I am always on the lookout for places that serve good Italian food, as its my family's favourite cuisine and the kids always eat their food without much hassle, when we have Italian.
I had come across this restaurant recently and brought a colleague here for lunch.
Its set in a restored shophouse that faces the Police Cantonment Complex. Parking is also convenient, where you can park at Pinnacle on Duxton and walk over.
The restaurant was half full for Monday lunch, which augurs well for the restaurant.
Here are the highlights of our meal:
Starters
- Bruschetta - Complimentary dish. The tomatoes were fresh and chopped up and served atop focaccia bread. Bread was crunchy and tomato topping were yummy.
- Zuppetta Argentarina: $25. Mussels and cut prawns stewed in a creamy porcini sauce & served with focaccia bread slices. The seafood were fresh and the gravy went well with the bread. Delicious.
- Tagliata al Tartufo: $34. Grilled premium tenderloin with truffle sauce. Beef were nicely grilled to medium, sliced & served on a wooden board. The whiff of truffle oil stimulates my taste buds and beef lovers will like this.
- Parmigiana: $23. Eggplant layers baked with Mozarella and homemade tomato sauce, then topped with Parmesan. Best eaten when its served to your table as you can enjoy the freshly baked and hot! My colleague loved this.
- Carpaccio Di Manzo: $24. Bed of salad, topped with finely-sliced raw beef, porcini mushroom dressing & truffle oil. The beef has to be fresh, else it can’t be eaten raw.
Mains
- Pappardelle della Vigna: $28. Homemade pappardelle with homemade Italian sausages in a creamy Gorgonzola sauce. The noodles were handmade and soft. The sauce is blue cheese based, and may be strong for some. Sausage was also good. Nice.
- Penne al Granchio: $28. Penne with fresh crab meat in a creamy tomato sauce. The penne was al dente. And the crab meat sauce coats the penne well to give flavour to every bite. Good!
Thus far, I have tried 3 of their pastas and they have all been good. Looking forward to trying other pastas when I visit again.
Desserts
- Bonet Argentarino: $16. Traditional homemade Italian chocolate and rum pudding with home-made caramel sauce. A very rich and delicious dessert. The caramel sauce complements the pudding well. The cocoa powder used is good grade and added flavour to each mouthful. This was a unique dessert that I have not tried anywhere else. Must-order!
The restaurant has an Ospitalità Italiana seal awarded by the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Singapore. It's one of only five Italian restaurants in Singapore to have this award that marks a recognition for authentic representation of the Italian culture outside Italy.
Recommended!

I have passed this restaurant several times in the past months and I came for lunch recently.
The lunch menu is smaller than the dinner menu (which has an expanded small plates and pasta menu)
We went for a pizza and pasta to give the food a try:
- The Bismark Pizza: $23 - This was a tomato based pizza with buffalo cheese, mushrooms and bacon with a sunny side up egg in the middle. It is good. The pizza crust is unique with a slighhhtly chewy texture. I learnt from the manager that they rest the dough for at least 5 hours before using it to make pizza to order.
- Rigatoni with Smoked Duck: $23 - This was my first time eating with smoked duck. I wished there were more pieces of smoked duck. There were also sliced sundried tomato in it. The sauce was more orangey, as they used tomato paste with cream in the sauce. Its good.
There are items on the menu that I spotted that I am keen to try on my next visit, such as their small plates menu in the evenings and their Carbonara pizza.
The quality of food is good and we will definitely be back here again.
Recommended!

My friend was recommending me to come to this place at Dover for coffee one recent afternoon and he brought me to SUTD. I was wondering if he brought me to the wrong place. After parking the car, we walked a short distance and found ourselves in a nice, high-ceiling cafe in the middle of the university campus.
It was a self-serve concept, where you order at the cashier and given a number. When your order is ready, the staff will flash your number and you collect the food from the counter. After eating, you also return the tray and cutlery at a tray-return counter.
The cafe bakes their bread fresh daily and the semi-open concept means you can see the chefs mixing dough in the back of the kitchen.
We had the following:
Ham & Cheese Sandwich with Bechamel, Honey Mustard and Fresh Apple Slices: $5.80 - What was interesting is that they added sliced apple to the sandwich. The kids loved it.
Desserts:
- Apple & Raisin Bread Pudding with Cree Anglaise: $4.70 - Rather unique is the bread pudding that has apple and raisin flavour in it. It was served with vanilla ice-cream and it's good.
- Dark Chocoolate Bread Pudding with White Chocolate Mint Sauce: $4.70 - This was even better than the apple and raisin one. Chocolate was rich and thick. Also served with ice cream and it was divine!
The cafe is now sited at the SUTD Campus, along Dover Road. SUTD will be shifting to their new capus in Changi, and this cafe will be moving to the new extension at Fusionopolis. You can visit them there.
Recommended!

