Minang House Traditional Nasi Padang, Lucky Plaza

Meanwhile, not too far away from Sari Ratu is Minang House (#02-04 Lucky Plaza, 304 Orchard Road, tel : +65 6887 4702) which serves nasi padang. I've heard of them for a while but haven't gotten a chance to visit until now.

If I had to describe, I'd say that their sambal hijau/merah were decent. We've been used to and still prefer the ones from Sari Ratu which had more dimensions and intensity. Especially for the red one which was much smokier than this particular rendition.

We got ourselves some nutty fried tempeh. These tasted better eaten with their sambal.

Couldn't pass on their curried beef tendon. Gravy was good with rice.

Gulai cubadak or gulai nangka - tender curried jackfruit.

The obligatory greens was kangkong. I'm not sure what's the style of preparation. The flavour was rather lightweight compared to the other dishes that I'm not sure if there was any sambal involved. Not really spicy.

Omelette was not bad.

The blurriest picture goes to the tastiest item we had which was their chicken rendang. The flavour was sweet, smoky and spicy with a similar nutty gravy to match that reminded me of our local satay sauce.

Soon Heng Pork Noodles (顺兴肉脞麵), Neil Road

There's been recent chatter on Soon Heng Pork Noodles (120 Neil Road). Comparisons have been made with that supposedly famous other soup ba chor mee stall from Bedok and even associations with the word 'ramen'. Curiosity was piqued.

The broth was not bad. Better than what I remember of Xing Ji. There was sweetness from the pork and the flavour from garlic. Couldn't associate the bowl with ramen at all though. 

Minced pork was good quality and those wanton that they made themselves weren't bad at all. But noodles tasted like just regular mee kia. Not extra firm like I was hoping for.

I realized there was fried pork lard on self service when I was getting more chilli and added a heapful into the bowl halfway though. The lard they used were soft and didn't have much flavour. The differences they made to the soup was barely marginal. But I liked them noodles with the sliced red chillis. 

Arigato and sayonara Machida Shoten

Japan Food Town seems to have lost quite a bit of it's allure. There used to be much more than twice the crowd back in earlier times even in the weekdays. Tenants have changed and shop units haves been left vacant. The menu of some of the still surviving restaurants have changed and not necessarily for the better.

If the food at Machida Shoten was of any indication of things, that decline could certainly be understood. While I wouldn't miss the spicy shrimp chahan, I certainly did the mentaiko butter rice and those shrimp gyozas that were pretty good. All of them no longer in their current menu.

There was a limited time tsukemen. Ingredients were not bad. The charshu was tasty but kinda tiny. The dipping broth was also nice in a tangy, spicy and bonito-y sort of way. But it wasn't viscous so it didn't cling well to the noodles. It also wasn't served very hot. Before half the noodles were done, it had become almost room temperature. I went through rest of the chilled noodles pretty much cold all the way to the end. Pity. 

Brewerkz after all these years

Brewerkz was known for many things. The pioneer of microbrewer-ism on this land. A good time with friends. The still respectable Golden Ale. A menu that used to be the bar (pun unintended for once) for food in a watering hole. A surprising blue cheese burger. A surprising Reuben; at least they used to.

The years have worn some of their veneer away. The food menu adjusted at some point and pretty much went southwards. Quite a bit of what I thought differentiated them went away and have been gone for good. Their beer selection's still pretty decent though.

I haven't eaten here for years. Here's a Hawaiian pizza. I was asked to choose between the tomato base or the garlic one so this was garlic. Loved the garlic in it. Crust was bread-y and the texture of it was more naan than pizza base to me. But these guys aren't exactly known for great pizza and my expectations weren't high. I ordered it because it was the only Hawaiian that I know of that had jalapeño and black olives. Which I thought was a nice touch.

The mozzarella was bland, canned pineapples were possibly the cheapest around and those honey baked ham looked extra re-constituted if you know what I meant. This pizza was a nice idea that never got the quality of ingredients it needed to gain its own identity.

