Binomio Spanish Restaurante, Craig Road

Binomio (20 Craig Road, #01-02 Craig Place, tel : +65 6557 0547) has been in operations for a number of years. We never noticed them until we started visiting PerBacco's old location. They were just next door to each other. Even then it took a long time for us to finally visit.

In their earlier days, I noticed people talking about their old executive chef Jose Alonso and his Michelin studded past. About two years back, not so much fanfare was accorded to the current EC Gonzalo Landin who looked like he was a touch and go kind of guy. Touched and went at places like Dinner by Heston Blumenthal or even a 4 month staging gig at El Celler de Can Roca. Locals tend to call this job hopping.

I guess this was amuse bouche. Manchego with jelly. Quince maybe? 

A sangria tinta while waiting for the food. This one had quite a lot of fruits. Nice enough that I followed up with another.

We ordered their blue cheese croquettes with very low expectations. Because curiosity and things are always an assumption until we know. It turned out enjoyable. Crisp breading exterior with enough of the pungent blue cheese flavouring in a piping hot creamy...erm...insides. Good for returns.

Got a half portion of their Jamón Ibérico pata negra. Yup, pata negra here and no less. Nutty, sweet and savoury like all nice Jamón Ibérico are.

The menu described this as a cheese terrine. The texture was light with an almost mousse like creaminess. Flavour was mild - almost relatable to mascarpone. I thought it was paired nicely with the honey olive oil thingy. 

We ordered lamb chops because *Joey Jordison drumroll* - lamb sweetbreads! So hard to find these things. And figs. And goat's cheese.

Lamb was competently done. The meat had a healthy amount of fat which translated to flavour. I thought those sweetbread were a little too little because they were delicious. 

We hadn't had paella in a while so why not one from a restaurant that's pretty well received. Artichokes and snails. Those artichokes were delicious and the snails were snails. What was outstanding was also the flavour in the rice. Deep savoury flavour with soccarat that was so good. And I am usually not a soccarat kind of person.

Not impressed by their cold whiskey cake. The middle layer is cream, the yellows are egg yolk and toasted almonds. That's all the texture. Whiskey was poured over when it was served and well, it's just creamy and sweet.

Authentic Mun Chee Kee King of Pig's Organ Soup (正正文志記豬什湯大王), Jalan Besar

Finally gotten round to trying this shop (207 Jalan Besar) after hearing about them for years. People come here for their pig's organ soup amongst other things.

To be honest, their pig's organ soup is probably the first of its flavour profile I've had. There was definitely that porcine quality and it was as much savoury as it was sweet. Not garlic-ky, kiam chye-ish nor peppery. The bowl was loaded with sliced pig livers, lean pork, strips of fatty pork, stinky meatballs and tender slices of pig's stomach. Both the meat and offal were tender. Delicious bowl there.

The stewing liquid for their boiled egg had a nice cinnamon aroma.

Pig's intestines were tender and chewy.

What caught me by surprise about their mei cai (梅菜) was the sweetness. While it wasn't bad, I prefer the savoury renditions of this dish.

What these guys are also known for are their lu rou fan (卤肉饭). Minced braised fatty pork belly with gravy on rice. It's good on it's own or with their chilli sauce. 

Chilled calamansi drink for the sweltering heat.

Prata breakfast

Two telur and one kosong with assam fish curry. Usually no fish in the curry but I got some bits today. And bones too.

The Wine & Gourmet Friends, Bukit Pasoh

We were here (48 Bukit Pasoh Road, tel : +65 6224 1982) by the way of recommendations. It's a wine place - with food, better food than the run of the mill wine places. Prices for house pours were half what one would pay for outside. Look at my Moscato - it's a glowing glass of nectar!

That's their Momotaro tomato - pickled with something that tasted like plum. Ume perhaps. For some reasons the texture reminded me of oysters. It was chilled, tangy, refreshing and dripping with juices that paired with sweetness from the white corn kernels in the creamy Stracciatella di bufala in olive oil. Those bits of furikake were a nice touch.

We had cheese. The Fourme d'Ambert was a nice semi-crumbly blue. Comte appeared to be nutty and sweet after my confused tongue has been swayed by wine, bubbled in porter and seduced by pickled Japanese tomatoes. Yummy with Jacob's cream crackers.

Didn't think much of the truffle Camembert. Not the better Camembert we've had - meaning that the cheese tasted young with little complexity or the pungent aroma usually associated. Not impressed by the truffle stuffings neither.

One of the reasons we were here was to try their bak kut teh risotto. It's not bad but I wouldn't say I'm a fan because it's based on the dark broth-ed herbal bak kut teh rather than the local less-herbal-more-peppery-and-garlic-ky rendition. Those Iberico pork ribs tasted like barbecued lor bak - not bad but would probably have worked as well with without the use of the more expensive pork.

The other reason was to try their onglet from the chocolate fed Mayura Platinum wagyu. For some context, Mayura Platinum is a grade/series of wagyu product from the Mayura Station ranch in Southern Australia. They only do full blood wagyu and yes, the cows were chocolate fed for reasons.

Very nice. But they screwed up the order and totally forgot about the sauce on the side request so their "Bordelaise" sauce was all over the meat. They drained it off and re-plated. I'm getting a bunch of sweetness which I'm not sure if it was from the residual sauce. But the flavourful onglet was obviously fat laced and didn't even need a knife.

goo Italiano, North Canal Road

A Japanese Italian restaurant, goo Italiano from Tokyo (#01-01 35 North Canal Road, tel  : +65 6226 1182) has newly opened up south side. Food was pretty good.

On the menu was burrata with diced strawberries and San Marzano tomatoes. Pretty refreshing and was quite delicious with balsamic vinegar.

goo Italiano also featured their rendition of focaccia di Recco - a bread whose make and name is protected by European law ensuring that it can only be called so if it came from Recco, a town in Liguria. Just like champagne can only come from Champagne.

There were a few options for toppings; this one had mushrooms. The insides of the bread was stuffed with cheese. Delicious, especially when doused with extra EVOO.

We had a spaghettone with clams and bottarga.  The pasta was competently done with an umami punch from the cured roe, aroma from minced garlic and meaty clams. Portions were kinda small. By the way, those slices of brown stuff were also bottarga and not garlic. 

The other pasta on menu which deserved mention was their spaghettone with lemon cream. Pretty impressed by the velvety rich lemon sauce that coated the noodles. Nice.

Ended with a dessert of panna cotta with strawberry compote and Banda Rossa balsamic vinegar. Also nice.

And the conclusion between China Street Fritters and He Ji Wu Xiang is......

So I was back at China Street Fritters recently and I was actually trying to discern the differences between the fritters and bee hoon between them and He Ji Wu Xiang. At least for the items that we obviously prefer anyways. While I could tell that they were a little different, I still couldn't precisely pinpoint what were those little differences. So in conclusion, it's not important. At least it's not for me. The take away is that we have two pretty solid wu xiang stalls in Maxwell FC.