J's @ Purvis Street, Bugis

Located at 7 Purvis Street, which is at the street full of shops opposite of Bugis Junction, near NLB. This restaurant serves halal latin american food, mostly mexican food. It has vegetarian menu too. Its dinner opening time is 630pm, so if you're there earlier than that timing, then you'll have to wait outside.

Was told that lamb shank is one of their best-seller, so ordered one to try.

braised lamb shank with heirloom vegetables @$32++

Lamb was tender and enjoyable. Quite filling, with the mash potatoes and mushrooms.

colleague's 'catch of the day' (cod fish @30++)

Didn't try the fish but colleague said it was yummy. Waited quite a while for the fish though. Paella was the fastest amongst the mains to arrive, followed by lamb shank and lastly the cod fish.

For desserts, we had churros and flourless chocolate cake with ice-cream. Churros was good but, just two sticks?? Where got enough! The flourless cake tasted better with the gelato.

churros with banana and mangoes @$10++

bochas negras (flourless chocolate cake with choco gelato) @12++

Iced water is available. The restaurant is not that big, so the tables are placed pretty near each other. Service was friendly and approachable.

There's a section of the menu catering to vegetarian. A few appetisers and main courses.

Price is slightly on the high side.

Zafferano @ Ocean Financial Centre

Located at Level 43 of Ocean Financial Centre, 10 Collyer Quay. This place is near Clifford Centre and Republic Plaza. My friend parked at Republic Plaza II on a Friday evening, after 7pm and parking was $3 there. Or one can choose to park at Ocean Financial Centre. Was informed by the restaurant staff that parking there is about $6.

Reservation was a breeze via online reserveit.sg, or one could just call up the restaurant. Got a call from the restaurant to remind and to confirm the reservation on the day of visit. Not bad.

One gets the ear pressure when going up to the 43rd floor (240m above ground). The restaurant is quite spacious. Indoor dining area is quite lovely, but rather noisy.

centerpiece

table setting

To start off the evening, we got ourselves a glass of prosecco at $8++ during happy hour (till 8pm).

prosecco with a red sticker (to indicate HH glass?)

If one is interested to bring own wine, the corkage charge here is $45 per bottle. That amount could nett you about 5-6 glasses of prosecco during happy hour.

"Sparkling or still water?"

"Just tap water."

regular tap water

The food menu has tiny fonts and can't really read much since I didn't have my spectacles so left the ordering to my friends.

Meanwhile, let's munch on some bread. Warm loaf of bread that's soft but leaves so much crumbs when cutting it. Request for balsamic to go along with the olive oil.

warm bread by the loaf

lovely bread

olive oil with balsamic vinegar

Amongst the five of us, we had 2 loaves of bread! Didn't order any appetiser and restaurant staff did inform us that the waiting time for the mains to arrive is about 15 minutes.

While waiting for the food, went exploring its alfresco area. If the weather is good, then one can choose to have dinner or drinks at its outdoor area.

outdoor seats

susceptible to weather conditions

view from Level 43

Ordered 4 main courses to be shared amongst the 5 of us. But that's because one of the main course, feeds two.

risotto al nero sepia (squid ink risotto)

Would've preferred if the risotto can be cooked that bit longer. Felt that the taste in the rice was somewhat lacking. Baby squids were nicely done though.

Guancietta di maiale Iberico (slow braised iberico cheeks)

Loved the taste of the slow braised iberico cheeks. Tender, warm and comforting. Very much home-styled cooking. The bright yellow polenta stack was interesting too. Thought it was a bit unusual to have the polenta served in its tin container?

We're very fond of meat. So another meat dish, which is the Filetto di manzo, grilled U.S prime beef tenderloin, pan-fried goose liver, celeriac puree and orange scented morels.

Filetto di manzo (beef fillet with foie gras)

Ok, what are morels? Fungus. See that black thingy that's sitting atop of the mashed blob. Has texture like bamboo pith but denser. That blob tasted very much like pureed liver though...I must be hallucinating!

medium rare

The meat dishes portion were rather small. Fortunately, our last main course, Astice allo busara was of a good enough serving for 3 pax.

Astice allo busara (Boston lobster with chili tomato sauce, pine nuts and raisin pilaf rice gratinated with creme fresche)

best dish for the night

Liked the pilaf raisin rice smothered in gratinated creme fresche. Prefered this much more than the risotto, texture and taste-wise. Lobster meat was firm and fresh. The sauce was sweet, thick and has a slight seafood umami to it.

We were there to celebrate our dear friend's birthday, and the restaurant kindly allowed us to bring our own cake. Ontop of that, Zafferano gave the birthday girl a complimentary birthday dessert. Nice gesture and thanks!

bursting with sweetness (both the cupcakes and birthday girl)

birthday dessert, complimentary

Overall, service was good. Water was topped up every now and then. Dinner was a leisurely affair, and we stayed till late, catching up with each others lives. Happy Birthday Cherlyn, the youngest in our group. Have a good year ahead! Cheers~

one more

Curry House CoCo ICHIBANYA 壱番屋 @ Star Vista

This top curry rice restaurant chain from Ichinomiya, Aichi (Nagoya) Japan, is also known as CoCo Ichiban or CoCo Ichi. According to wiki, カレ (karē) is one of the most popular dish in Japan and カレーライス (karē raisu) is a ubiquitous dish in Japanese household. It is quite amazing that CoCo Ichi has a thousand over branches in Japan alone, and another thousand over more worldwide!

restaurant

Such popularity! Makes one even more curious to try it. The chance came, in the form of an invited tasting session, much thanks to the good people from Imagine Consultancy and CoCo ICHIBANYA.

good curry, good taste

The restaurant was moderately busy on a mid-week evening. I do like Japanese curry rice, especially beef curry. But I've never had omelette curry rice before, and CoCo Ichi has it, so right from the start, I knew what I wanted. Target locked.

show me the curry!

