IKEA Restaurant and Cafe @ Alexandra Road

My colleague likes IKEA for its meatballs and chicken wings, plus some minor shopping, so usually I'll just trudge along for lunch. Give me chicken wings anytime! And of course, refillable unlimited cups of coffee for just 50 cents, that is value for money!

At 12+ pm during weekdays, if you are lucky, can still find seats. It is not uncommon to find students sitting there, enjoying leisurely lunch while discussing their projects. Working adults, shoppers having lunch/brunch made up the rest of the population found in the restaurant. The food queue can get crazy long, so be prepared to wait around 20 minutes.

chicken wings for 2

yummy and oily

The chicken wings are to be ordered in multiples of two. So for us two girls, usually we'll just have 2 wings each.

swedish meatballs, with potatoes

meatballs!

The meatballs come in two sizes; 5 or 10 balls per plate. I've seen other tables of one lady and a man, having a plate of ten meatballs per pax and two wings each. I've also seen young girls (probably late teens or early twenties) having a salad, a main course (salmon), chicken wings and dessert. Wow.

The meatballs tend to dry up and harden a little if left in the open for too long. Definitely need to eat it with the sauce. The potatoes that day were slightly harder, which probably meant that it wasn't cooked as long as it should?

Sometimes, they might have a promo on desserts, and so on that particular Tuesday, they were giving free dessert for every plate of 10 meatballs.

invaded by green desserts (round one is $2 while the longish one is free)

Well, looks can be deceiving. I thought the longish looking dessert (which was the free item for the meatballs promo) was chocolate. Turned out to be something that was seriously sweet but blah. The round dessert which my colleague couldn't resist buying, was better. It was soft, with skin similar to the snowskin mooncake (but much sweeter), and its inside has cream and cake.

don't know its name, but not bad

I had two cups of coffee, and by the end of the meal, was feeling really full! The costs of the entire meal was about $12+.

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Imperial Treasure Noodle and Congee House @ ION Orchard

Located at B3-17 of ION Orchard. There was a waiting time of about 25 minutes on a weekday lunch. Get a queue number and wait patiently.  We were led to our table after about 15 minutes, only to find out that the table was still not cleared. So another few more minutes of waiting time. The place felt kind of small and narrow.

Ours is a booth seat with us facing the 'wall'. Hahaa, felt like a cramped 茶餐厅.

our table, facing the wall....repenting?

table settings

cold soya bean that wasn't really cold...

We ordered quite abit for two pax. My friend insisted on ordering the roasted meats (2 types: duck and pork for $16++), char siew bao and prawn dumpling salad. While I insisted on flowy custard bun, siew mai and for desserts; souffle egg puff with red bean paste and banana. For drinks, we had cold soya drink ($1.80++) which turned out to be slightly colder than room temperature. Hmmm....

prawn dumpling salad

I think the 'salad' in the prawn dumpling salad really referred to the mayonaise (沙拉酱?).

douse it with a little mayo

yup, nice crunchy prawn

This deep fried item tasted nice with mayonaise and all, but I found it a little pricey though. Next, came the roasted meat plate. The meat here is cut into smaller bite size.

roasted duck and pork

roasted duck

roasted pork

Having a basis for comparison due to the recent visit to Canton-I and having had similar dish, I would prefer the other version of the roasted pork as this one here, was somewhat smaller in size, and not as juicy. The roasted duck here has leaner meat but more crispy skin.

mustard and plum sauce for the meat

Next, came the char siew bao (3 in a basket).

char siew bao

yummy char siew bao

We liked the char siew bao (in fact it was one of the de-facto item that my friend MUST order to satisfy her dim sum cravings!). Soft fluffy bun that breaks easily with yummy moist fillings and most importantly, not much fatty meat inside. However, the sauce of the char siew bao was a little salty for me.

siew mai

chopped prawns in siew mai

The siew mai tasted much like steamed prawn dumplings, probably because much of its filling seemed to be just chopped prawn cubes. I liked it for its simplicity.
 

flowy custard bun (流沙包)

all that glitters.. golden custard

The looks of the custard bun was rather mundane and boring. Plain white small buns in a basket. How exciting can that be? Especially since I've encountered purple coloured custard bun elsewhere. BUT, the taste of the custard bun here was... divine. Its filling was thick, and you can really taste the salted egg. Savoury and sweet, it was pure indulgence! And value for money too.

At this point, both of us were clutching our tummy and complaining about how full we are. We both concluded that it could be the soya bean drink that done us in. Felt bloated already. But, there was still one more dessert to eat.

Hehehe, this was one meal that I had not just one, but two desserts! Well, the story went like this. Earlier, while we were still waiting to be seated, they had this screen at the shopfront that displayed pictures of selected items from their menu. There was one that caught my eye, so we ordered it to try. We waited quite a while for it to come though. It was delivered to our table only after we asked for it twice, and 10 minutes after we finished everything and our tables cleared.

So, was it worth the wait?

souffle egg with sugar dusting

red bean paste and banana fillings

The answer was, YES. Definitely worth the wait! Served piping hot, the souffle was sooooo soft. A bite of this sweet dessert and you can taste the eggy texture, mixed with the heady scent of red bean and banana. Yums! But, it was kind of oily though.. so probably hot chinese tea would be a better choice of drink as compared to soya bean. The soya bean tasted blah after having the souffle, as the souffle was super sweet (according to my definition, that is).

The meal costs $47 for two pax. Most of the dim sum items that we ordered had prices ranging from $3.30 ~ $4.50. If you are not using the wet towels, just simply indicate so prior to paying and check the bill to ensure that the towels are not charged. Service was adequate, and the wait staff were friendly. Just take note that it could take a while to get the bill settled during their peak hours.