Revisiting Sawadee Thai

We ended back in Sawadee Thai for a few reasons. The food was enjoyable, the place was comfortable and it didn't have the queue that Ah Loy Thai had.

We ordered their por pea poo again because we liked them previously. Have these fried rolls gotten larger or am I imagining it?

Sawadee Thai's stuffed chicken wings were pretty good. Those wings were clad in a nice golden brown crispy skin with no excess grease. Look at those fat mid sections. We could even find entire caps of small straw mushrooms in them.

Unfortunately, the som tam mamuang was a little weak. For some reasons, these guys hold back on the fish sauce for their salads. More crushed peanuts would have been great.

Tom kha gai was awesome. This was the spicy counterpart to Gin Khao's rendition. The flavour from the coconut milk was just brilliant. This alone would be worth a return trip.

We fell back on the panaeng roast duck curry because it was just so damn good with white rice. I can't get over those warm lychees in the curry.

Some stir fried vegetables were also ordered for the quota of dietary fibre. This was actually a pretty good stir fry.

Dessert this time round was khao neow turian - their rendition using mao shan wang durian over the sticky rice accented by the aroma of the black sesame seeds and coconut milk. I'd eat this again. In a heartbeat.

Kuro Maguro, Tanjong Pagar Centre

This shop (#01-04 Tanjong Pagar Centre, 7 Wallich Street, tel : +65 6386 8561) is from the people who operate Maguro Donya Miura Misakikou Sushi & Dining at Suntec. What they do is mostly various kaisen donburi using seafood that is shipped in via the parent partnership business. Their toro aburi meshi featuring torched sliced and minced toro was pretty good but that was to be expected for the amount that they were charging. The other bowl with sake and hon maguro akami was a less impressive than the picture on the menu led us to believe. 

Still, it's an option in this vicinity for a frills free raw fish rice bowl when the craving hits.

The Coffee Academics, Scotts Square

We've been to Hong Kong a number of times and have for some reasons never noticed The Coffee Academics. Never had an inkling that such a place existed. Not a caffeine-y whiff. Nada. While I couldn't say that I was particularly intrigued, we came by the outpost here (#02-01/02 Scotts Square, 6 Scotts Road, tel : +65 6538 1940) for coffee and a bite.

That coffee that they have with black pepper and agave....needs better/more pepper. But that's just me. Or maybe just the one that I had. That aroma was there but not quite. 

We tried something called naked torpedo. Some crusty fried tube of bechamel and crab with skin akin to goreng pisang. I actually kinda liked it.

But simply couldn't understand why it had to be served in a little wooden tray thingy. Maybe they just enjoyed cleaning up the crumbs.

SBCD Korean Tofu House, Guoco Tower

This sundubu jigae shop (#B1-01,02 Tanjong Pagar Centre, 7 Wallich Street, tel : +65 6386 6441) claims to be a tofu soup specialist. Personally I didn't think there was much to write home about. My option with beef and intestines had really chewy intestines and no discernible beefy flavour. Those tofu in the broth were also crumbly and soft, none of that tofu flavour I was looking forward to. Maybe it's just not for me.

Brunch at Lolla

Lollapalooza has sadly been shuttered. But its progenitor, if you would, Lolla which has taken root long before in Ann Siang still perseveres with brunch on Sundays. 

We started with their squid ink pudding with uni. The very same one that had previously launched a thousand ships Instagrams. If anyone's wondering, it's still good. Sugar, squid ink and egg yolk which forms that obsidian custard base and very decent quality uni.

There's toast with peaches and foie gras. Those peaches look and taste familiar. Like a particular jarred variety that I've once bought at a store in Serangoon Gardens. The sweet fruit, the fatty liver and the toasted bread make great friends.

As it happened at this point, the munching got punctuated by a glass of flavoursome cashew nut milk.

From the daily specials - thick cut bacon with burrata and chocolate soil. Granted that the chocolate soil was probably not just chocolate and would benefit from more generosity considering how much burrata it had to pair against - chocolate cheese and bacon sound good don't it?

Three slivers of nicely charred lamb tenders with yoghurt, pine nuts and carrots. Nice.

The last thing we ordered was unfortunately the only thing that was somewhat disappointing. It's a beef tongue hash. What we didn't agree with was the treatment of the tongue. Braised and pulled and then fried, it ended up stringy with none of its associated textures. This tasted like hydrated beef jerky. Cubed ox tongue would have definitely made better hash and honestly, we thought this was not well thought out.

Ocean Curry Fish Head, Telok Ayer Street

This trip certainly explains why there is usually so many people packed into this coffeeshop (181 Telok Ayer Street, tel : +65 6324 9226) during lunch hours. The fish head curry was delicious that I was drinking it while the quality of the fish head that they used was good. In fact, the quality of the cooked food like that salted yolk sauce shrimps or sweet and sour pork were a couple of notch better than most of the economic rice stalls around. No qualms revisiting even though they're a little pricier than most.