Honey Creme

So the K-wave is far from over - but the good thing is that we have now gotten more delicious soft serve ice creams in Singapore. I'm such an old fossil (secretly 82) so I didn't want to go and crowd with all the other young things - so I have happily waited till the craze has sort of died down, before going to Honey Crème.

One of my friends who is in the F&B line has told me that soft serve ice cream is one of the most preservative filled artificially flavored foods ever, but I really love the taste and texture of it, and shall stubbornly remain in blissful ignorance.

I had to try their signature Honey Comb ice cream - which has their original soft serve ic cream with an entire comb honey. Honey on top of soft serve ice cream - such a brilliant idea - to add something sweeter to an already sweet item.

I don't recall ever eating real honeycomb ever (unless you count those fakey ones from the ting ting tang store wrapped in popiah skin with a dash of crushed peanuts). I didn't like the waxy taste that it left (spat it out cos it really was quite waxy) but the honey on top of soft serve ice cream exceeded my expectations.

It's supposed to have a whole lot of minerals, trace elements, amino acids and enzymes but I'm pretty sure that the purported health benefits are vastly shadowed by the amount of insulin resistance you're at risk of...

 

They have quite a few other flavours, including a cotton candy one (sugar on top of ice cream, just like honey on top of ice cream). I think ths was the tea flavoured one with pearls. Great to have more choices than Llao Llao  or Tsujiri only!

Honey Crème
#01-37
313 Somerset Orchard Road
Singapore 238895

Nakhon Kitchen and Project Acai

 Thai food is my 3rd most favourite kind of food - but since my chilli tolerance is pathetically low, I can't eat most of the ultra spicy dishes. I've tried Nakhon Kitchen in Bedok once (recommended by colleague KH 5 years ago) and most of their branches are located in really hard to get to out of the way places (i.e. industrial estates). I'm really glad that they have a branch in Holland Village now.

Its a no frills extremely affordable Thai restaurant, which serves really delicious authentic Thai Food. Quite similar to Diandin Leluk at Golden Mile, just much more accessible.

I their papaya salad as they can adjust the chilli level according to your tolerance. The pineapple rice is nice and sweet, and their phad thai tastes really authentic. Their fish cakes and prawn cakes are not bad either. Plus they serve water for free!

Also, the prices here are really pocket friendly (much more affordable than Thai Express) and the taste is really good (lots of Thai staff here). Superb place for lunch when you're in the Holland V area. The queues can be a pain but if you eat lunch early at about 1130 it shouldn't be a problem.

Nakhon Kitchen Holland Village
27A Lorong Liput
Singapore 277738

 One of the highlights of going to Nakhon Kitchen is that I can hop over next door to get myself a bowl of Acai goodness from Project Acai. I'm not sure about the purported health benefits of acai, but since it tastes so good, I just take it as a dessert (plus perhaps half a serving of fruits).

The acai pulp texture is similar to a slushie and it is the same shade of colour as red bean. I really like how refreshing it tastes, especially when paired with lots of fresh fruits.


Project Acai 
Holland Village
27 Lorong Liput
Singapore 277738

http://www.project-acai.com

Teppei Syokudo

I really really like Teppei for its budget no frills super worth it chirashi don. But going to Tajong Pagar area during lunch time is really a major pain. Not only do I have to pay ERP, pay for the super expensive CBD parking when I finally get a carpark lot, I have to queue too. I'm so glad that Teppei has come up with the concept of takeaway chirashi dons.

They have a very concise little menu, which includes a hamburg steak as well as some Japanese Curry dishes. But of course, I didn't manage to try those.

The chirashi don is great - marginally less tasty than the original Teppei but for no queues and no carpark angst, I'll definitely come back here again. All those lucky people who work in the area - I'm envious +++. No frills fuss free seating - stools and wooden tables uncomfortable enough so you won't hog the seat.

Teppei Syokudo
Millenia Walk #01-105
9 Raffles Boulevard
Tel 62381945

There's another branch in Takashimaya but I have yet to go there.

Tart Blanc

We were hankering for some dessert after Teppei, so after trudging around Millenia Walk, we settled on Tart Blanc. Because I wanted to eat the peach salted egg yolk tart.

I must say that it is a really good combination - syrupy sweet peach on top of a subdued salted egg yolk custard. Served warm. The shortcurst pastry is just right - at least, for me. Not too buttery or oily and yet not too flakey or crumbly. Would definitely be back to eat more of this, when I next come back to have some Teppei.

