Singapore Food

Should the question on what food that best represents Singapore culture arises, then my answer would be...you'll need to try a lot of food in order to answer that! Singapore, alike with its neighbour Malaysia, is a melting pot with many cultures. As such, we get variety and distinctive flavours from each but collectively, these forms the rich flavours of Singapore.

Singapore food - variety of flavours

Personal favourites of mine? Currently, on weekends, I'd like to wake up to a bowl of steaming hot lor mee 卤面, with chockful of ingredients and all the dark gooeyness. But of course, the queue to get this bowl of goodness, is unfortunately included as well.

lor mee

On days that I have no idea what I'd like to eat, then chicken rice would be an option to take.

steamed chicken, with piquant spicy chili and free soup

Thanks Seth for the prompt to post. You might want to check out www.foodpanda.sg for your favourite food delivery.

Chinatown Food Street @ 335 Smith Street

Attended a Reunion Supper at CFS (Chinatown Food Street) yesterday. With Lunar New Year just round the corner, it felt like as though everyone had congregated in Chinatown! Long lines of humans thronging the streets, right from the start of Exit A of Chinatown Station. The walk to Smith Street took forever. Well, almost. At 930pm, Chinatown was bustling!

sought shelter, away from the crowd

Truth be told, it has been ages since I've been to Smith Street. Probably when it was still in its open-air era. Was feeling nostalgic already.

great turnout

congregation of stalls in CFS

Glad to be seated with familiar faces. Great to see everyone again.

waiting to start, must resist ngoh hiang  五香 temptation

let's start the prosperity toss 撈起 (lo hei)

Yusheng (鱼生) is a Teochew-style raw fish salad. Always liked it with grass carp, but guess it is more common with salmon nowadays.

yusheng, convenience style

一本万利, 财源广进 (pouring the oil of wealth~)

All together now, Huat ah! Live healthy and prosper!

After yusheng, we sampled some of the hawker fares available in CFS. Did you know that there are 24 hawker stalls to choose from? Let's see what we ate.

First up, Chong Chong Ngoh Hiang Prawn Fritter 忠忠五香酥虾饼. The prawn fritters stayed pretty crispy throughout. That ubiquitous plate of bee hoon was pretty tasty!

freshly fried ngoh hiang

economical bee hoon

Satay sounds like a perfect supper food, yes? How about this plate from Newton Circus Ahmad Ibrahim Satay. Chicken satay was nicely sweet and tender.

tender and sweet

Is that all for supper? Well, not quite. Here was what my table ended up with. Can you spot the dishes from Odeon Beef Noodles, Food Street Fried Kway Teow Mee, Joo Chiat Ang Moh Noodles House, Chinatown Enak Fritters, Katong Keah Kee Fried Oysters, Bugis Street Famous Hainanese Chicken Rice and Chinatown Food Street Hot/Cold Beverages?

now, this is supper 开动咯~

For a limited time only, from now till 18 Feb 2015, Chinatown Food Street will stay open for all the night owls, the curious and the hungries all the way till 2am daily for supper.

Now you know where to head to.

Happy Lunar New Year 新年快乐!

The Square Restaurant @ Novotel Singapore Clarke Quay

For the uninitiated, if you know where's Liang Court, then you can find Novotel Clarke Quay. The Square Restaurant is at Level 7 of Novotel.

Was recently invited to try its Christmas Buffet. Dinner buffet is currently priced at $58++ per adult. This price is not valid on eve and on Public Holidays.

comfy seats

 The place has a nice ambiance, and Christmas'sy feel to it. Food is a mix of International and local fares.

holiday mood

Buffet with oysters? I like, especially those plump ones. Prawns and oysters. Double the happiness.

oysters, prawns and mussels

Canadian oysters yum

For sashimi, we spied tuna.

to start: salad, chuka idako, tuna sashimi, seafood salad and smoked chicken salad

 The Square offers roasted lamb and turkey at its carving stations. These ought to satisfy the carnivors in us.

lamb at carving station

roasted lamb with pepper sauce and mint

Cooked food has items such as carbs (fried rice, char kway teow), vegetables and meats (beef, fish and chicken). There was soup kambing (mutton soup) as well, but did not try.

fish dish

chicken in BBQ sauce

 If prawns is not enough to satisfy the seafood cravings, how about some crabs?

