Una Una, Bugis+

The quality difference between the unagi bowls from Una Una (#05-02/03 Bugis+, 201 Victoria Street, tel : +65 6238 1011) versus Man Man/Unagi Tei was obvious. While I hadn't expected a lot out of the cheapest unagi hitsumabushi in town, I still felt this was a letdown. Portions were kinda small for the double and the eels didn't have the light crispiness nor smokiness. Even the rice felt dry. It was a dollar more for the spicy bowl which basically involved just shichimi sprinkled over the eels.

The only consolation out of this was that two Sapporos were going for $10.

Loo's Hainanese Curry Rice, Tiong Bahru Food Centre

Loo's Hainanese Curry Rice has recently shifted from their former premise to the current location (#02-67 Tiong Bahru Food Centre, 30 Seng Poh Road) in Tiong Bahru Food Centre right where Original Tiong Bahru Golden Pig & Roasted used to be. Just next door to Skirt & Dirt.

So this was a late lunch (2-ish) and most of their cooked food were already sold out. Still plenty of their popular pork chop and curry squids for some reasons and there were still people in line though. The stewed cabbage didn't look appealing at all so the pork and squid were it for me today.

Lai Heng Mushroom Minced Meat Noodle (來興香菇肉脞麵), Toa Payoh

Finally managed to get a bowl from Lai Heng Mushroom Minced Meat Noodle (73 Toa Payoh Lorong 4) after hearing about them for so long. These guys are arguably ranked as one of the better minced meat noodle stalls around. Hence armed with a bit of reading and some real life feedback, I went in with my expectations tempered so as not to set myself up for disappointment.

Pretty solid bowl of bak chor mee by any standards. Chilli has that dried shrimp flavour but didn't pack as much heat as I was expecting/hoping for. Their concoction of the noodle sauce were more balanced compared to shops like Tai Hwa/Tai Wah which tend to be more vinegary. This bowl also had loads of stewed mushrooms. Will definitely try to get another bowl if I'm in the vicinity but I wouldn't go out of the way or endure too long a queue for them

Note to self : Stall has only a couple of bags of mee pok in the weekdays and will usually be sold out by lunch. No mee pok during the weekends.

Bánh Mì Saigon, Ang Mo Kio

I found out about Bánh Mì Saigon (505 Ang Mo Kio Avenue 8) a while back and came by for a couple of their bánh mì. Was pretty glad to get in line before the queue became deterring. These folks apparently took their time about the business with the proprietor making the effort to explain to each customer that had queries about what they were selling. On top of that, it was another almost half hour of wait before our orders were processed.

Each of their bánh mì was slathered with some pâté, butter mayo thingy and some vegetables before they were generously stuffed with the ingredients of choice. One of what made Bánh Mì Saigon's sandwiches stand out above many other "bánh mì" out there was the generosity of those ingredients. Our orders were all obviously sans coriander/cilantro of course. 

The top sandwich was their "special" bánh mì - stuffed with assorted hams and I added a fried egg. Hearty and delicious this one was and I thought it made an obvious fall back/go to configuration with the savoury sliced meat and egg between bread I could easily inhale. 

Got another one with stewed pig's intestines and ears. Those innards had their offal-lish flavour coupled with a bit of spice and sweetness from the stewing broth. I didn't think the crunch from the pig's ears felt good in the sandwich though.

Not that I've a lot of experience with these sandwiches but in retrospect, I'd rank this and Viet9 as the better bánh mì around. 

Songane (송가네), ARC 380

This Korean eatery which takes no reservations, is located at a locale not exactly known for Korean food (#01-02 ARC 380, 380 Jalan Besar, tel : +65 6980 3474) and has a facade that was pretty run of the mill managed to reel us in with their black sesame samgyetang. Banchan's simple and not bad. Love them all with rice.

This was the said black sesame samgyetang. It's exactly like how most people would imagine - samgyetang flavoured by some sort of sesame paste.

After a bit of stirring, the broth darkened from the distributed black sesame paste. A broth that was deliciously flavoured by the aromatic nuttiness of  black sesame, a delicate ginseng flavour lightly sweetened by red dates. Or jujubes if you would. 

The chicken which enveloped some tender glutinous rice was on the border of falling off the bone so it was pretty easy to slurp them off those bones. I'd come back just for this rendition of samgyetang. It was at least a couple of levels up from the one we had at Bigmama.  

If anyone wanted to take a look at the black sesame stained bones/remnants of the chicken.

We had some pork dumplings on the side. This were filled with juices from the stuffings of pork. Delicious. I liked them better with the sesame oil/salt than the regular dip they came with.

Pretty satisfying food from Songane. Will come back.

Shiok Shiok Noodles, Teck Ghee Court Food Centre

What a name eh? These folks from Shiok Shiok Noodles (#01-07 Teck Ghee Court Market & Food Centre, 341 Ang Mo Kio Ave 1, tel : +65 9773 9344) lay claim to the first mala bak chor mee.

I was curious and wanted to know if they were good. This was the large bowl of the mala bak chor mee. Notice those rough looking meatballs on the side? Yes, hand made and they were packed with the flavour from dried sole. There's also fish balls and fish cakes in place of could have been stewed mushrooms in bowls from other stalls.

The mala infusion in the sauce was legit. Solid Sichuan peppercorn flavour with a light 麻 and some heat. Enjoyed how savoury the bowl of noodles was and that their concoction didn't shy away from salt.  For a bowl of mala-cized local noodles, this had a load more credibility compared to the 麻辣三宝面 from Wen Ge Charcoal Delights (文哥烧腊).

We tried a bowl of black mee sua soup which featured sliced pig's kidneys and livers with loads of minced pork. The dark brown was was rich tasting and robust with a porcine flavour. Not bad. Couldn't taste the XO that was supposed to be in it though.