See my full reviews & photos at = http://chefquak.com/2015/09/29/nice-dinner-shelter-in-the-woods-on-27sep2015/
wife, daughter & i went to shelter in the woods for dinner on 27.9.2015. ^^
very nice ambience. we also managed to park just behind the restaurant.
this the favourite haunt of 1 of my friends. some months back he tried to buy me dinner here some time back but the place was fully booked, so he arranged a nice dinner at la braceria instead.
we had some complimentary baguette.
the server we had was polite, but she didn’t know anything we asked about the menu, maybe it’s difficulty with english.
wife wanted to try a different salad, so we had the endives salad.
pretty ok with the honey dressing. nothing special i guess.
the escargot tasted quite good, but was a bit dry.
it was served on a bone marrow, but unlike the lovely delicious wagyu with bone marrow at tess bar, here the bone marrow seems to be just presentation.
i loved the beef tartare, really nice! fresh, sweet small chunks of beef, and excellent with chooped onions, capers etc.
some quaint bottles to dispense salt & pepper.
i want to have this again, S$18 for an appertiser portion.
i ordered the japanese sweet corn soup because it was chef recommendation & also featured by other food writers.
should not have bothered. looked lovely in photos, but it was the poorest of the dishes. any of my own soup would be better. not that it was bad, but just ordinary, very sweet & basically not the kind of good savoury soup i like.
quiche was good. it’s not the kind of dish i fancy much usually, but this one here i can take again. rack of lamb-almost raw
we asked for medium rare for the rack of lamb. it came almost raw.
i took a piece. my wife & daughter couldn’t, so we asked the restaurant to cook it more. the guy server now said their chef’s recommendation was medium (which was different from what we asked of the earlier lady server who did not seem to communicate well in english).
anyhow we went ahead with medium. it came out medium rare, & it was perfect!so once we gotten the medium rare (though they say medium), the lamb was very good actually. & the sauce was very good too, not too “beefy”.
crispy apple tart was quite good.
cannot quite compare with the da luca version. still it was pretty ok.
the dinner was S$146nett for 3pax. they forgot to charge a glass of wine (S$19++), so we told them to add in the charge.
we enjoyed the dinner, food & ambience. the 2 best dishes for me were the beef tartare & the lamb rack (when done right!). the quiche was worth ordering too. the sweet corn soup can skip. the rest were average.

See my full review & photos at = http://chefquak.com/2015/09/24/best-omakase-dinner-hachi-restaurant-on-18sep2015/
wife bought omakase dinner at hachi 0n 18.9.2015. ^^
this evening there were only 3 tables including ours. the servers said it is often quite full though.
it’s omakase. still, quite useful to have a kaiseki menu.
#1 we had pork wine infused foie gras terrine.
a good start. very tasty, and putting on all the right expectations. ^^
#2 the uni & botan ebi in japanese corn veloute was simply fabulous.
don’t know if it is fusion, this was a superb combination of taste, the very sweet uni & botan ebi, in a wonderful japanese corn broth with all the flower decorations.
#3 the hokkaido kani (crab) chawanmushi was the tastiest chawanmushi i had.
so sweet, so beautiful!
quite a memorable dish. motivated me to go back & make a chawanmushi myself.
#4 the oyster was large & plump & sweet.
looked pretty too. i slurped it in with most of the jelly.
#5 sashimi moriawase were top quality – chutoro, sawara (spanish mackerel), kinmedai 金目鯛(golden eye snapper), katsuo (tuna), sanma. ^^
chutoro was very good, but i must say the chutoro in mikuni’s matsutake special bento set some days later was one of the best i had.
the sawara (spanish mackerel), kinmedai 金目鯛(golden eye snapper) were all very good.
the katsuo (tuna) & sanma were pretty ok.
#6 the braised awabi was really tender, superb abalone dish!^^
i took it with the liver dip & the sea salt separately, all very good.
they really braised it very well, as well as the very good chinese braised abalones.
#7 the ikura don with toasted sesami was a very small serving of rice with quite a bit of ikura.
all together really excellent!
#8 the best dish (among every best dish) though was the hamo (conger pike eel) shabu shabu, together with the A5 ohmi wagyu that was served next.the soup was just so tasty.
there were chinese cabbage & pine mushrooms.
the hamo (conger pike eel) shabu shabu.
hamo was so sweet & tasty.& the soup was like the very best of dobinmushi i ever tasted! ^^
#9 next we had a palate cleanser – pineapple & ginger sauce.
pineapple was sweet. the sauce was sourish & very appetising.
#10 the ohmi A5 wagyu in the yakimono was just incredible, so marbled, melt-in-the-mouth!^^
superb A5 ohmi wagyu.
the bamboo sheet & the rolled sanma & eggplant were very good also i guess.
but they were quite heavy going & lost in the process of so much excellent food!
#11 nigiri sushi was again tops!
chutoro, and especially shiro ebi & uni were fantastic.
just incredible sushi.
the akamatsu was supposed to be more fatty & marbled. maybe i still not used to the taste & it was marbled, but somehow did not feel wowed by it.
#12 dessert were black beans yuzu jelly, japanese pear, red beans ice cream.
pear was pretty ok, sweet, not sweet like japanese rock melon i guess, haha!
i always liked japanese black beans, the yuzu jelly was pretty refreshing too.
this one of the few dinners that i felt really wowed!

