Lucha Loco, Duxton Hill

Nice! I'm really glad to see more joints doing "the more" of Mexican food in the country than the tired stereotyped items and these were delicious. Right here at this bar/taqueria call Lucha Loco (15 Duxton Hill, tel : +65 6226 3938) in the first unit at Duxton Hill.

First up were grilled corn on sticks known as elote. These were nice. Juicy, on the cob and subsequently greased in mayo and coated in crumbled Cojita cheese with a sprinkle of chilli powder, this was a bag of flavours that were altogether savoury, sweet, spicy and tart (from the squeeze of lime).

Then a taco with beef briskets and chorizo, packed with flavour and cooled by the diced onions and the squeeze lime on the side. Very tasty in a savoury, spicy and smoky manner at the same time. I'd order these again in a heartbeat.

There was quesadilla with cheese and Huitlacoche. Those corn smut certainly didn't taste like those I had previously and the quesadilla was by far the least exciting tasting item. With all the flavours going around in the other orders, this was almost bland. 

Following up was a taco with pork belly and a stick of what tasted like turnip. Meat was rather tender, but not to the degree that disintegrates in the mouth. Flavours were pretty Asian, like caramelized dark soy sauce and sugar. Pretty tasty but I think this doesn't hold up against the brisket and chorizo one.

A side of baked black beans that showcased the aroma of spices in a heat packed dish. I like this.

We ended with some sweet and nutty blue cornmeal cakes. The texture of the cake was coarse, a little crumbly and gritty at the same time. Other than loads of corn, there seems to be some grainy bits which might be semolina or quinoa in them. Lightly drenched in agave nectar and Mezcal cream on the side.

Some sandwiches from Bergs Gourmet Burgers

The original plan was to lunch at Smoke Shack which has very recently, relocated to Far East Square. But we were one day too early from the actual opening and ended up checking out Bergs (1 Amoy Street) instead.

While I liked what they did with the sauteed onions, mushroom and peppers for the steak sandwich, the beef with the beef was that it was well cooked and a little tough for how thick they had sliced the meat. The lamb burger had a patty that tasted like it was full of seeds, herbs and paprika that really detracted from the natural flavour of the meat. Which was disappointing since the rest of the sandwich from the freshly sliced red onions and even beetroot was doing good.

I think for what these guys are charging, one certainly can get much better value in the vicinity at Sarnies.

Menya Sanji, Orchid Hotel

The number of ramen joints that have mushroomed in this island have started to becoming bewildering. Thankfully, my interest in them lies mainly within those of tonkotsu base and hiyashi chuka - which limits the ramen-ya that pique my interest.

Kagoshima's Menya Sanji (1 Tras Link, #01-14 Orchid Hotel, tel : +65 6604 8891) is located conveniently in the central Tanjong Pagar district not a minute's walk from Keisuke's Tonkotsu King. Kagoshima which is the capital of the Kagoshima Prefecture sits in Kyushu, southwestern edge. The ramen style is hence understandably similar to Hakata styled ramen. But not the same. I'm not an expert on these, but the noticeable difference was a less heavy hand in the salt and oil along with noodles that aren't thin and wiry.

The broth was creamy and rich and as mentioned, much less salty. I was about to make the analogy between this and the Kyushu style ramen with decaf coffee and regular coffee, but I guess that wouldn't be quite accurate. I'd eat this again if opportunity presented, but I probably wouldn't drink decaf. The eggs were in the hue of aged ivory but the flavour was somewhat absent. The other obvious thing was that charshu wasn't the soft variety. It was meaty and with much more bite.

Otowa, Orchard Plaza

This was one hole in the wall joint where one dines from the fires of a yakitori god. Hahaha....ok, dramatics aside, Otowa (150 Orchard Road, #03-16 Orchard Plaza, tel : +65 6733 5989) wasn't a full fledged kushiyaki in my opinion since most of the things that went into the grill were just chicken and chicken parts. But man, those were really good.

