Definition of Cafe Crema (Caffè crema) was first coined by Gaggia in 1948 to describe the light brown foam on espresso. (source from wikipedia). Also known as the old name of espresso, which become out of favour.Cafe Crema in Singapore, is a Cafe that served handcrafted coffee & sandwiches. In line with the current trend of 3rd wave coffee movement in Singapore, Cafe Crema source it beans from the local roaster Highlander. This information does not come voluntarily, but continuous gentle probing and tongue twisting by Chubby Botak Koala, finally able to 'fish' it out.Taking a break from my first shift guiding our guests through Cloud Forest, I decided that I need a cuppa. It seems the name and greenish background of this Cafe just attract me. I decided to order a latte ($6) and Chocolate Croissant.The décor of this place is very au natural. Surrounded by the lavish greenery of Gardens by The Bay, cool air-conditioning and some relaxing couch, this is a definitely the place to take a break and enjoy the cuppa. I have to compliment Cafe Crema on their effort in providing the information from the origin of their coffee beans to the black liquid gold full of caffeine in the cup. Do check out their website for more information on their coffee beans.The latte presented with a four layer of Rosetta latte art. First sip, it has a beautiful consistent creamy texture to it. I am not a coffee expert, but I always enjoy the well balance roast from Highlander. What a good way to perk me up. Although the coffee here is good, it is missing the OMPH factor, in comparison to other Cafe that use the same bean.The chocolate croissant is just average. It has a good thin buttery layers to it, but the central part was slightly soggy.Service is all right, but you probably need to be on self service type. They deliver the coffee and the croissant, but you need to get you own cutlery, serviette, etc.

Overall, this is definitely a good place to recharge before / after your visit to Gardens By The Bay. On top of the handcrafted coffee, they also serve breakfast, soup & salad, sandwich and other lunch menu (check out their website for the menu). I even see some teenagers using this place to hang out and study. Thanks for serving the good coffee guys. Cheers!!

For the complete Chubby Botak Koala experience, click / copy the link below:
http://www.chubbybotakkoala.com/2014/07/cafe-crema.html

Brotzeit Katong is the 5th outlet of Brotzeit in Singapore. Brotzeit is a leading German franchised concept casual dining restaurant offering Bavarian Cuisines and popular German Beer originated from Singapore (Yup, Singapore!!!). Currently, they can be found in Singapore (6 Outlets), Malaysia (2), China (3), Hong Kong (1), Phillipines (1), Vietnam (1), and Thailand (1); and on the way to grow their presence in China, Indonesia and Australia.This outlet in Katong has been in our mind for the past few times. Every time we passed by East Coast Road or Joo Chiat Road, always remind ourself that we need to try this place. So finally, we made it. Located in the junction of Joo Chiat Road and East Coast Road, this place sure attracts a lot of human traffic. The only draw back is that there is no parking available on the premises, so you need to park at the surroundings, that can be a challenge during the weekend.There are two main seating area, the bar or the high chairs section with live sports shown on TV or a more proper dining area. The atmosphere is very relax and casual. The design are modern, while incorporating the wood elements into it.For this dinner, we decided to drag S (Little Devil's BFF) along as she need to get away from home. Anyway, the more the merrier. Since we order to share, we ask them serve the food together. From the appetizer section we have: Schupfnudeln / Warm Spinach Salad with Bavarian Potato Dumpling ($14.50). A good salad to start. It is lightly seasoned and has a clean taste to it. It incorporated some stronger flavour such as sun dried tomatoes, parmesan cheese and balsamic vinegar. The potato dumpling is unique, which not to my preference.Two signatures of Bavarian dishes: Schweinshaxn / Oven Roasted Pork Knuckle ($36.00) and Pork Sausage, with a twist of curry sauce / Currywurst ($17.50). The Pork Knuckle is excellent, served with potato salad, sauerkraut, gherkin and homemade sauce on the side. The crackling is light and crispy, and the meat is tender and juicy. Sauerkraut and gherkin works provide the acidity that balance the fattiness in the knuckle, while the fried onion on top of the potato salad is simply delicious. The gravy is tasty and thick. Yummy !!For the Currywurst, I need to rename it Curryworst. The worst dish of the day. The pork sausage is good, but spoiled by the curry. Although it is suppose to be the number one German Fast food, we find the curry powder and mustard on the dish simply does not work. This is comparable to the disastrous Singapore Fried Bee Hoon that you can find any Asian food court in Australia.Schweinemedaillons / Pork Medallions ($29.50) is a dish that you must try. As the medallion does not have much fats, they wrapped the sides with bacon to ensure the tenderness remain. Perfectly executed and served with shoe string fries and sautéed mixed vegetables. How I wish they are more medallions.Service is good when you can get their attention, but it can be frustrating trying to get their attention. You can see that they are short staffed, and having problems attending to the customers.

