Chinese New Year

Happy Lunar New Year everyone! Hope everyone had a great time this holiday, catching up with family and loved ones, indulging in all festive goodies!

Nikon D70

No doubt that its a 5 years old model, but I'm more than excited to finally have my own DSLR! And I have to thank my uncle in Hong Kong for giving me this! Hopefully with a bit more practice, I could upload more tempting food shots on here!



Besides backlogs to clear (debt carried forward from last year, oops), I am also looking forward to this weekend's stay: Festive Hotel @ Resorts World! More on that soon!

NIE Canteen: The Secret Bak Chor Mee Combo!

The National Institute of Education canteen is really quite a hassle for most NTU students to visit. At the edge of the NIE main block, you need to walk plentiful before reaching it, a route march distance if you start off at South Spine. Most of us wil probably visit it only twice a year for its bookstore, but I am oh-so-willing to brave the walk for its Bak Chor Mee!



While there are plenty of good stuffs like Yong Tau Foo and the original Western Food, the undisputed longest queue is at its noodles store. Priced at $2.20 per bowl, they whipped out BCM, Prawn/Pork Rib Noodles and Lor Mee that could be sold out as early as 2pm!

Now I'm letting out the best well-kept secret of the store: (At least thats what I think la) Do you know that you can order a special version of BCM at 3 dollars? This one hsa extra noodles, ingredients and comes with their prawn soup!



But here comes the hard part: The uncle at the store can be quite a Food Nazi, so he will really scold you if you don't say properly what you want, or not in the order he wants to hear it. Ready?
This loosely translates into "I want 3 dollars BCM, with prawn soup, anyhow mix the ingredients"


Minced Pork Noodles

And there you go! Its one of the few BCM that really piled you with Minced Pork, alongside generous dosage of dried mushrooms, sliced ngor hiang and fried wonton. The noodles is al dente to my liking, with a good mixture of chilli and vinegar. Not something spectacular, but very comforting!


Prawn Soup

The second highlight! Now don't expect Beach Road standards, but it was still better than many of the prawn mee stores out there. With a pork ball and fishcake slices, the soup had a subtle prawn flavour which doesn't leave you thirsty afterwards. An obvious choice over the usual plain BCM soup!


Lor Mee

Besides BCM, the Lor Mee was also very well done with plenty of ingredients, thick stock and a good balance of thin vermicelli and thin broad yellow noodles. A real hearty steal at its price!

Old Hong Kong: Dim Sum For The New Year!

Where would you go for dim sum? The consistent, convenient and affordable Crystal Jade had always been my favourite choice, with a good bowl of congee and basket of Siew Mai for comfort Sunday brunch. But I think Old Hong Kong had just opened up a new option for me!



I think many had visited their 24hour cafe at Katong, but this branch at Square2 specialised in dim sum during lunch and tea, while serving up stir fries at night. The shopping centre was rather sleepy for New Year Day, but when I turned around the corner leading to the restaurant, it was packed beyond expectations!



Appetising Snack ($1.00), Iced Milk Tea ($2.80)

The staffs were speedy and well-trained, overhearing quite a number of them conversing in Cantonese. Unlike most places serving salted peanuts as table snack, they had a more local varient with long bean, ikan bilis and dried beancurd.

As I usually judged a so-called Hong Kong restaurant by the standard of its milk tea, the one here had its own pros and cons. At first impression, it was rather fragrant and had a solid good flavour to it. However, the aftertaste was bad, leaving a dry, scaley feel when you rub your tongue against the roof of your mouth. This, according to a milk tea expert (aka mom), was not the fault of technique, but due to leaving the tea leaves boiled for way too long.



Siew Mai ($4.20), Char Siew Bun ($3.20)

I ordered pretty standard things when it came to dim sum, but for me its the normal stuffs that kept me happy when done well. The inclusion of abalone clam in the Siew Mai might be gimicky, but I actually liked how it tasted overall, with a solid texture of minced pork and prawn.

The other one was definitely A grade. Soft fluffy exterior with juicy sweet barbecued pork, one of the best I had in ages!



Pan Fried Flour Roll with XO Chilli ($3.80), Shrimp Roll with Cheese ($3.80)

Flour rolls were usually steamed and wrapped with prawns, scallops or char siew. But another way to eat it was to pan fried with XO chilli sauce. More savoury than fiery, it was a good one for me!

The shrimp roll looked interesting on menu, but taste-wise the cheese could be a bit more heavier, while I had to complement the generous amount of shrimps used in each roll.