Tart Blanc
9 Raffles Boulevard
#01-102 Millenia Walk
Singapore 039596

Muchachos

 So after my animal-fat-free pre-dinner snack, we hop next door to eat Muchachos.
I've had it once (take away) and it was great - very filling and lasted me through the long and tedious night. So just before we went, the Straits Times had a section of all these incredible people who made their first million before they became 30, and one of them is the owner of Muchachos. I suppose my friends wanted to get some inspiration and hence decided to come here lol.

 I've previously tried the pork burrito, so I decided to try chicken this time. The pork is much tastier (and oilier) but then again, this whole thing is calorie and fat packed so I suppose a little bit more fat won't quite make a difference.
Packed full with normal beans, refried beans, rice, cheese, salsa, guacamole - very delicious and very very filling.

Corn chips with more guacamole. It's all bar seating save for 2 tables outside - so not quite an ideal place for large groups. They're doing a roaring business - lots of people eating in, taking away etc and the turnover is really quick! The burritos and burrito bowls cost $12.50 each, and extra toppings are around $1.50. Would definitely be back.

Muchachos
22 Keong Siak Road 
S089129
Tel 62200458

Nirai Kanai - Okinawan food at Liang Court

 Okinawa is a place in Japan which has been on my to-visit list for the longest time, especially cos I want to see the aquarium (I love looking at animals but don't like being out in the sun, so aquariums are perfect). I must say that I have never really eaten Okinawan food  before, so I was pretty glad that someone suggested this restaurant. Of course, while waiting for everyone to arrive, we spoilt our appetites eating cream puffs from the restaurant directly opposite the diner, as well as giving into temptation and eating Japanese curry rice from the food court in Mediya :/

The quintessential Okinawan dish - Champon which consists of bitter gourd and tofu, stir fried with pork belly. I found the dish slightly too salty for my taste (though I do understand that the Japanese like their food salty). It was well executed - hardly any bitterness from the bitter gourd and very tasty.

 The tomato salad was very refreshing - lots of sweet cherry tomatoes lightly dressed and lots of salad leaves.

 Eggplant and minced meat stew - most of us found the eggplant slightly undercooked, and were not used to it cos the usual eggplant we get locally are usually cooked to death and mushy. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be like that?

 I think this was the skewered chicken thigh which was really delicious. I think someone was full so I got to eat double my portion ;D

 The star dish of the day - was the roasted pork ribs with cartilage. Can you imagine the cartilage cooked until it was oozingly soft just like jelly. Plus it was well marinated and slightly charred. Mmmm I will go back just to have this dish!

Stewed pork belly - not a fan of pork belly. The sauce is slightly sweetish and the carrots are stewed until soft. Everyone else loved this so I think I'm just an anomaly. 

 We had to eat some carbs, so this chilled ramen was perfect for sharing and ending off the meal.

Even though we ate so much, I think the bill was about $30 per person (without alcohol), which I think is a very very decent price considering what we ate. Will definitely come back.

We adjourned to the desert store above for some Bandung and green tea chiffon cake. Perhaps it was diminishing returns but then I didn't find either cake particularly mindblowing. Though I must confess that I was super stuffed from dinner and my pre dinner snack...

Nirai Kani 
177 River Valley Road
Singaproe 179030
Tel 6339 4811
I would highly recommend you to call and make a booking - the restaurant initially looked empty but it was really full by the time we left at about 830pm

Comnam

Comnam is the sister restaurant of Namnam. Namnam at Raffles City had a ridiculously long queue so we decided to give Comnam a try. Dishes are quite affordably priced and the mains were around $10. 

We got some starters to share - including a refreshing salad, grilled pork belly with corn (of which I liked the corn better) and some sticky rice based dish (bottom right) which I cannot remember what it is... not very memorable I think.

 The main dishes are rice based - the rice used here is broken rice, which supposedly absorbs up the gravy and sauces better than normal rice. I'm not a big fan of rice unless it's sushi rice, so I wasn't particularly impressed with my main of grilled pork with broken rice.

Generally, from the assortment of mains we ordered (4 different) we came to a conclusion that the fried ones tasted the best...  It reminds me a bit too much of cai fan so I'm not a fan, but I suppose that if you're looking for a not very crowded place to eat at, this should do the trick.

