Revisiting Bar-Roque Grill

We didn't think so much of Bar-Roque the last time we ate here, but that had been quite a long while ago and I had forgotten that I had meant not to come back. But back we came, lured by the prospect of their Beef Wellington.

We tried one of their rum infusions. This was known as Sing, something with pineapple, red chilli and vanilla. The chilli existed as an aromatic with none of the heat. I suppose it would have been much much more interesting if there was something prickly in it.

We had a tarte flambée with snails and bacon. This was quite nice. Cheesy, salty and a nice flavour coming from the pesto.

The other cold starter was their quail terrine en croute with black trumpet mushrooms, foie gras and raisins. Not bad.

We had mixed fillings on their Beef Wellington. The doneness of the meat was quite spot on and the buttery crust was good. But there wasn't any mushroom duxelle - there was a paste on the tenderloin in the crust which tasted like meat. The foie gras was a pan fried one on top of the pastry rather than in it. Though those mushrooms bits that came with the spinach was amazingly fragrant. I couldn't say that I didn't like this because I did in some ways - but this liking didn't feel definitive somehow.

We were lured by an off menu special. Lamb saddle - how could we have resisted? In retrospect, this wasn't one of the more enjoyable ones we've had in the vicinity. There was quite a bit of garlic flavour in the meat (along with rosemary and something else) and I supposed we just like lamb to mostly taste like lamb without too much detraction from the natural flavours. I'm pretty sure we've had better.

Eating like an emperor at Kaiserhaus

The following Kaiserhaus meal Essen wie ein Kaiser was apparently a favourite of Kaiser Franz Josef I, former emperor of Austria if the literature in the menu were to be believed.

This first plate was not part of that. This was a linguine in lemon butter with duck foie gras starter which we though would be a nice addition to the meal. The liver was very tasty and oozing with rendered fat.  

The main item in the Essen wie ein Kaiser was the tafelspitz - beef rump and oyster blade served in a copper pot with beef bouillon and mixed root vegetables.

Accompanying that were their very delicious buttery rosti, a garlicky creamed spinach and horseradish sauce. The latter was awesome. It was like the non-cream version of Lawry's horseradish cream for their prime rib. There were equal parts to the sharpness and sweetness.

There were dumpling options for the beef broth in the pot. I picked the leberknödel - liver dumpling.

Here be the obligatory look at the tasty dumpling in the broth.

The beef bouillon came with a couple of bone marrow. So bone marrow, butter and bread. Mmmmm...

This was what a prettied plate of the food looked like. That's the oyster blade which was tender and delicious. Made extra delicious with their horseradish which I couldn't get over.

Dessert wasn't part of the Essen wie ein Kaiser so we ordered a slice of their raspberry truffle to end. 

Imperial Treasure Noodle & Congee House, 100AM

First time dim sum-ing down at Imperial Treasure Noodle & Congee House (#02-10/11, 100AM, 100 Tras Street, tel : +65 6543 6668). We've been to the one at ION quite a number of times and the food had never been disappointing as far as I can remember. 

pan fried radish cake

har gow

rice rolls stuffed with roasted duck

dumpling soup...

...which they said didn't contain coriander but actually did!

deep fried intestines

frog porridge with century egg

This branch wasn't too bad. There were some items on the menu that I've never noticed. One of them were the rice rolls with stuffed with chunks of roasted duck - I rather liked that. The deep fried intestines here tasted "meatier" than those we had in the past and this shop at 100AM doesn't do barbecued chicken livers. Tried their frog porridge for the first time - those slurp-off-the-bone-tender frogs, we were informed, had been slain only upon order. So any fresher we'd have to eat them live.

They screwed up with the ordering twice. We are normally very easy going with such things but I thought I would mention since this were outward fuck ups over what could have been non-issues. We ordered the dumpling soups after confirming with the staff that there wouldn't be any coriander and those dumplings in the end did have coriander. Ditto with the frog porridge which we had done the same for regarding ginger and the same screw up happened. Service recovery was quick, we did ultimately enjoy the food so we didn't hang anyone.

Still Zam-ing along nicely after all these years

These guys...reliable as always. Forget the deer and shoot straight for the mutton.

Brunching at Bochinche

The last time I was at Bochinche (115 Amoy Street, #01-02, tel : +65 6235 4990), they were located at Martin Road. It looked noticeably more spacious, had a larger bar/counter seating and was more well lit than the current shop. Now I'm not sure why did I even bother to mention those things.

We had a spinach and goat cheese empanada. I wonder if these pastries are to Argentina as roti prata is to Singapore. While I haven't had much of them before, this particular one looked suspiciously like a French pastry than the puff that I was expecting. It tasted okay, not so tasty that I'll be coming back again for them.

The other thing I couldn't figure out was their grilled watermelon salad. It was supposed to be grilled and for some illogical reasons, I was thinking that they could've had char markings on them. I did just mention that it was illogical - but these weren't even warm. In fact, they were a little chilled. The mint granita was a nice touch while the burrata cream could have definitely done better than those decorative portions. This felt like style over substance.  

