Kaiware Japanese Restaurant, TripleOne Somerset

shiro maguro don

some pretty smooth seafood dumplings

gindara mentaikoyaki

I found out about this place (#02-15 TripleOne Somerset, 111 Somerset Road, tel : +65 6735 2345) from a tip off. The location was actually where Ikkousha used be in the same building. Would not have gotten my attention to if not for that fact that I had been informed that Peter Ho - formerly of Wasabi Tei and Chikuwa Tei, runs this joint. I never understood the reasons for his patterns of running restaurants and then leaving them. But I'm not here to understand his business model. I'm just visiting for a hit of nostalgia.

There's a shiro maguro don on menu here. They only response they could give to my inquiry was oil fish but I'm pretty convinced it's escolar. So proceed to eat with caution and responsibility. The bone white slices of the fish were smooth and buttery, comparable to chutoro. There's some rather tasty seafood shu mai which I've never seen them do before and a very decent gindara mentaikoyaki to be had too. One can even get a similar cod hotpot just like the ones they used to do that came with a fantastic lemon/chilli/soy  sauce dip.

Nobu-ya (信屋), Middle Road

baigai

soy braised hijiki

 what the menu describes as grilled squid tentacles and guts

Miyazaki beef tataki 

tamagoyaki 

 buta kakuni

tempura hamo (pike eel)

tempura maitake 

suji nikomi (soy braised beef tendon stew) 

oden mori

If I had to gripe, I thought the maitake tempura had a bit too much batter and was more grease logged than I liked. That kinda robbed the mushroom of its delicate flavours. But otherwise, I think we rather enjoyed all the other food that we had at Nobu-ya (#01-05 Fortune Centre, 190 Middle Road, tel : +65 6338 3450). Special mention goes to the baigai, the rich livery broth that the squids came in and those braised pork belly that simply fell apart even from the chopstick. Will be back. 

Brrrreaaakkkfassst!

Yes please, more lontong from Kampong Corner.

Nantsuttei, Orchard Central

I had been wanting to visit Nantsuttei since they moved over to Orchard Central (#07-12/13 Central, 181 Orchard Rd, tel : +65 6337 7166) and had been planning to get myself reacquainted with their tonkotsu bowl to remind myself why I liked them so much previously. But as things went, I got suckered into ordering their spicy tomato miso bowl which ran for a limited 20 bowls a day.

On hindsight, it wasn't such a good decision. I didn't enjoy this as much as I hoped, leaving unsatisfied. The flavours were a muddle which resulted in.....well, nothing I had really recognized or expected. I certainly didn't get much tomato out of the broth and the measly slice of processed cheese didn't do really anything at all. The hard noodles were also softer than what I had been hoping for texture. I'm definitely going for the tonkotsu the next time and staying off miso for a while.

Some bites from this year's Ramadan bazaar

I hadn't visited the Ramadan bazaars for years. In retrospect, I didn't miss much in those years. Everything was pretty much the same as the last ones that I remember. There wasn't even much to look forward to to eat because little of the food stalls have changed. I could visit one of those roving pasar malam and pretty much find the same stuff for the most of it.  But here's a couple of items which we had.

These are deep fried Oreos. I had been expecting the cookies in the batter to be crunchy, but for some reasons, they were as soft as the batter. These are probably only good as a novelty snack.

The same stall that did the deep fried Oreos also did deep fried mac & cheese. The heart clogging street snack stalls might have made some progress beyond fried chicken parts after all.

This was unexpectedly tasty and it came with nacho cheese dips. I didn't think that I would enjoy it but I did.

More artichokes this year from Le Bistrot du Sommelier

The artichoke season is back upon us again! This year Le Bistrot du Sommelier has done up their steamed Brittany artichoke with a beef and tomato fondue, a change from the previous years where it was served with just vinaigrette. 

First up was their baby purple artichoke off the regular menu; this was not the seasonal item. The plant was stuffed with anchovy, ratatouille and a number of herbs. I think I tasted dill amongst a bunch of others. The flavour profile was surprisingly quite foreign for us and it did ring a little Middle Eastern-ish. Didn't quite enjoy this. It was way inferior in our opinion as a whole for flavours and experience compared to those seasonal Brittany ones that pop up in the middle of the year.

We got ourselves a steamed artichoke with the tomato fondue since the fondue option was new this year. It wasn't so much a fondue than a sort of Bolognese sauce. Sort of. Which was actually rather good by the way. Tangy, meaty and works with the little bits of "flesh" you scrape off the bottom of the scales.

This was their garbure, a vegetable soup of duck stock and bacon with chicken dumplings. The chicken dumplings were awesome. I'd come back here for this again easily.

I believe there was some sort of pesto involved in the garbure, but otherwise, the other main profile of the flavours were the slight smoky saltiness from the bacon. I couldn't sum it up beyond calling it an honest to goodness comforting soup. And one of the more memorable ones that we've had from recent times.

We finally made the heart of the artichoke halfway through the garbure. The best part.

And an onglet which we can never seem to get past during lunch. I don't know if this would qualify as one of the best onglet in town, but it's very competently done everytime we've had it. A nice caramelized crusty exterior encasing a warm red and juicy interior. Along the lines of what many lesser beings would described as "seared to perfection".  Lesser beings because only they understand perfection. I don't.