Comnam
Raffles City
252 North Bridge Road
Singapore 179103
B1-46/47

Poulet

As much as I hate being unadventurous and boring, I do quite like Poulet for it's accessibility, affordability and acceptable food. 

 I really like their signature salad (about $10) which is very refreshing and lightly dressed, so much so that we had to order a second one to share cos it wasn't enough...

 The truffle mashed potatoes were awesome but then the consistency makes me really worried that there may be a 1:1 ratio of potatoes to butter.

 Since this was about 2 months ago too, it was Christmas and we decided to try their apple sauce chicken wings, which were quite unmemorable. I think there was some promo so we got it...

 And of course, their chicken, which was tender and nicely roasted. Hasn't disappointed me and I've tried it about 3-4x since they opened. Just too lazy to blog about it heh.

Poulet didn't have their awesome banana crumble that they used to have - so we adjourned to St Marcs cafe for some delicious parfaits - I wouldn't recommend the strawberry parfait cos it was way too sweet and only had frozen strawberries... but the Kyoto delight which I usually have (in the background) is really delicious especially with the Warabi mochi pieces that I really love and the roasted soybean flour. Mmmmm

Immanuel French Kitchen and Two Wings

I'm a big fan of cheap and good food - especially if it's not in some far flung inaccessible place. Immanuel French Kitchen was on my food radar for the longest time, but then somehow I never went there. Till about 2 months ago (yes this is superbly outdated).

 The chicken liver pate with port wine ($7.90) was rich and creamy, and went fabulously with the warm crusty bread.

The pan fried foie gras ($16.50) may look a bit unusual, but it tastes great - prior to this I've never eaten foie gras in broth. Surprisingly it goes really well with the dash broth and daikon.

The escargots ($12.90) were also delicious - can't go wrong with ordering escargots in a French place right?

Fried frog legs with shallots and parsley ($12.60) - it was a bit disappointing for me cos I found the other starters better than the frog legs - perhaps it was also because we ordered chicken wings (see below) from another store so it was a bit of an overkill.

 The pork belly ($16.50) was a crowd pleaser - served with onset egg, duxelle mushrooms and potato foam. Melt in the mouth pork belly with creamy potato foam and delicious oozing onsen egg. Plus the crouton bits for the extra crunch. I think this would have cost me double the price from some fancy restaurant.

 Duck leg confit ($16.50) which was moist and tasty, but since duck confit isn't my fave dish - possibly biased cos I saw some cooking show and they cook it in pure duck fat >.< The mash potatoes were so awesome - I think we contemplated getting an extra mashed potato side but then we had too much food already...

 We also went to try the famous Two Wings, which supposedly has the best chicken wings in Singapore. I was waylaid by their awesome heaping cheese fries. But not a good idea to eat so much rich food in one seating... I will try to space it out the next time...

 The wings didn't disappoint- slightly larger than the scrawny ones that you get in most places... The skin was very crispy and evenly cooked. I'm not a big fan of chicken wings either so I didn't think it was spectacular, just that if you're in the area and love chicken wings, it would be a good place to go to.

Finished off the day with more good oils - and did a taste test of 2 of the more famous avocado milkshakes - I do think that the store beside Mr Avocado has the better milkshake (more creamy, less sweet) but then if there was a queue, I'll just go to whichever is shorter...

Immanuel French Kitchen and Two Wings can be found in a coffeeshop
119 Bukit Merah Lane 1
Singapore 151119
Just next to Alexandra Village Food Centre

Good Chance Eating House

Hello Everyone! Hope that you've had a great CNY feasting and vegetating around (two of the things that I'm superb at). 

I have been commandeered to update my dusty blog. I have been eating (lots) and TLC-ing myself even more. But as it is the new year, and since all these shops are closed (just like the apocalypse sigh) I haven't got anything better to do (besides study) so I shall update my blog. 

 We went to Good Chance Eating house (about 2+ months ago) to eat their popiah. It's super near my previous work place. The highlight of Good Chance eating house is their DIY popiah. Since Yilin says that it is very troublesome to make at home, we decided to pay quite a bit to have our own DIY popiah. I think 6 pieces of popiah skin and all the necessary ingredients cost about $14++ (if I'm not wrong). They do give lots of that turnip filling thing (very tasty, not like lousy Qi Ji's) but I found that there wasn't enough skins to wrap everything up.

Not my popiah

 Of course, wrapping does need some skill or not you'll end up with a squarish shape pillow like popiah that still is edible but just not very photogenic.

