Lao Beijing (老北京食堂), Velocity @ Novena Square

Lao Beijing (#02-11/12, Novena Velocity, 238 Thomson Road, tel : +65 6358 4466) serves arguably what can be termed as Northern Chinese food. They have a couple of outlets and is run by Tung Lok Group. I'm not intimately familiar with Northern Chinese food locally since it mostly looks generic but what we had seemed better tasting than a few of Tung Lok's other outfits which I've tried.

We've been here a few times over a number of years (no, I'm not a regular at all). The previous visits were for their lunch buffets which had pretty decent food, albeit small in variety. This was an impromptu dinner from the a la carte items which we haven't had for years.

Their cumin scented lamb was quite delicious. It was listed as braised lamb on menu but it's probably also deep fried after the braising. A tad greasy but tender, nicely spiced and slid off the bone easily. I don't think I would have minded if there was more of the natural flavours of the lamb. The green stuff on the side was mint jelly. 

The other item we liked was their minced pigeon soup. Not so greasy, tasted clear and if I might say so, heart warming. 

It tasted better after you've mixed up the minced meat patty/mousse at the bottom.

These were crab meat xiao long bao. I didn't think they contain enough crab to deserve to be called crab meat xiao long bao. While they were competent as regular dumplings, the word 'crab' in the name raised the bar. And in this case, also my ire.

I couldn't help but think of the spinach filled crystal dumplings from Red House Seafood as we ate these. These here were no match for those in terms of texture of the skins and the flavour of the fillings.