Lemak Boys, Shaw Centre

Whaddayaknow? Les Amis Group does nasi lemak with Lemak Boys (#03-10 Shaw Centre, 1 Scotts Road, tel : +65 6235 3218). 

There's always a challenge selling stuff like nasi lemak at prices Lemak Boys do because it's local food. Someone is bound to voice out that there's better and cheaper elsewhere. Others will balk at the prices because, local food - and that most of us are used to not paying a premium for them. There will always be somebody's need to justify the price tag because we all want them cheap and good. Or at a minimal, great value for the money we're expected to fork out. Understandable.

And because of what they sell, Lemak Boys will also invariably be compared to the likes of Coconut Club. So how did they fare?

Ingredients and cooking were fine in my opinion. What they included in the basic plate were quite nice but not particularly outstanding. It's the "getting there and not quite there" kind of standards if you catch my drift. Not mediocre, but also not quite there. Heh.

But I'm sure there'll be those that think that 'getting there' isn't good enough because of how much one is made to pay for a plate and in the other end of the spectrum, there'll be those whose standards are so low that they'd claim that this is one of the best nasi lemak in town/they've had.

The rice was forgettable. Not enough flavour. In fact I think I like Lee Wee Brothers' rice better. Ponggol Nasi Lemak was more satisfying as well since we're comparing. And if we're beating yet another dead horse, the defunct Island Cafe's basmati rendition blows them all out of the water. If I were to come back, it wouldn't be for the lemak rice. 

Sambal was interesting. There's heat and it was tangy - a tanginess with a quality that was almost fruity. Not traditional but also not bad.

Sayur lodeh packed a bit more heat than I had been expecting. This was rich and redolent of dried shrimps. Would make great pairing with steamed white rice.

I ordered the chicken and yam patty because I've never had one before. Made with minced chicken and strips of yam. Tasted like chicken and strips of yam. I didn't mind this though.

Chuan Hung Noodle (川巷米粉), Telok Ayer Street

Chuan Hung Noodle (#01-01, 51 Telok Ayer Street, tel : +65 9755 1058) is a noodle shop by the folks at Szechuan fusion restaurant Birds Of A Feather. The place has been around for more than a year I think and I've been wanting to come try their Mianyang rice noodles since I heard about them. Finally happened by chance today.

This canned hawthorn juice was delicious. Does anyone know where I can get these? 

We started with some chilled braised eggplant. The tender eggplants were topped with an awesome green chilli thingy with a smoky finish that packed a bit of heat. Delicious this was.

There was deep fried pig intestines. These slightly fatty intestines were braised with spices previously before they were fried and one could tell with all the flavour that had gone in to it. They were also stuffed with sweet leeks. Nice.

Had a bowl of their ox tongue noodles in vine pepper broth. These bowls featured the Mianyang rice noodles which had a silky texture like mee sua. These rice noodles had a lot more bite than mee sua though. Broth was peppery with some tanginess. There's chilli padi inside. Felt a bit of my lip tingle from the beginnings of numbness. Not bad. Wished there was more ox tongue.

We tried their bing fen (冰粉) because we haven't had anything similar before. Here I am tempted to simply describe it as textured.

BUT - there were a lot of flavour from the toppings. Sweetness from the red beans, sultanas and bits of hawthorn flakes. And then tanginess from both the raisins and hawthorn flakes along with a deeper caramel sweetness from the brown sugar in the jelly. That's all topped with lot of crunchiness and bite amidst the wobbly jelly.

Xun Qin Ji (寻秦记), Seng Poh Road

We noticed Xun Qin Ji (#01-17, 58 Seng Poh Road) the last time we were in the vicinity. Piqued our interest since they were supposedly featuring food from the Shaanxi province and thought we'd check them out the next time we were here. I shot straight for the sesame paste cold noodles (凉皮).

The sesame added little to the noodles. Wasn't fragrant like I imagined. Slightly disappointed. The spicy option wasn't spicy either so I had to add extra chilli which ended up making the bowl look dangerously red but still didn't pack as much heat as it looked. I did enjoy the texture of the noodles though. They were less chewy than I had thought.

