Hai Kah Lang (海脚人), Taman Sentosa, Johor Bahru

Came to know of Hai Kah Lang (173 Jalan Sutera, Taman Sentosa, 80150 Johor Bahru, tel : +60 11-1651 9813) by way of recommendation. They're a predominantly seafood soup kind of place with other small plates that one can also supplement on the side.

Had a couple of drinks while waiting for the food. This one was called I'm Not a Fool - there's lemon and cucumber and green tea in it. Pretty refreshing.

This other one was a sea bird nest jelly drink. I couldn't reconcile what I saw and tasted with the name so I'm not going to try. And yes, it's a baby blue drink. Tasted like coconut milk. A pretty delicious coconut milk if I might add plus some agar agar stuff in it.

Their mixed seafood soup was not bad tasting. Clear and oil free with a clean oceanic sweetness if you catch my drift. Seafood quality was pretty decent.

Noodles were nice. Texture was great and the flavour was just dark soya sauce. It was awesome with their sambal.

The sambal. A little sweet, lime-y and packed with invigorating heat.

What's impressive was their leopard coral grouper soup. We added milk. The fish was decent if unexceptional but that broth was outstanding with 花雕酒 flavour coupled with creaminess from the milk and a nice tanginess from pickled mustard and possibly tomatoes. Those and an added aroma/flavour from fried shallots. So good.

There was a stall at the entrance of the restaurant that sold durian ice cream of the premium variety - e.g. mao shan wang, wang zhong wang, blackthorn and I forgot what else.

We got the cheapest one which was mao shan wang. Not bad tasting.

Oriental Kopi, City Square, Johor Bahru

Wheeee....first trip to Johor in years. 🙌🏼 Breakfast at Oriental Kopi (Lot MB-07, Level B1, Johor Bahru City Square, Jalan Wong Ah Fook, Bandar Johor Bahru, 80000 Johor Bahru, tel : +60 18-262 6363) which is part of the Nanyang cafe trend that's been emerging in the past few years here and back home.

 

One gripe. These guys need work with their order workflow. Took us 45 minutes to get our food when they were just half filled.

Iced kopi cincau was pretty good. Coffee's robust, creamy and sweet. I like that for the morning. First time having them with cincau/grass jelly/fairy grass/仙草. I heard it's a Malaysian thing.

Butter kopi's not bad too. Butter's served cold on the side.

I wanted a go at their nasi lemak and here's one with chicken rendang. Chicken thigh's tender and the gravy was nutty but not as lemak compared the Peranakan rendition. Not bad though. I'm surprised I didn't dislike the ikan bilis - those weren't hard. Sambal was spicy and sweet, the latter not annoyingly so. Interestingly served with a poached egg.

What got our attention was their faint olive tinted rice. Sufficient coconut milk infusion and adequately salted. What's unusual, at least for us, were the tiny green beans sparsely distributed in the rice. On top of that, there was definitely cardamom and then a hint of lemongrass. 👍🏼

Dry curry chicken mee pok. Not the dry curry chicken I was anticipating.

Not bad tasting. Curry reminded me of the style from Hong Shun. Similar but not the same. Liked the mee pok which were the sturdier and wider variety. The chicken here was breast meat, not thigh. 

Pretty taken in with their crunchy peanut butter toast as well. Was altogether buttery, peanut-y, sweet and salty in a creamy layer over the crispy toast - which stayed crispy all the way. This tasted unhealthily delicious and we enjoyed it.

The Stamford Brasserie, Swissôtel The Stamford

Our first visit to The Stamford Brasserie (Level 1 Swissôtel The Stamford, 2 Stamford Road, tel : +65 6431 6156). While their name rung a bell, I've never noticed them until recently.

Just sweets.

Got intrigued by their vanilla bean cremuex which looked kinda like a cocoa bean pod. Couldn't identify the cake/cream fillings inside but the shell was dark chocolate. Also not getting any vanilla flavour from the cream as well. Did not taste bad but it's also a first and a last.

Their almond croissant also looked unusual with its scaly crest of toasted sliced almond. Those were held up by marzipan which was flavoured with, get this, Chinese almond (杏仁). Which I read are actually apricot kernels. There were more crushed sliced almond with some custardy thing stuffed in the middle of the croissant. Pastry was moderately buttery and pretty delicious as a whole. 

Coffee's ok. Moderate strength and bitter. Which was what we wanted.

$12 a pint during happy hour and for Erdinger Weiss on tap in Swissôtel, I guess it's a pretty decent deal. 

Wen Xin Fish Soup. Lu Wei (文欣鱼汤 卤味), Bukit Merah View Hawker Centre

Here's a bowl of sliced grouper with fish roe soup from Wen Xin Fish Soup (#01-40, Bukit Merah View Hawker Centre, 115 Bukit Merah View). This was so good! The slices of fish were thick and firm and I like the dried sole flavouring in the clear broth. Just next door to R&D. Will be back.

Re-revisiting Casa Vostra

Back for more pizza and pasta from Casa Vostra.

For some reasons, the pasta was the first to be served. While we didn't expect any traditional sequencing in what arrived first, I thought antipasti was generally the fastest to be plated. Especially when what we ordered was salumi. Anyways, their agnolotti del plin was delicious. What they described as their pork stew stuffings was intensely savoury and well salted with fat from both the pork and butter in the sauce.

Next came the cold cuts. Wagyu bresaola was delicious. I'm not sure exactly how but it was different from most if not all of bresaola we've had so far. Maybe the word here could be 'sublime' from a particular brand of headiness in the melty fat and salt. But would I even understand this if I read it years later?

Wanted to try their house cured lardo and didn't expect them to be so thickly sliced. We were thinking see through kind of thinness. There're some slices I couldn't identify and it was generously salted. We ending up saving them to eat with the cornichione of the pizza.

We got the pizza acciughe today - saltiness from the anchovies and olives mellowed by the velvet creaminess from the fior di latte. Nice.

This was the way.

Sakunthala's Food Palace, Race Course Road

First time eating at this branch of Sakunthala's (66 Race Course Road, tel : +65 6293 6649). Place was much more pleasant compared to the poorly ventilated outpost at Safra Mount Faber and also less character rustic than the shop at Dunlop Street. Not that rustic was no good.

Pappa pa dum...pa dum...pa dum pa dum padum.

Tried a couple of their naans. The Kashmiri one was packed with dried candied fruit while the pudina/mint one was disappointingly tasteless. Why do people get them or even make them? What was the point that I was missing with these? 🤔

Pretty decent cumin scented yellow dhal.

Mutton kola urundai - fried spiced mutton balls. I was imagining them to be like meat balls made with ground lamb/mutton but they weren't. These were formed from very finely minced/pulled meat very much like bitterballen we've previously had.

I remember not thinking much of their masala milk when we had them previously but today's brew was deliciously spiced and milky sweet. Glad I gave them a second chance.