Overall, Brotzeit got our vote. The food are good, with the exception of the Curryworst (@ Currywurst). Unfortunately we are a group of non-alcoholic drinkers, so we can't comment on the beer. We'll sure be back for more. Prost!!! Cheers!!!

For the complete Chubby Botak Koala dining experience, click / copy the link below:
http://www.chubbybotakkoala.com/2014/06/brotzeit-katong.html

Chef Tan Yong Hua has finally find a place to call HOME. Also known of the Prince of Pumpkin, Chef Tan is the proud Co-Owner & Executive Chef of Restaurant HOME ('HOME'). A celebrity chef in Singapore Media scene, Chef Tan also proudly represented Singapore Chinese Chef Association in 2013 to conquer the Iron Chef Thailand specialised in Chinese Cuisine.HOME is located at Rail Mall Bukit Timah. The decoration is quite minimalist, and the open concept made the restaurant look big. It has a nice balance of traditional big round tables for group of 8 to 12 and square tables for group of 4 or smaller. Due to a huge following of loyal customers of Chef Tan, HOME has 2 sessions for weekend dinner and reservations are required.

Our first visit to HOME was with Little Devil's BFF for dinner. Our Entrée started off from the Barbecue selection, the Crispy Roast Pork and Honey Glazed Barbecued Pork Loin (Char Siew). The roast pork has a light crispy skin, well seasoned and the meat is tender. This is one of our niece favourite dish and she will personally order two plates and for herself. The Char Siew uses a fatter cut of the loin. It is slightly burnt with honey crisp and the meat just melts in your mouth. Slightly sinful but Yummy! I personally like this version of Char Siew, but Little Devil does not. Barbecue Peking Duck with Lychee Wood came next. It is one of the Signature dish at HOME. Following the traditional presentation of Peking Duck, the prime cut of the breast skin are served first with sugar. HOME version is thin and crispy, without much fat on it. The rest of the duck has a consistent crispy skin and not oily. Although it looks more healthy, the downside of minimum fat is the meat of the duck become dry and slightly though, which is what happen here. The sauce has a nice flavour and well balance sweetness to go with duck and the wrap. If you order the whole duck, the left over can become the second dish either soup, deep fried or a stir fry dish. On some special occasion, they will have roast goose available. We have tried it before and we personally recommend it. Not only roast goose are difficult to find in Singapore, HOME's version got my two thumbs up. It is better than the duck and tasted similar to the one in HongKong.

If you are a fish lover, don't miss the fish baked in claypot with Chef Tan In-house recipe. The lemon grass, galangal and spring onions are stir fried first to create a base aroma for the baked fish. Combine with rice wine and baked it on the claypot topped with ginger and parsley, the result is just delicious. The meat of the fish is just tender while the gravy is just a great companion with a bowl of rice. However, as I were expecting more dishes to come, we refrained ourself from ordering rice just slurp the gravy without the carbo.From the four legged section, we have Pan Fried Wagyu Beef Steak. This dish is served on individual plating version. The beef is cooked to medium rare, well seasoned and melts in your mouth. The coarse sea salt accentuate the flavour of the beef. For the final savoury dish, Stewed Homemade Yellow Noodle with Lobster, served in O Ba Leaf. The yellow noodle has a similar texture to wanton mee. It was firstly seasoned with special soya sauce before topped with the lobster and gravy. The noodle is springy or should I say it is simply very Q, absorbs the flavour of the lobster and gravy well while retaining the texture. LD's favourite dish here. On another occasion, we also tried their Braised Duo Rice Vermicelli with Pork Knuckles served in O Ba Leaf. The pork knuckles are home made, braised daily for five hours. The meat are tender and the gravy are robust. Simply put it just delicious even my picky FIL loves it and Tan Hsueh Yun from the Straits Times give her approval for this dish. Service standard can be improve. As they are short handed like many F&B establishment in Singapore, the service staff seems to be overwhelmed and looks disorganised during the peak dinner hours. It is also difficult to get their attention to top up the tea or get a fresh set of plates.

