Zhao Ji Hainanese Chicken Rice (趙記海南鸡饭), Chinatown Food Centre

We noticed this chicken rice stall (#02-180 Chinatown Food Centre, 335 Smith Street) the previous times when we were around. What in particular got my attention were the amount of older folks that ordered from them. These guys drew a queue even before lunch time. Which prompted me to get a closer look to see what was different about them compared to the other chicken rice stalls in the food centre. 

They have brown chicken rice and also kampong chicken. I ordered a plate of kampong chicken 鸡尾 with their brown chicken rice and livers. Pretty good tasting actually. Liked how that regular chicken rice flavour has infused into the brown rice. Chilli was pretty lime-y. This is where I also got a little confused because the 鸡尾 that they gave me was the rear end of the chicken when I've been getting the thigh portion in the past.

A couple of limited items from Sushiro

We're back in Sushiro. Ordered a couple of items that we haven't seen before on limited run. That above was the broiled Hokkaido sardine nigiri. It's pretty good. Like the oils and flavour coming from the fish. I wished they hadn't decided that it needed the tiny dollop of ginger though.

The other item that caught our attention was their whole squid sushi. Made me think of those ikameshi that I used to get from Isetan. This was tastier than it looked. Squid might have been pan fried or something. Had a nice squid flavour. The body was stuffed with rice but it wasn't those flavoured rice like the ikameshi.

Alan Banana Leaves BBQ Seafood, Pasir Panjang Food Centre

Alan Banana Leaves BBQ Seafood (#01-23/24 Pasir Panjang Food Centre, 121 Pasir Panjang Road) came about as a suggestion for dinner. I haven't been much to this parts so I thought it might worth checking out.

We had boiled sea snails. These were not bad. Tender and slightly chewy like squids. The sambal provided was deliciously spicy and tangy.

There's sambal petai. These were stir fried with onions and ikan bilis. The onions lent a bit of sweetness to the dish, quite similar to the rendition done at Xin Curry Fish Head Zhu Chao at Tanglin Halt. As opposed to the more savoury and meaty ones from say Tian Tian Seafood Restaurant or Sin Hoi Sai.

Also got ourselves some stir fried kailan with garlic. Vegetables were nicely salted and not fibrous.

We ordered mui fan to see how their's was like. The gravy was starchy and they had decent ingredients but I wouldn't consider those portions generous. Taste was okay but if you added the sambal from those sea snails into them, it became quite delicious. Without that sambal, the one at Hillman Restaurant beats this.

That's sambal lala. Clams. In sambal. Not too bad.

Not forgetting sambal stingray. This wasn't as good as I imagined. Firstly, there was a lack of char on the surface of the stingray which kinda defeated the purpose of getting grilled stingray. On top of that, we could easily tell from the texture that it was frozen. That texture ruined the experience. For some reasons, this triggered the memories of the good ones we've had at Newton Food Centre many years ago. This was not of the same league.

Bai Nian (百年), People's Park Complex Food Centre

I had 百年 once a few years ago at Albert Food Centre. Remembered liking it so I got a bowl after discovering that they had also set up shop at People's Park Food Centre (#01-1144 People's Park Complex Food Centre, 32 New Market Road). Nice as I remembered it. Maybe this one has much less spring onions. But the yong tau foo ingredients that were hand made in the shop was still tasty and good quality.

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.