Revisiting Sakari Sushi

It's been almost a decade since we were first/last at Sakari Sushi. This was again lunch.

Ordered the green tea iced because the weather was blistering. These tasted more diluted than they looked. $3 a cup lightly murky green iced water?

Lunch came with salad with goma dressing. I kinda liked this for some reasons. Maybe it's because it's well tossed and chilled.

Chawanmushi was like half filled. Or half empty depending on your perspective. Only kamaboko and some mushrooms. Dashi was weak.

I have the impression that their barachirashi felt more premium in the past. That's just an impression. Still tasted nice though with the finely diced seafood. Portion felt small.

Another option for lunch was their mini donburi which included both aburi engawa don and a kaisen don. I thought this felt more satisfying compared to the barachirashi this time round.

The aburi engawa bowl was sublime. Didn't expect to find bits of chopped squid in it. This was smokey, melty with the fat of the fin over the rice and well salted. Nice. 👍🏼

The other mini bowl was a small kaisen don. Wasabi's grated. Not bad - had a cleaner taste compared to the engawa.

Xiang Ji Hainanese Chicken Rice, Porridge and Noodle (香記海南雞飯, 粥, 面), Holland Village Food Centre

I'm not sure if I've had chicken rice at Xiang Ji Hainanese Chicken Rice (#01-22 Holland Village Food Centre, 1 Lorong Mambong) before but they do look familiar. Anyways, here's a plate of roast 鸡尾 with roast pork and egg. Not a bad plate. A little greasy though. Their roast pork was surprisingly better than the generic run of the mill variety by being relatively moist and not half desiccated. Chilli has a burn.

It's one of those that I don't mind having if I'm in the vicinity but won't go out of the way for kind of stall.

Clos Pasoh, Bukit Pasoh

We've seen a lot of pictures of the food from Clos Pasoh (48A Bukit Pasoh Road, Level 2, tel : +65 6980 0672) and it looked good. That has in part set expectations.

The restaurant described themselves as "a chic reimagining of the French brasserie for today’s urbane food and wine lover". I find that noncommittal-ly vague. A simpler and more accurate description would be just Asian influenced French.

We were wrapping our heads around the Asian influenced French brasserie vibe. From the French-y setup amidst lush tropical plants to a sequence of music we noticed that included some rap tune I didn't identify, followed by some stereotypically Frenchie music and then 'Baby I'm Yours' by Breakbot & Irfane. Eclectic much?

Personally, I preferred the French aspect of their food.

Sourdough was charcoal grilled. Great smokey flavour.

Accompanied by some tangy Cervelle de canut.

And salted butter.

One of the pictures that comes up often on social media is their bisque coco-homard. Coconut lobster bisque with lobster dumpling. I tasted lemongrass and kaffir lime leaves. Was unpleasantly surprised by julienned ginger. The broth was nice. One could describe it as lobster-y and reminiscent of laksa. 

Did not enjoy the dumplings. When it's described as lobster dumplings, expectations tend to be raised. I couldn't identify what I ate.

Can you believe this is tartare de beouf? Did not think sliced red chilli add to the experience but maybe that's just me. Loads of texture which I expected from bits of herbs, roughly chopped meat, onions and capers were not present. It's inside mantou instead of on bread. Texturally it's nothing like beef tatare.

There's also green curry in it. In my not so humble opinion, they tried too hard with those Asian elements.

The glass bowl contained cashew butter. With the garnish, I thought it was more of the beef tartare. 😂  The cashew butter was nice though.

Ris de veau was good. Like I mentioned earlier, the French stuff was nice. Chunks of well caramelized foie gras in it were nice also. Mopped the Vin Jaune sauce clean with additional bread we asked for.

That the additional bread. Sourdough but not charcoal toasted.

The lamb we had was part of the butcher's cut of the day. Shoulder braised in what the server described as Madras curry and drizzled with Greek honey. The latter was totally lost. That huge smudge of harissa was actually nice but unfortunately I like lamb tasting like lamb mostly and used that for my bread. Did not understand the obsession with capsicum here. 

The lamb itself was fantastic. Slip off the bone tender. If they were to tell me this was an African/Middle Eastern dish, I'd buy it. Don't see the French part in this.

Pistachio souffle was...not great. Could not taste the pistachio so calling it 'not great' was a kindness. Raspberry sorbet was delicious and robust.

Some Irish coffee with Jameson whiskey to end.

Shikar, Maxwell Reserve

I've been wanting to come to Shikar (Maxwell Reserve Singapore, 2 Cook Street, Whatsapp : +65 8866 0823) to try their thali lunch which is only available on weekdays which are non public holidays. Finally happened.

