Nana Curry, Tiong Bahru Plaza

Never noticed this shop (#02-111, Tiong Bahru Plaza, 302 Tiong Bahru Road) until recently. It seemed that they were some sort of franchisee for Nana Curry that only serves a limited selection for their curries. What they had were curried chicken, fish and mutton - no vegetable curry, potato add ons or bread for the curry. The have man tou though. Not the same as the regular Nana Curry shops that some of us might be familiar with. The majority of the menu is cze char which has nothing to do with the curry.

Anyway, we tried some stuff.

Seafood tofu was not bad. There're bits of luncheon meat in it. Pretty tasty.

This was the mutton curry. Same old frozen mutton used. Did taste like what I remembered of Nana Curry. The restaurant mentioned that they were provided the curry to use and that they didn't need to be made from scratch in their kitchen. So I supposed it wouldn't deviate much coming from a central kitchen. Pretty salty.

We ordered salted fish fried rice. This was the same quality as one could find in countless cze chars in coffee shops over the island. Meaning not very good. It was a little too greasy for my liking. The fake char siew which were supposed to be crab sticks were made of fake crab sticks. What set them apart were bits of minced chicken and thinly sliced string beans. For some reason, I ate more of it than I thought I would. 

I always felt that fried rice is a reliable indicator for cooking in an eatery. The ingredients reveals the minds behind the owners and tells about the level of quality they endorse. The outcome of the fried rice uncovers the skill level of the kitchen. 

There's fried prawns with pork floss on the menu. No idea how the of combining these two came about or was supposed to work but the floss tasted better on the fried rice.

Kinya Izakaya & Ramen, South Beach

Sapporo Miharu Ramen had been around as I recall from the days in Gallery Hotel and later, Millenia Walk. For reasons, they seemed to have reinvented themselves in their recent relocation to South Beach into Kinya Izakaya & Ramen (#B1-22 South Beach Ave, 26 Beach Road, tel : +65 6733 8464).

We asked how long they had been in the current location and they said it had been about a year. When we tried getting some of the ramen, at least half their ramen menu were still unavailable because they claimed that they didn't have the ingredients for them. We thought it strange for them not to have ingredients since a year would have been more than enough time for logistics to be smoothened out.

The izakaya small plates section of their menu was pretty much like any of those izakaya themed wannabes that's been opening up. Nothing mention worthy because it's mostly templated. We did get some hamachi sashimi which was not bad.

I remembered liking their shiso gyoza previously. They one that we had today tasted disappointing. The shiso flavour was lacking. Seems that Tsuta's sui rendition is currently superior.

Tried their wabushi shoyu bowl...

 ...and their miso tonkotsu bowl. Decent if unremarkable. Not the kind of broth that made me want to finish up after the noodles. Also didn't feel like it digested well for the rest of the day with the greasy burps.

Something feels off about them. I suspect the old Miharu as a ramen-ya is gone for good.

So Good Char Chan Tang, TripleOne Somerset

We've been recommended So Good Char Chan Tang (#01-16 TripleOne Somerset, 111 Somerset Road, tel : +65 6493 0338). Prior to the recommendation, we've also heard a bit of online chatter about how their food was "authentic". Curiosity prevailed and we wanted to be the judge of that "authenticity". What we did not see coming was a 40 minute queue on a late afternoon. A number of items on their menu were also sold out then.  

That's their bolognese sauce with rice and a fried egg. It's actually not bad. Hence the first wall breaks. The sauce was a little sweet but not annoyingly so with bits of meat and had some umami. Wouldn't mind eating this again.

They ran out of char siew so we got the duck and roast pork. Duck was decent and the roast pork was okay if one was okay with soggy crackling. I expected better from things we've heard. While the flavour wasn't bad, you can get better ones from the Imperial Treasure dim sum restaurants.

Cheong fun with beef briskets was nice. The stewing sauce of the briskets was competently flavourful. Liked that there were also pieces of tendon in it. But, the quality of the briskets aren't the same as the ones we've had in Hong Kong for sure. This was the leaner cut that local businesses use. Probably why beef brisket dishes here will never be on par with those in Hong Kong.

Tried their prawn dumpling noodles (水餃麵). Those sui gao were not bad. Didn't expect the gloopy oyster sauce on the noodles. This came with a bowl of soup on the side that tasted like it was flavoured with conpoy. Loved that. While I didn't think these were the better noodles we've had in terms of texture, I also didn't mind them.

Wanted condense milk bun but they were out of it. We settled for their French toast. Also not bad. That little dish on the side, I don't know what it was. Probably syrup with something because it didn't taste like maple syrup nor honey.

Breakfast at Ikea

I hadn't realized that Ikea has vegetarian bee hoon for breakfast in the weekends until we happened by one morning during said weekend. We tried it out of curiosity. There's mock char siew, some bits of fried crispy bean curd sheet and very measly strips of cabbage in it. They offer pickled green chilli as well. Didn't taste bad but it had less ingredients that what most would expect out of vegetarian bee hoon.

There's pancakes too but these have been around. Just that I've never had them before. They're like a big breakfast thingy from McD with pancakes, eggs, sausage and hash browns. McD's hotcakes are nicer. These were a little stiffer and they didn't give butter/margarine. The eggs here tasted more like eggs though and those chicken sausage patties on the side were actually pretty tasty.

Obanyakis from 108 Matcha Saro

I've been wanting to try the obanyaki from 108 Matcha Saro (#B1-K5 Suntec City, 3 Temasek Boulevard) since I heard about them opening up last year. Never happened until now because it's never in the way.

I liked the one with matcha custard fillings. Gotta love that there was enough of the green tea flavour in that custard which also gave that hint of bitterness after the creamy sweet.

There was this other double chocolate one with green tea dough. Didn't think so much of the chocolate custard and chocolate combination. 

Tenjin, Raffles City

Les Amis' tempura shop Tenjin opened more than a year back. They're a relatively wallet friendly tendon based shop. Did not manage to try them until the opening of their second outlet at Raffles City (#B1-46 Raffles City, 252 North Bridge Road, tel : +65 9663 1365).

There's truffle chawanmushi. It's okay-ish. I kept thinking about the much more expensive one from Aoki as I ate this. This one was obviously not as good as that was.

This was the Inaniwa cold udon set with the tempura. Not bad. I like the tempura here much better than the grease logged and oft mentioned Tendon Kohaku which I never understood. Loved the chilled udon and equally chilled smoky tsuyu that came with it.