Sunday, December 18, 2016

The Coconut Club, Ann Siang Hill

The Coconut Club, nasi lemak

These folks (6 Ann Siang Hill, tel : +65 6635 2999) have gotten by with word of mouth and social media that they've gathered themselves quite a crowd over the weekend. It certainly helped from the curiosity angle that the place is out of reach of many and the opening hours are short. The main stay is nasi lemak - an elevated version with possibly better ingredients along with careful treatment of those ingredients in the cooking that takes this traditional rice plate beyond where it's been before. At least that was likely to be the intention.

Unfortunately, this doesn't quite cut it for me. There was coconut fragrance in the rice for sure. But - it's not rich enough, not satisfying enough. I could name a couple of places where we've had better. The basmati rice rendition from the defunct Island Cafe beats this hands down and hell, it was more enjoyable even at Nasi Lemak Kukus. So while there's a story to be told about the founders spending a couple of years finding their fresh coconut milk from their perfect hybrid of the fruit and a fair share of R&D on the recipe, the outcome was that their rice was just passable. 

Sambal's not too bad, had some shrimpy flavour. While the chicken was good frying done, the tumeric was overwhelming. Otak-otak was not bad too - looked a little like those from Muar but doesn't quite taste like one. Would I come back? Maybe just to try the cendol

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