We were looking for a restaurant to done last week and my lunch partner suggested a few places to dine. I picked this restaurant, as it was in town and easy for me to get to my next appointment.
The restaurant is located just outside the Esplanade, at Colors by The Bay
Gajalee means "an informal gathering" in Malvani & Konkani dialect is a Singapore outpost of a chain of seven restaurants, with the remaining six based in Mumbai & Mangalore, India.
The restaurant is popular for seafood, but as this was lunch time, we had to be practical and choose something easy to eat to avoid accidental staining of our business attire if we were to eat seafood.
We chanced upon set lunch options, and we ordered the Mutton Set, which had a mutton chop on bone, Briyani Rice, Mutton Curry, Dahl soup, Onion salad and Plain Naan. It costs $18.
The verdict:
- Mutton chop on bone, Mutton Curry, Dahl soup, onion salad and Plain Naan.
- Briyani Rice: I find the briyani rice a little moist. It was set in a mould. Breaking into the mould, you will find a hard boiled egg, which is cooked in the rice. A pleasant surprise.
- Mutton Curry: This was very tasty and went well with the biryani rice and naan. Nice!
- Dahl Soup: The soup is a small portion, with carrots and sliced French beans. Stir the soup around, which has mashed dahl below to get a better flavour.
- Onion Salad: This is like achar (pickled vegetables). But the onions were a little strong and both my lunch partner and I had half of this left behind at the end of the meal.
- Plain Naan: Naan was round and cut into 4 quarters. I felt the size was a little small and it was more like prata-sized. Eaten together with the mutton curry, it was nice.
I added a Spinach Soup, a creamy spinach soup cooked in vegetable broth. It costs $8. I found the soup a tad salty, and a little watery.
We ended our meal with masala tea ($6). I wished the serving could be more, as the tea cup was barely sufficient for me to enjoy my fill. The restaurant could use a bigger cup or offer a tea pot.
I learnt from the manager that the 3 chefs in the kitchen hails from the restaurant chain in India and have many years of experience. This means that the food served here is of the same quality and taste as those served in the restaurants back in India.
I will come back again with a larger group to try their ala carte menu items and definitely their seafood items.

I have been talking to my colleagues about this restaurant for some time.
The restaurant is located on a jetty at Woodlands Waterfront Park and has a good view of the Johor skyline from Singapore. They serve halal 'Tze-Char' dishes, which is rare to find. They have a lot of Malay customers who come for meals with their families.
At a recent conversation with my colleagues, I proposed to head here for dinner and they agreed.
Here are the items we had:
- Salted Egg Crab (Wet): $70. Sri Lankan Crabs are used and they are about 1 – 1.5kg each. We had two crabs done with salted egg yolk. The uniqueness of this dish was that the sauce was ‘wet’, i.e. watery and coated the crab pieces, so you can
- Cereal Prawn: $25: Big prawns coated with cereal. Portions are decent and more than enough for the 5 of us at the table, as some of us had double portions.
- Grouper Fried - 3 Flavours (Mango, Thai Chilli and Lemon): $26. The grouper was butterflied into 2, coated with batter and deep-fried. The fish is then served on a plate and garnished with 3 types of toppings: Mango, Thai chilli and Lemon. Each of the topping imparted different flavours when you eat with the fish and you get to enjoy 3 different flavours with 1 dish! This is also a popular dish amongst other patrons.
- Mee Goreng: $5. My group ordered plain white rice. I ordered this, as I was craving for noodles. No regrets, as it was fried well, with good wok-hei. It was spicy. Portion is good for 3 to share, if you have ordered other ala carte items.
- Curry Fish Head: $24. Served in a claypot, the gravy is thick and cooked with coconut cream. It had a similar taste to laksa, with tau pok, lady’s fingers and brinjal slices. Goes well with white rice.
- BBQ Seafood Combo (Stingray, Cuttlefish & Lala): $28. The Stingray, cuttlefish and La la were barbequed over a flat pan and laden with sambal chilli. Its spicy, but yummy!
The food here is good, and it came shortly after the food was ordered.
There were also a good number of tables filled with large families having dinner there.
The restaurant is located in the middle of a pier, with a great view of the Johor right out the window. After your meal, you can enjoy a nice walk on the jetty or bring the kids to the large children's playground nearby.
A word of caution for drivers: Do put car park coupons for the duration of time you are spending there. The carpark attendants do come regularly to check!