Brothers Ramen, International Plaza

I've known about Brothers Ramen (#01-20 International Plaza, 10 Anson Road) for a few years but haven't gotten a chance to visit them until now. Incidentally, their ability to endure marks them as serious survivors in our unforgiving F&B scene. Anyways, these guys are known for their tori paitan ramen.

Tried their supermen - the bowl that has ajitama, sous vide chicken charshu, pork charshu, and wanton. Seems that they're not serving wanton today and they were replaced by menma. Egg's not bad, chicken is not bad but I found their charshu to be a little lean. More fatty would have given the texture more dimension, made it more pleasing and also gotten them better flavour.

There wasn't any option for the hardness of the noodles that I could see so I'm guessing it's not a a choice they're offering. The default doneness was also okay. Liked that it wasn't too soft but I would have preferred harder with a bit more bite. Their creamy paitan broth was likeable - predominantly chicken flavour. 

The item that I had been eyeing with interest was their dry megamen. Megamen being their take on Jiro-styled ramen. The dry one has only a little broth. Opted for spicy as well. That chunky piece of braised pork belly was tender and flavourful if anyone was wondering.

Very solid and enjoyable bowl. Loved the textures from the cabbage, bean sprouts and chewy noodles. Garlic and whatever gave heat in the spicy option kept it interesting. It was almost reminiscent of certain characteristics of a bowl of lor mee with the starchy sauce broken down. I'd come back for this again. 

Supper from Jalan Tua Kong Ya Lim Mee Pok

I've heard of the Jalan Tua Kong mee pok for years but have never gotten the story of their branding straight. Previously I've had a bowl from Original Jalan Tua Kong 132 at 6th Avenue. Wasn't impressed. There's another Jalan Tua Kong Lau Lim around Bedok and there's also a Ah Lim Jalan Tua Kong Mee Pok at Joo Chiat. No idea which one of them is the original or the better or if there are even more of them around. 

This one was from Telok Blangah. It was one of those options available close to midnight.

Not impressed too. While obvious as it may be, tar pow-ing mee pok isn't the best of ideas since they tend to harden and clump together. Texture fails at this point. The flavour was also lacking. Not getting the pork lard, chilli was barely passable and I couldn't taste any vinegar. I did opt for chilli and vinegar in case anyone was wondering. Here's a first and last.

A bacon burger with mayo, sauteed onions and mushrooms from Five Guys

I've been curious as to how the burgers at Five Guys would taste like without cheese because I haven't had one. This was it. Just like how I was curious previously about how Shake Shack burgers would fare without cheese. Aside from a getting a cleaner mouthfeel with the meat, I don't think I liked it better. So it's gonna be back to cheese burgers again in the future.

Geylang Lorong 29 Charcoal Fried Hokkien Mee & Mao Shan Wang

I'm generally not big on Hokkien mee. Nothing against the local and well loved plate of seafood stock-ed stir fried noodles, I'm just not majorly into them. But easily off my head, I'd rate Nam Sing and Serangoon Gardens Fried Prawn Noodle as more enjoyable eats. Hmmm. Hawkerman comes to mind.

Anyways, I pulled the trigger after reading some off social media. Caveat lector. For something that had been supposedly charcoal fried, I'm not getting any smoky wok hei. The stock for the noodles had the prerequisite crustacean sweetness but I didn't think it was anything that would be wowing anybody for $35. Lobster meat was hard, lacked the subtle sweetness and basically tasted like a big meaty prawn. Not that it tasted bad but it's not what I was hoping to get out of lobster.

Where's the lard?!

The mao shan wang came into picture because these guys apparently are taking orders for them. I paid $29 for a box. It wasn't much - half a durian at best. So it'd be almost $60 for a whole fruit which I felt was expensive in today's durian climate. The durians were very chilled. It's good msw if anyone was wondering. Just a little too little for what it cost.

And the first PCB meal out is......

PCB means differently to different people. It may abbreviate more than a couple of things to some. In recent months, it's gotten itself another meaning. But let's not get wayward here......

I've been resisting getting ramen while eating at home because I don't think they survive delivery well. But I hadn't anticipated that the first eat out after these couple of months would be at Keisuke's Kamo Soba. The miso bowl won. Love the balance of miso and duck in the broth. Strangely, I seem to recall it being nutty/peanut buttery but this wasn't it. Very odd. This time the first imprint from the broth was aka miso. I'm hoping this isn't the Mandela effect at play... 

Jew Kit

Not Jew kid. We weren't quite done with eating at home yet because too many reasons to run through. We ordered from Jew Kit (105 Killiney Rd) - a local eatery that added to the list of restaurants that do chicken rice and cze char.

Pretty impressed with the quality of their boiled/steamed chicken (白鸡). We ordered a half chicken which came chilled with a thin layer of jelly beneath the skin. Chicken was respectably slurp off the bone tender. So now we know where else to get some nice chicken rice in town. 

The oil rice (油饭) or what many usually refer to as chicken rice wasn't heavily flavoured. There were some. Not as nuanced as I generally prefer. Not much to remember by on its own. But it paired very nicely with their chilli which introduced a synergy to the flavours. I'm going to leave it at that.

I was curious about their special pineapple steamed fish - intrigued mostly by how it looked on the menu and imagining the sweet pineapple sauce with diced bits of the fruit over the tender steamed fish.

This was the real Slim Shady. Not so much pineapple bits but the sauce was pulpy. Must have been made with a lot of pineapples. When we opened the packaging, there was a waft of something that I thought might have been tamarind.

Sauce had a fruity sweetness, was tangy and had a nice warmth from the chilli. What I liked most about it was the flavour of pineapple that it captured. Very appetizing stuff that I found addictive. Fish was good quality and tender. 

So this dish looked little like the picture on the menu, didn't taste like what I imagined from that but turned out to be very delicious.

We washed it down with some sour plum Coke.