Shiokoji Tonkatsu Keisuke, Paya Lebar Square

Keisuke is mostly known for his ramen shops. That being said, there also seems to be some diversity in his newer businesses. I didn't see a tonkatsu shop (#01-02/03 Paya Labar Square, 60 Paya Lebar Road, tel : +65 6214 3345) coming though. Making not just a regular katsu but ones that are marinated in shiokoji for that extra flavour and fried in some state of the art fryer that results in a less oil absorption I heard. I can't verify nor pretend to understand much about the latter so let's just take this with a pinch of shiokoji.

I tried a few of their colas through the years. Have found them all to be a little disappointing except for the sakura flavour which I kinda liked. A little. This yuzu cola reminded me of Chinese preserved plums. Not that it's bad. Not that it's yuzu flavour either.

Oooo....what have we here? O-o

A breaded fried egg with golden orange molten yolk. Drizzle a little shoyu and it's good with the rice.

I thought rare salmon katsu was a good idea. The fish was light and went down easily. Might have been a better idea if they could use a cut that had a little bit more fat but I suppose that could be a lot more effort than what they're charging right now.

The rare maguro katsu was lacklustre. Some slices were just a little mushy. Not much flavour from the tuna so you could knock yourself out with the variety of sauces they have over there and not worry about missing out on what ever is "intrinsic". Tartar sauce is good by the way and so is the sweet miso.

What I personally found most impressive was the shiokoji marinated pork. This was their 200g rosu. The katsu was chunky, tender and moist. Outstanding flavour from the meat. I'd come back just for this alone.

Revisiting Mak Hong Kee

Have been wanting to come back to Mak Hong Kee for a cze char dinner for a while but that hasn't happened until recently.

Today we tried their green beans stir fried with preserved vegetables. Both greens provided their own crunchiness among the spicy, salty, umami and a bit of sour. This dish begged for steamed white rice.

Their pipa tofu looked deceptively unassuming from the mundane appearances. The tofu was mashed together with minced prawn and pork before being formed into their shape fried. To add on, they were sitting in a flavourful savoury stock (上汤) that made me scrape the plate clean. Did I forget to mention there was also ebiko?  

Sweet and sour pork. The meat was lightly fried so it didn't have the sturdy crunchy exterior that other renditions do. Sauce was sweet and vinegary. Not bad.

We liked the lobster ee fu noodles more than we had initially thought we would. The texture of the noodles was the first thing that won us over. Secondly, I was quite impressed that the stock for the noodles had the crustacean flavour from the lobster infused in it. Nicely done with just a light hint of ginger that I didn't even mind.

An update at Nakajima Suisan

It's been a while since we ate at Nakajima Suisan. They've added some stuff to their menu which weren't there before.

I was reeled in by their akauo hiraki teishoku this time round.

The main reason was that I've learnt to appreciate this fish in the recent year. The fact that I've figured out a better way of eating them by stripping off the spine first helped. The other reason would be that there was something about the meat that reminded me of kinmedai.

There be oysters too and these grilled ones were pretty good. I'd get them again easily. But the shishamo today wasn't as egg stuffed as I was hoping for. Hmmmm......

They even have gindara shioyaki these days. A refreshing change from the usual teriyaki version.

Okinawan Diner Nirai-Kanai, Great World

After years at Liang Court, Nirai Kanai has finally relocated to Great World (#01-107/108 Great World, 1 Kim Seng Promenade, tel : +65 6339 4811). The menu remains the same as before so if you've had stuff that you liked from them before, they are still there.

We ordered some old favourites like their meaty gyoza.

And the chanpuru.

Note to self - order this without onions the next time. 

Tried their curry rice with tori karaage for the first time. Nothing much to say about the fried chicken. It's okay. Curry was....not what I expected from Japanese curry. It's not annoyingly sweet for one and that's a good thing in my opinion. The spices were a bit more pronounced than what I had imagined. Not bad.

Happy breakfast at Havelock Road Food Centre

Happy meal + big breakfast = happy breakfast? Today we have frog and turtle soup from Havelock Turtle Soup and bee hoon from Ivan's Porridge. Those frog legs in the soup were thick and meaty - slurp off the bone tender!

Gather, Raffles Hotel

A new shop (#01-12 Raffles Hotel Arcade, 328 North Bridge Road) doing galettes and crepes has opened up at the spot where Ah Teng's Bakery used to be at Raffles Hotel. From what I gathered (pun intended), the proprietors aren't new to these kind of business. It showed with how they handled the crowd.

Got a bottle of cider. Expensive but I did get drink at a shop in Raffles Hotel so there you have it. I'm not good at describing it but it's nice.

Their galettes included this one with potatoes and salami. Not bad. I liked that they bothered to pan fry those salami for a bit before they used them as a topping. But otherwise, it tasted like how it looked.

This was "Off The Bone". Ham, Gruyère, Cheddar and egg. How could I not like this? So simple yet it pushes almost all the tasty buttons on/in me. All on/in a light crisp galette.

Hot chocolate is..... okay. I've had better. *cough*starbucks*cough*

We tried a crepe. This one had Camembert, honey and some fig and Earl Grey preserve. The funky saltiness from the cheese obviously paired well with both the preserves and the honey so there - I liked this. 

All these galetting and crepe-ing has gotten me curious about Entre-Nous Creperie just around the corner. It's been quite a while since. I wonder how they fare in comparison with Gather these days.