The morning bun and the drunken snail from Starter Lab

Sounds like the title of some trippy children't storybook?

Anyways these were a couple of ready to eat sweet pastries that one could get in the morning from Starter Lab. While it may appear obvious, I'm assuming the raisin Danish to be the drunken snail and the cinnamon sugar pastry thingy to be the morning bun. They're okay. I prefer the Danish with more raisins from Pullman Bakery down the road to this one. Those are also less than half as costly.

Chicken otah meatloaf nasi lemak from Crave

Every time I get nasi lemak from Crave (which isn't often if anyone was wondering), the question that pops into mind is how can anyone think that this was the same product as Selera Rasa? The quality of the rice was obviously different. The person cooking this either didn't care or was bound for some reasons by a recipe which didn't end up with the same tasting rice.

Anyways, the chicken otah meatloaf......I've been curious about that one. Decided to quell the curiosity. Tasted like a lemongrass flavoured otah which incorporated minced chicken instead of fish. Didn't taste bad but nothing I would get again.

More noodles from Ji Ji Noodle House (基記麵家)

There's chatter about the wanton noodles from Ji Ji Noodle House. The reason I got one was because of what I've heard/read about how it tasted different from the other styles and I was curious. That part about it tasting different was true. I'm not sure how to describe the flavour. Not a fan though. 

Nothing about the individual toppings were outstanding. Maybe I'm just not a local wanton noodles person. I was hoping that perhaps the noodles were what made it special but the texture wasn't my type as well. While it already had a bunch of flavours going on from the sauce, I thought those noodles were better for me with their chilli paste which had a nice ikan bilis flavour. 

I liked their curry chicken noodle better than the wanton noodles. Curry's thin but had a bit of heat and was more straightforward savoury. Good enough to drink. They didn't have particularly tender chicken though. Will probably be sticking to the curry chicken chop noodles if I come back.

Braseiro, Joo Chiat Road

We were originally heading to Burger Frites but they were closed because of manpower shortage and a sign pointed us to their sister restaurant Braseiro (333 Joo Chiat Road, tel : +65 9116 3304) just across the road which does steak frites. French-y kinda like L'Entrecôte and Les Bouchons and easier on the wallet than the both of them.

They served their strawberry lemonade looking like a margarita/mojito. For a moment we thought they got the order wrong but there was no tequila or rum. The crystals on the rim were sugar. 😅

Upsized my meat to the 400g entrecôte. It was okay eating but I wouldn't miss it after today if you catch my drift.

A little bloody looking from the under doneness and a bit of silver skin but nothing we couldn't deal with. 

Was tempted by their raclette cheese upgrade for their frites but they had run out of cheese so that kinda decided for us how we had them. Because we ate them with nothing else but salt, the light sweetness and potato flavours got through. Soft and some soggy...just like how we like them.

Re-revisiting The Hainan Story Chapter One

Here's us back at The Hainan Story Chapter One.

I remembered that "rojak peanut jam" toast from the last visit so I asked them for one minus the gula melaka kaya plus butter. Nice. Will probably not find a sweet fermented prawn paste with butter sandwich like this anywhere else in the world.

Munched on fried pork belly while waiting for the orders to arrive.

Curry rice's not bad. Need to ask for extra curry and their unusually smooth sambal belachan which will make inhaling this entire plate a breeze. The latter wasn't as spicy as I would have preferred but it still had sufficient fermented shrimp flavour to pack a punch. Here's where I remind myself to not get this rice set with braised pork the next time. The rest of the stuff on the plate was pretty good eating.

What's awesome was their lamb stew with crispy noodles/sang meen (生面). I figured that since I liked said lamb stew from the last visit and that I'd be letting the sang meen soak in the gravy anyway, this sounded like it made sense and it did. Gotta be the most delicious lamb noodles I've had. For now.

There's an osmanthus lager on their menu and I got it while thinking that it might taste like the King's Garden Ale from Song Fa. It didn't. While the osmanthus flavour was pronounced, I didn't like this as much as I thought I would.

More food from piu M

Here's us back at piu M.

We saw the seafood salad that other people were having previously but they were out of them when we tried to order. We had to get it this time round. Oysters, clams, crab legs, uni and ikura. Frutti di mare much. And something that tasted like dashi jelly infused with garlic.

In this moment, Jun-san chose to photobomb. I obliged by putting up this picture for posterity. Hahaha...

A repeat order of their chicken liver pâté. The one with the brûlée shell and spritzes of Yamazki 12. I strongly recommend this.

Masako-san wasn't around tonight. We were told that she has gone back to Japan for a while but before she left, she made sure that there were a couple of thousands of her sui gyoza around. Yeah, the same one we had the last time with shiso and that shoyu butter sauce. So in spite of her absence, it was ensured that the dumpling show for season 11 will go on. 

Tried their crab croquette. Solid panko crust and creamy insides. There were tiny tube pastas in the croquette with all the cream. Couldn't taste much of the crab but as croquette went, this was quite nice.

This was another item we spied from our last visit. Pan seared boned in chop of Iberico pork with clams cooked in a delicious sauce that tasted of butter, anchovy and capers. Those together with green olives and cherry tomatoes topped with a torched sprig of rosemary. Pork was tender, fatty and had a bite. Lots of clams in there too. This was worth coming back for.

Some smoked and salted edamame. Nice. I wouldn't have thought much of them by description but the were more enjoyable than I imagined. A large part of it was because of how smoked they were.

Nice mentaiko pasta with onion and shiso. Creamless. For a one man chef behind the counter, Jun-san had excellent timing for the doneness of the spaghetti. 

This was the part where I was starting to feel the tiniest bit of reluctance because dessert signified the end of dinner. Matcha parfait which had matcha ice cream, matcha castella (which I had initially thought was warabi mochi), matcha flavoured granola (I suspect from Nissin) and a fried spring roll with adzuki bean paste.