 One of their other signature dishes is the braised pork belly with yam, served with yellow colour mantous. Artery clogging to the max but this was super delicious - the yam is soft, crumbly and moist and infused with the black sauce and porky taste. Very nice and must try.

 We also tried their black hokkien mee which I wasn't a big fan of, just that I haven't eaten it before so I wanted to try.

 Their fried prawn rolls were not bad but nothing memorable compared to the popiah (which was fun to warp) and the braised pork belly.

Surprisingly the ohr nee here is really good! It's my favourite kind of ohr nee - not to thick or dry, very smooth, and topped with creamy coconut sauce and lots of tender gingko nuts. I don't like the dry kind with the colourless syrup sauce.

Good Chance Eating House
149 Silat Avenue Singapore 160149
Phone 62710698

Do make a reservation as the restaurant is quite small! Service is pretty good and even though they're quite crowded they are very friendly and not the food nazi kind...

Real Food

Went to Real food (Killiney Branch) for lunch - the service is really atrocious. Food is consistently good, but service was bad.

 Their signature salad, which was lacking avocado (the server didn't tell me that they didn't have avocado when I ordered). They made it up by adding a bit more long beans, but it made me feel slightly cheated. Our server really lacked a spark of life.

 Their dumplings are still super awesome - would totally go back to eat a whole bowl of it.

 First time trying the pizza - it's not bad cos the veggies are all very fresh and sweet, but I still felt that I missed ham/pepperoni/sausage in my pizza...

They charge for tap water - do get the bottle and not just a small cup - it's cheaper for 2 persons. Obviously my server with no spark of life failed to tell us that (there were 2 of us).

Real Food
110 Killiney Road
Singapore 239549

Fix

 Was surfing the internet for new food places, and saw a review on Fix cafe online. The thing that caught my eye was the liu sha doughnuts. I absolutely had to go and try them! 6 mini doughnuts, piping hot, with liu sha (salted egg yolk) sauce. How amazing is that! I'm such a fan of salted egg sotong, salted egg crab, and salted egg just about anything else. Salted egg doughnuts are a a level up! Can you imagine if they injected the doughnuts with liu sha sauce? They would be selling out faster than you can say Krispy Kreme! The liu sha sauce was a bit cold when served, but since the doughnuts were so warm, it didn't quite matter to me.

Another thing is that Fix is the sister cafe of Grub, which is this insanely popular cafe in Bishan Park, which has immensely long queues so I have't been there cos I don't particularly like standing in the sun, queuing and wasting my life away. Ok I hope that Fix does't get flooded after the word that they have liu sha doughnuts gets out >,<

We also tried their naanwiches, which are essentially open faced sandwiches on a naan base (instead of your normal muffin/bread). I had the chicken tikka naanwich, which was really delicious - soft tender chicken, with crispy achar on the side and a perfectly half boiled egg. The naan was soft and fluffy.

Check out their perfectly half cooked egg - the yolk was gel like and slightly runny. x2. It's so freaking hard to find a cafe which has such perfectly cooked eggs ( I hope the standard remains the same after I blog about it).

The beef kimchi naanwich - which I didn't try but my friend said the beef was so super soft and delicious.

The naanwiches come with a side of cheese nachos, with tomato salsa. Really value for money since the naanwiches are only $10 each. Who says you can't find good quality brunch at decent prices?

 Since I don't drink coffee, I got myself a chocolate peanut butter banana milkshake (there's some offer if you get it together with the main courses, can't remember exactly but it's $1-2 off the original price). Comes with crispy wafer flakes on top. The peanut butter taste wasn't very strong, but the chocolate and banana was really intense. I was so full after drinking this.

 Since I was so full, I had to dapao the cakes - this was a coconut and mango cake, which reminds me of the Kki cake that I really like. The coconut mousse layer was really light and refreshing.

Strawberry pistacho rose tart - the rose was only in the blob of cream, but nonetheless, the tart was good - buttery moist base, fresh strawberries 

Ordinarily I would have skipped going to a new cafe if there wasn't any air-conditioning cos it's so humid and hot, but Fix has a really nice poolside view, and lots and lots of ceiling fans so it's nice windy and cool.

Another good place near Novena (sigh) which opens early and are perfect for the people who post call at 830 ;P

FIX
31 Ah Hood Road
At the HomeTeamNS Clubhouse
#01-06
Tel 62561484