Overall, HOME delivery a very good combination of Chinese Cuisine. The Peking Duck are good but missing the Omph factor. The rest of the dishes are perfectly executed, tasty and delicious. It sure is worth the trip to the West side to visit HOME. Cheers!!!

For the complete Chubby Botak Koala experience, click / copy the link below to your browser:
http://www.chubbybotakkoala.com/2014/03/restaurant-home-home-of-iron-chef.html

TungLok Xihe Peking Duck ('TXPD') is a collaboration between TungLok Group Singapore with XiHe Group from Beijing. The collaboration presents the diner with the traditional Chinese dishes with innovative cooking method and modern plating. Of course not forgetting, Peking Duck as the signature dish of this restaurant. We were looking for a place at the very last minute for gathering with our friend for our regular makan session and since it is Chinese New Year, we decided to make it a Lo-Hei session as well. TXPD got our vote due to its location and the appeal of their Lunar New Year Menu. Little Devil ('LD') and I visited TungLok quite regularly in the past, we just did not notice we have not step into TungLok restaurant for more than 2 years after they closed down Tung Lok East Coast and Humble House.

TXPD is located facing car dealers section, opposite side of the football field. The dominant red colour, Chinese traditional red lantern and the Chinese graphics of Peking Duck on the outer wall, made the restaurant easy to spot. Upon entering TXPD, you welcomed by the Peking Duck and bright red brick duck oven on the left side. You definitely won't miss it. We decided on Lunar New Year Menu 10. $468++ for 10 person. As we have about 16 person including children, we are split into 2 tables of 8. As it was getting late and some of our friends have not arrive, we ask them to serve the Peking Duck first and postpone the Yu Sheng.

As a signature dish of the restaurant, the Peking Duck received the royalty treatment. Once a duck is ready to be serve, someone will sound the GONG!! and you know there is Peking Duck on the way to a table. A chef will carved the duck in front of the table and divided into three plates. The breast skin, or I prefer to say it is the prime cut that normally eaten with sugar; the dark meat (from the thigh) and the breast meat. The condiments such as spring onions, sugar, Peking duck sauce and the wrap/pancake are served on a partition platter with bowl of hot water in the centre to maintain the moisture in the pancake. The breast skin is crispy and melts in your mouth. The rest of the duck skin is crispy and the meat are tender. The duck and the wrap/pancake was maintained warm by using the hot water and charcoal pouch (a Japanese technology). By keeping the dish warm, it helped in retaining the moisture in the pancake and preventing it from hardening and the meat of the duck to maintain its juiciness. Kudos to them for coming out with this innovative idea.

We then proceed to the Lo Hei session. The Yu Sheng ingredients are very generous, with a little twist of raisins in the dish. Two plate of salmon for 8 people. The vegetables are fresh and crispy, while the sauce has the right sweetness in it. Huat Ah!!!!Next come the Double-boiled Soup with Sakura Chicken and Ginseng. Chinese version of Chicken Consommé. A beautiful clear soup, with robust ginseng taste and chicken essence. The Live Prawn with Vermicelli in Black Pepper sauce has a little Thai flair in this dish. Served on the claypot, the black pepper taste quite prominent, covering the sauce of the vermicelli and fresh prawns. It is a pity that the vermicelli tasted a bit dry. Tan Jia style Crispy Fish is just delicious. The Garoupa fish fried until crispy on the outside but moist and tender on the inside. The robust stock gravy, helps to soften the fish a bit while still deliver on taste. For Braised Spinach Beancurd with Monkey Head Mushrooms, the tofu is soft and smooth and it just melts in your mouth. If you ever wonder what happen to left over meat from the duck, it was shredded and cook with braised Ee-Fu Noodles. The condiments are quite generous and the noodle is springy, full of flavour but not soggy. The Sesame Glutinous Rice Balls in Sesame Paste is quite ordinary as most of us did not finished the desserts. Service here is inconsistent. Our table got a very good service, while our friends table with the kids seems to get less attention. Plates are not clear properly and service is quite poor. When I was finished this review, I just realised that they forgot to give us our Complimentary Nian Gao ha..ha.. For TungLok standard, we find this service issue need to be ironed out. In a typical Chinese Restaurant, they will normally serve Peanuts and Pickles as appetizer. During the CNY period, TXPD served bak kwa. What we don't know apparently they charged $2 per person and we end up with $30 extra bill just for this little plate of Bak Kwa. Lets just say the amount serve is not equivalent to 1/2 kg of bak wah worth. Wow, talking about hidden charges.

