PaPi, 5 Mohamed Sultan Road

PaPi, from what I've read stands for Pasta and Pizza. Located at 5 Mohammad Sultan Road. The restaurant is easily visible from the main River Valley Road. It's located in between Banoo and Patissier. Like Garibaldi, they're one of those shop house restaurants that provides valet parking for their customers. The place was about half filled tonight. Service was very attentive service despite the small crowd in the restaurant.

The menu looked rather ordinary. A mundane bunch of standard Italian pasta and pizza offerings. No real complains on the quality of the food but the portions were a little dainty. What made eating here a positive experience was that the food is freshly made, done with efficiency and of course, the good service. Their pizza had a thin crust which was great while it was hot. But that crust got soggy quickly. Pasta tasted very decent from what I tried.  The Tagliolini with shrimp and it's bisque "Papi" was appetising because of the semi spicy sauce which I thought was exceptional.

Dinner began with shared antipasti followed by the pastas and pizza. And a foccacia that tasted like corn bread.

"Vitello tonnato" Classic roasted thinly sliced veal served with tuna fish and caper sauce.

Grilled mix vegetables "Verdure" with sliced smoke scamorza cheese

The Vitello tonnato's tuna flavour drowned out the veal. I'm not sure if that's how it's suppose to work. Their grilled vegetables were decent, but the scamorza cheese that came with them appeared in ultra thin slices and only two slices at that. I had expected more of the cheese.

"Nero di Seppia" Tagliatelle with fresh squid ink sauce

"Papi" Tagliolini with shrimp and its own bisque

"Frutti di Mare" with basil pesto and mixed seafood

"Papi" with fresh tomato sauce, egg and truffle puree

Everything about the pasta and pizza here was quite nice. I wished that they could be more generous with the seafood in the Frutti di Mare which I thought was miserable. It looked almost like token decoration.

Liquid had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb...

This was an unplanned for dinner at Banoo with my old friend Eddie. With the memory of the tasty kebab koobideh still fresh from the prior visit, I decided to bring Ed down to check out more of the Persian food that this place served. Early dinner it was, we were the first 2 customers to step in at 6 in the evening with no one else yet in sight.

Kashk-e Baademjaan

The Kashk-e Baademjaan was a dish of roasted eggplant with fried onions, mashed together with mint and yoghurt sauce. It was served hot. Banoo's rendition of the minted eggplant mash came finely ground. The imagination of machines crushing these crossed my mind then. It tasted fine but as an appetizer, it didn't come across as appetising much. Beat their Naan-o-Paneer-0-Sabzi which I thought was too fresh and raw.

Kuftah

This curious giant meatball was the Kuftah and was not on the menu. It was introduced by the waiter and I remember having seen it in D's visit. I like meat so there wasn't a question to do or not. The Kuftah came with a broth like a spicy tomato curry which was great pairing with the butter rice of their kebab koobideh. The minced lamb ball had rice fillers which was different from the one that D had which was described to have potato filler. I thought this ball tasted pretty good. It was also large and pretty filling.

Double butter Kebab Koobideh

We couldn't not do their kebab koobideh. Today, I asked for an extra butter. This dish does come with the option for flat bread instead of rice as well. I personally thought that the rice was so damn good so I had the rice again. It was even better when it got buttered up. For $15.50, one gets a generously portioned and delicious meal of grilled mince lamb kebab with fragrant basmati rice. Sounds like an expensive nasi bryani? This was better than many nasi bryani out there.

Today's dinner came with a unexpected surprise. The proprietress of the restaurant brought over a dessert and mentioned that it was on the house. Wow, that was certainly a nice gesture. That dessert was by the way, the Sholeh-Zard which was made of rice, sugar, saffron and rosewater with cinnamon and almond bits. Something I had noticed from the previous visit but didn't get to try. It tasted like chilled jellied sago with rose and it was actually very good. The two of us, as stuffed as we were from the food still managed to finish it.

Miss Clarity Cafe, Purvis Street

We've been past this place on numerous occasions at Purvis Street, but have never walked in. Did stop once to look at their menu but there hadn't been any compelling force to step into the place. Now that I've finally done so, I've to admit that they do make a pretty decent risotto and bread pudding. With no disparagement intended, the interior of Miss Clarity Cafe was flushed with bright and cheerful hues of pinks and oranges and yellows and other shiny happy colours. It made me feel that everything is plastic...lol.

