California Pizza Kitchen @ Forum Galleria localised?

This was actually my second visit to this place.

Being here reminds me of the mention of the localization of dishes by The Traveling Hungryboy more than one occasion.

Localization of food refers to the change of style and ingredients from which a type of dish is prepared normally from its origins. Normally to cater to the preferences of the people where the dish is made. Obviously not at the place it originated from. Adding chilli padi to aglio olio pasta is a example of localization here in Singapore I suppose.

I wanted to try something I hadn't had before this visit. From the appetizers, we got the California Shrimp Rolls. From their menu on the web, those rolls are called Singapore Shrimp Rolls.

As you can see (or not), these are shrimps wrapped in rice paper wrappers with some vegetables and rice noodles. The description of the ingredients on the menu was the same as the one from the web menu. One would wonder what happened to the baby broccolis, carrots, bean sprouts and whathaveyous. What was glaringly omitted was the lack of mention of coriander/cilantro. Which was a total turn off since I absolutely detest that herb. 

The rolls were actually quite tasty. Didn't bother with the sesame ginger sauce. The bunch of vegetables on the left were called Szechuan Slaw. Basically shredded red lettuce with a spicy sauce which was much better tasting than I had expected.

The salad we ordered was the Original Chopped if my memory serves me right. It consisted of chopped lettuce, diced tomatoes, what appeared to be strips of salami and small bits of chicken. It was chilled so that was nice The ingredients were pretty fresh here. 

Based on a rather unsatisfying experience with the Peking Duck pizza from the last visit, I decided to stick to something a little more "regular". Hence the Milan.

Italian sausages, some ground meat chunks , 3 types of cheese apparently and mushrooms. The menu mentioned wild mushrooms but they looked and taste suspiciously like shiitakes to me. Not so wild there.

The pizza was pretty decent. That opinion was swayed also by the fact that I was hungry when it arrived. Everything on the pizza tasted as good as it looked.

We finished the meal with some sweets. Going with the spirit to try something which we hadn't before, we ordered the Chocolate Banana Royale and the Tiramisu.

The chocolate cake was okay I guess. Quite a bit of banana flavour. I wonder if that's artificial. There was a balance between both chocolates and bananas.

Tiramisu has been by far a variable in terms of taste. Everyone does it differently. California Pizza Kitchen has their rendition. Which wasn't bad but didn't quite wow like the first time I put a spoonful from Pasta Fresca into my mouth. The cream was dense and soft. Some parts of the lady's finger were dry and the cake was drenched in a vanilla sauce. Cocoa powder was relatively thin. No one's gonna be choking from this.

UOB credit cards gets you a 10 dollar voucher which can be used in the subsequent visits. We paid for today with UOB and a voucher obtained from the last visit and well, it's 10 bucks off the bill and we got another voucher for a next visit. We'll see how it goes eh?