The first time I walked past Desire was during Pooja's birthday (held at Breeze) which had really nice ambience (and mojitos). It looked really interesting but then it looked very expensive too! So I conveniently forgot about it till I was leafing through my Wine and Dine Guide 2008 (given by annalisa) and stumbled upon a tantalising picture of the Seafood Soiree.
Desire is the restaurant located in Scarlet Hotel, which is a boutique hotel (somehow synonymous in my dictionary as expensive). The design of the whole place is really pretty - including the waiting areas, toilets and they even have a doorman with a trench coat (dunno how he stands the heat!).
This restaurant has naughty names for their dishes, and their menu is called "The Book of Desire", entrees are under the heading of "Main Affair" and desserts called "Lust bites".
They serve 2 types of bread - Onion and Olive, and while I was in frantically debating which one I wanted to try first, the waiter helped me by saying that he'll give me both! No more agonizing while deciding which one to eat. Even though they look really crusty and hard on the outside, they're really cotton wool soft. The Olive roll had a more subtle flavour, with minced black olive incorporated into the fluffy bread. I liked the onion roll better - as the delicious aroma of caramelized onions gave the bread a savoury taste.
Seafood Soiree ($34)- Seasonal mix of crustacean and fish slivers served with avocado mousse Somehow I couldn't get a nice shot of the seafood soiree - it's really pathetic compared to the picture in the Wine & Dine guide. We had a sweet scallop, 3 slices of salmon sashimi, an extremely fresh oyster and a prawn served in a glass of luscious avocado mousse. The glass came in an ice bath, which kept the dish delightfully chilled. 
Asparagus with Egg and Truffles ($34) Grilled asparagus, warm egg, shaved truffles and Parmesan cheese crust drizzled with white truffle oil.
Asparagus with Egg and Truffles ($34) Grilled asparagus, warm egg, shaved truffles and Parmesan cheese crust drizzled with white truffle oil. The moment we heard 'white truffle oil', we were sold into getting this dish already. It was prettily presented on a warm dish, with the egg wobbling and the truffle oil smells wafting around our table. I like anything truffle, so I really liked this dish. The asparagus were perfectly grilled, just cooked and not raw, and it went amazingly well with the creamy egg yolk and of course, the truffle oil. 
Canard De Challandais - ($48)Smoked Challand duck breast on saffron risotto served with bing cherry and foie gras sauce This was my fave main course - though I think the duck breast was a bit too pink for my liking, the smokiness went very well with the slightly creamy, al dente risotto. 
The risotto was perfect - each morsel of rice was cooked through, but still had a slight resistance on chewing.
Kurobuta Pork - Sous vide crackling pork belly and pork cheeks laced with its own braced jus and warm fennel salad tossed with mustard miso ($40)
I didn't quite like this dish, probably because I can't appreciate crackling pork and pork fats. Though the pork cheeks were deliciously soft (and full of fats), I didn't like the pork belly because it was too salty. Fans of roast pork (the chinese kind) will probably like the crackling pork belly lots.
Char Grilled Chateaubriand with confit of ratte potato, baby carrots, sauteed wild mushrooms and morel jus ($50)
The risotto was perfect - each morsel of rice was cooked through, but still had a slight resistance on chewing.Kurobuta Pork - Sous vide crackling pork belly and pork cheeks laced with its own braced jus and warm fennel salad tossed with mustard miso ($40)I didn't quite like this dish, probably because I can't appreciate crackling pork and pork fats. Though the pork cheeks were deliciously soft (and full of fats), I didn't like the pork belly because it was too salty. Fans of roast pork (the chinese kind) will probably like the crackling pork belly lots.
Char Grilled Chateaubriand with confit of ratte potato, baby carrots, sauteed wild mushrooms and morel jus ($50)This is some special beef thing which I didn't eat.
Warm Fondant Cake with melted truffle infused white chocolate and butternut pumpkin, laced with cream anglaise ($22)
Warm Fondant Cake with melted truffle infused white chocolate and butternut pumpkin, laced with cream anglaise ($22)This is unlike any fondant cake I've ever eaten before. I'll recommend it for adventurous people who are willing to try new kinds of desserts. This sort of defies the traditional sweet dessert.
The fondant cake has no chocolate at all (totally not for chocolate lovers - you'll feel cheated if you are), and when I happily made a hole in the side of the cake, pumpkin sauce oozed out. They use truffle oilfor the pumpkin sauce, so this was pretty unique to me - most restaurants use truffle oil for savoury foods. I like these intersting desserts - makes me think about Macaron (which has closed down, probably because their service is too snotty!) because their desserts are really like art pieces.
Citrus Tart ($16) Yuzu and citrus fruit sabayon with almond crust served with mascarpone ice cream The other dessert that we tried was the citrus tart, which is really very citrus-ey. I don't really like citrus fruits - but I'll take lemonade and lemon tart, just not orange (and the likes ie. grapefruit, mandarins, yuzu etc). The yuzu was more orangey than lemoney, so I took one bite to try. The yuzu taste is really very strong, and pretty refreshing.
We had dinner on a weekend - and there were 2 big parties going on - even though we were seated about 5 m away from one of the groups, we could hear everything they were saying (cos they were really speaking damn loudly - they're either drunk or deaf) so the fine dining ambiance was ruined. The waitstaff were really apologetic about the din, and apologized profusely (even though it wasn't their fault). 
We had dinner on a weekend - and there were 2 big parties going on - even though we were seated about 5 m away from one of the groups, we could hear everything they were saying (cos they were really speaking damn loudly - they're either drunk or deaf) so the fine dining ambiance was ruined. The waitstaff were really apologetic about the din, and apologized profusely (even though it wasn't their fault). 
Desire 
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