Lian Kee (蓮記), Alexandra Food Village

Bak chor mee breakfast at Lian Kee (#01-50 Alexandra Village Food Centre, 120 Bukit Merah Lane 1). Pretty decent bowl here.

This was the big bowl ($6) which was pretty loaded with ingredients. A couple of thing stood out from watching them prepare the noodles. The saucing was mostly the dark concoction from a pot of stewed mushrooms the proprietors were regularly stirring and that those fishballs looked yellow.

Understandably, the base flavour profile was from said stewed mushroom sauce. Those stewed mushrooms were pretty good by the way. Tender and full of flavour from the stewing sauce. I'm pretty sure that would improve if there was more 猪油. Perhaps another time.

Burger King's Gourmet Garlic Angus Beef Burger

Yes it was garlicky mostly due to the garlic chips they've added in the sandwich. Those weren't as crunchy as I had imagined. On top of the meat and lettuce were some dark garlic sauce and mayo. Was it good? It's edible. Don't think I'll get it again because it's kinda expensive. I somehow missed the cheese amid all the garlic. 

Lao Huo Tang (老火汤), Star Vista

I don't actually remember if we've ever had anything from 老火汤. We've seen that branch at Star Vista (#B1-31A Star Vista, 1 Vista Exchange Green, tel : +65 6262 3125) numerous times and have been intrigued by their soups. 

Their longan red date tea was quite nice.

The soup we picked was the one with pork ribs, apple and winter pear. Enjoyed the natural fruity sweetness in the soup. Those pork ribs in there were tender that they were almost disintegrating. I'd get this again.

Steamed meat with mei chye (梅菜蒸肉饼) was.....much more bland than I had expected. I guess we were given the impression that it would be more flavourful from the countless preserved mustard greens we've had. Or maybe it's also the salted fish I had taken for granted would be in the steamed pork patty. Meat was marinated and had an odd texture. Wouldn't say this was bad tasting but also won't be getting it again.

Their cereal prawns had cereals that were soft and not crunchy. Also not what I had expected from what I know of regular cereal prawns. Won't be getting these again too. I think it's fair to assume that these guys are only good for their soups which we will probably stick to in the future.

Re-revisiting Swaadhisht

I've been wanting to come back to Swaadhisht for a long while. Too long.

One of the reasons was to try the Thallaseri goat briyani. I had the Malabar version with basmati rice previously so I was just curious how this one would be with the short grained Jeerakasala rice. I couldn't tell much apart from the texture. I liked it though. The curry marinated goat was incredibly tender. Like how one could cut them with a plastic spoon kind of tender.

We topped that with an order of curry eggs. That delicious curry was savoury and if I wasn't mistaken, almost tangy in a creamy spicy manner packed with some heat. Nice. 👍🏼 

This wasn't on the menu but we were obliged with a serving of aviyal - a Keralan dish of vegetables with coconut, curd (yoghurt) and curry leaves. Kinda like the wet version of thoran and great pairing with rice.

Trying their prawn coconut fry for the first time. The dish was a stir fry of prawns with onions, garlic, coconut and curry leaves in a spicy sweet and savoury black pepper gravy. Not bad.

Our orders came with payasam for dessert. 😬

Izakaya Torikin X Cafe Hachi

There are some things to be understood here. Izakaya Torikin and Cafe Hachi (1 North Canal Road, tel : +65 6226 1182) operate in the same space but at different times along North Canal Road; in the very spot that used to be Trattoria La Vita and if you went further back, goo Italiano. Izakaya Torikin X Cafe Hachi operate in both the same space at the same time. In the evenings.

Izakaya Torikin also = Torikin X Cafe Hachi. Torikin, an izakaya at UE Square set up Izaka Torikin which collaborates with Cafe Hachi at night. The setup's an "izakaya" that still serves the matcha desserts that Cafe Hachi does in the day. Confused? We came here today for their matcha shabu shabu which I thought was delicious but overpriced.

House made ginger ale was not bad. It had a nice gingery flavour and wasn't excessively sweet.

Liked the goma kanpachi. I guess it was a kind of starter we got ourselves while waiting for the matcha shabu shabu. Amberjack with sesame sauce and grated sesame seeds. Delicious with the wakame, nori and the sweet grated wasabi.

Lamb chop's not bad, a little pricey and they need to learn how to serve it sizzling like the other izakayas that do it in air conditioning. This one came with a sweet black pepper sauce which was actually kinda nice. 

So why did I choose to call them an "izakaya" instead of an izakaya? Kitchen looked severely understaffed and food prep management looked very very lacking in experience. Uncoordinated even. Menu was very limited. The shabu shabu which has technically close to zero setup time took a long time to prepare. Throughout that time, they had somehow decided to start the fire going on the pot while the broth was evaporating away. All these as they rushed to assemble a platter of vegetables and sliced meat. I don't understand why.

I mentioned them being overpriced. This was meat for two. Kurobuta belly and loin. In my not so humble opinion, I would have considered it portion for one because it wasn't that much. And each portion of the matcha shabu shabu is $55 before service and tax.

So those meat and these vegetables costed $110. Feels like prices from a nice Japanese restaurant in a hotel than an izakaya, doesn't it?

The broth was matcha in dashi. You can taste it when you drink it on it's own. Not apparent when it's with the food. And totally indiscernible when you get the dips/sauces involved.

Speaking of sauces and dips, I thought they did those well here. We were provided a matcha/goma dip (goma hidden under the matcha), some spicy yuzu thingy and pureed garlic.

What elevated the flavours for the shabu shabu was the matcha/goma dip. The aromatic (to a certain extent) bitter from the matcha melded with the aromatic sweetness of the goma into a nutty green tea and sesame concoction which totally works with the sliced kurobuta. To step the experience up, there was garlic puree which was lightly salted. That together with the green tea dip on the meat and vegetables......outstanding would be my modest description of it.

The menu called this matcha Basque cheesecake. Erm...it's a matcha cheese cake. Not bad. Not too sweet and there wasn't a compromise from the green tea flavour.

This was their "affogato". I would have called it a parfait on a plate - what with the mochi, azuki beans, chestnut and green tea cornflakes and all. Nice. I'd gladly come back for the matcha desserts.

Long Phung Vietnamese Restaurant, New Bridge Road

We've eaten at Long Phung at Joo Chiat once years ago. Left the place pretty impressed with what we had. This wasn't so much the case for their new setup at Chinatown (239/241 New Bridge Road). Their noodles kinda derailed everything we had expected.

Ordered a tomato smoothie out of curiosity. It was more like an ice blended drink with tomato and milk than an actual creamy textured smoothie I had been imagining. 

Vietnamese iced coffee was aromatic, strong and sweet. 

Disappointed with their phở đặc biệt. There was way too much broth for the rice noodles and said broth was more sweet than savoury. It took a few squeezes of lemon and fish sauce to get through this bowl. Anyways, this was what we got when I asked them to leave out the coriander. They apparently left out everything.

Mi kho tom thit also had a sweet-ish sauce which we did not see coming. It looked like a plate of savoury egg noodles.

I remember that there used to be pork belly in their gỏi xoài. This one didn't but as a mango salad, I didn't see that as a deal breaker. I liked this.

They have pretty good chả giò. I haven't paid much attention to these much until recently and I'll be ranking these ones just below those from May Pho Culture.