Swapping toppings at Healthy Soba IKI

Have been missing the lemon soba since I've been distracted by the monthly specials at Healthy Soba IKI. I didn't like the dry and stringy shredded chicken topping on that so we asked if we could swap that for toppings of equivalent value on the menu. Noguchi-san obliged so that's how the avocado and boiled egg up there came about. Still can't get past how refreshing the lemon infused broth was.

We also swapped the same stringy shredded chicken for smoked duck for this month's kuro goma soba. The duck wasn't very smoky though.

Uncle Ho Tuckshop, Pasir Panjang Road

So is the restaurant Uncle Ho (#01-04 Old Behn Meyer Building, 100 Pasir Panjang Rd, tel : +65 9624 5761) or Uncle Ho's? If you didn't know, this is a Vietnamese eatery with chefs from Vietnam if what I had read were true. We came over to their main restaurant because the menu at Republic Plaza doesn't have everything.

We had gỏi cuốn/summer rolls, not bad tasting. The rolls were packed. For some reasons, I got reminded of the ones at the defunct O Banh Mi where they were noticeably smaller and had mint in them even though these didn't. All good with the nước chấm.

Pretty impressed with their chilled green mango prawn salad with mint. There was a medley of textures from the mango strips, toasted peanuts, prawn and onions. This medley was paired with another medley of flavours from the green mango, sugar, fish sauce and what I really enjoyed from this, the mint. I'd eat this again.

Their turmeric fish (chả cá thăng long?) was nice. The slices of fish were firm and crisp with the flavour from the turmeric. Wished there were a lot more dill to go with it though. This was served with bún and some fermented shrimp paste (mắm tôm?). That was a lot of shrimp paste because even a little of it packed plenty of the briny pungent fermented shrimp flavour. 😅 

I didn't get a photo of their beef stew but as a note to self, the gravy was nicely spiced and delicious. The chunks of beef were however hard and stringy. Avoid if I ever come back.

Starbucks priced Vietnamese drip coffee. Not bad though. I liked that it wasn't as sweet as how other places tend to do theirs.

The permanance of Chicken McCrispy from McD

Who would have foreseen that we would be ever buying a bucket of chicken form McD. Not that it was impossible. Just improbable. Chicken McCrispy has apparently made it into the permanent menu of McD.  I remember having them in the previous times they made their limited appearance but don't really remember if the flavour was the same. I do have the impression that I thought that they tasted better previously though. 

What's slightly little odd about about them were the chicken thighs. They were thoughtfully prepared with just one bone in the the meat but that meat looked flattened. Shaped out for some reasons. There were juices but not real moisture. Otherwise, we found the skin too crusty. I detected garlic, some very mild heat and felt like I was eating a lot of fried flour. Surely they do not think they could compete with Jollibee with this?

Meatless at Babas Peranakan

Going meatless there with takeaway from Babas Peranakan. Also noticing the hae bee flavour from the long beans. I'm normally not so big on lemongrass in curry but this lemak rendition was delicious. Heftily portioned for princely sum of $3.

Mom's Touch, Centrepoint

With the name Mom's Touch (#B1-07 The Centrepoint, 176 Orchard Road) and products like Mom's Thigh Burger, isn't anyone getting the Oedipus Complex-esque vibes? Hawr hawr hawr....anyways this Korean fried chicken brand was brought in by the No Sighboard Holdings group which runs No Sighboard Seafood. Alright then, no signboards for anything Oedipus Complex-y stuff.

That's their Incredible Burger up there. Fried chicken, egg, ham, onions, pickles, lettuce and sauce. A mouthful. Maybe it's the sauce. The usual suspect that overwhelms the flavour of everything else because it taste like a average fried chicken burger to me. Not much of the other ingredients came through except for the lettuce because there was actually quite a bit of lettuce there. Nothing particularly outstanding that I'll likely pick Popeye's or a McSpicy over this. I don't mind giving them another try though just to be sure. Right mom?

$6 at Yuan Chun Famous Lor Mee (源春驰名卤面)

It seems that the difference between the $4 bowl and this $6 bowl from Yuan Chun are the amount of fried toppings that they give. The bowl wasn't larger nor did they give more bee hoon. It was a lot more enjoyable because of the increased toppings though. Noticed that the sliced chilli was a mixture of the regular variety and chilli padi. I'm starting to dig their gravy which I've just noticed to be egg dropped.