Chicken McGriddles with egg

I've never had the Chicken McGriddle before. Just a swap of the protein from their usual chicken sausage to a McChicken patty. Got this without mayo. In retrospect, I prefer the regular ones. Didn't taste bad but I don't think this McNugget-y flavour paired as well with the pancakes.

Tsui Wah (翠華), Orchard Road

Just realized that I've never mentioned this particular branch (#02-02 COURTS NOJIMA The Heeren, 260 Orchard Road) of Tsui Wah even though we've been here a few times. But mostly it was for tea and their crispy condense milk toast. And the listed address is kinda weird.

Anyways, the braised pork with cartilage and scrambled eggs with truffle paste on rice. Truffle paste was weak and the pork cartilage was mostly crunchier than the tendon-soft ones we've had before. I thought it was a pity that we didn't get that level of tenderness today. The braising sauce was a deliciously rich soy concoction. Would be remiss of me to not mention that almost aged balsamic quality of the accompaying soya sauce on the side which was thick with sweetness.

Char siew looked better than it tasted. Unfortunately. The pork belly cuts were meaty and with fat - not the "melt in the mouth" type if I might add. I don't know how this was made. While it looked dark, it did not taste caramelized like the renditions that are well received locally (think Roast Paradise or 88 Roast Meat). Neither did this taste like most char siew I remember having from Hong Kong.

Wild Coco, Circular Road

We've been seeing/hearing a bit about Wild Coco. Curiosity prevailed. This was their new shop at Boat Quay (84 Circular Road, tel : +65 9119 3822) not far from Sonny's Pizza.

This drink was called Bossy Balonglong. Most of us that know the fruit used it in would recognize it as buah long long or ambarella; a sour-ish astringent citrus fruit that usually tries to pucker your lips inwards. This juice came with a preserved plum and was pretty refreshing.

Food arrived pretty fast. This was nasi lemak with their chicken thigh berempah and their burnt green chilli. I was imagining that the burnt green chilli which they used sambal hijau to describe would actually taste like sambal hijau. It didn't quite. This had noticeable bitterness with oil richness and little salt. Not the kind like Sari Ratu.

Peanuts were toasted. Sambal was pretty onion-y and packed a bit of heat. Rice nicely infused with coconut milk and sufficiently salted that it was delicious on its own. Which kinda made the sambal redundant for me. Not a fan of their fried chicken - it has a decent marinate but not in a way that ticks my boxes. Not to mention that the burnt green chilli taste was the most of it.

Seafood laksa's nice. Said seafood included a couple of prawns, a scallop and some razor clams; not bad but I wouldn't use 'great' to describe them. A couple of possibilities methinks - natural flavour/sweetness from the seafood was low or the gravy has masked those. Mostly likely both. There's also sliced fish cake and tau pok.

But the gravy rocked. With a rich lemak viscosity it did. Low on the dried shrimp flavour but still heart cloggingly satisfying. Personally, I felt that a good job was done with baseline of the laksa. Their seafood was just a luxe layering that didn't feel so luxurious. 

Kueh binka with ice cream tasted... pretty mundane. Not bad tasting to be clear about it. We were thinking that with the prices we were paying, we'd at least be getting standards from Sinpopo or Chalk Farm.

AMS Steam Seafood Bee Hoon (蒸蒸日上), Amoy Street Food Centre

AMS Steam Seafood Bee Hoon (#02-120 Amoy Street Food Centre, 7 Maxwell Road) appears to be new; right next door to Spicy Wife Nasi Lemak. Here's a recent (relatively) Saturday breakfast plate of their bee hoon in soup with minced meat patty and additional sliced batang, sans their ginger paste. According to the owner, said soup was made with the bones of chicken, fish and pork with vegetables.

What's were the obvious pick ups that I liked? Broth was gently savoury with flavour from Shaoxing wine; minced pork had chunks of water chestnut and the slices of mackerel were thick and firm. Noticed that the bee hoon were more squiggly than the regular variety. Also nice sambal.

Seoul Noodle Shop, Tanjong Pagar

Came across Seoul Noodle Shop (99 Tanjong Pagar Road, tel : +65 9632 5814) recently.

Menu's mostly noodles. The pork bone spicy noodle sounded good and there were a number of people ordering it.

Broth was savoury and lightly salted. I'm hard pressed to think of more descriptive adjectives beyond that. Noodles were thick like udon. That rice/barley on the side had a nice sweet miso sauce. 

The perilla powder mentioned on the menu are just on top of the pork bone so it didn't do very much. Bones hadn't much meat but they were tender. Also not much flavour from them so the sauce helped.

Wouldn't say that they're bad but I'm not getting the "will come back" feel about this place.

无名海南鸡饭 (Wu Ming Hainanese Chicken Rice), Redhill

Have noticed this stall (#01-110, 75D Redhill Road) the past few times while we were in the vicinity. Interest was piqued because their name refers to them being nameless so they're a nameless chicken rice shop with a name. 🤔  Anyways, curious chap working behind the counter who either begins a sentence or punctuates them with 他妈的.

Chicken's decent but not exceptional. Meaning it's pretty edible if one is looking for something passable and frills free.

Rice was pretty good though. Beady and good flavour with discernible pandan. Pretty sure it was pandan. Their chilli sauce was also sweet and lime-y - there's too much sweetness that I prefer the rice without them.

Each order came with lotus root soup that has tender peanuts in them. Flavour's intense with sweetness and it wasn't unpleasant. But I couldn't help but feel that there's something in there not of unprocessed natural ingredients enhancing it.