Ming Fa (明發), Smith Street Food Centre

First time getting a bowl of bak chor mee from Ming Fa at Chinatown (Green Zone, #02-049 Chinatown Complex Market and Food Centre, 335 Smith Street). Have tried their branches at Tekka Food Centre and Upper Thomson and have also heard things about this one being the original.

Anyways, this was a decent vinegary bowl. Like the Tekka branch, there were no fishballs, no prawns and no pig's liver in it. Also nothing that made them stand out from most decent bak chor mee. It's in the category where I wouldn't mind getting if I'm in the vicinity but wouldn't travel here just for them. 

Jin Kimchi Express, Bukit Merah Central

I've bought kimchi from Jin Kimchi before but never made the connection with them to their Jin Kimchi Express stalls for some reasons. Ate somethings from their Bukit Merah Central branch (#01-3749, 161 Bukit Merah Central, tel : 6910 3180) recently. They're in the same SG Kopitiam as No. 25 Minced Meat Noodle.

Happy with their signature kimchi set with added sausage and egg. It's actually pretty good. The bowl was generously loaded with kimchi, tofu, and thin sliced pork belly in a savoury broth that was also kinda briny. That little serving of banchan on the side had really nice savoury sweet marinated quail eggs.

Jjajangmyeon wasn't great in my opinion. Was looking forward to a more robust bean-y flavour in the sauce.

BBQ mutton from Milan Shokudo

Previously, I was kinda disappointed that Milan Shokudo took away the chocolate banana pizza from their menu. My impression of them took a serious downturn with this bbq mutton I noticed on their menu recently. I mean, what the hell was this?

The pasta on the side was undercooked and looked like it had been previously portioned in a container and refrigerated. It hasn't even lost it's shape so yeah, you can judge the freshness of the prep from there. And that mutton - it's got that irritating sweet marinate which was pretty much the only flavour in the meat. I couldn't tell it was mutton/lamb. 👎🏼

Look at how much gristle in that mediocre quality meat that was inedible. It looked like these guys couldn't care less what they were serving to people. 👎🏼

Ruxu (入续), Funan

 

Ruxu (#01-11 Funan, 107 North Bridge Road, tel : +65 8171 8419) is a tong sui (traditional Chinese dessert) and bakery chain from Guangzhou, China. They've gotten a bit of spotlight on local social media lately because of their first branch in Singapore.

They've something called phoenix milk custard with rice wine & mochi. Not bad though I think the flavour from said rice wine was a little weak. The custard was not excessively sweet with an almost ethereal texture and the mochi was much more tender than I imagined. 

Mango sago pomelo was okay. Decent tasting if not exactly memorable. Those mango were just crossing the edge into the pretty sour zone.

Almond pudding with osmanthus syrup tasted like I imagined. No surprises here.

Changi Village Cooked Food (樟宜村熟食), Bendemeer Market & Food Centre

There must be at least a couple of stalls selling nasi lemak/economic bee hoon at this food centre. I had to choose one so I picked Changi Village Cooked Food (#01-45 Bendemeer Market & Food Centre, 29 Bendemeer Road) which looked promising. It was pretty decent. Got myself the squiggly noodle which they called maggie and bee hoon along with some cabbage, a triangle hash brown, egg and luncheon meat. Not bad tasting.

后港六条石 Simon rd, Bendemeer Market & Food Centre

I don't remember the last time I've been to Bendemeer Food Centre. Anyways, this was a plate of black char kuey teow with extra egg from what I determined to be the Simon Road Fried Carrot Cake stall (#01-78 Bendemeer Market & Food Centre, 29 Bendemeer Road). I don't know how the Chinese name is tied to Simon Road.

Radish cake wasn't well caramelised at all. That and there wasn't as much dark soya sauce as I preferred. What made this pretty memorable was their spicy lime-y sambal which I went back to the stall to ask for more of.