Kushikatsu Tanaka, Clarke Quay

In a broad stroke, kushikatsu isn't big here. Not like how sushi, yakitori or even teppanyaki are. Hence, Kushikatsu Tanaka (#01-01B Clarke Quay, 3A River Valley Road, tel : +65 6258 3789) intrigued me since we don't have so many specialist of fried stuff on sticks around.

Right off the bat, one should not be expecting standards equivalent to the defunct Han or even Panko. I enjoyed their morokyu though. Cucumbers were nicely chilled and it even came with ume.

The spring section of their menu had mango beer so I got one to start. Nice - it was refreshing and sweet. It even had tiny bits of the fruit in the beer.

DIY potato salad is okay. Aren't these the smart thing to do to offload the elbow grease needed to the customer? Still prefer the one from Hokkaido Izakaya because of the smoked egg.

Loved munching on those mame aji karaage. I thought these crispy/meaty baby horse mackerels were appropriately salted without being too excessive and still enough to keep you reaching out for more.

Our kushikatsu came in two batches. This one had asparagus, shiso pork and shitake stuffed with meat. For the former item, I thought Panko did better. As a whole, I personally preferred a lighter breading. 

We had a bunch of other stuff like oysters (small-ish but tasty), scallops, quail eggs, cheese with bacon, cherry tomato with bacon and lotus root. Nothing particularly special about what they offered or were they outstanding. After a while, all the fried breading got to us. I can't do this as much as I can kushiyaki.

I needed another drink and ended up with their double matcha highball. Double because it came with a scoop of matcha ice cream which you were supposed to mix in before drinking. This was a lot more potent that the one from Hakata Yakitori Batten Yokatoh.

Menya Kokoro, Plaza Singapura

Hmph. I was pretty sure that I had passed by this branch of Menya Kokoro (#B2-53 Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Road) not too long back and noticed that they have curry mazesoba on the menu. That's what we wanted to come for but it's apparently not available. So I ended up with their nikuyama beef mazesoba. The sliced beef was marginally better than those in the local Yoshinoya.  Disappointing. They were also a little sweet so I didn't enjoy it. While the mazesoba wasn't bad in any sense, I thought it lacked depth compared with their spicy bowl.  

Pork knuckles from Marché

Can't say that I know where I could find the better fried pork knuckles around but I thought that Marché has generally done a pretty good job of being dependable with them. I wouldn't say that it's good all the time, but I think they're very decent most of the time. Nice meaty trotters and crispy skin. Is it just me or am I tasting more beer in the sauce these days?

Summer Hill, Sunset Way

Summer Hill is a French restaurant nestled in Sunset Way (#01-62, 106 Clementi Street 12, tel : +65 +65 62515337) by Anthony Yeoh from the defunct Cocotte. Yes, that Cocotte.

They have small plates and regular ones. This glazed beetroot with ricotta was one of the small ones. I believe it's been marinated with possibly the juice of some fruit. Loads of perky citrus paired with a light earthiness of the beets and richness from the ricotta. I loved this. Very nice.

We had some roasted baby eggplants with hummus, crispy chickpeas and some pretty plump raisins. Not bad.

Their mains included chicken pot pie with truffle and foie gras. The pot pie was a lot smaller than it looked. Only half the pot beneath the crust was filled. It was creamy and delicious though.

Also had the fried boned in Dutch veal with a panko and thyme crust. The meat was very tender. Would have preferred a fruity sauce to go with it but I guess whole grain mustard was also fine. I didn't dislike this but I wouldn't order it again because it was expensive. For that price I was also hoping for a showcase of a spectacular sauce/compote to go with the veal than just mustard.

Dessert was an olive oil cake flavoured with citrus and rosemary. Not bad. Rather small though. Nice with the cream.

Kurobuta X Kombu & Oroshi from Tonkatsu by Ma Maison

I had gotten the impression that the kombu component to this kurobuta rosu katsu at Tonkatsu by Ma Maison was some sort of shredded cabbage salad with the seaweed. Apparently not. It was dry and fine with texture somewhat similar to dragon beard candy (龙须糖) if you could believe it. Yep, that green stuff above the katsu was it. Underneath the pile of it was the oroshi. 

I've never had kombu in this form. Couldn't get much flavour of them. All the moisture from the oroshi had clumped the kombu together making it a little messy to eat. Didn't taste bad with the dashi/yuzu-y dip they provided though.

Hamburg Steak Keisuke, Peck Seah Street

Finally visited Hamburg Steak Keisuke (72 Peck Seah Street, tel : +65 6908 4348) after attempting to wait out till the queue has subsided. It didn't quite. If the name was not already obvious enough, the selling point of the restaurant is their hamburg steak - or hambagu (ハンバーグ). 

There's a salad bar. It's not Astons but there was still a decent variety. I recommend the crabby flavoured mayonnaise hijiki, potato salad and the noodles. 

The other attraction was their egg station. One can load up on unlimited serving of eggs cooked in various ways. Their scrambled eggs were deliciously buttery. Tamagoyaki was passable. They do sunny side up as well which was awesome when it's laid over rice with a splash of shoyu and some pepper. I know because I had two of those sunny side ups.

This was their triple cheese hamburg. Came with an ebi fry.

The mince of the hamburg was too fine. There wasn't much texture apart from the caramelized crust. Which was my first problem with it. The second was the marinate which was sweet. To add on, I'm not getting much beefiness from the hamburg. 

The cheese helped mask the sweetness but it didn't change the fact that it was sweet. 

There's coffee jelly at the salad bar. The jelly was bitter and unsweetened. Which paired nicely with the sweet cream you could ladle over them. Yums!

Liked the place. For the quality of food and the price they charged, it represented good value for money. The irony was that I didn't like the hamburg but enjoyed the rest. I spied a shiokoji chicken on the menu. Will come back to try that. And also for the salad bar, egg station and coffee jelly.