Great Nanyang Heritage Cafe (大南洋), Craig Road

Finally dropped by Great Nanyang Heritage Cafe (5 Craig Road). We were on our way elsewhere in the vicinity and decided to swing by to see if there was an insane queue and they didn't. A decision was made quickly. Anyways, they're a local Hainanese food eatery with that "traditional" theme which extends from what they cook to the decor in the eatery; kinda like The Hainan Story.

Even though there wasn't a mad queue at that time, it was still packed to the brim. Tried a few items that looked like they might be good.

Nice kaya butter toast - think texture of thin crispy bread on chilled salty butter and sweet kaya texture that's uniquely that. Did not realize it's the coconut kaya and not the pandan one that I prefer. Not a deal breaker though. It's still enjoyable and I'm attributing the main reason to be the adequately thick slice of butter in there.

Their signature Hainanese chicken cutlet....I don't think it's traditional with that sauce but that sauce was delicious. I tasted mostly onion and butter. Piping hot fried chicken thigh was competently crispy on the outside and moist on the inside.

Didn't think much of their dry mee siam or the chicken berempah that came with it. The spice and salt for the latter didn't pack the requisite punch. Guys like Spicy Wife Nasi Lemak and Uptown Nasi Lemak have chicken berempah that would blow this out of the water. 

Their hor ka sai kicks butt though with thick Milo flavour infusion into their coffee. Sweet, flavourful and nicely chilled. This was at least a couple of leagues up from that shitty 3 in 1 powdered stuff from Peck Hoon Teng Eating House.

Sabeen Sara Prata & Briyani Stall, Telok Blangah Food Centre

The indicatory signs to something delicious were definitely around at Sabeen Sara Prata & Briyani Stall (#01-07 Telok Blangah Food Centre, 79 Telok Blangah Drive) when we were there in the weekend morning; from the telling queue of anticipating faces to the bustling of the crew behind the stall front working animatedly, whipping out plates of prata and nasi briyani.

The plates of briyani we got were served piping hot, rice aromatic and delicious even before the curry. Curry's good too if anyone was wondering. We got chicken and mutton. The former came with portions of breast meat which was reasonably moist and the latter, easily scraped off the bone with tenderness. Gotta come back again for more of it.

A few days later...

So we had the telur, telur bawang and a kosong. Prata's pretty good - light crisp with bite and the kosong was fluffed up. The telur bawang had very little onions though. 

Re-visiting Chinatown Sun Seng (生成)

The style of food from Chinatown Sun Seng appears to cater for the older folks. Other than the range of zi char which clearly showcases their age, portions aren't big and salt is sparing. At least that's the impression we were given between this and the last visit.

They have mui fan on menu and it's good. Style is pretty similar to the one at Hillman Restaurant which meant it's old school. Gravy on the rice was pleasant in a light savoury manner and not starchy. No squid in it possibly because of old folks?

Like the mui fan, this seafood fried rice suffered from the lack of salt. Not an issue in our case since we were ready with our soya sauce dipped fried lard and sliced chilli. In spite of the tell tale scorch marks, we didn't detect any smokiness. Odd. Anyways, the seafood in this fried included prawns and sliced fish, no squids as well.

So Good Bakery, 100AM

We've bought stuff here (#01-10/14A 100AM, 100 Tras Street) before but this was a first time sitting down with their bakes. Donut was freshly fried so not bad tasting though I cannot help but feel that something about those old school fried donuts is missing from this one. The matcha buttercream cake appeared to be new and I thought it had good balance between the flavour of the buttercream and green tea. Nice. 👍🏼 Char siu sou (叉烧酥) was also decent. Note to self : Coffee's forgettable, don't bother in the future.

Jia Li Seafood Soup (佳丽), Tiong Bahru Plaza

Jia Li Seafood Soup has set up shop at Tiong Bahru Plaza (302 Tiong Bahru Road, #B1-135) in the unit that used to be occupied by The Breakfast Club. I remember not being impressed by their fish soup the last time and wanted to get the seafood soup instead to see if it was any different. 

The flavour was indeed a variant of that previous fish soup. Wasn't bad. Crustacean-y, not well rounded and a little thin. Would have been great if there were some dried sole in it. Still don't think it's impressive. The crayfish bowl featured small bugs which had meat that weren't as easily removed as I was hoping for. The prawns from the seafood soup were deliciously sweet though.

Huang Chao Teochew Noodle House (煌潮潮州面家) from Malaysia Boleh! at Great World

This was our first visit to the Malaysia Boleh! (B1-102/103 Great World, 1 Kim Seng Promenade) which had taken over the same section at Great World that used to be Malaysia Chiak!. Pretty good bowl of signature noodle from Huang Chao Teochew Noodle House. Soup's deliciously savoury with a mix of  decent quality ingredients (balls/dumplings) and the mee pok was lardy. Note to self : Gotta get those noodles 白 and to get them to omit those Chinese celery (芹菜?) sprinkles the next time.