Of Valentino Valtulina, white truffles and Moscato d'Asti

The season for tartufo bianco has arrived. That has compounded on, with the surety of our sunrise, the truth that Ristorante da Valentino hasn't been as easy on the wallet for some years already. But come we did, lunched we did and then departed we did quite happy with what we had. 

Their pesto had always been a point of interest. It's always been an excellent dip for their ciabatta. After these years, I've given up guessing what's in the herby mixture aside from what goes into regular pesto. Today, we were getting a lot of anchovies.

Interestingly shaped plates. These seemed to be a more practical sharing shape than the usual plates.

The first of the white truffle items we had was on sunny side ups and morels. Yum! We wiped the remaining yolk and butter clean off the plate with the ciabatta.

The ciabatta. Salted, crispy on the outside and definitely freshly baked.

The simplicity of house made fettuccine, eggs and butter with shavings of white truffle. I enjoyed it but for some reasons, I didn't think the experience was ahead or on par with the one from Osteria L'upupa in San Miniato years ago.

Finally got to try their aglio olio with seafood. There was definitely some seafood-y flavour going on that took away from the olive oil. Not bad, but not good enough that I'll want to come back for them again.

Apparently their Moscato marinated pork chops are well received. The meat was caramelized with a little sweetness along with the aroma of rosemary. Meat had a bit of fat that kept the porcine flavours in place.

Speaking of Moscato, we found out that the Moscato d'Asti they served by glass was the same as the one they sold by the bottle. Apparently, they only have one specific bottle here and they use that for everything they need Moscato for. Like probably the pork chops too. I always felt it was a nice one.

A nasi goreng putih mutton from Haji Kadir Food Chains

I picked this stall (#B1-14 Golden Mile Food Centre, 505 Beach Road) because I saw nasi goreng putih mutton, I haven't had that before and I wasn't familiar with this particular area. It wasn't that great. Edible but I don't think I'll consider it again. The fried rice was ordinary and the bits of mutton were hard and disappointingly lacking in kambing-ness. Bland, in other words. In the end I thought it was just another average plate of nasi goreng in a food centre where one has plenty of other options.

Does anyone know of good nasi goreng mutton that uses ground mutton (like those in murtabak)?

Nasi padang from Food Opera

That above was from the Indonesian cuisine stall at Food Opera. It was a pretty good plate. I liked those kang kong; a bit of garlic with some dried chilli aroma. They were wilted and tender and didn't pack much heat at all. Bean sprouts were just bean sprouts. I supposed as long as they were nicely cooked it's mostly good for me. Mutton/lamb curry was delicious in their flavoursome savoury and spicy manner. Meat was pretty tender. Not shabby at all for nasi padang. I just thought that $9.30 was kinda expensive though.

More brisketing at Decker Barbecue

It's been a while - a couple of years since we last/first tried Decker Barbecue so we decided to come by for a quiet afternoon lunch of their briskets. You know, just to get reacquainted with their barbecue over again. It's not like we have much other options for American barbecue as well.

We got ourselves a brisket sandwich and just a little bit of brisket. The former wasn't piled as high with slaw as we had imagined from the menu description. Between the two orders, we came to the conclusion that the tenderness was top notch. There was some smokiness in the meat. But the other flavours was a little muted and maybe some more salt would be great. 

Not to mention that these guys were pretty expensive too. But then again, not like we have much of a choice for barbecue here.

Two fried eggs from Beo Crescent Curry Rice

Yeap, todays curry rice came with two fried eggs (荷包蛋). Almost the same configuration as the last time except for the swap back to the regular squids. Yum yum!

Le retour à L'Entrecôte

Has it been almost 8 years already since that first time we stepped into L'Entrecôte at Duxton Hill? Time surely sidled by almost unnoticed. I managed to get a better pic of the steak they're known for this time round though. Portions seem to have shrunk. If there was anything that really bothered me about this visit, it was that they seriously need much better air conditioning.

We didn't do anything else but their entrecôte steak. I'm not entirely sure if the sauce was exactly the same but I didn't think there would be any reason that anything would change. I still enjoyed it. The meat had some aroma from a bit of char to go with as well. Fries didn't seem to be as good as I remember them. Les Bouchons has nicer fries.