There was sliced mutton on the menu. I thought it was a pity that a restaurant that supposedly featured Shaanxi cuisine only had just a couple of dishes with lamb/mutton. This was one of them. I'd say that this would be akin to some sort of mutton ham or corned lamb. Delicious with the natural meat flavour. The garlic sauce on the side packs potency so if you dip too much, that mutton-y flavour would be lost. Otherwise, I liked this. Tender.

Since we were at it, an order of their Chinese hamburger/rou jia mo (肉夹馍). The fillings weren't as much as pictures suggested but the pork fillings were deliciously moist and packed with flavour.

Cheese soba and kombucha from Healthy Soba IKI

Did not see this coming from Healthy Soba IKI. Lured by their cheese soba which was just recently announced to be part of their dinner option. I liked it. The noodles were chilled. Predominantly flavoured by cheese, pepper and unexpectedly - olive oil. With a light perfume of truffle. I might just get this again without the tomato paste which tasted a little "jarred" to me.

There's kombucha now too. Lavender and mint flavoured ones. Those flavour were just a little above subtle so it's mostly still that regular tangy kombucha flavour for me.

More Market Grill-ery

First time back in The Market Grill since Umbrella Corp had the accident. There was a one for one tenderloin offer over the recent weekend and we wanted to take advantage of it.

Lobster bisque seemed to have lost some of its crustacean punch today. It's still not bad but......

We ordered sides of charred broccolini to go with our steaks. The broccolini came first. Before the steak that is.

Tried to eat them very slowly while waiting for the tenderloins. While I kinda like this dry char for the vegetable, aren't they supposed to be served with the steak?!

Those grilled tenderloin finally did arrive. Took a little longer than what I thought was the norm. Seemed like they didn't think steak knives were necessary for such a tender cut. Steak was nice. Nice meaning proper medium rare with a charred crusty outside. Everything else's forgiven at this point. Liked their Béarnaise sauce. Was happy with the fries.

So we decided to do desserts. Burnt cheesecake. It looked browned rather than burnt. Cheesecake was lighter than the looks suggested. Delicious cinnamon flavoured pears. That white scoop on the side was yoghurt. Loved those buttery bits of walnut streusel. Importantly, I liked that Market Grill doesn't attempt to kill with excessive sweetness in their desserts.

Still I appreciated a bitter coffee at the end. 

Ma Maison Kitchen, 100 AM

Ma Maison Kitchen (#02-11, 100 AM, 100 Tras Street, tel : +65 6694 7383) is the second newest outlet by Ma Maison. The menu appeared to be consisting of stuff from their regular outlets + some tapas-y small plates.

This was disappointing coming from them. The idea was fresh cabbage served in an dutch oven that would wilt from the heat along with anchovies. Didn't expect to find a fried egg. Most of the cabbage slices were too thick. The dutch oven didn't stay hot for very long. Most of the cabbage ended up being very crunchy and raw tasting. Which was a waste of those melted anchovies that wouldn't cling to stiff half raw cabbages.

I had imagined that they would have the experience to set this up with smaller leaves to do this.

Their gyutan was in the small plates section of the menu like the cabbages above. They were anything but small. Not complaining about the portions. The meat was sliced a little too thick as well. Which made them a little tough. Still delicious in the pepper sauce. Just have to chew harder and longer to get those flavours out. Tasted like something one could find in cze char stalls if only cze char stalls ever offered ox tongue.

That's daikon in porcini cream sauce. Don't know what was the brown sauce at the bottom. Wasn't bad but it shouldn't have been there since it drowned out whatever little presence from the porcini cream. Poorly conceived this was.

There was white asparagus with cheese on menu so we ordered it. Delicious because the asparagus was crunchy and sweet and the cheese was milky and chewy. Nice.

In the spirit of All Hallows' Eve, we had their Scream Curry Rice.

Our Ghostface looked like it had double chin. A visually poorer cousin compared to the menu. Too much rice has the tendency to remove definition from one's jawline. Hahaha! 

Curry's not bad. The sliced chillis packed serious heat so I liked what it did for the curry. Those pieces of sirloin were unexpectedly delicious. Suitably salted and surprisingly tender with a beefy fattiness. I need to re-look into their sirloin steaks methinks.