Garibaldi, Purvis Street

Last time I was here, I mentioned desserts was a good start. So now I'm finally here for dinner. I think I was almost expecting to be wow-ed (as in totally blown away) by the food here after things that everyone had been saying about the place to me. But caught myself at the end asking how good could it get? Well, on hindsight I thought it was pretty good. This place is definitely worth a visit both for the food and for dates you want to take out to a nice place.

Garibaldi Italian Restaurant and Bar is located at 36 Purvis St. Purvis Street runs perpendicular along North Bridge Road just across from the current National Library near City Hall. The entrance of the restaurant is fronted by wooden framed glass sliding doors and an innocuous looking gentleman at the front who is the parking valet. The doorway leads directly into a little bar which also serves as a waiting area for people that are yet to be seated. Reservations are probably a must. Bar opens up on the left to the main dining area, and to the front, a private dining room.

This dinner  was not exactly the regular options for the most people. Meaning, the items weren't chosen off the menu. So it all started with this really nice toasted cheese foccacia with olive oil and followed by the best egg I've ever had. Seriously. And the most expensive too. I kid you not.


I do not know what was the name of this starter. Soft boiled eggs with white truffle shavings. I think there might have been some cheese inside too. "Best" is a term I usually reserve for something without the shadow of a doubt and that takes a lot of conviction to use. Lol. The could have been the best bloody egg I've ever had. Seriously, it must have been fungi magic involved here. And I'm at a loss as to how to describe the taste. You'll have to eat this to know how it tasted like and I was told by Roberto that after eating this, I will remember the flavour until the truffle season next year to come back for them again.

If I didn't recall wrongly, the general sequence for a traditional Italian dinner starts with pasta before the meats. Tonight they arrived together. A spaghetti pomodoro and a pan fried quail with mushrooms and foie gras.


The spaghetti was nicely done. That meant something as I don't usually like them in tomato based sauces. The quail on the other hand was a bit of a disappointment. Disappointment here meant it tasted like chicken chop. Lol. I'm positive that it's better prepared than a regular chicken chop and having foie gras with balsamic vinegar ups the ante. Still it reminds me of a well done chicken chop. The foie gras was a tad over cooked, but I'm not complaining since the other things on the plate were just chicken and button mushrooms.

I love that egg.

More....salad dinner @ home

This is slightly different from the previous. The only greens are the butterhead and zucchini. There is an addition of grated mozarella cheese the ring like things are some salmon fish cakes. There's no more ham or pineapple in this too.

Pineapple rice with chicken leg

There is a Delights Corner just beside the entrance to Carrefour at Suntec. At the section selling barbecued items, you can get this pineapple rice with a barbecued chicken thigh. The rice was a little bland but they do not make large portions and fresh batches of them are fried as needed. In the queue, chances of getting freshly fried rice is pretty good. Apart from being a little greasy, this was quite tasty. One can choose between black pepper and honey for the chicken. It's packed into a microwaveable paper box with a small side of achar (spicy picked vegetables) for $3.50.

Salad dinner @ home

Here're some looks at home made salad I had for dinner. Quite easily done. The main ingredients are regular, red and butterhead lettuce, tomatoes (sliced), pineapple (fresh ones, chopped), ham (sliced) and chicken (from Cold Storage, deboned and shredded). The only condiments in the mix are lemon juice and some Japanese sesame salad oil. Which is good enough for flavoring.

Lunch @ Jaan, Swissotêl The Stamford

This place probably looks a lot more prettier at night when the hours after dusk dims the details of the cheap looking walls and the not so posh looking decorations of the restaurant. It doesn't look bad in the day, it's just a lot more dull than I was led to believe from pictures I've seen. Jaan can be found at the 70th floor of Swissotêl The Stamford in the Equinox Complex. The restaurant looked like a small dining room that sits maybe about 40-50 (?). The entrance is connected to the elevator via a small passageway on the main landing of the complex and reservations I believe are necessary. The Murano "Wave" chandeliers in the restaurant are unique looking rows of glass lightings on the ceiling which are shaped remotely like....waves. In the day, it looks quite dull and cloudy but I suppose the attraction of them comes in the night when it is actually lit and when one is already and partially mesmerised by the scintillating skyhigh view of the city to notice the non-flattering details. 

Did lunch with fatpig. Equinox offers a 3 course lunch package at $35+++ (or was it $38?). Food was really good although it came in fine portions. If it were larger, I'd probably sink into lethargy and that's not good for a work day. Lol. The service was what I would describe as sculpted marble. Carefully shaped and doesn't emit warmth. If you're on a schedule or like your food to arrive fast, this isn't the place to be. I spent approximately 2 hours here.

We were served bread and water approximately 15 minutes or so after we've made our orders. I'm not sure what took so long but to venture a guess, it's probably to give time for the butter that is already placed on the table shortly after we've ordered to soften. Jaan serves a small variety of bread ranging from walnut loaves, wheat and honey ones, regular baguette and a pretty tasty and triangular sesame covered bread which was pretty fragrant and looked like a small Lembas bread. Feel free to ask for more to tide the waiting time because this place does leisurely lunch. The walnut loaf however was quite dry and tasted like reheated loaves instead of fresh ones.

Appetizer was a Pastilla of Confit Duck Leg with Sweet and Sour Raspberry Jus, followed by a petite sized main of ribeye with pink garlic crème and truffle parmesan rizoni.

Pastilla of Confit of Duck Leg

Ribeye

Pastilla as I've learnt recently is like fried poh piah. A pastry fried skin which wraps around minced meat fillings. The filling of minced confit of duck leg was delicious and juicy. The raspberry jus worked wonderfully with the dish and made it more appetizing. I wonder what that token handful of greens on the top really meant to the dish. A poorly conceived decoration or because vegetables are good for you. Because if it serves the latter purpose, we need to have more than that small handful.

Jaan did a very delicious ribeye. I have two gripes with it. Firstly, it is puny as a steak. Secondly, medium rare does not seem to be in order and I vaguely recall that the last time I had such an experience, it was in another French place. The doneness was more like medium. Despite that, it was rjuicy with a good beefy flavour. Against the recommendation of the server for Red Port jus, I picked pink garlic crème which I thought was a good choice. The truffle parmesan rizoni was nice. Me being a sucker for cheesy things. All in all, it was an enjoyable steak that should have been much bigger.

Dessert was a marinated pineapple in vanilla with dry figs, blood orange granité and tomato foam. I swear the foam tastes nothing like tomato. Doesn't even look remotely tomato-y to me. The combination of the figs, granité, foam and pineapples did make interesting textures in a mix of smooth and granular sensations padded with a foamy citrus feel. Not bad.

So lunch at Jaan is pretty good. A little hefty in prices for lunch, but enjoyable.

Dessert @ Garibaldi

This Italian eatery located along Purvis St. has been a landmark of sorts for Italian cuisine. I have unfortunately not had the opportunity to eat here, but doing desserts is I guess a good start. Lol.

Panna cotta

Tiramisu

I'm not generally big on panna cotta and have only had it in a couple of occasions in recent times, so I can't really talk much about it. I don't even know how an authentic one is suppose to taste like. Garibaldi's rendition of the dessert comes in a firm jelly like texture and a slight hint of what I thought to be citrus. The tiramisu here like tiramisu elsewhere stands on its own standards. The difference here is that it comes with a dark chocolate shell filled with more...dark chocolate. In liquid form. I had originally thought that the cream colored sauce to be just plain vanilla, but it tastes exactly like the panna cotta. The hollowed chocolate ball is again, dark chocolate, but is filled with Baileys. Which is a small but pleasant surprise.