Tutto, Jewel

Dinner at Tutto (#02-246/247 Jewel, 78 Airport Boulevard, tel : +65 6035 7880) by Da Paolo.

Calamari's a little hard. Kinda disappointingly mundane considering that these guys (meaning the Da Paolo Group) have been in the business of restaurants for ages and a pedestrian rendition of a common starter was all they could manage. Lemon aioli's not bad though.

What we thought was memorable was their limone e stracciatella - spaghetti with stracciatella, Pecorino Romano and lemon zest. Pasta was creamy, cheesy, lemon-y and light at the same time. Only available at Jewel.

Quite impressed by their pizza cotto e funghi - the simplicity of it brought out the flavours from the ingredients which were the ham, mushrooms and tomato sauce. Like that their sauce wasn't tart.

Our pizza had a broken blister like a popped pimple. 😬

Burrata gelato with chilli - I liked the creamy spicy combination.

A recent trip to Lai Heng Mushroom Minced Meat Noodle (來興香菇肉脞麵)

It's been a while, more than a couple of years actually, since we last ate at Lai Heng Mushroom Minced Meat Noodle. Prices have gone up by a dollar since then. The big bowl is now $8. This was a 40 minutes wait on a sweltering Sunday late morning.

Seriously got quite irritated with the wait. I guess it was a combination of heat/humidity, crowd and being hangry. 

When all was said and done, it dawned upon me how I've had just almost imperceptibly (even to myself) determined if a place was not overrated. Maybe just one of few of such ways. All that roiling boil pent up beneath the surface dissipated in short order after I've tucked into the bowl. The spicy umami and textures immersing through and shrugging off that previous 40 minutes of vexing sweat.

Chicken sausage jalapeño cheese bagel from McD

McD's limited variant of their breakfast bagel. According to them, there's jalapeño cheese in those bagels.

Couldn't tell that there was cheese baked into those bagels. The jalapeños were weak - barely discernible. Another half-assery by McD.

A sesame hiyashi chuka from Ohsho

It's been years since we last ate at Ohsho.

Because of the heat, I've been thinking about hiyashi chuka. Not much of them around to my knowledge. This was the sesame bowl from Ohsho. I've had the shoyu one many years back.

They've upgraded from the pink sludge ham to their charshu. Done away with the pointless red coral as well. But this tasted like it was bottled sesame sauce. Surfeit crept in easily from the sweet salty flatness. Won't be getting it again.

Lontong kering from Siti Nurliyana Nasi Lemak

Siti Nurliyana Nasi Lemak is presumably Siti Nur Liyana Nasi Lemak with an updated signage and name. The stall's unit number the same as the last time. Here's a lontong kering from them - paru and hot dog were add ons. Tasted much like it looked and I didn't mean it in a bad way. That being said, it was also not as tasty as the ones from Ming Ang and Nura & Tara. 

Regarding Margaret Drive Sin Kee Chicken Rice (新記馳名雞飯) at Holland Drive

I just realised that the other Margaret Drive Chicken Rice branches that used to be around have disappeared except for this one at Holland Drive which is Margaret Drive Sin Kee Chicken Rice. Up till recently, I also hadn't realised that that the name "Sin Kee" was on their signage. 😬 Always though they were just another branch of Margaret Drive Chicken Rice. 

This does make things less murky, at least for me. It's the stall that I've been eating at since their days as Sin Kee Famous Chicken Rice at Mei Ling Food Centre. I'm going to disregard the confusing branding among various similarly named stalls and move on with just this one.

This was from maybe a month back. They're still great without the chilli sauce which allows for some nuances like the flavour of the rendered chicken drippings over the poached bird to be more discernible.