They've satay on the menu. Though most locals wouldn't actually call these satay. An accurate description would be grilled chicken on skewers. There's no discernible satay marinade on the chicken. Which was a waste. They've already a good foundation from the chunky skewers to follow through.

Also their thick satay gravy which was made with cashews was already 75% amazing. A little tweak to the recipe and they probably could have one of the most awesome satay gravy around (maybe 85% amazing). But things never got that far. Because tourist probably wouldn't appreciate them or know better anyway.

Fish and chips had a grill option for the fish. It's kinda nice. Fish was a little too small. Still better than their regular fried variety which was a brick of grease laden batter that had been shrinking over the years. I'm not sure why they had ever thought that their batter was a good idea. I've never liked the thickness.

Hajjah R.S.A., Tanglin Halt Market

We were in the vicinity looking for breakfast and I suppose it was chance that I noticed Hajjah R.S.A. (Stall #27 Tanglin Halt Market, 48A Tanglin Halt Road) during one of those moments where there wasn't a queue. That's their egg masala thosai there. Savoury light crisp on the edges and tender on the inner parts of the thosai that enveloped a fried egg and masala potatoes. The ladle of warm sambar and coconut chutney completed it. If I had to describe it with just one word, it would be 'satisfying'.

Back in Black (Tap)

We're back in Black Tap for more of their burgers. I've come across some pretty lousy comments on their food and never understood why. While nothing here was so amazing that it'll give anyone an orgasm, I did enjoy the burgers.

A Brooklyn Lager - again, to quell the heat while the burgers were making their way.

The All American was a pretty solid cheese burger. Not much distractions away from their hefty prime beef patty and the melted American cheese. I wonder why these guys don't do onions. But not complaining. The ingredients made their way through in terms of flavour and I'm glad that the sauce they scraped over the top bun didn't distract from those important flavours that made the burger.

For some reasons I had imagined the Steak Au Poivre burger to come in a pepper crusted patty. It didn't. Just their regular prime patty with crumbled blue cheese and a very delicious creamy green peppercorn sauce that was so good with the burger. And fries. And pickles. Or pickle and fries wrapped in lettuce. Like their Greg Norman, a good balance of the separate ingredients was achieved. Nice.

139 Hainan Chicken Rice, Yuhua Village Market and Food Centre

Happened to be in the vicinity for lunch and picked this (#01-39 Yuhua Village Market and Food Centre, 254 Jurong East Street 24) chicken rice stall that apparently sold $2 plates of them. Didn't go for the $2 plate. Went for an order with additional roasted pork and an egg. It's not bad chicken rice. Not one of the better ones in my books but definitely one I wouldn't avoid. Decently flavoured rice if not outstandingly so. The garlic-ky chilli sauce was delicious. What I didn't like was the roasted pork. The crackling was so hard that I gave up after a couple of pieces.

Some stuff from Huat Huat BBQ at Food Republic

I've never been big on barbequed chicken wings but we've had some from Huat Huat BBQ (Lvl 4 Wisma Atria, 435 Orchard Road) not too long back and found them to be quite nice. We headed back this time and got ourselves a plate of their charcoal grilled chicken thigh rice and satay. Both weren't too bad as well. Would have preferred for the chicken not to be chopped to such small pieces. A thicker satay sauce would have been great.

Ikea's apple cake

This was actually kinda nice. 

Tambuah Mas, Tanglin Shopping Centre

We noticed Tambuah Mas (#04-10 Tanglin Shopping Centre, 19 Tanglin Road, tel : +65 6733 3333) the last time we were in the area and made a note to come back. Why? Because we thought it had an old school charm away from the crowd which deserved a visit. A shallow reason? Why not? 

Haven't had their tahu telur for a long time. Cubes of fried tofu held together by frittered eggs into a little tower drizzled with a spicy sweet kecap manis. Delicious. But it's not a dish that holds out for me well since those egg fritters are pretty grease laden. While it was enjoyable at the start, one experiences diminishing returns working through the dish. To be shared.

The obligatory greens today was their singkong santan - tapioca leaves simmered in a delicious coconut gravy. Gravy that made me eat a lot of rice.

