toa Payoh Lor 8 or even the shophouses near Toa Payoh Central to eat, and even Chinatown or the the People's Park Hawker Center before the plastic surgery. Great food. In fact, I often wouldn't want to eat at the newer areas because I just don't think that there will be anything great to eat.

And there is Food Republic. Opened by the creator of BreadTalk and the person responsible for bringing in Din Tai Fung. I have to say the concept is great. Make it look old and feel old. The decor is pretty cool because it makes me think that the food actually might be good. I like the Tim Sum person pushes the Tim Sum cart around, I like the Indian man bringing around all the little snackies for sale and I especially love the Kopi Tiam atmosphere, with the old stools and tables. The food there is still slightly expensive than the old markets. I mean, do you really expect an "old," hawker center in the heart of Orchard road be cheap? No. When I found out that the Food Republic was opened, my point was try every store possible. Did I? Nope. Not really.

Over a period of 6 months,I have tried NEARLY every store, except the restaurant ones. The fake western food store, the Indian and Thai store I skipped out because I felt that they were in synch with the integrity of Food Republic. So here is the quick review of the other true hawker center stores at the Food Republic:

Chicken Rice Store: Nothing fantastic. I ordered the chicken rice set and asked for extra stuff. Service was good and friendly. Rice was okay but nothing fantastic about the chicken.

Value:5/10
Service:6/10
Food: 5/10

Fish Soup Store: Was impressed by their different variety of fish for the store. Looked interesting. The fish soup again was nominal at best. Service wasn't great. They kept bugging me to decide and I was confused by the type of fishes. But the soup was ordinary. Nothing too "old school," or flavorful about it. Nothing to write to mum about.

Value: 5/10
Service: 4/10
Food: 4/10

Indian Store: Service was okay. Food. Bryani was too small a portion for $4.50 or was it $5? Prata was good. It was actually pretty good. And my dad loves their ginger tea.

Value:6/10
Service:5/10
Food: 6/10

Nasi Padang Store: As usual, old Malay ladies are the sweetest people in the world. They were very polite and motherly. Asked me what I wanted every time and explained to me what they were. Food was pretty good. Rendang was never too tough and their Padang was LEMAK! Price was very LEMAK as well. Each time I ordered 2 meats and 1 vege, it was close to $7. I thought it was pretty expensive.

Value: 4/10 - a little too expensive to Nasi Padang
Service: 7/10 - probably the most polite vendor there.
Food: 6/10 - worth a try.

Beef noodle store: Bleargh ...... A pretty cute girl served me my Hakka beef noodles soup. And that was the highlight of the meal!

Value: 4/10
Service: 4/10
Food: 3/10

Hookien Mee Store: By far, the store with the longest queue. The owner has pictures of his C.I.A trip pasted over the food store. C.I.A is the Culinary Institute of American, not the Central Intelligence Agency. Its a joy to watch them do the Hokkien Mee. In our increasingly voyeuristic world, I have to say that just watching them make the Hokkien Mee makes me want to learn how to do it! They wear their pretty funny looking straw hat, a trademark look methinks and their noodles are served on the special white leafy type material that all good Chinese food is supposed to be on! Hokkien Mee is actually between better and good. Its not the best. But its definitely up there. In my personal opinion, just order the Hokkien Mee, the rest is just a waste of time.

Value: 6/10
Service: 5/10
Food: 7/10

Roasted Meat Store: I have to say they are the most pricey roasted meat store I have had in a fake Hawker Center. I am not saying its not great. I'm just saying that for $4, I am getting very little pieces of meat on my plate. The wontan and the Har Kaw soup on the other hand is fantastic! Order it. Its one of the best things there.

Value: 4/10
Service:5/10
Food: 5/10. Wantan/Har Kaw Soup: 7/10

Duck Rice Store: It has to be one of the least crowded store there. Amazing. But I know why. Its just average. Its the duck rice you have every where else. And whats worse, you're next to the store with the longest queue. So no one ever bothers to take a look at the store.

