Mamma Lucia, Robertson Walk

Churrascaria has been around for some years now. Besides the term 'grilled meat buffet', there isn't much more one can do to describe them. I'm saying that because it gives me the excuse to write less and just put up pictures which describe better. Mamma Lucia (Robertson Walk #01-03/04/07) actually exists as 2 separate restaurants. One of which does Italian food and the other, Brazilian which serves only churrascaria. For $38++, one can pig out from their selection of grilled meats which includes also some seafood and fruits. That and also a small salad/tapas bar to help yourself to. What I didn't like was that they didn't serve ice water. We were cornered into buying drinks since all of the meats were pretty salted.

Food was still good though. Hot meat sizzling off the spit onto the plate doesn't come by that very often.

Shinryoku Yakitori Restaurant, Purvis Street

This was a spot which I have passed by numerous times when I'm about Purvis Street. Occasionally I've even peeked through the glass out of curiosity to see what they were about. Unsuccessfully. A suggestion from a friend landed me a dinner spot on this yakitori place which was actually not too bad at all. Of course it's not in the same leagues as Kazu or Kushigin. Not in terms of both quality and quantity or even options options. But this was much more affordable too. The buffet option for dinner runs at $48++ for an all you can eat izakaya styled from the menu which includes sashimi, charcoal grills, salads and tempura.

Service can be excruciatingly spotty when the crowd picks up. I do mean seriously slow. And there's no iced water to be had!

maguro and hamachi sashimi

fried cod

crispy pork

grilled chicken hearts

tempura prawns

pan fried beef

quail eggs

smoked duck

golden mushroom wrapped in pork belly

salmon and swordfish sashimi

grilled squid

battered fried mint wrapped oysters

more beef

prawn wrapped in pork belly
duh!

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Another Sunday lunch at Café Iguana ( 2 eggs??)

I'll stop writing about this place after this one since it comprises of most of the Mexican category. It's pretty obvious that I haven't tried much of elsewhere. I thought that it's strange that this huevos verdes which was essentially, pretty much the same thing as their green chile stew with additional two eggs on the top, is only served on the weekends up to 4pm. What's the deal with the two eggs that cannot be made anytime after that?

Papa de Lamb de Clarity

I remain impressed sufficiently by the pasta at Miss Clarity (this visit at the new outlet, Yew Lian Park, 205 Upper Thomson Road (S)574345) to seem to always order something from that section of the menu up to this point and apart from their risotto, I've never actually eaten anything else here despite a few visits. This is not the best pasta in town (or out of) but it's quite well done because the chefs apparently understand al dente. I did think that there could be room for abit more improvement in that area, but it seems that consistency can be a double edged sword in this case. That consistency has kept them at the same standards.

This Papa de Lamb is a non complex slow braised lamb in tomato concassé tossed with parpadelle. I like parpadelle because like tagliatelle, reminds me of mee pok. The former is just the thicker and larger version. The importance of being al dente for these large pasta strips is because, you wouldn't want them to taste like thick wanton skins. Firmness and bite to me is something that pasta should preserve after being prepared. The tomato concassé reminds me of arrabiata, meaning that it's also mildly spicy. I'm not too sure of how the braise is done for the lamb, but it appears to be dry on the surface and a little harder than what I expect of the usual braised meats. My only gripe with this pasta, is the portions. It could really do with larger portions. Seriously.

On a side note, the escargots (garlic and chilli oil where all I could taste of the seasoning) here are pretty tasty and inexpensive.

Australian Ribeye from Botak Jones

It's been a while since the US beef option has been put up at Botak Jones. I'm still not that sure I'll be willing to pay their prices considering that there's nothing remarkable about the quality of their steaks. So here's an 400g Australian beef ribeye. In retrospect, there's not too much to complain for the price since it was probably one of the best priced, if not indeed the cheapest steak to be had at that weight for $27. Those guys cooking did put in some effort at trying to get medium rare. Knowing that in life one tends to get what one pays for; allow me a little criticism. The texture of the meat was stringy (also fibrous near the fat) and the consistency of the doneness was a little lacking. Despite saying that it was a valid effort, I don't think that was the medium rare that I'd be happy with if it were an expensive cut of meat. Still, if you're in for big meat at affordable price, the Australian ribeye here works.

Persepolis, Prinsep Place

Chew on this for a bit. 'Persepolis' is the Greek interpretation of the ancient capital of Persia which many of us know of today as Iran and this place serves Italian food. Are we getting confused yet? Persepolis (46A Prinsep Street, #01-01) also happens to be located along Prinsep Place just next door to a better known Trattoria Lafiandra. Despite claiming to be an Italian restaurant and bearing those national colours of Italy, there was a section of the menu which has Persian cuisine. And shishar too! There was also a finger food section which looked like fried frozen food that one can buy from the supermarket. That's how bad those looked.

The kebab koobideh at this place bore some similarity with the one from Banoo. For $15.00, it was a bit more expensive too. Banoo had a better version of this dish. For a start, the meat here was dangerously close to being an unidentifiable meat substances. The saffron flavouring was lighter than I was hoping for and the butter was actually buried in the rice. I didn't have anything against the butter being in the rice, but I thought more butter would have been great. Rice was pretty good though. I noticed that most of the people seem to be here for drinks and snacks rather than actual food.