Rumah Bebe, East Coast Road

This shop (113 East Coast Road, te; : +65 6247 8781) looked the part of a prettied up Peranakan shophouse unit, albeit one that's a tad ostentatious. Maybe because of that, I got the feeling that it might be more style than substance with the food but we came by for some coffee and kueh anyway.

They weren't bad tasting. I prefer Bengawan Solo's kueh salat to this because I like the kaya/pandan custard layer to be less gelatinous. The rendition from Chalk Farm was also nicer so I'm really not feeling for the salat here. Ditto for the latter location on the sugee cake. Their baked curry puff though, which looked like a tiny Cornish pasty, was nice.

Coffee's not good. At all. Weak. Not aromatic. Note to self : never come back here for coffee.

Leung Sang Hong Kong Pastries (良辰美點), Jalan Membina

I remember getting some bakes/pastries from Leung Sang Hong Kong Pastries (#01-06, 18 Jalan Membina, tel : +65 6271 6056) in the past. They were okay. They've been around for quite a while. I got this custard filled bolo bun from them recently.

It's those old school dry custard. The name of the shop suggests that they're Hong Kong styled and they're just that. At least for the bolo buns. I've always felt that they didn't fall within the golden range of crust to bun ratio that would have made them great - like say compared to those from Kam Wah in Hong Kong. The local bolo buns just generally don't have well done crust. Or am I missing something?

Revisiting Pizzeria L'Operetta

Haven't had pizza at Pizzeria L'Operetta for a long time. Their menu doesn't seem to change. Neither do their specials.

There's Suntory on tap, so a glass of dry bitter malt while waiting for our Neapolitan styled pie.

Genovese frutti di mare - some shrimp, squid and octopus. Delicious pizza but as a pizza, it's not as impressive as I remember them. Was also a tad expensive. I was hoping for more seafood for $32 because their AVPN certification certainly isn't worth that much. Maybe I'll just stick to Luka and Zazz.

Chocolate buffet at Clove

So...chocolate themed buffet with savoury and sweet dishes at Clove (Swissôtel The Stamford Level 2, 2 Stamford Road). Piqued my curiosity. Possibly half of the dishes in the buffet have chocolate, not all of them. There's a whole bunch of regular stuff that one could conceivably find in similar buffets but my focus was on the servings that had chocolate.

Here's a look at some of the stuff I had. Some. Because it was too much of a pain to try to take pictures of everything we had.

There's chilli mocha ribs. Pretty rich flavour from the sauce that was similar to the kopi c ribs from Baba Chews. Didn't get any of the chilli though. Sadly, the meat was crusty and dry.

Pan seared duck breast with 70% dark chocolate sauce. Nice. Meat was pretty tender and moist. The creamy dark chocolate sauce was savoury with just the faintest hint of sweetness.

That's gratinated cauliflower with white chocolate sauce and hazelnuts. I wouldn't have known there was chocolate in there if not for the description. Sauce was creamy and buttery tasting.

Very solid milk chocolate dal makhani. There was definitely a light creamy chocolate sweetness amid the spices. Like.

Baked salmon with ruby chocolate citrus beurre blanc - could taste the chocolate in the background which also had a faint creamy sweetness that you would almost miss.

And wok fried slipper lobster with ivory chocolate pepper sauce. Not getting so much chocolate here but it was pretty peppery.

So my first plate was a sampler of the chocolate savoury dishes.

That milk chocolate dal makhani was nice enough for me to polish a few pieces of naan.

Chocolate truffle Brie and chocolate sauce Camembert with pecans.

Gratinated oysters with chocolate béchamel sauce, mint lime gel and a dollop of chocolate. This was actually pretty good. For some reasons -  the lime, chocolate and toasted cheese worked with the oyster.

Oysters, cheeses and crackers. Blob on the cracker was onion jam.

Label is self explanatory.

Interesting ivory chocolate mustard but the pork belly wasn't so good. Meat was kinda dry.

Smoked duck with quinoa and shaven chocolate, tangerine mint salad with shaven chocolate, some chocolate bread and their Ruby Chocolate Ravioli. The latter was a ricotta ravioli with a chunk of braised beef on the side, something call ocean foam (no idea what was that) and shavings of the ruby chocolate which wasn't enough to register. The best part of it was actually that tender chunk of braised beef.

There was briyani with raisins and almond. Nice with the refreshing raita.

And a butternut cream soup with chocolate croutons. The soup tasted like it had maple syrup in it. Not bad though.

Couldn't pass on the cold cuts and tangerine mint salad. That white piece on the left was smoked snow fish. That one was nice. Going anti-clockwise, smoked tuna, coppa and bresaola.

More of those wok fried slipper lobster with ivory chocolate pepper sauce.

There's a laksa station. Not bad. No chocolate in this one.

The dessert on the left was named Nitrogen Cocoa. Had kaffir lime jelly, coconut sorbet and some sort of coconut foam served in a chocolate pot. Not bad. Those flavoured chocolate buttons on the side were very good. Great flavours from the raspberry, straw berry and yuzu. I had thirds of those. Don't remember the last time I had so much chocolates in one seating.

Poh, Chinatown Food Centre

Remember Poh at Empress Road Food Centre. They have disappeared a while back and then recently set up shop at Chinatown (#02-011 Chinatown Food Centre, 335 Smith Street) right next to Chinatown Fried Rice. Menu's very streamlined now with only their "preserved veg hor fun" and deep fried prawn paste chicken.

We had a serving of the oyster preserved veg hor fun. Preserved veg refers to chai por/chai poh (菜脯) if you didn't already know. The vegetable that is preserved is turnip in chopped bits which are then stir fried/seared with hor fun and eggs for this dish. 

The outcome was smoky and delicious and I liked that it was sufficiently salted. Came with plump little oysters and not forgetting crispy fragrant bits of fried pork lard. I'll be back for the regular plate and their prawn paste chicken.

Wagyu kushi and hot purple sweet potato latte from Don Don Donki

Don Don Donki (selected outlets) has wagyu skewers on sticks. A la plancha. I'm also hearing Japanese wagyu from the Kagoshima prefecture. Because it wasn't very expensive, we've had them a couple of times on separate occasions.

The outcome of the skewers is dependent on who makes them. We've had ones which had better charring and those which weren't as much. Likewise, the salt on these skewers aren't consistent. But they're good eating and aren't terribly expensive.

We've never realized that their purple sweet potato latte comes as a hot drink. It's creamy and thick. Not bad. Never occured to me ever that wagyu kushi and a hot purple sweet potato latte pairs as a snack combo but it has happened.