Value: 5
Service:5
Food: 5

Quasi - Coffee Shop: My wife loves the coffee and toast. I love the coffee and toast! I like their jam and otah toast. Seperately of course. Not together. It tastes great. The only knock on Ya Kun if I ever have one is that their kaya bread is so darn thin. Here, its uber thick like Texas toast. Service is okay and value is great! I don't know about the hygiene though. The mountain of butter is left out there the whole day.

Value:7/10
Service:5/10
Food:7/10

I know that I missed out on a couple of stores. The soup store next to the Hokkien Mee store, and the Chinese Handmade noodles store next to the duck rice store. I can't write it because I have never tasted the food. But overall, I do like the Food Republic a lot. The lines might be long and its a bitch to find a seat during peak hours but its totally worth the experience. I just hope all the other food court owners would follow in its foot steps, its definitely the way to have a food court.

A Rant about burgers

Several weekends ago, I read a newspaper article about a certain reporter allegedly going to several restaurants to try the best burgers in town. I don't how what kind of test he did or what he was smoking, but he gave the award for the best burger in Singapore to some $45 burger. I don't want to go on a rant here but a $45 burger? Are you kidding me? I mean seriously, are you kidding me? A burger is a burger. You can put Wagu beef, Kobe beef, Kansas City Strip or porterhouse cut beef between 2 slices of bread and call it a burger, you have to be out of your mind. Come on. I have tasted burgers from the capital of burgers - the United States, and I have never heard of such, don't mind me saying this, such idiocy in chefs trying to one up the traditional burgers and make it into a gourmet meal. Its like me trying to upsell the char kway teow by putting in tiger prawns and lobster, special quail egg, marinating the cockles with saffron and special chilli only found in the deep deep jungles of India, plus the noodles beings specially made from rice blessed by Buddha himself and the dark soya sauce used to color the noodles is actually truffles and soy fermented together under the Tuscan sun. This has to be a joke right?

Burgers are meant to be good old minced meat patty slapped between 2 buns of your choice. In fact, the history of the hamburger started with the somebody putting a slice of beef patty between 2 slices of white bread. How good the burger is is not dependent on how much it is. How good the burger has and always been how bad the burger is for you. Come on. Sure, you put in the ketchup and mustard, onions and lettuce. Tomatoes don't do it for me in a burger. Throw in some barbecue sauce and waalaa! A burger! I have had 100s of burger throughout my whole life, from cheap Macdonald ones to the relatively expensive hotel ones, the best ones have always been less than $15 SGD at the most.

In Singapore, Carl Jr's is the best burger out there I think. Its worth the $11. Its friggin huge. I wouldn't recommend it if you were in the United States, but you're in Singapore and there really isn't much of a choice. Furthermore, the article about the burgers never really explained what make s a good burger and how did he decide which restaurant or burger was the better burger. It was a taste test done based on nothing. I mean, did he eat one burger everyday for 2 weeks for lunch? Did he just took a mouthful of the burger everywhere he went? There are so many test variables. And what did he drink with each burger? That's important too!

Seriously folks, this website is not meant to critique the Singapore journalist, that's for other people. All I am saying is that please treat food with more respect than that. Its an article written with not much effort for the pre-supposed idiot reader.

H K Roasted Meats at Marina square Food Court

I love roasted meats. Especially the char siew, roast pork, roast duck, roast goose and suckling pig. Yum Yum! After reading the article on the Straits Times about this store, I told myself that I had to have a try. And so I did over the weekend.

The line was as expected, long! The place was not as crowded as I thought it was going to be so finding a seat wasn't difficult. I waited for about 15 mins and was immediately disappointed that there was no more goose left! When it was my turn, I ordered a mix combination of duck, roast pork and char siew including 3 plates of rice. To my surprise, it was only $17.50. I was also very surprised by the great service the young man at the counter provided. He was smiling and happily taking orders. He even suggested to me what I should order!

