Atout, Harding Road

My history with the food by Patrick Heuberger started back in the days of Au Petit Salut at Jalan Merah Saga. That might have been the pioneering of casual French cuisine on our shores followed by his subsequent venture, Le Bistrot Du Sommerlier. Before we knew it, he had started an off-the-beaten-track location at Casse Croûte for a short stint and then dove into charcuterie making at Huber's Butchery. I recalled that he successfully attempted to sell us some fruity Spanish olive oil then.

I don't know if this could be considered the coming back into a circle of sorts but today, Monsieur Heuberger is back into the restaurant/bistro business with Atout (40C Harding Road, tel : +65 6679 1800). Ironically located in the building where Au Petit Salut had been for some time. A rebirth spawning from the site of a legacy he had left behind.

Sidestepping further forewordplay, Atout was nice.

It's been noted that charcuterie is an interest and forte of the chef. So we got our selves some thinly sliced beef tongue which was salty and fatty and delicious. 

We had pink radishes with butter. Interesting pairing.

Bread which is chargeable here was in order (pun intended) because of the food we had. No better vehicle for those and their sourdough was good.

Followed up by Atout's rendition of boudin noir. A take that was mousse-like perfumed with onions and a crusty exterior. Not so different from the rendition at Le Bistrot du Sommerlier which could have been the way it was because of influence. Very nice with their delicious apple sauce.

This was a redemption of lobster bisque for us. Creamy and robust with the crustacean flavour, unlike the poorer rendition which we had very recently. This one even came with little chicken dumplings we liked like those that they make in Le Bistrot du Sommerlier.

The andouillette here tasted different from the ones we had at Casse Croûte. This one seemed fatter and a little less densely packed. The scent of the offal sausage was strong when it was served but the flavour was a lot better than the smell suggested. It was nicely spiced and paired pretty nicely with the sharp mustard on the side.

Their black forest gateau was nice. The liquor was sufficiently robust, cherries sufficiently intoxicating and the chocolate nicely sweet. Reminded me of the outstanding tiramisu from the defunct Angeleno. Stuttgart has a competent competitor now.

Un café marked the end of lunch.

Ruth's Chris Steak House, Marina Mandarin Hotel

In an epiphanous flicker shortly after we got seated in Ruth's Chris (4F Marina Mandarin Singapore, 6 Raffles Boulevard, tel : +65 6336 9093), it all came back to me. I remembered having been here before. This was the location where the defunct Bologna used to be. I had a lousy experience then. It seemed that the ghost of the experience past had endured. 

Bread was kinda boring. That came with butter that was fluffy but not very buttery tasting. This was merely an observation and not a gripe. The real griping has not yet begun.

We had imagined that as a steakhouse, Ruth's Chris' lobster bisque ought to be dependable. I wouldn't condemn this as bad, but mediocre isn't too far from the truth. It was creamy without sufficient crustacean flavour. Every time I have a lousy lobster bisque, I inevitably compare them to the one at Morton's - which may not be the top in the world, but at least they were good. Wooloomooloo and Bedrock also made better bisque.

Lamb was tender. Distribution of fat was not so great but I expect that the restaurant take responsibility for the quality of the meat they use. Some parts of the ribs had a good mix of meat and fat while others had only meat. Moving from meat and fat to just meat only resulted in a sudden lack of flavour. Other parts were just chunks of fats. 

The restaurant had also recommended medium rare for these as they said that the plates would be sizzling hot and the lamb would cook a little more. The actual sizzling on the plate lasted a total of probably 10 seconds. The medium rare didn't even get a chance to turn medium. So while I thought that those guys at 665°F wasn't competent enough, they were better than Ruth's Chris.

Like the lamb, the sizzling went out of steam pretty fast on the ribeye. The colour of the meat didn't look right. There wasn't much of sear. I thought there was too much fat without a good marbling that some mouthfuls felt like just fat. 

The meat texture was bad in a way that the fibres didn't sustain their form and splayed at the edges of the cut. It was soft, not tender. At certain points, we couldn't identify which parts were meat or fat. We could tell the sinews though. So much for them trying to explain USDA Prime because it sure didn't feel like it. I kid you not when I say that even Aston's was more satisfying. I'm writing this place off on this alone.