Indonesian styled chili crab

black pepper crab

The Indonesian chili crab was spicy but the sauce was oh-so-shiok! The only thing missing, was the deep fried man-tous.

glorious sauce

There is a live cooking station as well, and one could request for mee-siam, aglio-olio or risotto.

chicken cheese risotto

Cheese section was interesting. The Irish Porter Cheddar looked as though it has nuts in it, but it doesn't. The texture was semi-soft, like a jelly or a slightly drier and not so soft konyaku. Saint Morgon seemed to be the most pungent of the lot. The rest were pretty mild, and nice to be eaten with the sweet relishes and crackers.

cheeses

Irish Porter Cheddar

Lanquetot and Saint Morgon

yummy condiments

Desserts are aplenty here. Cakes, ice-creams, puddings etc. For festive season, there are even log cake, and gingerbread men cookies. Too stuffed to try all!

Christmas is coming!

log cake (back)

Pecan pie

brownies

rainbow cake to brighten your day

The chocolate log cake was good. Moist and sweet.

ice-cream

If your stomach has only a single slot left for desserts, then do try the durian pengat before you leave. Unless, you have a major dislike of durians.

durian pengat

Durian pengat was definitely not a looker, but it sure was darn tasty! Just the right amount of pulp too. Thumbs up for this.

Special thanks to Spencer and Fara, for your hospitality and also to HGW for the invite.

Oh, Le Bar Rouge beside The Square, has a 1-for-1 offers on house-pour and Tiger draught beer daily from 6pm tp 8pm, so do check it out.

Eat, Drink and be Merry!

The Square Restaurant

Address: #07-00 Novotel Clarke Quay, 177A River Valley Road, S179031
Website: http://www.novotelclarkequay.com/restaurant/the-square/
Contact: +65 6433 8790

Ultimate Hawker Fest 2014 @ Suntec Convention Centre

The Ultimate Hawker Fest 2014 was held on 22 November 2014 at Suntec Convention and Exhibition Halls 401-402. UHF2014 is in support of over 32,000 beneficiaries of Touch Community Services.

let's begin

Armed with stack of coupons, went around looking at the Ultimate Original Recipe, Ultimate Pursuit of Happiness and Ultimate Ingredients.

queue for chicken rice

Let's start with a plate of chicken rice, made with Anxin chicken supplied by Toh Thye San farm.

100 Days Anxin Chicken Rice by Tian Tian Chicken Rice - Ultimate Ingredients

Tender chicken flesh with a certain spring in its meat. Its been ages since I had Tian Tian. Satiated for breakfast.

Next up, King's Roast which saw long queues formed, perpetually.

Chef Kingsley, with the premium sio bak

The roast pork had good crackling that remained crispy. Two hours later, it was sold out. Wow.

Visited Lek Lim to get some kuehs. Good choice, as a rare type of kueh made its appearance for UHF2014.

kuehs

assorted kueh platter - kueh lapis, kueh salat, ang ku kueh, soon kueh and kueh gambir

Kueh gambir contained minced chicken meat but its taste is slightly sweetish and similar to ang ku kueh. The soon kueh contained a surprise, where dried shrimps were replaced with fresh shrimp instead. Yummy!

last bit

desserts

Was rather thirsty after the chicken rice, so got the Durian Mango Ice from Jin Jin. Happiness indeed.

Durian Mango (Gangster) Ice by Jin Jin Dessert - Ultimate Pursuit of Happiness

Good job to all the participating hawkers and restauranteurs. Kudos too to Maureen, Derrick and Ian.


See you at next year's Ultimate Hawker Fest!

The Clifford Pier @ Fullerton Bay Hotel

Located at Fullerton Bay Hotel (the main building). Enter through the doors and walk straight. Dinner service doesn't start till 630pm, hence you won't be seated till then.

hotel lobby

The Clifford Pier

It's a cosy place on a wet evening.

hello world

feels like high tea

There was this bowl of crackers on the table, so we started munching on those while perusing the menu.

munchies

For starters, we chose one that had everything and replaced the kong bak bao with popiah.

kueh pie tee, popiah and satay

Liked the beef satay best. What can I say? I'mma meatarian!

skinny satay

For mains, one could do local or fusion, or western. The online menu is slightly different from the printed ones, so am not sure what's the exact name for this noodle dish that my colleague chose but I'll call it 'kong bak' pasta.

kong bak pasta

flowy egg

Had only tried lobster roll once, so decided to try the version here.

salad, lobster roll, truffle fries

close up of half a lobster

It was pretty tasty. Liked the small chunks that aint too tiny. Well dressed salad, and crispy truffle fries. Likeable.

One cannot shy away from desserts when one is with a group of ladies.

bourbon profitteroles

key lime pie

pulut hitam

The pulut hitam was tasted first, and it was lacking in the sweets department. Bourbon profitteroles was refreshing as it has ice-cream sandwiched within and choco sauce poured all over. Yum.

Glad that we ordered the key lime pie. As with any merringue, it was really sweet. The lime part of it was tangy sharp and the combination of those was good.

Expect to spend about $60 per pax without drinks.