The meats: The duck was above average. It's not better than the one at People's Park but it was above average. Better than the regular duck rice store. The meat had a hint of dryness and it just wasn't as succulent as I thought it was going to be. The char siew was worse. It was slightly over charred. It wasn't the best part of the meat I thought. Yet, there was a still the faintest taste of how good it can be when I bit into a good part of the char siew. The best meat on the plate, in my humble opinion is the roast pork. Excellent! The skin was both crispy, slightly sweet tampered with the saltiness of the pork. It was not too hard or thick. It was just right. The meat was juicy and beautiful. Marvelous. Very seldom have I tasted such good roast pork from a roasted meat store in Singapore. I was satisfied.

Even though my wife didn't exactly like the roasted meats, (she's American, what does she know? .... Sorry honey.) it was more for me and my buddy. I had a fantastically full meal.

Service: 8/10
Value: 8/10
Char Siew and Roast Duck: 6/10
Roast Pork: 9/10

hope this helps!

Bakerz Boys

I think that was the name of the place. Its not really a restaurant but its at the basement of Orchard Cineplex. We had to go there after the movie because my friend wanted to go to the ATM.

Quick Review: Tried Bakerz Boys at Suntec City. It was fantastic. The cookies were soft and gooey in the middle and warm. Just the way God intended cookies to be. Being greedy and suffering from a severe case of sweet tooth, I ordered for the missus and I the double and triple chocolate cookies. Service was great. Person that served us was really polite. The price is a little bit steep for a cookie at $2.50 but I can't complain about having a great cookie.

But alas, the cookie was luke warm, the middle not as soft as I liked it to be and it just did not capture my cookie imagination.....

Food: 4/10
Service: 7/10
Value:5/10 - it depends on how much you value a good cookie.

Overall, a good date place to go. Its casual. Stop there. Order a cookie. Eat it. Its sweet.... hmmmmmm

I DID IT ALL FOR THE COOKIE. THE WHAT? THE COOKIE!

Bakerz Inn at Paragon

You know, for a so called food critic, I sure as heck don't know where to go eat lunch in town. We were about to watch The Sentinel at Orchard Cineplex with a friend and were meeting at Paragon. My friend, whose wife was out of town was too lazy to decide where to eat, as was I, so my wife wanted some sandwiches or salad. Thus, we proceeded to Bakerz Inn.

Sure, Bakerz Inn isn't exactly the place to eat sandwiches and salad. They do try to make their food look good. Can't blame them for that. We ordered the Seafood Pasta, Clam Pasta as well as the Avocado and Crabmeat salad with a side of the vegetable puffs. You never go to McDonald's and order Char Kway Teow and you should never go to your favorite hawker store and ask for a burger. Similarly, never go to a place popular for dessert and order their food to expect a good meal.

My pasta for the Seafood Pasta was too soft and the tomato sauce was too luke warm. The Vegetable puffs were really small compared to the picture but what is the deal with ordering evian water? For the over priced food, I still have to pay for evian water? Its not like I have a choice in ordering plain water, but Bakerz Inn has an unusual rule of only allowing their customers to drink plain tap water. God Forbid! I don't want to go on a rant here but it is terribly ridiculous for a restaurant to make people order evian water if they want to drink hot or cold water. I mean, how in the world do we as the customer even know that the hot water is boiled evian water? It's a bad joke gone wrong.

BESIDES the sub standard fake Italian food, my wife did say that the Hazelnut Latte is one of the best in Singapore. And I have a good friend that swears by Bakerz Inn's souffle. In summary, service was relatively good for being so busy and they were nice about the evian fiasco. Honestly, what should I expect from a place that serves $15 pasta. Its not supposed to be that good! I should save my evil comments about pasta on Senso or something. In total, I paid about $78 for the 3 of us. Its not that expensive. And the transparent plastic chairs in the restaurant did make me feel like we were in Wonder Woman's plane....

Food: 6/10 - Stick to the desserts.
Service: 7/10
Value: 6/10.

Hope this helps.