Xiang guo with rice at Zhang Liang Mala Tang (张亮麻辣烫)

Shifting away from the tang (烫) and towards the xiang guo (香锅) at Zhang Liang in 100AM. Also trying here to avoid processed items and keeping to ingredients that are more natural - like their fatty beef, sliced tioman (giant snakehead), eggs, some vegetables.

The rice wasn't fluffy but more sturdy, short grained and a little bit harder and less sticky than what many of us are used to compared to Japanese rice. But it was kinda hearty.

It might not have evaded notice that there was bai ye (百叶) in there in spite of the claims of keeping away from processed foods. We all succumb once in a while. 😏

Might have gotten to much sauce there.

Ten Tenths, Havelock II

Dropped by at Ten Tenths (B1-25 Havelock II, 2 Havelock Road, tel : +65 8363 2100) for lunch after hearing about them. Never knew about their existence before even though they've been in business for a few years.  

These guys serve a different herbal chicken from the usual style. Bird's roasted/fried rather than steamed. Meat tasted like it's frozen. Kinda dense and hard around the edges. The herbal sauce was robust and a little more sweet than I was expecting. Set came with oil rice (油饭). Chilli's sweet, limey and has a bit of heat.

Here's a bowl with char siew and roast pork. Roast pork's tender and has a good crunch on the crackling. Nice. Not a fan of their sweet & spicy char siew. Meat was kinda crumbly. The odd item in the bowl was their achar - looked like normal achar but there's barely any sour from the pickling.

Abbas Indian Muslim Food, Bendemeer Market & Food Centre

Nice prata from Abbas Indian Muslim Food (#01-54 Bendemeer Market & Food Centre, 29 Bendemeer Road) - this was a plate of egg cheese and a kosong. The former used plastic wrapped sliced cheese which meant that it was salty and milky. The latter has a bunch of crisp on the surface and also some chew beneath the crisp. A little old school-ish.

Fried fish roe from Jia Li Seafood Soup (佳丽)

Finally got the fried fish roe from Jia Li Seafood Soup. Decent tasting if unextraordinary. Portion looked sad compared to Cai Ji Fried Fish Soup.

Hill Street Hainanese Curry Rice (小坡海南咖喱饭), Hawkers' Street @ 100AM

We've been coming back to Hawkers' Street at 100AM (#04-05/06 100AM, 100 Tras Street) quite a bit in recent times. Tried the curry rice stall even though I'm usually not a big fan of curry rice; with a couple of exceptions which I'm not going into. Anyways, this was their "signature" plate which included pork chop, stewed pork bellly, fried egg and stewed cabbage. The gravy tasted a bit better than I imagined. 

Note to self: Pork chop's totally forgettable, don't bother again. Pork belly's pretty tender.

Artichoke, New Bahru

It's been some years since we last ate at Artichoke (#01-02 New Bahru, 46 Kim Yam Road, tel : +65 8092 4210) and that was back in the old premise at Middle Road.

They've shifted to New Bahru since and it's become a sort of pizza place with traces of their "least-Middle-Eastern Middle Eastern restaurant" still in the menu.

Got myself a craft cherry cola which was basically cherry flavoured tonic water with some spices that reminded me of the masala mix used in teas.

Love their green & gold kiwi starter which featured feta, pecorino, spearmint, black pepper and honey. A large part of it was the sweet fruitiness from the kiwis, milky saltiness from the cheese and a breath of freshness from the mint leaves. I like this a lot. 👍🏼

There's ox tongue in Marsala sauce with crinkle cut fries chips. Not a fan of the chicken salt in the fries. Tongue was nice but didn't think much of the Marsala sauce which came across as pretty generic tasting brown sauce.

The thing I was looking forward to most was their pizza - something I've heard described as Detroit styled with thick, airy, focaccia-like crust and crispy caramelized cheese edges. This was a platter featuring the 4 available toppings in the menu. Clockwise from top left

• Beef pepperoni - has hot honey and pickled peppers which had a bit of heat. Spicy, sweet and sour.
• Sunny slice - featured a refreshing mix of Halloumi, roasted fennel, kumquat, pistachio, arugula. Those kumquats tasted like sour plum. Not bad.
• Dirty margherita - just margherita.
• Bacon apple pie - with pancetta, brie, rosemary and hazelnut. Pretty relieved that the rosemary wasn't overpowering. This one reminded me of Christmas/apple pie. Nice aroma from the hazelnut.