Saizeriya Ristorante E Caffe, City Square Mall

I liked this Japanese place (180 Kitchener Road, #B2-55/56 City Square Mall, tel : +65 6834 4878) a lot better than I had expected. Perhaps it was the fact that I had came by expecting very little since I believe that one gets what one pays for. The prices at this place were very affordable for what they served and at their price point, I couldn't complain at all. There were no frills and presentation was..... well, perfunctory. But one doesn't come here for prettied up plates.

As you can see, squid ink pasta was generously inked, so to speak. I was really pleased that they did not scrimp on the squid ink and their flavour came through with every forkful of the al dente noodles. There wasn't much but pieces of squid in the pasta, but they were quite generously portioned and I'll probably want to order a plate of these again the next time I come.

The spinach with bacon was pretty much what it was. A bunch of soft wilted spinach flavoured with bits of bacon. I actually enjoyed how straightforward it all was in terms of how it was served and how it tasted.

This was probably the cheapest mushroom soup I've had for as long as I could remember and it was also a lot better than most that would cost twice of it. It's not close to the better ones I've had, but hey, those cost a lot more too.

I could imagine this order of smoked salmon to be something I took off the cold food section at Ikea. In fact, it arrived so quickly that it might have probably been prepared in a similar fashion. There was nothing fancy nor exciting about it. Just a mildly smoked salmon.

Their mushroom pasta was also satisfactory costing probably half of what Pasta Mania charges, but tasting more than twice as good. The flavours of the mushrooms were definitely not found wanting. These guys here didn't use excessive cream sauce and that was definitely a one up there.

Dessert was a panna cotta. It's probably a pre-packed dessert that was imported in bulk, but it was served chilled in a chilled glass bowl and it didn't taste half bad.