Mr Appam, Maxwell Food Centre

I categorized this both under Indian and Vietnamese since appam is Indian but the proprietress of the stall who is also the cook, is Vietnamese. So Vietnamese Indian this one? There's a tale behind how she ended up with Mr Appam (#01-99 Maxwell Food Centre, 1 Kadayanallur Street) but it will not be told here. We tried their pandan coconut (green one) and princess appam (below). 

I liked that we were getting a good sour from the fermented rice flour for the pandan coconut appam but I'm not getting any of that pandan flavour. Heh! Princess appam which didn't have any of the sour was sprinkled with palm sugar - a little different from how it's done at Heavens which provided brown sugar/grated coconut on the side making the sweet component optional. Not bad tasting appams here, wouldn't mind coming back another time but the wait can be grating since it's all made to order.

Mr Briyani, Chander Road

Dinner at Mr Briyani (11 Chander Road, tel : +65 8661 4273). I've been wanting to try their food for a while and we discovered this outpost the last time we were around the area.

The lassi they served were creamy and chilled so we liked it.

Ordered fish tikka. I don't know what fish was it they used but we could tell it was frozen and not mackerel nor the cheap dory. The texture was slightly bouncy rather than flaky - reminded me of grouper but I don't know if it was. What was done nicely were the spice marinate and the char the fish had gotten from the tandoor. Pretty good eating.

Wouldn't recommend the their gobi 65. It's probably half or 2/3 batter so there's very little cauliflower in it. Didn't order this to eat all the batter.

Tried the keema briyani. This. Was. Awesome. There was a solid savoury spice infusion in both the minced mutton marinate and rice. Briyani was well salted and packed a pleasant heat as well. Couldn't stop myself from spooning mouthful after mouthful of it. This alone was worth the trip. Pretty big portions for each serving. 

We had Kashmiri naan. This one was different from most renditions we've had because these didn't use maraschino cherry for the fruit in the bread. I couldn't tell what fruit exactly it was but it could have been dates. Or maybe figs? Latter's unlikely. There were bits crushed nuts in it - something most of the Kashmiri naan we've had don't. Nice. Liked the buttery taste.

Tried their gongura mutton - think of this the red sorrel instead of the spinach version of a saag gosht. Which was essentially what it was with all the tanginess. Mutton's not exactly tough but they were also not of the same standards as those tender ones we had from Punjab Grill. 😂

Kanpachi head and kama shioyaki from Tora Tora Tora

Seems that the prices on the menu at Tora Tora Tora have increased. Their kaisen don has gone up by a few dollars though I've noticed that there're a few more slices of fish now. Here's a look at their kanpachi shioyaki - head and collar. Not outstanding per se but still a pretty decent eat. I'm not sure how much grilling was done but I'm pretty sure that those black speckles on the fish came from a blowtorch.

Golden Nur, Market Street Hawker Centre

Market Street Interim Hawker Centre at Cross Street has finally finished fulfilling its interim purpose and the stalls have moved back to the old location which is the new Market Street Hawker Centre in the shiny new CapitaSpring building. I've seen/heard of Golden Nur (#03-11 Market Street Hawker Centre, 88 Market Street) but haven't tried them until today. Here's their crispy fried chicken briyani which is something that they're known for.

I was here around dinner time so the bird might not have been the most freshly fried. My order came with breast and wings. Not exactly so tender or moist like dark meat but it wasn't hard either. Could have sworn I tasted a hint of mutton in the dalcha on the side. Rice was light, not heavy on the grease and pretty flavourful on its own. Those crispy bits on the chicken? Deliciously salty.

San Hu Bak Chor Mee (三虎肉脞面), Boon Tiong Road

Not bad tasting signature bowl of bak chor mee from San Hu Bak Chor Mee (11B Boon Tiong Road). It's at the same coffee shop as the defunct Yuan Chen Wai a couple of minutes walk from Tiong Bahru Plaza. I liked the piquant chilli that had some heat and dried shrimp flavour. Pretty generous with the stewed mushrooms there. What was different about their signature bowl was the use of dark soya sauce which essentially made the bowl of noodles taste like ban mian. In fact, I think they've probably done just that - creating a bowl of local style minced meat noodles with the flavour profile of ban mian.

Charcuterie, cheeses and foie gras soba from Healthy Soba IKI

This happened at Healthy Soba IKI (一, 二, 三, 四, 五, 六, 七, 八, 九, 十, 十一, 十二, 十三, 十四, 十五, 十六) recently. It's a half day event involving a bunch of stuff away their regular menu that happens now and then featuring soba that is a one off, sides that they don't usually serve and wine. This one was for their foie gras soba.

Most of the menu items aren't regular stuff obviously. Maybe except for the burrata which is sometimes available but not on the menu and you could get them if you asked. We ordered one of everything.

Starting with smoked salmon on little crispy slices of baguette.

Some Iberico salami. Top one's chorizo. 

Their cheese moriawase was awesome. There was some stinky Brie, sweet nutty Manchego and a Brillat Savarin which was drizzled with honey. The latter tasted like a blue, was all white and very creamy. Love those sweet grapes too.

Got the larger burrata today. 300g. Great combination of flavours from the salt, pepper and aromatic toasted buckwheat seeds with the olive oil on the creamy burrata.

We did the pork rilettes as well. Salty, fatty and flavourful these were.

Our first time getting the pan fried smoked duck from the shop. Chunky, meaty and smoky with a lot of bite.

What we were looking forward to today was the foie gras soba. I'll keep this short. Roasted red & yellow peppers were tangy, sweet and tender to the point they dissolved in the mouth. Nicely done those. There's a layer of foie gras puree on the soba which was covered with what I would describe as a deliciously sweet onion jam/jelly. Counter to the sweet from the peppers and onion was the tsuyu. 

Never had soba like this before. Am glad we came here for it today.

Finished with their Basque burnt cheese cake. The first of its kind we've ever had was from Olivia. First impressions along with the bar was set from there henceforth. We're seldom if ever impressed by the others.