The decoration in the restaurant consistent through out. The use of modern red colour are quite prominent. Instead of using all round tablets, TXPD incorporated modern square tables and boot seating as well.

Overall, we are quite pleased with the quality of the food served here. The presentation of the Peking Duck is very distinct and creative. Although it is not the best Peking Duck that I ever ate in Singapore, it can be considered one of the good ones. The rest of the other dishes are good and worth the TungLok standard. Hopefully we have a chance to try out their ala-carte menu in the near future. Cheers!!!

For the complete Chubby Botak Koala experience, click / copy the link below to your browser:
http://www.chubbybotakkoala.com/2014/02/tunglok-xihe-peking-duck-royal-duck.html

Chef Jackie Nguyen is the owner cum head chef of Pho Hanoi in the Serangoon North. Graduated from ITE in Singapore and has spend more than 8 years in here, he decided to introduce North Vietnamese food. According to Chef Jackie, most of the Vietnamese food here is from Ho Chi Minh city (Southern Vietnam) and the rareness of North Vietnamese food leads to Chef Jackie to set up shop. Located under HDB at Block 153 Serangoon North Ave 1, the establishment is decorated and furnish simple yet elegant manner. They use white background, white tables and green chairs. For small group of 2 or 4, you can choose to seat inside, while a bigger group can choose the round table outside. We ordered Vietnamese Spring Roll Combination ($6.50) and Fresh Spring Roll ($3.50) for our starters. The fresh spring roll also known as paper roll are fresh with a springy texture wrap. The ingredients, especially the prawns are fresh and goes well with the peanut sauce and fish sauce. The combination spring rolls come with fresh spring roll, fried spring roll and fried beef roll in seaweed. The fried spring roll has a crispy texture with a bit of chewiness. While the fried beef roll has a strong gamey taste from the beef, which need some time to get used to. For the mains, Little Devil had Wagyu Beef Noodle Soup($8.90). The soup is clear and robust, however comparing to the Southern Version such as at Nam Nam or Long Phung, it is on the lighter side. You can taste the natural sweetness of the broth, and the Wagyu beef just melts in your mouth. The rice noodle is al dante. For me, I ordered BBQ Beef Noodle ($6.50). The beef is marinated with traditional Vietnamese flavour such as lemon grass. It is tender and succulent infused with capsicum flavour. It is good, but capsicum is not my best friend, so I just have the meat with the springy thin (bee hoon) type of rice noodle with fish sauce. Meanwhile, my MIL ordered Mango Salad with Seafood ($6.50). The mango is slightly raw and provide the crunchiness to the dish. LD says it lacks of sourness, a bit more lime will be better. We discover that the North Vietnam food seems to be more subtle flavour in the dish compare to the South side. A few items that catch our eyes in the menu is the grill seafood. It seems to be their speciality, but we did not have a space in our tummy to try this time around. We took a mental note to come back and try this out.Service is prompt and friendly. Overall, Chef Jackie's Pho Hanoi introduce us to a different taste of Vietnamese food. Although you feel that you have seen the dishes before, but the taste of the good will surprise you, as it is somewhat lighter and allow the ingredients to speak for itself. Pricing is very friendly to the pocket. During this short period, it seems the Pho Hanoi has immerse itself to be part of the food culture in Serangoon North Community. Cheers!!

For the complete Chubby Botak Koala dining experience, click / copy the link below to your browser:
http://www.chubbybotakkoala.com/2014/02/pho-hanoi-north-vietnamese-food-in.html