The place was pretty small. 12 seats they have and it's all at the counter, which was good since one can see the kitchen at work. A kitchen which just consisted of a Japanese yakitori master and a dish washing lady. Most of the items on grill came in shio or tare options.

We were served some otoshi of chilled grated yam and greens in a dashi.

Amongst the starters they offered, was a julienned pig stomach with a sweet and spicy chilli sauce. Enjoyed this but portions were really puny.

Because we were pretty much sitting near the grill station, we could observe all the flame kissed food at work. These sticks of chicken with leeks were very well done. There was what we felt to be a well balanced char aroma that encapsulated the pieces of tender juicy chicken. I kid you not and I repeat, tender juicy chicken. The leeks were also aromatized from the charcoal grill and were filled with their natural sweetness. We had seconds.

Chicken livers were very good too. The texture was creamy and the shio option allowed the livery flavour to shine.

The tsukune were something that came recommended and seemed also to be well received. It had a nice crusty surface that revealed juicy and fatty minced meat which had a likeable gritty texture that generally meant that cartilage might have been involved. We had seconds

If you had been wasting enough time on this site to detect my eating patterns, hatsus are another favourite of mine. These tasty morsels were adequately salted, tender yet chewy at the same time. A little more char would have been nice but I'm not complaining.

At the point of being worked on in the flames, the kawa was creating a small fog of smoke at the grill when the oils were dripping into the coals. Afterwards, they came up crispy on the edges and lightly chewy in the middles. Redolent in the chicken-y flavours. And some fatty chicken-y oils if I might add.

A kawa-iiee close up. Lol.

They had foie gras too. It was quite nice, and had a well engineered crust. I totally understand that it sounds weird to use such word to describe the crusty charred exterior of fatty duck liver but the crust looked and even tasted so well made that it felt fabricated.

But it is apparently not what I consider to be a forte in this joint. This was a little too well cooked and Kazu still takes the lead with Sansui's unusually uncharred rendition as a very close runner up.

Following that was their tebasaki. Tasty little wings with crispy skins. These wings were a little small.

We ordered grilled eringi mushrooms as well. I liked them too.

We ended with a Korean styled porridge which was a spicy broth of rice with egg drop and bits of sliced mushroom. This was pretty comforting.

The porridge was suppose to be the last item, but as we were getting the bill we realised that they hadn't served us the grilled quail eggs yet. Both the bill and the eggs came together. The latter came with a spicy miso paste and the former, without. 

I had been thinking that these might have been dried out from the grill, but my respect goes out to the master that creates grill marked eggs that actually had creamy textured yolk!

score cup at Otowa

To answer your question D, no...... this will not be the Kazu killer. This joint is primarily a chicken specialist and they do chickens really well. Kazu has the advantage of a much wider variety of options. But, it's another option that we have for good quality yakitori.

Handlebar, Jalan Mempurong

Paris Baguette, Wisma Atria

We stumbled upon this place (435 Orchard Road, #02-48/53 Wisma Atria, tel : +65 6836 2010) a couple of weeks back after not having stepped into the mall for ages and made a mental note to come back early on another day after seeing the crowd.

Trust the Koreans to be the ones that have set up a French styled bakery/cafe that got me interested. From what I had heard from a friend who had been to Korea, this place is as common as how often one encounters McDonald's here. Which is to say that there's one outlet in every couple of blocks and not surprisingly, they're less expensive over there.

What pushed the comfort buttons for me from this bakery included stuff like a sweet bacon roll stuffed with chopped boiled eggs, a wrap containing a fatty sausage cushioned by a bolognese-esque minced beef and mustard, pricey and ridiculously addictive charred cheese sticks and even a bulgogi sandwich that featured a sweet braised meat piled inside a bed of textures consisting of fresh vegetables in a soft and heavy milk bun. And then, BLTs with walnut cream cheese and sweet relish, a smokey aburi-ed seafood chowder in a super chewy bread bowl and even a brunch plate of sliced chorizos and scrambled eggs on brioche.

I haven't even begun on their snackingly delicious calzones yet.