The Big Bird, Balmoral Plaza

One of their claims to fame according to the news clippings on the front of this chicken rice restaurant was their fiery chilli sauce - which the owner refused to discuss when inquired regarding the ingredients. I thought that chilli from The Big Bird (217 Bt Timah Rd, #01-07 Balmoral Plaza) deserved mention because it tasted different from most of the other chicken rice chilli sauces. Believe it or not, I came back two evenings in a row because of the chilli sauce which I hear is available off their shelf. That stuff simply made me want to eat a lot of their chicken rice.

Big Bird's chicken rice ($1.00)

half a fried chicken ($14)

eggs and chicken liver ($0.50 per egg/liver)

crunchy poached vegetables ($5)

lotus root and peanut soup ($3.50)

lala (stir fried clams in some spicy garlic sauce $10)

Besides steamed and fried chicken, Big Bird has a bunch of other dishes. Such as poached vegetables, stewed eggs, stewed tofu and chicken innards. There's other cooked food as well and some of them are apparently positioned as their signature dishes like the lala (clams), cold crabs and assam fish head. Prices were arguably reasonable. Except for the rice which I thought was a little expensive at a dollar a bowl. The flavour of that rice was also different from most of other chicken rice. These were not the beady or fluffy variety and the colour was a shade darker. I had initially thought that the rice wasn't so remarkable on it's own. But then the chilli worked it's lip burning magic. Made me down two bowls of that "unremarkable" rice. The chicken was served warm and that probably meant that I got some fairly freshly fried birds. Tasty with the skin still slightly crisp.

The lotus root soup had a very robust flavour. To the point that I couldn't really tell it was sweet or salty since it tasted like both. But it was piping hot, tasty and for what they charged - a very good deal. Those poached vegetables were fresh as they looked. I thought that the lala (clams) were quite good and packed a punch with the spicy garlic sauce. I could still taste that after having my tongue numbed by the chilli sauce.