Red wine risotto with pan seared scallop

This almost looked like it came from across the road at Garibaldi. Almost there. The red wine risotto with pan seared scallop was pretty damn tasty. Something I could see myself coming back for. Liked the risotto pronounced creamy red wine flavour is laced with some something spicy I couldn't identify. It looked like porridge and tasted good.

Risotto Venere with steamed seabass and vegetable cream

The Risotto Venere with steamed seabass and vegetable cream trailed a distant second in comparison with the previous. This was cooked with the same black rice as bubor hitam so I was half expecting it to be sweet. It's wasn't. It tasted creamy and flat. Without any unique identifying flavour. Was also a little put off by the fact that the fish had scales and bones. That fish was also boring.

Theur bread pudding was another hit. I don't eat bread pudding much. Mostly because they often cold, too soggy or too sweet. This one was served hot, firm and not overly sweetened. It was delicious. Something to be enjoyed while it's still fresh off the kitchen.

Xanderscopicqued

Dropped in at Basil Alcove for lunch. It's been over a month since my last visit and I was curious about what's abrew in this new place which I've realised, has received quite abit of cyberpress. Sunday Times did an article on it, so seemingly, news does travel fast in this small country. Especially if it's about food. Here's a couple of glances at what new storm the place has been whipping up in the new menu. The duck, the mackerel, the bratwurst and the ribs. I noticed that the presentation has improved.

The duck...

The mackerel...

The bratwurst...

The ribs...

The prices have been upped a little, but really, it's still within the realm of what I would consider very affordable. I'm not going to pinpoint any specifics since the cost of eating at this restaurant really speaks for itself. I just wished that the ribs had meat which I could easily strip off the bone with my fork.

St. Norman's Ham, Egg and Cheese Garlic pain grillé

Mmmmm.........breakfast by Norman.

That's essentially toast with eggs (now with pepper), ham and sliced cheese on toast with garlic spread and butter.

Les Bouchons, 7 Ann Siang Road

If you're a meat loving carnivore/omnivore who has bouts of craving for meat of the bovine kind, this is a heads up to read on. Les Bouchons is a small French restaurant located along the ground floor of a bunch of shophouses down at 7 Ann Siang Road. The restaurant was decorated with French posters of cigarette advertisements, old theater plays, booze and unrecognizable whathaveyous on the walls - painting a cozy, French-y and warm ambience. Akin to what one would generally romanticize of little street side bistros that one might find in France.

The menu of this place appeared to be curated with the majority of the offerings being grilled meat. The dinner tonight was focused on a specialty of the restaurant known as côte de boeuf, a kilogram slab of prime rib for two. Gash your teeth and keep your pants on. Although the price of the beef was stated at $37/per, that beef platter serves two. And multiples of two. The meat was pre-portioned.

The restaurant provides free flow of small hard loaves. Regular tasting bread and wasn't heated up. Made decent munching with butter while waiting for the food though.  The appetizers we had were the Burgandy escargots with garlic butter and the Terrine "Maison".

Burgandy Escargots with Garlic Butter

Terrine "Maison"

The escargots could do better with more garlic butter. Apart from that, the snails were scalding hot and tasted quite decent. I found their terrine much more interesting. Wonderful infusion of peppercorn with a coarse finish which tasted good by itself or with bread.

On to the dinner highlight.....the côte de boeuf.

It tasted as good as it looked. The meat was a little dry. However the rich beefy flavour were sealed in the meat and I think it appealed to the primeval red meat cravings that I have sometimes. I'm sure there's a whole lot of you out there that share the same sentiments regarding beef so if you're thinking to let loose some of that beastly urge for large quantities of medium rare beef, you'll know where to look.

Orders of their beef came with a basket of fries and a salad each. For this case of the côte de boeuf, it's two portions of the chilled salad.

Le Bouchons doesn't have much of desserts. Apart from ice cream, the only others were a rather nice creme brulee with Grand Marnier and the Ile Flottante. The creme brulee here was pretty good and there's enough Grand Marnier in the dessert to be identifiable but not overpowering. One of the uncommon renditions which I thought was not bad.

Ile Flottante means floating island? My French is 10 years rusty and the translation was the courtesy of Babelfish. It's a soft meringue topped with almonds and drizzled with caramel, floating on a milky erm...sauce? The meringue was firm yet easily disintegrated in the mouth. Not bad.