Like the previous visits, we hit up their spiced paru goreng with sambal petai. So hard to get past these tasty fried cow lungs.

Their tempeh goreng was freshly fried and delicious. Even more so with that sambal belachan on the side to enliven things.

More killer gravy came with their ayam korma which featured also another delicious coconut curry that we drizzled generously over their nasi putih.

One does not simply not get steamed rice in Tambuah Mas.

Market Grilled

The Market Grill was closed for some renovations recently. The counter was shortened to make way for more tables/seats and counter seating went away. They made a bit of changes to the menu as well.

Think the watermelon salad was new. The compressed watermelon which was in it had texture like rock melon. Pretty refreshing salad with a medley of textures and perky flavours. Personally, I liked those slices of jambu (rose apple), the candied pumpkin seeds and smoked cheese curds.

Wanted to see if their regular cheese burger was good.

It's not bad. Came in light toasted buns that managed to hold up because these guys do not need to over-sauce their burgers. The pickles and jalapeño served to cut across the meat, aged cheddar and bacon. I'm not sure how the grilled red onion helped. I thought wasn't needed. 

Fries are now a chargeable top up option. Unlike previously.

Their sakura chicken was plated instead of being boarded like before. Haha. Seemed like the brown sauce they served it with previously was replaced with grilled vegetables. Those grilled vegetables were good but having the sauce around would have made good better.

One more thing. Teh halia next door after lunch.

Most expensive strawberry

Came across these white strawberries in Meidi Ya. Didn't get one even though I was really curious about what made these cost as much as they did. Will I never want to eat a regular strawberry after having tasted one of these? Maybe I'll never know.

Japanese Restaurant Goku, Mohamed Sultan Road

Amongst any other things that Japanese Restaurant Goku (#01-02, 33 Mohamed Sultan Road, tel : +65 6735 4232) might be known for as an izakaya, they do motsunabe - offal hotpot. Something that supposedly helps enhance beauty because of the amount of collagen that comes with the broth.

But we didn't get that today. We went through a bunch of other dishes they had to offer which were also pretty good. 

There's Sapporo on tap and also a shandy of Sapporo with ginger ale. Food as expected of such establishments goes well with the drinks they serve.

Such as the mentaiko which the menu claims is grilled. That would make it a mentaiko yaki as opposed to one that was aburi-ed which the receipt printed. I'm pretty sure it was just torched rather than grilled. But importantly, it was tasty with that fish spicy salty flavour. Those slices in between looked and tasted like daikon but the texture was quite different.

We had gyutan on hotplate that came with a pile of negi.

The slices of cow tongue were thick and full of chewiness. Chewing brought out the flavours. Lemon had also been squeezed into the dish to effect. We swapped the positions of the negi and the gyutan so that the negi would soften on the hotplate.

The menu described this dish as lady's finger with pork. The picture featured cubed tofu as well. The actual dish also included also bean sprouts and bonito. Those tofu were in little bits rather than cubed. This tasted Okinawan if you catch my drift.

Had oyster soup that was served in a claypot.

Those oysters were large and fleshy and tasty. Broth was oyster-ly and sweet. I was initially worried about the shreds of ginger in the them but it turned out that I barely detected it.

Behold their minced wagyu katsu. The flavour from these fried patties were great. Contrary to appearances, these fried patties were pretty moist on the inside, shelled with a nice crisp on the exterior.

We went with an order of their motsu cabbage. Offal stir fried with cabbage. Again, great flavours that came from a variety of ingredients. There was the beef flavour from the chunks of fat, sweetness from the cabbage and a nice sweet and spicy from the sauce that they used for the stir fry that included tiny slices of dried chilli. That, some sesame seeds and chopped spring onions. Great dish with rice.

Yup, tamago kake gohan there.

And shirasu gohan as well.

Mixed with seaweed and chopped spring onions. Comforting deliciousness with a splash of shoyu, the lemony negi from the gyutan or the sauce from the motsu cabbage. I couldn't not finish this.