A couple of favorites from Din Tai Fung (鼎泰豐)

These above are known as xiao cai on the menu of Din Tai Fung. It's a bunch of julienned stuff and a bunch of other stuff that's not actually julienned, but looks that way too. There's seaweed and beansprouts, strips of bean curd with rice vermicelli that results in a medley of textures in the mouth. The flavours were savoury, a little spicy and a bunch of sour. And it's been so addictive that we've had them almost every single visit since.

And then there's their truffle xiao long bao. I may not be an expert in them, but I daresay that the ones here are consistently the best in this country. A two hit combo of a noticeably robust aroma of the truffle in the soup followed by the flavour of pork. Keep in mind that I'm rating these as the best because of the truffle flavour over something else like the ones from Paradise Dynasty which had a porkier punch, but suffered very poorly from the inexcusable lack of aroma from the truffle.

These two alone could keep me coming back. Or at least until I get a shot at their truffle chicken soup which I always seem to miss.

Chinese lamb skewers in Balestier

I've been having a bout of craving for some lamb skewers lately since the last time in Hong Kong. Coincidentally, a buddy of mine happened to have stumbled upon one in Balestier Road a while back and we ended up there one evening.

There're no addresses on this post because I forgot to ask for a business card but the place was a Chinese restaurant that strangely has Korean characters on their signboard and also serves a selection of Korean food. Hmmm, it's a few units away from the Loy Kee Chicken Rice place.

This was pretty good. In fact, much better tasting than the one I had previously. The flavours from the spices were bold and fortunately didn't mask too much of the natural flavour of the lamb. For a dollar per skewer, it wasn't tough on the pockets too. We managed a small wok of spicy beef tendon and potatoes along with spicy bean curd strips in chilli/sesame oil and we thought that it was honestly pretty good. I'm going to head back here again another time.

Edit 19/04/2013 :
The name of the place is Jia Yan Restaurant. Address is 336 Balestier Road.

Yu sheng noodles at Wei Ji Noodle House

The idea behind having sliced raw fish and noodles is ingenious. I'm not sure if there are other people who're doing this, but this one from Wei Ji (335 Smith Street, #02-35 Chinatown Complex Market) was pretty damned good. Egg noodles and shredded lettuce for texture tossed in a light soy sauce, sesame oil and a squeeze of lime with sliced wolf herring. This was refreshing and light as a salad.

Tamoya Udon, Liang Court

This is apparently another one of those first of overseas outlet (177 River Valley Road, #01-32 Liang Court, tel : +65 6337 0301) of a Japanese chain; specializing in udon and coming from the Kagawa Prefecture. I used to avoid these thick chewy noodles for some reason, but have gotten to appreciate them in the recent years after some good experiences. Tamoya is yet another positive turn and I certainly liked what I had.

Which was a beef bukkake udon. One could snigger at the thought process of initiated men who has to vocalize the order. I was surprised, in a positive manner that is, by how sweet and savory the flavor of the broth. The trinity of dashi, mirin and shoyu perhaps? The udon was chewy and the slices of beef were definitively beefy. To soak up all that broth was also addons of tempura and kushiage options that one could choose along the order line. Of these, were just a focused selection that were pretty decent.

Will return for more.

Update 13/04/2013 :

This wasn't planned, but I had come back much faster than I expected. Here's a quick dinner of the kama-tama udon - basically a bowl that came with a raw egg and a shoyu broth on the side. It wasn't as rich as I had hoped, but I guess it did the job. If anyone is wondering about their tempura, I recommend the sweet potato.

Ythu Wendy Authentic Vietnamese Cuisine, Food Opera @ ION Orchard

Believe it or not, this was the third or fourth time this year I've been ordering the chicken chop rice from this stall (Stall #5 Food Opera, Basement 4). It all started off with running out of ideas on what to eat in a place filled with food. So I gave them a try and subsequently, their lemongrass and orange marinated chicken that was oven grilled got me hooked. I'm not sure why even though it was a mediocre grill. Maybe it's the whole thing with the marinade, the fish sauce and chilli on the side and the appetizing mango salad with a breath of basil and mint with the crunch of toasted peanuts.

The simplicity of it all resonated with what street food really was. Albeit it was all at premium food court prices. This will not be my last visit.

Le Bistrot Du Sommelier, Armenian Street

I've been wanting to visit this place (53 Armenian Street, tel : +65 6333 1982) for quite a while. To be a little more accurate, it was since the time they've opened up at Prinsep Street. Never happened until now. The current location is at the space where Fi53fty Three used to be.

We were aware that Le Bistrot du Sommelier was known for their house made charcuterie, so we ordered up a bunch to taste what they had to offer. Namely their duck rillette, pig tongue terrine, chicken liver pâté with port wine and a current off the menu special of pig sausage with pistachio baked in a brioche.

Believe me when I say that every bit of the greens helped there. The food was rich from the fat meaty flavours and salt that the sour from the gherkins help cut all the richness that was building up from every bite. Every delicious bite that is. Their brioche was altogether buttery, dry and crumbly, but I thought that had worked pretty well with their fatty pistachio and pork sausage for textures.

All that meat was further bolstered by a serving of oven roasted Mangalica pork chop served with a gratin of pig trotter and macaroni. The exterior of the pork chop was caramelised lightly which added smokiness to the moist interior along with a light hit of rosemary. The gratin had unfortunately (or maybe fortunately at this point) contained little of the meat from the pig trotters.

This was definitely one heavy meal. Thankfully there was wine as well.

As stuffed as we were, we managed a dessert of profiteroles. I like this. The choux pastry was crisp and light. Will come back again for other stuff.