Keria Japanese Restaurant, Cuppage Plaza

This was a small shop (#B1-28 Cuppage Plaza, 5 Koek Rd, tel : +65 6733 0654) nestled in the basement of Cuppage Plaza. You know - the homely izakaya kind of place? We've been to Cuppage Plaza countless times and never knew they existed until recently.

We had uni temaki. Tasty hand rolls with filled with sea urchin on shiso and rice.

That's cabbage stir fried with mentaiko. I found this very addictive. These would be just perfect with a bowl of steamed white rice.

We had momotaro tomatoes. Man these were sweet and juicy. Not to mention expensive as well.

We munched through a couple of chutoro maki too. Tasty and also rather dearly priced.

Their beef curry was one of the more memorable ones I've had in a while. The flavours were rich and packed a nice warmth from the heat along with very tender pieces of meat and tendon. This was a half portion with miso soup which was an option on menu.

Some meaty gyozas were also in the cards.

And something the menu described as 'pork steak wasabi soya sause'. Through the erroneous spelling and wrongly sequenced gramma, we found out that it was some kind of wasabi butter on pork loin. The butter made the pork very tasty though the meat was much tougher than what we had expected out of a slab of rosu.

Today was a first time for us with grilled soramame (broad beans). These were like a larger and more flavourful version of edamame. I like these.

Because ayu was in season, we just had to have them. The bitter sweetness from the head and belly from the grilled fish was amazing. The meat was tender with a light texture and there was also that flavourful skin. This was superior to the last ones we had from Kanda Wadatsumi.

Super Red Burger from McD

So that's the current gimmick from the golden arches, a red bunned chicken burger that's as red as the angry bird. With lettuce, a slice of tomato, a fried egg and pepper mayo on a fried chicken thigh. Crispy batter and real chicken meat. There was a bit of heat but it wasn't anywhere close to the previous Fiery Mala burger. In fact, this doesn't even get on par with the regularly available McSpicy. Something about it was smoky though. If you're wondering if it's any good, it's as good as it can reasonably be for something that you can get from McD. Now that my curiosity's satiated, I don't think I'll be having it again.

Revisiting PerBacco

So it's back to our rather recently discovered Italian restaurant. Honestly, the crowd here looked a little worrying on a Friday evening when you couldn't even get a table without reservations at neighbouring joints like Pasta Brava. While we appreciated the peace of a quiet spot (an experience uncommon these days) for dinner, it also means that business might not be good enough to sustain rental and profits. That being said, I hope these guys stay around for much longer.

By the way, the menu has changed a little since the last time. The green pea mint risotto is no longer on the menu; amongst others which we wanted to try. Prices seem to have increased a little and black summer truffle season is here. 

Frittelle Soffici e Involtini al Prosciutto e Scamorza

Started off with some prosciutto wrapped Scamorza cheese and fritters of some sort. The cheese and prosciutto were good, nothing unexpected yet the essence of an attractive enduring flavour. Assuming you like ham and cheese that is. Those fritters tasted like beignets. Almost like choux pastry with a crisp shell while the insides were soft with a core that was almost like custard. Savoury of course.

Linguine alla Carbonara di Astice

As the name described, this was lobster carbonara. Did it taste anything like regular carbonara? No it didn't. It was less cheesy and didn't have the aroma of black pepper or pancetta/guanciale/bacon. But the lobster flavour in the sauce reduced us to silence and slurps. This was pretty damn good.

Wagyu ribeye of, by my guess, middling marbling with some nutty sauce and shaven black truffle. This was rich, flavourful and satisfying. Even those fried potatoes on the side were awesome.

Tagliata di Agnello con Cipollotti Stufati e Salsa al Marsala

We had lamb too. With a Marsala jus and sweet braised shallots. Delicious little loins just like the last time.

Hai Xian Zhu Zhou (海鲜煮粥), Yishun Street 21

The last time we were here (#01-472 Choh Dee Place, Blk 233 Yishun St. 21), we saw quite a lot of people with their steaming bowls of noodles which looked pretty good even though it seemed that these guys are pretty well known for their porridge. Yes, it's the same Choh Dee Place as the one with the fried carrot cake. I got a bowl this time round - tom yam pork Koka noodles. Pretty generous portions of thin sliced pork, liver and what appears to be home made meatballs. All for a princely sum of less than four dollars. If you were wondering, it tasted like instant noodle seasoning with instant noodles. It sure was delicious though.

Breakfast food for dinner at MTR and other thoughts

I've disliked coriander for as long as I can remember. There are spectrums to dislikes and my relationship with coriander falls close to one the extreme end. Hence understandably so, when I realized that the rava idli from MTR was stuffed with them the first time I ate them, I was mortified. Mind still not fully latching onto the reality of these days when I actually eat one; half anticipating that I'll be spitting out a mouthful from reacting to the flavour. But no....that did not happen. I happily scooped another piece, warily eyeing bits of leaves and stem hanging out from the rice cakes - still unbelieving that I'm actually enjoying these. 

That's a chow chow bath. Breakfast kind of Indian vegetarian food. A plate with a scoop of the savoury kara bath and another of the sweet kesari bath. Semolina pudding/cakes the both of them. The former with ghee, mustard seed and bits of vegetables and the latter with ghee and cashew and raisins, flavoured with saffron. I learnt of their existence back in the day at Chellas. These ones here at MTR tasted better.

And to wash down, a cup of hot badam drink. Which is pretty much like their badam milk. Except that it's hot and not cold and was noticeably less creamy. But basically a sweet milk drink of almond spiced with saffron and cardamom. 

Diandin Leluk, Golden Mile Complex

We noticed Diandin Leluk (#01-67/68/69, Golden Mile Complex, 5001 Beach Rd, tel : +65 6293 5101) the last time we were here at BeerThai House. A bit of Googling told us that the restaurant had been around and well known for quite some time. Since we were exploring Thai food here, why not? Their iced green tea with milk was stronger and creamier than BeerThai.

That's some deep fried catfish with mango salad. The catfish meat seemed to have been shredded and deep fried into a crispy floss cake. I'm generally not so big on something so deep fried and crispy and it was pretty much the mango that kept me going.  Couldn't say that I could actually taste fish. Now that we know, we'll just stick to the regular som tam mamuang in the future.

Their pad krapow moo was quite tasty. There was a generous portion of the minced pork, savoury with some heat from the chilli padi. I would eat this again.

This was larb muang moo or is it just larb moo? A pork salad with innards - there were bits of chopped liver, intestines and maybe kidneys. The porcine flavours were a little too heavy for us. While I could work through this, I'm pretty sure we won't be getting it again. I had been expecting that vibrant hit of lime and mint like the larb moo from Gin Khao.

We had oyster omelette too. Not too bad, but this looked more like the local variety than the ones we had seen in Bangkok.

In retrospect, BeerThai had left a deeper impression than Diandin Leluk - but I don't think I'm going to discount this place without another try.