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2015-11-17
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Swatow Restaurant is quite a popular with the older generation and it is well known for its teochew cuisine. On friday night, the restaurant also offers teochew opera show, which is quite rare to see these days. The restaurant is located opposite the library, on top of the supermarket. Although the building is quite old, there is a small lift to the restaurant which can fit 2 persons in it. This is great as a lot of people coming to this restaurant are quite old.The restaurant is decorated in qu
Swatow Restaurant is quite a popular with the older generation and it is well known for its teochew cuisine. On friday night, the restaurant also offers teochew opera show, which is quite rare to see these days. The restaurant is located opposite the library, on top of the supermarket. Although the building is quite old, there is a small lift to the restaurant which can fit 2 persons in it. This is great as a lot of people coming to this restaurant are quite old.
The restaurant is decorated in quite the old school and no frill way, with traditional opera clothes at the entrance. As the restaurant is quite popular, it is best to make reservation before coming.Today the family is coming here for the hi-tea buffet which costs $22.80++ for an adult and $16.80++ for a child. Although the family have made reservation for hi-tea buffet which usually occurs from 3pm to 5pm, we have a rude shock when the staff tells us the last order for the buffet is 3.30pm. It seems that there is an event tonight. The restaurant will be closing the buffet earlier in order to prepare for the event. I am annoyed that the staff should have called up to tell us about the problem so that we could come earlier.
The buffet style here is quite different from outside. There is no buffet counter or menu for one to look at. One just picks whatever one likes from the various push carts going around the dining room. Within a short time, the table is easily filled up.
Kueh Pie Tee, Shark's Fin Soup and Duck meat roll are part of the buffet, but is limited to one serving per customer. The kueh pie tee is not filled with the traditional vegetable filling. Instead it is filled with calamari salad. Interesting.
For the steamed dim sum, there is items such as xiao long bao, siew mai, bean curd roll, steamed pork ribs, crystal bun, chive dumplings, vegetable dumpling, seafood dumplings, chee cheong fan with assorted fillings and chicken feet. The crystal bun has savoury rice filling in it. Tastes not bad.
For buns, there is cha siew bun (BBQ pork bun), pan fried pork bun, black sesame bun and everyone's favourite Liu Sha Bao (流沙包). The Liu Sha Bao (流沙包) is uniquely green in color, and the filling really flowing out easily. The black sesame filling in the black sesame bun is a bit too sweet for me.
For deep fried items, there is shrimp roll, shrimp dumplings, seafood balls, goyza, and fried durian shrimp roll. The fried durian shrimp roll is covered with deep fried noodle like crust, inside filled with rich and chunky filling. Although one cannot smell the durian in it, the taste is pretty strong in it and surprisely well with the juicy shrimp.
Besides these, there is also fried ee fu mee, century egg porridge, lotus leaf rice, chilled pork in jelly, chilled cheek in jelly, baked pork pastry, deep fried fish skin with salted egg and black sesame paste. The deep fried fish skin with salted egg sauce is quite nice with the mayonnaise, although I wish that the salted egg sauce could be thicker. The black sesame paste is quite rich and flavourful. Too bad that is the only hot dessert available that day.
For cold desserts, there is ice jelly, almond jelly, herbal jelly and mango jelly. The herbal jelly tastes quite bitter. The ice jelly is quite refreshing with a hint of tea taste.Overall the food is not bad with quite a huge range although mother feels the various is less than the usual dim sum menu. Although there is a lot of staff running around, it is quite difficult to get their attention. Besides the hot tea served on the table, one can also help oneself to the ice lemon tea and ice cubes at the counter. Yes most of the times we seem to be helping ourselves to the various things around. Even when the staff has a push cart full of desserts in front of us and we request that we would like some, the old staff answers that it is not for us, but the tables behind us. Funny especially everyone is having the buffet too. The staffs here seem to be choosy in serving customers. Although at the end of the meal, one feels like having gone through a very fierce battle. Feeling super drain out.
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