Deep-fried Yam Dumpling ($3.20), Mini Egg Tart ($2.80)

Another well-done snack, the dumpling was piping hot and stuffed full of savoury yam and minced meat. The egg tart however, paled in comparison to Crystal Jade, with a diluted custard center and a crust just not flaky enough.



Chinese Pancake with Diced Scallop ($6.00), Steamed Rice with Chicken and Chinese Sauasage ($6.00)

The pancake was a mistake made on impulse. I had an impression that it would be the crispy prata-like type, but instead it was lumpy and tasteless, with the scallops hardly able to save it.

Still feeling hungry? Go for the rice selections! Fragrantly steamed and eaten with a dash of soy sauce, it will fill you up with satisfaction!

Bill for two was $40.20 after taxes, and that was a lot of food! Not exactly a Crystal Jade replacement, Old Hong Kong did have dishes to my liking, but there were some that could be further improved or avoided during my next trip!

DAC: JB Seafood Trip!

During the recess week, NTU Deli Aprecio Club (DAC) and 90 of its members went on a half day seafood/kelong trip in Johore Bahru. Being one of the largest outing ever organised, we catered two full buses for this!



Located at Danga Bay, the fishing kelong was about 10 minutes ferry ride away. We were greeted and brought upon a mini tour by the friendly guide, who explained to us that the kelong was built afloat of many emptied oil barrels. Quite an amazing feat eh!

He then gave a live demonstration of opening an raw mussel to the woos and ahhs of everyone, followed by a mass feeding of mouldy breads to the hungry fishes!




Banana Leaf Otah, Goreng Pisang With Ice Cream

Danga Bay was lined with a variety of restuarants. While waiting for the other batch to return from the Kelong, we had some snacks in an oriental cafe. The otah was slightly moist and had a pleasent sweet taste to it, while the combo of ice cream and fried bananas went rather well!




We then travelled to this kelong restaurant for our 8 course seafood lunch. The place reminded me of Batam with its laidback and rustic surroundings. And the famishing people dig in!




Unfortunately, it wasn't that fantastic. My table of kangkong had a burnt taste to it (apparently its only ours), the crispy chicken was not bad with sour lemon sauce, prawns and mussels were alright and like I always say, you could hardly go wrong with steamed fish in soy sauce. The crab though looking good, had a disappointing bland chilli sauce while the butter sotong could easily pass off as normal deep fried calamari .

The best dish, to our surprise, was the dessert of Yam Paste. Smooth and creamy, it wasn't overly sweet and had a decent mix of riped pumpkins and ginko nuts. We nearly ordered a 2nd serving of this!


Group Shot

Next outing would be Oktoberfest @ Werner's Oven on 23rd this month. We are also opening up the event to the public and still have 7 seats left! Do let me know if you are interested to join us with a couple of friends!

HLX Fusion: 馒头Burger!

There seems to be a burger craze in Singapore, with gourmet joints sprouting everywhere using premium ingredients. Not exactly a threat to the Golden Arch, but a refreshing change from your usual variety. And at Hua Li Xuan, they are doing it fusion-style!



Located at Iluma, its one of the restaurants in the open area on level 5. I always liked such settings for its non-claustrophobic feel and people-watching ability. The staff here were mostly mainland Chinese but they could comprehend English fairly well, pleasently taking my orders without a hitch.


Pepper Beef Burger Set ($7.80)

Given a choice of steamed or fried mantou, I went for the healthier choice as I reckoned it would softer and lighter. Came wrapped like a real burger, it revealed white buns sandwiching a beef patty, lettuce and tomatoes. The black pepper sauce was thick, flavourful and not too spicy, complementing the mantou rather well.

The patty was alright with a moist texture, but mine contained too much minced vein that was hardly chewable. It could be just this one that the proportion could be improved. Coming with standard tasting fries and coleslaw, the set was rather filling overall.



Mini Burgers ($4.80)

My girlfriend ordered this as she wanted to try a range of stuffs. And when they say mini, they really meant it! Each was probably the size of two stacked-up macarons and could easily be devoured in one mouth. My girlfriend had the mantous to be garlic-baked and chose fried fish, teriyaki chicken and sweet and sour pork for the fillings.

Taste-wise, they were actually pretty good, each having a distinct flavour and texture, with the mantou tasting abit like garlic bread. Good for a light snack, but hungry men would probably find this barely an appetiser! We added some piping hot onion rings($2.00) to make it more complete!

Total bill for two was $17.65, which was rather affordable for a quick dinner. They also had a wide range of la-mien pasta and hot grills on their menu. I would probably be back to give those a try!