We had thought that some brandy peppercorn sauce would salvage the steak. This tasted weird - in a herbal kind of way. We gave feedback and they replaced with fresh portion that tasted like they added more brandy. Didn't make things any better. This didn't taste like any peppercorn sauce because I couldn't taste pepper. By the way, Aston's is a very affordable entry level steak joint that makes black pepper sauce which blows this one away.

Those grilled shrimps on the side weren't too bad, but a few shrimps aren't going to be enough to salvage the experience.

You know that there's a big problem when there is talk about the potatoes being one of the better tasting items from the menu. These Lyonnaise potatoes were indeed one of the better tasting items.

Tenshin tenyears later

We first found out about and visited Tenshin about ten years ago. This was us coming back a decade later today because we still remembered that we wanted to come back to try something else from the menu. Prices have gone up since. The entry tempura set at lunch is now $40 - $10 up from 10 years ago. Their uni tempura is now a princely $45 a pop. The rest of the restaurant seemed to have remained the same.

Goma tofu was served as part of the zensai. I don't remember this from the last time. It was nice and nutty though.

This was their tendon from their tokusen tendon set. What was different from the regular tendon was that this came with their ebi kakiage tempura - which could also be ordered separately at $30 a pop. Which we also did because the chopped prawns were so delicious and sweet.

That's the uni tempura...sea urchin sealed in a seaweed packet which is then tempura battered and fried briefly. It's not on the menu, but many people seem to know about it. It's still as good and 50% more expensive compared to the last time I had them.

No uni lover says no to this.

Re-visiting Todamgol (토담골)

That's what it was. A re-visit to Todamgol because we enjoyed the food from the last visit.

Because waiting was needed, I ordered their draught makgeolli. I had the idea that it was made in house since 'draught' was mentioned but apparently, draught came from a plastic bottle which was poured into the urn as part of how it was served.

Banchan for today.

That's the gool jeong - oyster pancakes which weren't much different tasting from the local oyster omelette. This one has less flour, more egg and nicer oysters.

The main item for tonight was their al tang - a spicy fish roe stew. This was nice. There were plenty of fish roe in the stew along with those squiggly parts which were very tasty.

We couldn't get past the rice, especially when there was kimchi to go along.

Kamo ju from Ginza Kamo Soba Kyudaime Keisuke

Did anyone notice that Keisuke has quietly changed the name of the shop to simply Kamo Soba instead of the older longer name? Anyways, this was the kamo ju - the last item and also the most expensive one that I wanted to try from Ginza Kamo Soba Kyudaime Keisuke (there's the older longer name!). Understandably, this could be perceived as a sort of Japanese duck rice which was not so much different from the local variety except for the ingredients and preparation method. Sliced duck, soup and rice.

Those sliced ducks were okay. Tender, chewy and I suppose passable in flavour. I'm pretty sure that was where most of the cost of this set came from. Underneath those duck was a layer of rice with minced meat packing some wasabi. That wasabi was a nice touch. What I found myself liking was the soup that was packed with loads of gamey duck flavour. If not for anything else, Kamo Soba did a ducking good job out of their broth.

Buffet at Kintamani Indonesian Restaurant

The last time I was here was probably a little more than a decade back. Kintamani Indonesian Restaurant (3F Furama Riverfront Hotel, 405 Havelock Road, tel : +65 6739 6463) isn't a high profile location and not so many people talk about them. But these guys are known for their Indonesian food buffet which is pretty expensive if one doesn't take advantage of those one for one credit card deals. There's an a la carte menu which isn't cheap that features some of the stuff that doesn't get put into the buffet variety. Likewise, there are regular buffet items like their sayur lodeh that for some strange reasons is not available on the menu.

I don't think these guys were the standards of Sari Ratu. But the food was decent enough. Some of the more memorable include their curried beef tendon, sayur lodeh, telur balado and a surprisingly savoury laksa which one could assemble from a station. There's satay to be had, gado gado which one could customize, kueh lopis where one could shovel as much shredded coconut and drizzle as much palm sugar as you wanted and unexpectedly tasty goreng pisang at the dessert station. All the food was made with delicious gravies and sauces that one cannot help but help themselves to more servings of the nasi puteh and kuning. It wouldn't be just a pun to say that the food was explosive. Haha!