The last dinner of 2020

2020 has been a trying year. For many and for myself. While I was tempted to say that I hope the next year would better or some shit like that, I caught myself because know that's not how it works. Reality would not bend for a change in the calendar. But I do hope that things get better as we go along and here's our happy meal from our favourite teishoku restaurant to mark an end to the annual milestone. And the link to all the times that we came here before that (一, 二, 三, 四, 五, 六, 七, 八, 九, 十, 十一, 十二, 十三 ).

I ordered lemon tea for the first time here because for reasons, they ran out of their Suntory on tap. I could be wrong but this tasted like something out of a can. From Seasons.

Sweet corn tempura which we've had previously. Nice munching with a bit of salt.

This was a first. Scallops they described in butter and soya sauce. Could taste the soya sauce but not the butter in the sauce. The scallops were really nice. The exterior was done with just the light char that flavour from the caramelization came through with insides that were still slightly rare. Vegetables were good quality, well cooked and juicy.

Doesn't look apparent but this was their white fish in shiso tempura.

A happy meal deserves their beef cheek in miso and red wine. 

Suju also has one of the better gindara teriyaki I've had.

One of the happy components of having a meal here is the rice and those takuan. They pair so well together and I almost always get seconds.

 

Burrata cheese soba from Healthy Soba IKI

Healthy Soba IKI has a Christmas special. Burrata cheese topping on their soba. Nice. Again it's all sitting in some tsuyu with a fruity olive oil and tomatoes, topped with tomato salsa, burrata cheese and negi. And black pepper. Tangy and creamy at the same time paired with their freshly made soba.

Proprietor Noguchi-san came over and asked about the food. Short chat broached the topic of their previous cheese soba. Apparently the shavings of cheese were 36 month Parmigiano Reggiano. Who woulda thunk?!

More food from Burger & Lobster

More food from Burger & Lobster.

These above were their lobster nuggets. Each "nugget" was a claw, six pieces of them for $18. So if $3 is a fair amount to pay for a fried shelled lobster claw to you, here's where you can get some.

That's the lobster mac & cheese. Nice crusty salty melted cheese that sealed a ramekin of macaroni which was soaked in something that tasted like a creamy lobster bisque. Full of creamy crustacean flavour and had bits of lobster meat as well.

Lobster rosti wasn't as impressive as the previous two items. Rosti wasn't bad but the lobster here was just salty without the sweetness. Will not order again.

They had this venison burger for the Christmas season. Venison patty with Brie, bacon and cranberry relish. Not bad. But I couldn't tell the meat from their beef burger.

Something they called Texan waffle chicken. Chicken's not bad. Buttermilk fried and very moist with a pleasant savoury marinade. The waffle was thick and sweet and had come crunchy sweet bits in them. For some reasons, I was popping mouthful after another of the waffle until I finished one. Didn't do it for the second piece because of the sugar overload by then.

Pretended to quench thirst with their expensive but delicious pineapple tea.

Sushiro in December

It's been a few months since we've hit Sushiro. While it can be fun to try some the items they've introduced into the menu which we haven't tried before, there's also us being us sticking to what we liked from them. 

One of the newer item their hiyashiame which was flavoured with cinnamon powder. This was sweet and pleasant from the combination of cinnamon and ginger.

There's a madara shirako gunkan. No idea why madara is in the name but this was a better one than the shirako gunkan they had last year. The ingredients were mostly the same. This one had more shirako.

The stacked snow crab nigiri looked better in pictures. It's okay. Not the better tasting snow crab out there since you do get what you will be paying for.

Their scallop sushi is generally not bad. Applies for this one with more scallops and ikura.......

......and the one which have larger scallops.

This ankimo gunkan also looked nicer than the one we got from last year.

We had chutoro. Not the better one out there but it's sometimes the luck of the draw for a conveyor belt sushi joint like this.

Some sesame marinated snapper nigiri. Unusual flavour profile for a sushi which we haven't had before from the sesame.

The nigiri with the big red prawns are one of those good ones to pick.

The other no brainer is the gunkan overflowing with ikura.

Not traditional but there's an appeal to tuna mayo.

Tried their whole (yari ika) spear squid nigiri. Are these like babies? Tasted much like the regular squid sushi except for the mouthfeel. Wished they hadn't decided that there was a need to include that tiny dollop of ginger paste.

I liked that their tamago yaki was sweet and chilled. 

Albacore tuna was tender.

Chilled chawanmushi with dashi jelly was unexpectedly refreshing. There's a scallop and shrimp in it.

The noodle item we hadn't tried before was their shirasu mazesoba. This looked better in real life than the pictures on the menu. There was a light sauce which I could describe as savoury and that was all that accompanied the shirasu and negi for the noodles. Nothing unnecessarily complicated. I'd eat this again.

Amaebi not so sweet.

Tai looked dry-ish. 

The Earl Grey pudding from Hattendo was nice and creamy. Really creamy.

They also had these sweet potato cream buns from Hattendo which were also nice. There was milky sweet potato flavour in the creamy filling.

Tambuah Mas, Great World

With this (B1-110/111 Great World, 1 Kim Seng Promenade, tel : +65 6235 6713), we've visited all the Tambuah Mas restaurants. The other two are at Paragon and Tanglin Shopping Centre. We had the idea that their menu never changes but we were wrong this time round because the introduced dishes of the month.

One of them was their urap. Not on the regular menu. We confirmed with the server that the vegetables were cooked before ordering because the raw rendition simply didn't work for me with all the green-y flavour. This one was not bad. Was also unexpectedly spicy.

We had sayur lodeh. Vegetables were so tender.

We also liked their tempe goreng which I thought was good with their sambal belachan.

Tried their udang petai belado. Prawns were pretty fresh and easily removed from the shells. Wished there were more of the petai.

Ordered a serving of their chunky sate which was accompanied by some nicely chilled cucumbers on the side.

Gotta have rice here. Otherwise, it'll be a crime to not show proper appreciation to all the gravies and sambal. While I haven't actually paid attention before, I've never noticed that they were using basmati. Was that a recent thing?

Revisiting Ma Maison Kitchen

That's their yuzu latte. I had imagined that like a sweet potato or pumpkin latte, I'd be getting a flavoured milky drink. I didn't expect yuzu flavour in an actual latte. But that's what we got. And oddly, it worked without tasting weird. Just like the cucumber latte.

Last time we were here was Halloween season. This time it was the Christmas. Ordered one of their Christmas special steak which came with mushroom soup. 

Australian Angus beef, no cut was mentioned.

Served with a sauce boat of their spiced berry and red wine sauce. It was a fruity tasty steak.

We remembered their sirloin from their Scream curry rice the last time. So we got the steak today. Not bad. Very decent piece properly treated with a crusty char on the outside. No dry ageing needed.

And their yummy umami mentaiko supagetti with wok hei. This has been more or less consistently good since the first time I've had it.