Hajjah Mona Nasi Padang, Geylang Serai Market

Believe it or not, this was our first time at the current Geylang Serai Market. My last memory of the market was the old single storied place by the road - which if I remember correctly was at a different site? Anyway, since it was a first time, we were a little overwhelmed by the options. As chaos theory fate would have it, we ended up at Hajjah Mona (#02-166, Geylang Serai Market and Food Centre, 1 Geylang Serai).

Which also lead to my first urap. Aside from my first urap that is. This salad was more raw and herbal. There were bean sprouts, wing beans, something that looked like sweet potato leaves and some herbs which I couldn't recognize. I don't think all that rawness worked for me and it was precisely because there was some cooking of the vegetables that enjoyed it previously. But we managed to finish up the whole plate with help of the nutty sweet and spicy gravy from the quail eggs.

We had curried tripe - a curry that was rich and flavourful with coconut. That gravy was awesome with rice.

There was paru goreng too. In case anyone didn't remember, these are fried cow lungs. They aren't weird in flavour or texture and are more delicious than the looks suggest.

These were the quail eggs I mentioned earlier. Just quail eggs in a nutty/sweet/spicy chilli sauce.

Bonta Bonta, Japan Food Town @ Wisma Atria

I gather that Bonta Bonta (#04-39 Wisma Atria, 435 Orchard Road, tel : +65 62623207) is a rice specialist that uses kinme mai - a rice from Japan that is processed with a patented buffing technique that helps preserves the nutrients by retaining the nutritious sub-aleurone layer. It is supposed to taste better too but I couldn't detect anything special from the rice which they served with their kaisen dons. In fact, it tasted ordinary.

The seafood for their rice bowls were pretty decent quality but not top notch if you catch my drift. These guys are rice guys anyway so I guess pretty good was good enough. That botan ebi had some deliciously sweet head fat and the uni they served turned out much better than what I had imagined in my apprehension. I may just come back another time.

White asparaguses and purple potato at 2it & drink

We returned to 2it & drink must faster than I thought we would. This would be largely because of the white asparagus season and we were pretty impressed with their white asparagus pizza the last time.

Today we had those asparaguses with tagliatelle in a butter sauce. This was amazing. The sauce even had the aroma of the asparagus. Pasta had great texture while the vegetable was tender and sweet with its asparagus-y flavour. Something not to be missed as long as they are in season.

That's their lamb shank with purple potato mash. Another good call here. The shank was tender but not fork tender. There was a nice flavour on the meat flavoured by the jus and some bits of fat. The mash was pretty tasty. I wished it were bigger though.

Profiteroles for dessert. Cream inside, not ice cream. Enjoyed this.

Timbre+, Ayer Rajah Crescent

Dinnering at Timbre+ (73A Ayer Rajah Crescent). I'm seeing that the hawker centre style of their setup resonates well with a lot of people. Myself included. Did anyone notice that in spite of the big ass fans and additional ventilation, this place isn't particularly better ventilated than many hawker centres?

We got some salted yolk wings from Two Wings. These deep fried wings were dunked in their salted yolk sauce before they were served. These were not bad. A little greasy though.

Here's a shrimp po boy from Dancing Crab Shack. At least that's what they call it. 6 fried shrimps and some coleslaw between buttered brioche. I wished they gave more shrimp. That buttered brioche made it all good though. While we enjoyed this, I don't think I'm getting it again. 

Big Bern's American Grill (from the original owner of Botak Jones), has what they call a lamb cheese steak po boy. Something they're saying is a first of its kind. Which I thought was a cool idea conceptually. The sliced lamb appeared to be sautéed with onions and mushrooms. The sauce was cheesy, had a bit too much dried oregano and the lamb flavours were barely discernible. Still we enjoyed this more than a certain cheesesteak than we had recently.

2it & drink again

A revisit. These guys have a nice salumi board. Even though it's pretty much the usual stuff - salami, mortadella, speck, and prosciutto di Parma - it was delicious. Especially good with their bread that's been doused with some of the olive oil.

There was white asparagus pizza from the specials board and it was pretty damn good. The mild flavours of those asparaguses and its sweetness came through in spite of all the cheese. With a few twists from the pepper mill, this was easily one of the most enjoyable pizza I've had in a while. The restaurant even did their spaghetti carbonara upon request, without cream. It turned out a wetter than I had imagined but I thought the flavours were quite good. Just needed a bit more pepper. 

Mao shan wang pizza from Tino's

One would be very hard pressed to find something like this anywhere else in the world - not to mention the fact that it's made with the expensive mao shan wang varietal. Tino's might have gotten themselves a first around here. They have a D24 option as well but I thought I should just shoot for the better.

I suppose I was both anticipating and somewhat wary of a durian pizza. So part of me was hoping that it'll be amazing while the other, reminded me not to set too much of expectations.

How did this go? While it wasn't as robustly flavoured as the eating the actual fruit but the pie didn't taste bad at all. The durian topping was pretty generous but I wonder if it was purely mao shan wang. No, it wasn't really so weird together with cheese. This should be eaten while it's still hot though.