Parmesan Truffle Chicken and Zhng Zinger from KFC

Those who never learn history are condemned to repeat it. I felt like I wanted to check these out from KFC hoping that maybe, just maybe, things have gotten better. 

When I get Jollibee, the first elicited response when I take a bite of their chicken is usually a silent 'yummy!'. KFC usually gets me to 'fuck, this tasted unhealthy!' There's a bit of truffle flavour and it was pretty cheesy in a cheap cheesy way for the parts with the cheese powder. The crusty bits got to me after a while because the parts that didn't have cheese were bland. Meat's a bit dry.

Despite apprehension, I got the Zhng Zinger anyway. Since I've already transgressed, might as well poke around. Apparently this was inspired by some TikTok dude. Chicken was pretty tender. With the hot sauce and the pickles, it was actually not bad. Until the pickles ran out in a few bites. That's when it regressed back into a regular Zinger with dry buns. Couldn't taste the onion rings in it all. Cheese? Do you even see it? Will take Popeyes' chicken sandwich over this any day.

It might have been psychological at this point but eating the cheese fries felt like a coat in the arteries minus the satisfaction. The best part of this visit was probably gulping down the Coke Zero to wash away all the grease.

Renewal at Nakajima Suisan

It's been at least a couple of years since we ate at Nakajima Suisan. Definitely missed them. (一, 二, 三, 四, 五, 六, 七, 八, 九, 十, 十一, 十二, 十三, 十四, 十五, 十六) The global pandemic had been in part, one of the reasons why we haven't been eating here. The other reason was of course, the usual relentless queue the shop has which can sometimes be deterring.

That being said, they have upgraded the premise. Seating capacity is about double what they once were and there seems to be minor changes to their teishoku. Apart from the old shredded cabbage salad with sesame dressing which doesn't seem to have seaweed anymore and the takuan, they've now also, if you would believe it, a little dish of chuka wakame with mala flavour.

There's also options to top up the rice with mentaiko or negitoro. We got the latter.

Fell back to some stuff which we thought was reliable. This akauo hiraki teishoku was satisfying. Fish was clean tasting, flaky and meaty at the same time with that faint prawny aroma.

On the other end was their buttery mero teriyaki which was flaky and rich. The crisped up skin was so good.

Re-visiting Claypot & Cooked Food Kitchen (砂煲小厨)

Claypot & Cooked Food Kitchen hasn't been opened for some time a while back - I know because I came by and was disappointed. Kinda held my breath a little there. What I gathered from a friendly source online was that the auntie from the stall had gotten some injury and that the reason they haven't been operating. Glad they're opened again. 😬 

Ordered the tofu and roast meat. It's egg tofu they're using. Some were sliced thinner and were nicely browned and others weren't. This claypot was pretty generous with the roasted pork belly there but there were much less tofu than I was hoping to get. Wouldn't have known it was a tofu dish from the variety of ingredients they put in there.

This one was claypot sea cucumber......which also came with pretty generous portions of roasted pork belly. Both claypots so far tasted like they came with the same brown gravy. The sambal belachan rocks with the pork belly by the way. I know I can't complain at this price point but I wished there were more sea cucumber in it.

Gotta declare this the awesome-est kung bao chicken (宫保鸡丁) I've had in recent years. The thick sauce was pronounced medley of sweetness, tanginess and heat underneath a layer of oil. The chicken which appeared to be all thigh meat was chunky. I liked it so much that I was slurping the sauce off the dried chillis when the meat was done. Ended up with a burning tongue but it was worth it.

Stir fried (清炒) kailan was okay. I would have much preferred if they had used garlic instead of ginger as the aromatic.

Here be the sauce catcher.

Festive menu ribs from Morganfield's

Been wondering about the chestnut and cranberry glazed ribs from Morganfield's for a few years now. We've always somehow managed to miss them when they're available through the end of the year. So we've finally come to try them this year.

There's Connor and Kronenbourg on tap and it's $13 for the whole day on Sundays.

Mushroom soup's decent. The texture felt like something that came out of a blender.

The description for the chestnut sticky bones on the menu was 'chestnut roasted to amplify its nutty flavour, then blended into an earthy basting sauce to give our ribs a subtle sweetness in every bite'. I didn't think there was anything subtle about the sweetness. Nothing about the chestnut came through. Tasted like generic barbecue flavour.

Cranberry sauce on the baby back ribs tasted much like the chestnut sauce. If not for the cranberries on them, I wouldn't have known. While the ribs didn't taste bad as a whole, the flavour was underwhelming from expectations they have etched with their description. But now we know.

Yaowarat Thai Kway Chap, Tiong Bahru Plaza

I never understood why Yaowarat Thai Kway Chap closed at Holland Village. Always had the impression that they were doing well. Anyways, they've opened up at the basement of Tiong Bahru Plaza (B1-135 Tiong Bahru Plaza, 302 Tiong Bahru Road). And yes, the herbal peppery and salty broth was still as delicious with those penne-like scrolls of kuey. Or kway. Today we also discovered their chilli sauce (that one reminded me of chicken rice chilli actually) which was spicy and lime-y and made a great dip for the meats. Those fried chicken mid wings were also pretty good eating too. 

Confounding mala mazesobas from Menya Kokoro

So there're a couple of "mala mazesoba" at Menya Kokoro. We've tried the both of them and one of them appears to be the real McCoy while the other which bears the name is likely not.

The Kiwami tantan mazesoba is described as having a spicy and numb flavour. What baffled me was, why is there a mala flavour in it and how come this didn't taste like dan dan mian as its name suggested? Charshu was thick and a little hard. 

Then there was their spicy mala mazesoba - I once ordered it minus the mala and they obliged. I wanted to try it with the mala this time round.

The sauce was gritty, spicy and nutty. But I couldn't detect any mala. I also don't recall it tasting like the previous spicy mazesoba as well. Pretty delicious but the name of the bowl doesn't go with the flavour. Something doesn't add up with these two bowls.

Did anyone notice that the rice is getting smaller? It taking two portions these days to properly soak up the leftover gravy from the mazesoba.