KS Fruits Rojak . BBQ Rojak, Pasir Panjang Food Centre

Came across this stall (#01-45 Pasir Panjang Food Centre, 121 Pasir Panjang Road) selling fruit rojak while having dinner so we ordered one with cuttlefish and century egg. Indeed their rojak had a larger variety of fruits than the usual rendition - there's red/green apples, pineapple and guava; these on top of the standard ingredients of tau pok, cucumber, you tiao. What I didn't expect was that this plate a lot more refreshing than the usual rendition because of the fruits. Would look forward to this again the next time I'm here. 

Gochi-So Shokudo, Chinatown Point

These guys have a branch at Chinatown Point (#02-41/42 Chinatown Point, 133 New Bridge Road). They have Iberico pork steaks and what appeared to be chirashi don that the one at One Raffles Place didn't. We stuck to their grilled pork donburi. This was the Iberico pork collar bowl. Garlic barbeque sauce on the side. Meat's a lot leaner than the belly or jowl. They seriously don't salt their meat at all.

Angelina, Marina Bay Sands

I always had the idea that Angelina was just cakes and confectionaries and pastries only so I never paid them much attention when they opened up at Capitol Piazza. Recently we walked past their place at MBS (#B2-89/89A Marina Bay Sands, 10 Bayfront Avenue, tel : +65 6688 7218) and also saw them featured on YouTube and I realized that they was more than met my eyes.

 

That's their old-fashioned iced chocolate “L’Africain”. Fruity thick chocolate drink. Had dimensions but I don't know if there was that much cocoa. Not a bad chocolate drink. Will try the hot one the next time.

For some reason, the coffee from our Christmas set came first before everything else from the set did. Thought it would be the last. We asked for cream and they obliged. Because the coffee didn't pack the punch as the one of the defunct Antoinette, it also didn't taste the same with cream. This one was like French kopi gu yu. 

Back to the Christmas set I mentioned earlier, there's a seafood platter that came with it. Seafood plate to be precise. The prawn, scallop and torched salmon rosette were all delicious. There was enough caramelization to for that smoky flavour without downplaying the taste seafood. Those guys in the kitchen who made this must have either been lucky or competent.

This lamb was the main course for the Christmas set. Done medium. Not bad. Flavour's there but not exactly robust and there was also a hint of rosemary which I would have preferred not there. Gratin dauphinois that came with it was creamy and delicious.

They had a delicious slow cooked chicken with morel cream. This was part of their a la carte, not the set. Flavourful chicken was competently cooked and made extra yummy by the rich morel cream. By the way, that morel cream also paired well with the lamb and we knew because we tried.

We couldn't try any of their desserts on menu because the set came with a chocolate fondant which we didn't want to waste. Wasn't bad.

Dumplings.ru, Maxwell Chambers

We tried the food from Dumplings.ru (#01-05 Maxwell Chambers, 32 Maxwell Rd, tel : +65 8875 7033) some time back when they were just Ang Moh Dumplings. They've set up a bigger shop now. It's more of a tavern/bar than a restaurant. Remembered that I wasn't impressed previously at all but someone we trusted tried recently and the feedback was that they weren't bad. So we thought, what the hell - let's give them another try.

Kvass. Quite like this.

Ordered their okroshka because it looked so nice on their menu.

This was how it was served. Tasted like raita with dill and potatoes. The menu mentioned ham but we didn't get any. Nice for the hot weather but when we had this, it was one of those rainy nights.

Tried their kholodets. If you're trying to figure out from the picture, it was a chicken jelly/aspic dish. It was okay. Jelly was salty.

The shuba was not bad. Haven't had much of these before so I can only describe them based on whether I tasted good or not. Liked the mild earthy sweetness of the beets together with the smoky saltiness of the herring. Not as fancy or high quality as the one at Dacha though.

When we had their lamb pelmeni previously, I remember that they were unimpressive. These tasted different from the last time. We could discern the lamb flavour from the fillings today which was a good thing. A little more salty than I preferred but still quite tasty.

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.