They say that their food is inspired by the grand old feasts of Indian Royals where members of high society socialised, ate and drank. Well, the food certainly came with a price tag to match those.

Place looks colonial swanky like the hotel it is housed in with a level of ostentation that zips past say, Raffles Hotel as a comparison. But it's all good. It was pretty, a pleasant sanctuary from the blazing heat and the staff was nice.

We started with some chaat. Not part of the thali sets. This one was purple sweet potato patties stuffed with goat's cheese and tempura kale on yoghurt and pomegranate. Not the kind of chaat that you get in the street obviously. Those sweet potato patties were spiced.

Their thali was served in a U shaped tray which was made to fit a plate as separated pieces. From the left, it's cucumber raita that's infused with cumin, aloo gobi, pureed palak, the main dish, dal makhani, steamed basmati rice and a salad. 

There're a couple of main dish options for the vegetarian and non-vegetarian thalis. That's mostly the difference and everyone gets pretty much the same variety of stuff with one exception.

Which is if you choose to top your palak with Italian morels and that comes with additional charge.

One of our thali came with what the menu described as pot roasted lamb. Most of us would have called it curry mutton. This was exceptional fork tender curry mutton in a delicious rich gravy

This was the tiger prawn option. Gravy is creamy and coconut-y with the flavour of saffron and prawns. Outstanding.

We're at the vegetarian curd cheese kufte thali. I read it as their rendition of their paneer makhani in the form of fried cottage cheese balls. That tomato butternut saffron gravy it came in was kickass awesome.

The thalis came with bread as well. Naans and roti.

Dessert was rava kesari. Love the moderated sweetness for this one.

Saffron masala chai which was an additional order not part of the thali lunch. Say what? I know right? Saffron-izing good old masala chai as well. But hell yeah it was good. For a lack of a more comprehensive description, the chai was well balanced. There weren't overbearing elements in its composition as far as I could tell. Masala mix was in harmonious proportions, tea wasn't overly milky and definitely not excessively sweet.

Revisiting Tuan Yuan Pork Ribs Soup (团缘肉骨茶)

It's been a while since the last time I ate at Tuan Yuan.

Tried their spare ribs today. Meat was fall off the bone tender and yet with that bit of bite to it in a peppery broth where one could specify the level of pepperiness. Not bad. Would have preferred if the chilli they had for their dark soya sauce to be the spicy type than the large and not spicy ones they use though.

Dough fritters to soak the peppery bak kut teh broth with.

A proper cai por omelette with cai por, nothing like the sub standard rendition we recently had at Lao You Ji.

Braised eggs.

That's their lu rou fan (卤肉饭). The lu rou is richer, sweeter and has a stronger star anise flavour. I prefer lu rou to be more savoury. 

Kuey was delicious with a discernible rice-y flavour. Gotta get more of this the next time we're here.

Da Paolo Pizza Bar in the August of 2023

It's been a while since we were last at Da Paolo Pizza Bar. Thought it would be a good time to revisit and also check out their limited time pizza for this National Day month.

Started with some lobster bisque fried croquettes. That creamy capsicum dip on the side - I tasted mostly just capsicum and olive oil and it was so good.

These guys were serious when they put 'lobster bisque' in the name. The those croquettes were literally deep fried lobster bisque flavoured mashed potatoes. Nice.

One of the mainstays at Da Paolo is their pasta with creamy crab meat sauce. I think the recipe might have changed a bit through the years but the difference is probably not big. Today it's the tagliatelle al granchio. At a point of time, it was spaghetti. Even further back, it might have been an alla Vodka. I used to think of it as an Italian butter chicken noodle but it doesn't feel as rich anymore so that's why I thought the recipe might have changed. Even if it was a little.

This month's pizza special is squid ink laksa. The squid ink base was dark and like rempah. Reminded me of a dry sotong hitam gravy. The pieces of squid were smokey. Together with the curry leaves and chilli, the flavour was very Asian. There's no cheese. Could taste lemongrass. Those bubbly stuff were supposed to be laksa foam but I couldn't discern anything laksa-y about it. I wouldn't have minded this with some cheese.

First time having affogato with dark chocolate ice cream. I'm not sure how I feel about them here because the espresso tasted bitter and quite strong on its own.

With vanilla ice cream it's kinda like regular affogato. Which is understandable. Decent but not one of the better ones.

With the dark chocolate, a lot of the espresso is subdued. So it's not so affogato-y.