Xanderscopicqued

Dropped in at Basil Alcove for lunch. It's been over a month since my last visit and I was curious about what's abrew in this new place which I've realised, has received quite abit of cyberpress. Sunday Times did an article on it, so seemingly, news does travel fast in this small country. Especially if it's about food. Here's a couple of glances at what new storm the place has been whipping up in the new menu. The duck, the mackerel, the bratwurst and the ribs. I noticed that the presentation has improved.

The duck...

The mackerel...

The bratwurst...

The ribs...

The prices have been upped a little, but really, it's still within the realm of what I would consider very affordable. I'm not going to pinpoint any specifics since the cost of eating at this restaurant really speaks for itself. I just wished that the ribs had meat which I could easily strip off the bone with my fork.

St. Norman's Ham, Egg and Cheese Garlic pain grillé

Mmmmm.........breakfast by Norman.

That's essentially toast with eggs (now with pepper), ham and sliced cheese on toast with garlic spread and butter.

Les Bouchons, 7 Ann Siang Road

If you're a meat loving carnivore/omnivore who has bouts of craving for meat of the bovine kind, this is a heads up to read on. Les Bouchons is a small French restaurant located along the ground floor of a bunch of shophouses down at 7 Ann Siang Road. The restaurant was decorated with French posters of cigarette advertisements, old theater plays, booze and unrecognizable whathaveyous on the walls - painting a cozy, French-y and warm ambience. Akin to what one would generally romanticize of little street side bistros that one might find in France.

The menu of this place appeared to be curated with the majority of the offerings being grilled meat. The dinner tonight was focused on a specialty of the restaurant known as côte de boeuf, a kilogram slab of prime rib for two. Gash your teeth and keep your pants on. Although the price of the beef was stated at $37/per, that beef platter serves two. And multiples of two. The meat was pre-portioned.

The restaurant provides free flow of small hard loaves. Regular tasting bread and wasn't heated up. Made decent munching with butter while waiting for the food though.  The appetizers we had were the Burgandy escargots with garlic butter and the Terrine "Maison".

Burgandy Escargots with Garlic Butter

Terrine "Maison"

The escargots could do better with more garlic butter. Apart from that, the snails were scalding hot and tasted quite decent. I found their terrine much more interesting. Wonderful infusion of peppercorn with a coarse finish which tasted good by itself or with bread.

On to the dinner highlight.....the côte de boeuf.

It tasted as good as it looked. The meat was a little dry. However the rich beefy flavour were sealed in the meat and I think it appealed to the primeval red meat cravings that I have sometimes. I'm sure there's a whole lot of you out there that share the same sentiments regarding beef so if you're thinking to let loose some of that beastly urge for large quantities of medium rare beef, you'll know where to look.

Orders of their beef came with a basket of fries and a salad each. For this case of the côte de boeuf, it's two portions of the chilled salad.

Le Bouchons doesn't have much of desserts. Apart from ice cream, the only others were a rather nice creme brulee with Grand Marnier and the Ile Flottante. The creme brulee here was pretty good and there's enough Grand Marnier in the dessert to be identifiable but not overpowering. One of the uncommon renditions which I thought was not bad.

Ile Flottante means floating island? My French is 10 years rusty and the translation was the courtesy of Babelfish. It's a soft meringue topped with almonds and drizzled with caramel, floating on a milky erm...sauce? The meringue was firm yet easily disintegrated in the mouth. Not bad.

Set Lunch at Menotti

Menotti has a set lunch from 12p.m. that offers a pasta, dessert and either coffee or tea at $19.90. Met up with an old friend Gweezer for lunch so decided to check it out. This will probably be my last visit to Menotti in a while. No, I'm not picking on the food.

I have a couple of nice shots of the squid ink ravioli from the place so I decided that both should be in here.

The portions aren't too big, so it's not as filling as I would like it. The ravioli is stuffed with shredded cod and dressed in some creamy saffron sauce which while wasn't terrible, was also nothing extraordinary as a cream sauce. I generally enjoy cod as a fish with it's taste and texture, so having shredded or smashed cod doesn't really do it for me. I mean, drenched in all the sauce, I could hardly tell the difference.

The Bavette is a seafood pasta (squid, clams and prawns) in spicy tomato sauce. I usually avoid tomato based sauced because I find them the least exciting, but for today's instance, it did reveal itself to be a better option which I think I would have preferred.

Knowing that the ravioli wouldn't suffice to do the trick for lunch, we got a Crochette (crabcakes) to share.

I think I've mentioned acouple of times that these are one of the best crabcakes I've had even though I haven't had it at that many other places. It's also been mentioned to be a tad saltish, but I personally find it to my liking. One of the noted difference between this dish here and Riciotti is that the orange & basil mayo looks completely different. Here it comes as a light milky peach sauce while the latter looks like regular mayo.

That's the Soffiato, the dessert I picked for today's lunch. It's a warm dark chocolate cake, dusted with icing and a scoop of chocolate chip ice cream. The slightly crusty exterior breaks open to reveal a rich sweet chocolate sauce which will spill forth like molten lava. Kinda reminds me of Morton's signature chocolate cake which comes warmer, a bit larger in size, taste a little better and cost a lot more. Chocolate lovers will probably like this.

Of rotis and tissues and milk

This was a post-dinner snack with tea.

If you're acquainted with roti paper, it's a thin crisp prata drizzled with condense milk. The texture of the pastry is light and crispy and generally appeals to those with a sweet tooth. Much as I may be stating the obvious, it can require some finesse to eat. The roti crumbles easily being crispy and all. Utensils aren't really necessary since they're probably more unwieldy. Learn to love your fingers a little. Share the sweetness.

Taste of Thailand, Sembawang Shopping Centre

The funny thing about the Taste of Thailand was that it tasted totally local. Lol. These guys were the typical cze char which operated at a fast and furious pace that I found astounding. I mean, the dishes pictured below came under ten minutes after orders were taken and the place was definitely packed. They must have had a pretty big kitchen manned by an army of cooks that can cook en mass. Anyway, Taste of Thailand graduated from a regular stall with a strong following in the old food court in the basement to a restaurant. I know that because I've had dinners with my family on numerous occasions in the past before it was what it is today. Says something about how successful their business had been. The food was reasonably priced. The place is currently located at the 4th floor of Sembawang Shopping Centre. The photo off to the left is how it looked like at about 6.30pm and didn't diminish at the time after we're done with dinner and left. They look like they've literally robbed the food court currently located on the same storey of most of their business. And no, they don't take reservations.

pineapple fried rice (with a generous topping of meat floss)

Spicy egg bean curd

sambal kang kong

Fried cuttlefish legs (a popular signature dish here for a good reason)

Sweet and sour fried sliced fish

Kung pao chicken (6" ToT remix.....lol)

Close up on my portion of the fried rice with the meat floss

As I said before, they're atypical of local cze char stalls. The only difference was that the kung pao chicken tasted different from the regular ones that we're used to eating. The chicken was fried before getting stir fried with the sauce - which didn't taste as rich or delicious as the regular ones. Also, there was very little spiciness in the dish. The above dinner plus another 2 bowls of white rice came up to $35. Lime juice at a dollar each.