Food tasting and curry rice. Hmm. Overload of carbs? No worries. For small eaters, the menu here is pretty customizable. Prefers less or more rice? Yes, you can. Choose level of spiciness? Yes, you can. Add toppings? Yes, you can.

more or less

Started off with mini-salad. Nicely refreshing with crisp greens.

mini salad (available as part of Set Menu top-up @$3.50++ for 2 items of either a drink or dessert)

dig in!

Omelet Hashed Beef Rice (non-spicy @$14++)

Hashed beef rice is also known as Hayashi rice. Western-styled and its sauce is a demi-glace with tomatoes. Non-spicy and some sweetness. Not too thick and quite yummy. Prefers slightly fattier beef slices though.

fluffy omelet and sticky japanese rice

Next, pork curry rice with Level 1 spiciness. Very very mild, slightly thick curry and enjoyable. This one would be the Indian-influenced curry.

pork curry rice

Ordered Pork Cutlet Omelet Curry Rice with a Level 3 spiciness for comparison, and the verdict? Had some heat but still manageable. In fact, it was not easy to break out a sweat. My bro preferred Level 1, while I thought Level 2 and 3 were pretty similar. Unfortunately, the pork cutlet was rather lean and slightly tough that day.

pork cutlet omelet curry rice

If your tongue starts to tingle from too much heat, then perhaps a smoothie to cool it down? Mango flavour was definitely much stronger than orange! Nicely cold.

mango orange smoothie

The chicken karaage omelet curry rice had very good karaage. Tender bite sized chunks, freshly fried but limited edition with only 6 pieces!

karaage omelet curry rice

How about some desserts? Ice-cream and cheesecake!

vanilla and strawberry ice-cream

green tea cheesecake

The green tea cheesecake has three layers; cheese, red bean and green tea base. Most prominent was the slightly bitter green tea base. Most surprising was that there wasn't any cheese taste in this dessert. More like tofu pudding with dense green tea base. The red bean layer was useful to offset the bitterness by having some sweetness to it.

Special thanks to Glenn, Taisong and CoCo ICHIBANYA for the invite.

CoCo ICHIBANYA

Address: #02-06, Star Vista, Buona Vista
Tel:  (65) 6570 2457
Website: www.cocothailand.com , or 
http://www.ichibanya.co.jp/english/index.html

Fish & Co @ Novena Square

Located at Level 3 of Novena Square. Visited on a weekday for lunch and it wasn't crowded.

signature tabletop accessory

ample seats

It must've been awhile since I last visited Fish & Co (any branch). Just realized that they've implemented iPad ordering system. But no, they didn't do away with service charge.

order here

For students, one could get the Student Specials of a Fish & Chips and a drink for just $9.50. Need to show the student pass for verification.

whitebait (@$5.95++)

prawn fritters (@$5.95++)

The whitebait portion was quite small. Preferred the prawn fritters. No doubt it was quite oily, but the batter was crisp and the prawn wasn't that tiny. The chili dip was nicely refreshing.

Seafood Platter for 2 (@$40.95++)

The platter was good, lots of chips and we had taken a liking to the sauce that coated the mussels.

black pepper cod (fingerlings portion) @$9.95++

If you happen to see 'fingerling' mentioned in the menu, it means a smaller portion. Was quite dissappointed by the grilled cod fingerling. The fish was tough and tasteless. One wouldn't have expected this from a 'cod' fish.


Payment via Citibank card would get 10% off on ala-carte items.

NeNe Chicken @ Star Vista

Located at Level 1 of The Star, 1 Vista Exchange Green otherwise known as Star Vista at Buona Vista. Small small shop, and rather warm inside. Visited on a Friday evening, and its diners composition was made up of small group of friends, couples and single diner. Takeaway waiting time is 15-20 minutes.

Service staff that night were young teenagers. Service was alright.

takeaway

attractive looking box

Green Onion Chicken Tender Meal with extra freaking hot sauce (@$10.90)

Hmm. The chicken tenders and buffalo sticks (fries) looked rather sad, don't they?

tasty but limp as limp can be

breast meat

The chicken pieces were quite small, and could be finished in two bites each. It was cold, and as it was breast meat, it was rather dry too. Best to reheat the cold chicken.

green onion sauce and freaking hot sauce (red)

Its original green onion sauce (tasted like a mix of soy and wasabi) was quite nice. Loved the freaking hot sauce. No worries, its heat was bearable and likeable. Mix these two sauce together for better effect. Nice.

The small radish cubes were good too, but only if you like pickles in the first place. Just found it abit too sweet.

chicken pieces coated with sauce

Perhaps, wings or chicken pieces with bones would be a better choice as compared to chicken tenders?