See my full reviews & photos at = http://chefquak.com/2015/09/23/superb-set-lunch-concetto-on-23sep2015/
my RI friends decided to visit national museum & have lunch, so 3 of us met for lunch at concetto @ the cathay on 23.9.2015.^^
another 2 friends joined lunch afterwards, so 5pax.
concetto set lunch menu S$22.90
last time i had the set lunch here was on 10.2.2015.
prices have gone up from S$20.90 to S$22.90, inflation i guess, but for me it’s still a good deal.
i missed the YMCA (that being nearest to concetto & national museum & cheaper parking rates) carpark entrance, so parked at park mall & walked over to the cathay. concetto looks out onto the road, and is bright & airy.
we all ordered the concetto pasta – an interesting chilled capellini dish.
it was not quite the famous chilled capellinin at da luca or gordon grill or of course gunther.
still it was pretty flavourful & unique. & ala carte price is just S$4.90! :-)
i like the previous version – chilled capellini with crab & prawn tartare (tiny morsels) tossed in lobster oil & topped with lobster foam & ikura (salmon roe) – a lot better though.
think they should just revert to the previous version, full-stop!
i pushed away most of the mayonnaise. this drier version was heavier, less refine but still tasty. i had the kurobuta pork cheeks.
it had this impressive squid-ink calligraphy, haha! ^^
the kurobuta was super, melt-in-the-mouth.
& the gnocchi & sauce were very good. this the best dish for me.
we ordered different main courses to share & try.
salmon was done beautifully.
plating & presentation were top class!
with cous cous & pickled shallots, and the tasty & crab bisque pretty foam.
the chicken was good too & nice presentation too.
taste was pretty good, just chicken nothing special out of the ordinary though.
for me, kurobuta was no 1, salmon next & last chicken.
my good friend on the other hand liked the salmon best.
i only tried the pistachio panna cotta here nefore.
this time we ordered the tiramisu. again it was so pretty!
it was kind of deconstructed.
as a dessert, i think it was rather good, and i would order it next time.
as a tiramisu, i think my own tiramisu is much better, both in flavours especially coffee & liquor, & also texture.
the pistachio panna cotta was as good as last time.for a change, i will try the tiramisu next time though.
for me the only complaint was the poor service. the young guy was unhelpful, tidak apa & very poor in his service attitude. towards the end though his attitude improved from poor to ok. think he just needed some service training. the lady server was ok.
the 3-course set lunch was S$22.90, to me great value-for-money! there is a supplement of S$3 for the salmon.

See my full reviews & photos at = http://www.hungrygowhere.com/singapore/babette-restaurant-bar-jalan-besar-lavender/review/submit/
daughter bought dinner @ babette on 18.9.2015 to celebrate an important occasion for her. ^^
ambience was quite cool i guess, though a much lower level of decor c/w say foc. the table & chairs were like canteen sitting.
service was really poor because of shortage of staff. we waited very long to be served even after signalling to the servers several times.
octopus tempura was poor. octopus was tough, batter was not tempura standard.
but perhaps that is to be expected. octopus are usually sous vide (eg our favourite tako kakiage at mikuni) or slow braised & grilled. octopus done by this preparation will almost certainly be tough.
cauliflower was ok i guess but non-descript.
passable i guess.
this barachirashi don must go down as the worst ever!
yes!! the worst barachirashi don in Singapore! they have pickled carrots & radish mixed in the barachirashi don??? made the don overly sour unlike a sweet vinegared don. never had such preparation before.
even the photos may look quite pretty, but in terms of taste, this would be 1 if sumiya’s is 7 & sun with moon@wheelock’s is 8.
the chilli crab linguine was also the worst i ever had.
chilli crab sauce was overly sweet. crabmeat had not much taste probably the very cheap frozen stuff.
it’s the standard of any fast food or cheap pasta joints.
the duck confit was very good though. may not be better than saveur or concettobut it had good crispy skin & the meat was very flavourful & not very sinewy.the don was not much taste also, but at least the duck confit was a saving grace. it was very expansive though at S$28 c/w saveur & concetto!
afterall, duck confit at saveur & concetto were just S$13.90! ie 1/2 the price!
the steak & foie gras don was the best of the lot!
the steak was very good.
think the steak was an average cut so the preparation was really quite good to give it nice bbq flavours & not tough texture.
chicken wings was surprisingly good. better than what my helper makes, which is a very good chicken wing. we added the order at the end & it took forever (like another 20mins) to arrive.
we had a bad experience though.
restuarant did not honour the chope’s black & white offer of a complimentary macha cake for every S$50 spent!
we spent S$257 & got only 1 complimentary macha lava cake! :-(
i asked for just a second macha lava cake (afterall we spent 5x the every S$50) but the restuarant refused. i guess the management & staff are not properly schooled in service recovery.
i did not like the macha lava cake either. macha was very sweet & very strange combination of flavours unlike the macha parfait kind of flavours which i like (say) at sun with moon. one good thing though was that my youngest daughter liked it. just as well we only had 1 complimentary cake.

See my full reviews & photos at = http://chefquak.com/2015/09/18/s3-meepok-tar-xin-lu-新路-fishball-noodles-on-18sep2015/
went to pick up something.
dropped by xin lu (新路) teochew fish ball noodles (formerly from margaret drive) at mei chin road food centre for a S$3 meepok tar on 18.9.2015. ^^
last time i did a post was 2 years ago on 3sep2015 when i came here with my son. time flies!
i ordered my usual S$3 meepok tar, less noodles (面少)。
& it came with 5 tasty, bouncy fishballs. the texture is one of the best.
because i ordered less noodles (面少), i get 1 more fishball. well, it’s inconsistent, depends on who is serving. sometimes i get, sometimes i don’t. not that i am too bothered.
the meepok texture was excellent, QQ. and the chilli also consistently good.
anyhow, by comparison, this is a lot better than the-
very poor one (noodles quite unpalatable with the heavy mix of sweet sauce) at food opera @ ion orchard, and also the
below par toa payoh lor 7 teochew fishball noodles (noodles a let down, not QQ!) at food republic @ lido.
and xin lu (新路) only S$3. these other 2 cost S$5!