At Newton Food Centre after all these years

I haven't eaten at Newton (500 Clemenceau Ave North) for a really long time. The last time was duck macaroni from Kwee Heng. It's been that long. And I felt like a tourist. 😂

As I browsed this unfamiliar grounds, I wondered which were the stalls that ripped off tourist and chalked up the bad rep in past. 😂

Hokkien mee from Newton Old Signboard 25 (#01-25) was not bad. I like their creamy and robust crustacean stock for the noodles. Not to mention as well their delicious spicy sambal. Might try the clam or oyster version the next time.

Okay-ish black radish cake from Heng (#01-28). Oysters from the oyster omelette were plump and metallic tasting.

Tried the sambal petai from Alliance Seafoood 27 (#01-27). Their rendition has squid and ikan bilis. The petai tasty fume-y. 😂 Like they were emitting gas as we ate them. There were some crunchy bits in the dish which I thought might be crushed peanuts though I cannot be certain. Wouldn't say this was bad tasting but I'm not a fan. That is probably because I've been biased by/used to/spoilt by the no nonsense rendition with just petai and minced pork at Sin Hoi Sai. No fillers like onions to bulk up the plating and mess with the savouriness.

Their weak looking fried rice with the despised red floury goo was actually pretty delicious. Not because of the red floury goo. What's the red floury goo? Old school yang zhou fried rice used bits of char siew. Evolution and lack of pride reduced the char siew component to crab sticks. These red floury goo were even further down that evolution, replacing crab sticks. A replacement of the replacement. A devolution of a devolution.

More eating at Hajah Maimunah @ Jalan Pisang

Was looking forward to this lunch back at the flagship of Hajah Maimunah. Will just be pointing out a few of the notables.

Rice with rawon gravy and serunding. Gravy was a lot less intense than I imagined for something that has buah keluak as part of the ingredients but the serunding compensated with its spicy sweetness. One thing that's definitely not lacking from the food here is flavour.

The stingray here was not as good eating as the one we had at their branch at Clementi. It's not bad by any stretch. Meat's stiffer than what I had expected.

Paru belado was outstanding. Believe it or not, the first thought that came to mind was tenderloin.

Pacuk paku masak lemak - fiddlehead ferns in a coconut rich spicy gravy.

The gravy for their tahu telur seemed different...unless I remembered wrongly. I was anticipating something like kecap manis but this was more like rojak sauce with the belanchan in it. Love it though. Tofu was crispy on the outside and wobbly tender on the inside.

Our first pengat pisang....a sweet coconut soup with sweet potatoes and bananas that were on the verge on disintegrating in it. The tanginess from the bananas had seeped into the soup. Damn this was good.

I'm not sure if these were kueh salat or if there's another name for them. The one with the white bottom layer is made with sago and coconut and the other was pulut hitam. Nice.

More food from Tsui Wah (翠華)

Late-ish dinner at Tsui Wah at Clark Quay Central. I think I've figured out why I find their borscht appealing. Must be the sugar.

Got one of their sizzling plate with grilled king prawn and chicken steak. Mostly because I remember wanting to come back for their chicken. Pretty surprised by the size of that king prawn. Not bad. 👍🏼

Hot Ovaltine. Tasted a little thin. I like their Horlicks better.

Was curious about their salted egg lava French toast.

Decent. Salted egg didn't seem to taste like those in liu sha bao.

One week + later......

Breakfast. They've a few breakfast sets plus a bunch of stuff from the a la carte section. 茶走 and 啡走 were defaulted with light sweetness.

One of the sets included minced pork & century egg porridge with noodles. The latter wasn't the stir fried chow meen like I imagined. These were like noodles from wanton mee.

Continental breakfast was pan fried salmon in a lemon butter sauce, scrambled eggs (barely discernible salt and no butter), some nicely buttered buns and chilled coleslaw. Decent tasting plate. Wished they would do salmon rare/medium rare on the inside but that'll probably be asking for too much out of them.

I like the egg tarts from Tai Cheong and Tong Heng better. Mostly because of the egg custard which I feel is better than the ones here.

Momolato, North Bridge Road

Came across Momolato (723 North Bridge Road) while seeking sanctuary from the sweltering heat. 😂

This was called Shotgun. Iced coffee with kunafa.

I'm actually not sure if it's just iced coffee because the texture's frappe and it tasted like it might have been coffee ice cream than iced coffee. Decent coffee strength. More pistachio flavour than I imagined from the kunafa.

Aburi cheese katsu from Tonkatsu by Ma Maison

Tonkatsu by Ma Maison has limited aburi cheese katsu. Rosu with Camembert and cheddar.

Nice melty cheese both on and inside the katsu. Pretty rich tasting and delicious. Nice with mustard.

Beyond The Dough, Arab Street

Gemini has a pretty concise summary about Beyond The Dough (150 Arab Street, tel : +65 8679 1788). Tokyo-Neapolitan known for its 30-hour fermented dough and wood-fired pizzas run by Eddie Murakami that was formerly trained at Tokyo's award-winning pizzerias. Imported Japanese flour and Okinawan salt, baked in a 500-degree oven for a crisp, chewy crust and I think the picture is kinda formed.

Came across a summary from a trash publication claiming that it's been touted by many as one of Singapore's best pizza restaurants. Really? Who? How many? Based on what kind of evidence or study or fabrication? End of rhetorics.

I also heard it's not easy to get a table.

Maybe it's less difficult these days or perhaps, we just got lucky.

One of these was Tokyo Beyond's Squash which was described as Japanese citrus shikuwasa and soda and the other's Urban Chill which was Taiwanese jasmine tea with crush pine and soda. I don't know which was which 😂 but if I had to guess the former's green and the latter's orange.🤔

Pork meatball slow cooked in tomato sauce.

Sauce was unexpectedly not very tomato-y. Maybe no tomato puree. Meatballs were pretty tender. Not bad tasting but I wouldn't get them again.

This was Not Your Ordinary Fried Chicken. Name of the fried chicken described itself. Nice crisp with really moist interior, gentle with the rosemary and adequately salted for flavour in all its tenderness. Not karaage here. I liked this one.

Tried a signature called Singapore Rampage. Topped with a house made tomato sauce which they claim uses over a 100 prawns. I don't even know what that means with no context on the quantities, but it's a sauce that's gentle with the prawniness. My thoughts on this was that it's not bad but Casa Vostra has sometime similar and less expensive.

Smoked Margherita which featured smoked mozzarella. Nice pizza (burnt parts aside) with good tasting ingredients and lovely crust. But I had to try, just to even discern the really gentle smokiness. First and last here.

Tiramisu's not bad. Savoiardi's nicely soaked too.