Yuan Cheng Wai (源成威), Boon Tiong Road

Came across this stall at the Food Paradise coffeeshop at Tiong Bahru (11A Boon Tiong Road) by happenstance. Chance paved my way to them over the other roasted meat stall because the other one had a queue and this one didn't and also didn't look too bad.

I didn't dislike it. There was relatively tender soya sauce chicken. Decent stuff though I don't think they're in the same leagues as the ones I've had in Chinatown market food centre (一, 二, 三). One of my yardsticks is "slurp off the bone" tenderness which the chook didn't quite meet. Liked that their gravy wasn't starchy though. Char siew was edible and unmemorable. What impressed me were both the red chilli sauce and sambal. The former had a bit of heat and a nice hit of lime like chicken rice chilli while the latter was robustly flavoured with ikan bilis. Delicious chillis.

Sin Song Kee Teochew Fishball Noodle, Holland Drive

Haven't been here for a while so we stumbled upon Sin Song Kee Teochew Fishball Noodle (Chang Chen Mee Wah Coffeeshop, 40 Holland Drive) right in the spot where Sin Kee used to be. Looked like they've opened up recently. I've never heard of them but apparently they've been around, moved around and are known for their handmade fishballs and fish dumplings.

I thought they were okay-ish. Didn't taste bad but I also didn't think they were special that I'd scramble back for more anytime soon. Would have liked them better if the mee pok hadn't clumped up together. Couldn't get much out of the chilli so maybe I should be asking for more if I ever come back. The fish dumplings were nice though.

Syohachi Wagyu Hamburg, One Raffles Place

Enough has been written about Syohachi Wagyu Hamburg (#01-01 One Raffles Place, 1 Raffles Place tel : +65 6223 0755) - the newly opened casual hamburg restaurant by Syohachi Yakiniku from Hong Kong, so I won't parrot. We came over early for breakfast to take advantage of the 50% discount over the weekend. While the queue to order was a little less than 10 minutes of wait time, waiting to collect took over 45 minutes.

I liked it as a sandwich. What pushed the right buttons for me were the generous buttering on the pan fried toast and the melted cheese (this was added on by the way). Those became pretty much most of the flavour in the toasties. The wagyu patties were fully cooked, very tender and had flavours drowned out by the other ingredients. I'm just saying that this wasn't the best use of the meat or configuration for a sandwich if the flavour of the beef were to be showcased. And of course, there's the overcooking......

HK Mong Kok Kui Ji Kitchen, Chinatown Food Centre

We ate at this cze char stall (#02-217 Chinatown Food Centre, 335 Smith Street) once many years ago and remembered liking the food. Have been wanting to come back again over those years and never happened until now.

One of the dishes we remembered liking from the previous visit to HK Mong Kok Kui Ji Kitchen was their fu rong dan (芙蓉蛋). The omelette looked different today. Used to be more voluminous and had onions. This one didn't and was much flatter. Didn't taste bad though. Those cubes of char siew were still there.

The other dish we recalled liking was their steamed chicken with black fungus. It used to also have golden needle mushroom/enokitake (金针菇) and red dates which sweetened the dish. These ingredients were no longer there so the flavour had changed. Wasn't bad steamed chicken, just not mention worthy anymore like the old rendition they did.

Ordered steamed fish head with fermented black bean sauce and chilli. Awesome. Loved those black beans and chilli on rice. The steamed fish from this stall is as good as any of the competitors in the vicinity.

Zazz Pizza, Short Street

We've been wanting to come down to Zazz Pizza (1A Short Street, tel : +65 8199 9909) for a while and we're glad it finally happened.

It seemed that burrata is the thing that many people were ordering. We got a platter which featured some usual suspects thrown together. I thought their prosciutto di Parma was good.

We only had room for one pizza so we went with their Contadina which was basically a pizza bianca with four cheeses, some red bell peppers and salami. Nice. Liked it. Liked that the red bell peppers were sweet and didn't come on strong. My only gripe was that I couldn't taste the Gorgonzola. But otherwise it was delicious. Zazz has officially gotten itself, in my books, into the same league as people like Cicheti, Trattoria Pizzeria Logic and Luka.

Impressed by their saffron cream fettuccine with prawns and scallops. Sauce was delicious - a crustacean-y prawn flavour infused with garlic and saffron. Seafood was sweet. Enjoyed the bite on the pasta. The plate tasted better than it looked.

Ding Ji Wanton Noodle (鼎记云吞面), Tangs Market

So the wanton mee stall at Tangs Market has a name which I had previously never noticed. Their dry noodle came in a bit of soup. Wasn't what I had expected. Noodles not bad. Wantons were nothing to write home about. In this aspect, this stall was similar to Fei Ye Ye and Guang Li - the other wanton mee stalls with boring wantons but had noodles good enough that kept them in their game.