Brioche french toast with ham and bacon ice cream. The last part got me sold. Did taste like bacon but I couldn't really tell if the flavour come from just the bits or also the ice cream as well.

I liked their Provoleta best. Hearty, solid and sufficiently voluminous with their grilled bread. I just wished that the bread didn't have such a hard crust.

Kaiserhaus, Capitol Piazza

From what I could gather from their website, Kaiserhaus (#02-06/#03-06, Capitol Piazza, tel : +65 6377 0013) offers a culinary representation from the former Habsburg Empire - a big assed dominion that spanned nations in Europe which had its capital in both Vienna and Prague. Nations including the one Dracula came from.

While on the surface the restaurant claimed that culinary representation, it probably was just a very small fraction of that representation. From my limited perspective, there were Slavic/German/Austrian influences. Couldn't see any from the Italian counterparts that used to be part of the said empire.

But hey...  

That's the salon beuschel, an old styled Viennese ragout made with veal hearts and lungs. This was awesome. We could smell the offal from the first scoop and it came in generous portions of small manageable shreds with its meaty aroma. This stuff was served with bread dumpling. I could come back just for this alone.

We had their tafelspitzsulze - beef aspic. While this wasn't too bad, it had been outshone by the salon beuschel.

 The aspic came with bread on the side.

There were some fried mushrooms as well, courtesy of their happy hour beers.

This was the first time we've had veal schnitzel. This one looked cute. It had a wrinkly fried skin that reminded us of shar pei. Since it was veal, there wasn't much on the flavour from the meat. But wait - a squeeze of lemon on the side and a smear of their cranberry ragout, it was all good. Remember to ask for extra cranberry ragout.

The schnitzel was served with their vinegared potato salad. Simple and tasty.

From their Game Weeks menu, we had venison steak. Gamey tender loin served at medium doneness which for me didn't need the accompanying sauce. The bacon wrapped around it had already provided a nice smoky flavour. I shouldn't forget to mention that those red cabbage on the side were nice too. Are those rotkohl? And chestnuts - this plate tasted like Christmas.

We ended with an apple strudel. I had initially thought that this didn't need the vanilla sauce but ended up using most of it because those apples turned out to be quite sour.

Wolf Burgers, PasarBella @ Suntec

I've been wanting to try Wolf Burgers at PasarBella (#01-455 Suntec City Mall, 3 Temasek Boulevard) for a while after hearing some good things about them. You know what? This wasn't bad at all. There's a little bit of heft in the double pattied Alpha and those no-nonsense cheese blanketed patties were pretty good. Their brioche held up even though it wasn't remarkable and the bacon were really crispy. In the end and in spite of appearances, the burger didn't sink like leadened grease in the stomach. 

I'll would consider coming back if I'm in the vicinity. Will probably pass on the onions the next time round - I thought they weren't necessary.

Sari Ratu, Lucky Plaza

Came across the mention of this nasi padang shop (#02-107 Lucky Plaza, 304 Orchard Rd, tel : +65 6294 9983) and boy were we glad to have stopped by for dinner.

One of the dishes that Sari Ratu is known for is the gulai tunjang - curried beef tendon. Awesome savoury curry with a mild heat paired with generous portions of soft tendon.

Tendons so tender that one wouldn't really need teeth to eat them.

There's paru balado to be had here too. Their balado was actually pretty damn good. The lungs were somewhat inconsistent though. Some were tough, bordering on inedibly chewy while other pieces were really tender.

That's the telur gulai, curried hard boiled eggs. The curry, was awesome. Made us eat a lot of rice.

Didn't really think much of their beef rendang. I'm sure these are something they ought to be good at being Indonesian food and all and we were hoping that they would turn out tender like great slow cooked dishes; but the dry stringy textures of the meat didn't quite work out for us. Personally, I got through by drenching them in the curry from the telur gulai.

We washed down the dinner with jus belimbing. Star fruit juice. 

This was a little spot with awesome food in town. Gotta come back another time.

Tsukemen from Ramen Keisuke Tori King

Keisuke's Tori King has recently introduced some new bowls of ramen to their menu, a first since the time they have set up shop. This was the tsukemen with their bonito and yuzu spiked dipping broth.

The toppings for noodles were quite new to me since the last time. Only the chicken thigh and the ajitama were familiar. There were some garlicky menma, some chicken balls with bits of yuzu which I had never seen before and even some tender chicken charshu which tasted like it might had been marinated in some alcohol. Like Shaoxing chicken.

I would have liked for their dipping broth to be served much hotter. This was just lukewarm and turned cool pretty fast forcing you to finish the noodles quickly before it all turned cold. I also noticed that there's some ultra rich tan tan men and mazesoba under their new offerings too. Could be that I'll be heading back soon.