Re-revisiting Jeong's Jjajang

I've been wanting to come back for this stir fried jjampong from Jeong's Jjajang. It surprisingly packed little heat compared to their regular jjampong and was also less smoky. Wasn't bad tasting but I was imagining/anticipating/looking forward to more smokiness and burn from it. Squids were pretty chewy.

Josh's Grill, 313 Somerset

We've eaten at Josh's Grill once at Bugis a few years back. Food was decidedly decent. This was our first time at their 313 branch (#B2-15 to 19, 313@Somerset, 313 Orchard Road, tel : +65 6235 0594). Menu seemed a little different from the last time.

There's butter beer - tasted like root beer with melted vanilla ice cream. Non-alcoholic if anyone was seriously wondering.

Tomato soup's not bad. Texture was velvety creaminess and flavour's tangy from the tomatoes. I kinda enjoyed it.

Nice tasting oysters with garlic butter. My only gripe was that these were pretty puny. I could fit 3 of them in my mouth.

Something called cheesy melts fried chicken cutlet - basically fried chicken cutlet with melted cheese. Said cheese was brought out separately in a cast iron pan still bubbling and poured over the fried chicken when they served it. Nice.

Josh's Grill has a series of steaks in their menu under J's Steaks. 250g served on a hot plate with a lightly sizzling pool of what I initially thought was butter. Presumably, J is for Josh rather than the clown prince of crime. 🤡

That stuff bubbling on the plate didn't exactly taste like butter. Don't know what it was. Ribeye has low marbling so it's edible, not great. Meat seemed barely salted. What's not good was the creamed spinach. Those were really fibrous and chewy

Ma Maison, Anchorpoint

Some food from Ma Maison (#01-12 Anchorpoint, 370 Alexandra Road, tel : +65 6479 1670). These guys have been around for ages and have generally been pretty decent. They're also my first exposure to Japanese styled western food.

Onion gratin soup which was made with beef stock was not bad tasting. Sufficiently savoury and beefy plus pretty cheesy as well.

Their sirloin's generally not bad. I like that they get doneness correct and the crust that they give to the steak. This one has tamari sauce which was actually pretty good pairing with the meat. The only thing that they haven't quite gotten going well is the consistency of their meat. There's silverskin sometimes which can be a bummer. 

Yummy ikasumi omu rice. Creamy but not excessively because they didn't overdose with that cream sauce.

There's seafood and mushrooms about with squid ink rice in the omelette which was delicious. One can taste that squid ink flavour in it.

Love their chocolate strawberry shortcake too. These tasted better than their appearances belie. Pretty chocolate-y from the combination of the cream and sponge and the chocolate flavour's quite nice. Have mentioned liking them before.

Hai Kah Lang (海脚人), Funan

Hai Kah Lang from Malaysia has opened up at Funan in the spot that used to be occupied by Keisuke Plus (#01-15 Funan, 107 North Bridge Road, tel : +65 9003 4023).

Their Bamboo White Coffee's not bad tasting. Supposedly infused with bamboo salt which barely registered. 

Fried fish cake's great munching with their dip.

We like their prawn paste sliced fish (虾酱炸鱼⽚). There's sufficient prawn paste flavour in the batter. That aside, the base flavour/texture of said batter was personally nostalgic for me.

Soup with milk and parrot fish and 干捞 wanton mee. Flavour from the broth was as fantastic as the one we had in JB. Love those dry chewy noodles.

Grouper with tom yam soup and rat tail noodles. That tom yam broth had a sweet seafood-y base which kinda caught me by surprise - in a pleasant way that is. Lou shi fun was delicious...I'm detected some flavourful oil but I couldn't put a finger to what it was.

We also got some of their coconut-y sea bird nest jelly drink that we liked from the last time. 

Sing Swee Kee (新瑞记), Seah Street

Sing Swee Kee (34-35 Seah Street, tel : +65 6337 7180) is part of the legacy of an old chicken rice institution, Swee Kee, that I'm not familiar with. It's kinda related to Swee Kee along the same road that was previously known as Sin Swee Kee.

Like that shop formerly known as Sin Swee Kee and other chicken rice shops like Boon Tong Kee or Chin Chin & YY Kafei Dian in the vicinity, they serve both chicken rice and zi char.

Their luo han guo longan drink was diluted. Note to self: never get it again.

They have an option for half poached and fried for their half chicken. Decent tasting chooks. I prefer the poached one over the roast/fried one.

There's chicken rice balls too. Something I haven't had since Good Year. Wow, it's been a decade since.

Not bad tasting. The balls were packed densely and well flavoured. This one falls into the category where it's good with or without the chilli. Chilli's not bad by the way. 

This dish was called Hainanese vegetable (海南杂菜). Which was essentially chap chye. Their rendition had fried pork lard and was flavoured with large dried shrimps. Taste was pretty good but I found the cabbage too crunchy. I like my chap chye tender.

Egg and tau kwa. The latter had chewy skin.

This was their chicken collagen broth with fish maw (胶原蛋白鱼漂上汤). The chicken meat inside was stringy and didn't feel like part of the soup. Fish maw's okay. The soup though, was nice.

Kopi c was not bad. Not bad meaning that I enjoyed it and will have no qualms ordering it again if I come back. Decently brewed Hainanese coffee here that wasn't excessively sweet or milky.

Kinmedai from Grilled Fish Keisuke

Back at Grilled Fish Keisuke for the kinmedai.

Kinda like how I imagined it to be with that firm flakiness that's a little prawny.

Quite a bit of bones to navigate though.

Last Christ-mas, I......

...we made some food. Mostly experimental without formal recipes. Like a ham we got from NTUC with a glaze made from a reduction of mulled wine spices & some Finnish honey (don't ask), cloves and jam. Turned out to be really good and was definitely less costly than ones we used to order from a place that sells ribs.

Onion and bacon soup.

These were highly experimental based off some recipe short in TikTok - eggwashed Vietnamese rice paper/bánh tráng with ham and cheese rolled into snails and oven baked. An alternate universe gỏi cuốn minus vegetables.

A second batch was made to include crab tomalley. 😬

Didn't make this obviously but the Vacherin Mont d'Or made it to table with breads and jams and honey. 👍🏼

Buttery baked mash with bacon and a awesome cheesy crust.

All these and bottles of mulled wine and durian.

Re-visiting Surry Hills Grocer @ Raffles City

Getting some food at Surrey Hills Grocer at Raffles City.

Farm styled mushroom soup's not great. We've had more mushroomy ones at this price point. The sweet potato foam felt gimmicky because it's there, we're not sure how they work together and the flavour wasn't sufficiently intense that it left an impression. It felt like it was there because they wanted to be different.

Their Lao Gan Ma chee cheong fun did not look like much.

Turned out to be awesome. Those Lao Gan Ma roasted chilli added plenty of flavour, not to mention a measure of umami heat, into the creaminess of the sauce. 👍🏼

Mussels were okay. Garlicky broth was pretty decent too. Fell short of memorable and that's what we were looking/hoping for.