This recently opened Zi Char stall at Blk 802 French Road coffeeshop near Lavender MRT station woks up delicious Chinese-Thai Cuisine. It definitely distinct itself from the rest of the competitions around the vicinity in offering a combination of Chinese and Thai style cuisine. What got me more excited is the chefs are from the popular Thai Zi Char stall at the basement of Sembawang Shopping Centre. It definitely gave me the assurance these guys are not new kids on the block. Being located at a coffeeshop, their extensive menu are very reasonable and value for money.The Xiang Di Mi Fen or Crispy Fried Noodle is a popular noodle dish in Malaysia. The noodle was first deep fried and served over a gravy full of seafood and vegetables. This is my first time having the noodle dish and I really enjoyed it. Look at how big the serving was and it costs only $3! The dish is not on the menu so you have to ask the stall.

The Braised Pork Shank was a surprise to me. It was soft and tender with a bit of herbal taste. Usually you don't find it at Zi Char stall as it takes long hours to braise the meat until soft and tender.

The Deep Fried Eggplant known as "Mei Ren Yu (美人鱼) or Mermaid" Eggplant is sliced into french fries shape and size. I still could not figure out why it is called Mermaid Eggplant but it was really very good. A lot of people do not like to eat eggplant because it turns mushy when cooked. The Deep Fried Eggplant was not mushy at all. The sweet sauce coated around the eggplants and the anchovies lifted the dish further in taste and texture.

The Thai Style Fried Cuttlefish or Calamari was big and firm. It also came with a sweet chilli dip sauce.

The Thai Style Honey Chicken which I could not find anything Thai about it was rather average. It will be a kid's delight with the sweet honey and tender chicken meat.

The Signature Fish Head is a best try. For a mere $15 you get a large fresh fish head with a lot of meat. The delicious sauce which was a bit sour and spicy was specially made from vegetables.Zi Char stall offering Pineapple Fried Rice on their menu is quite rare. Hui Wei's Pineapple Fried Rice was really good and fragrant. It came with a generous serving of pineapples, shrimps, char siew, egg and pork floss. Forget about plain rice to go with the yummy dishes Hui Wei offers on their menu, each mouthful of their Pineapple Fried Rice will definitely satisfy your dining experience here.

We visited Xu Jun Sheng at Joo Jiat Road for its traditional Teochew cuisine and porridge. This place has 60 years of history and has moved from its previous location from 50 Joo Chiat Road to 121 Joo Chiat Road.

Unlike most Teochew Porridge places whereby you ordered from the row of cooked food, you are given a pencil to indicate on the menu what you want to order.

The Prawn Rolls were probably one of the best I have ever eaten. I googled and read that they used pork mesentary to wrap the fillings. Maybe that is the secret of the crispy outer layer. The Prawn Rolls were also sliced thinner but bigger in diameter which is different from other places. I am not a great fan for Prawn Rolls but I enjoyed this a lot.The Stir Fried Sambal Kang Kong was nice, crunchy and not too spicy.

We noticed a lot people eating this particular steamed fish which had its stomach split out into half. We were very curious and asked the server to order for us. The Steamed Mullet prepared without any seasoning was surprisingly very fresh and tasty. It doesn't have the fishy smell.Teochew cuisine is known for its braised stuff so how can we not try it. We ordered both the Braised Platter and Pig Trotters. The Braised Platter had both big and small pig intestines, beancurds and fried beancurd skins. The innards, beancurds and fried beancurd skins were well braised soaking up the soy sauce.

The Pig Trotters was very tender and melts in the mouth. I was a bit disappointed that most of it was lean meat. I think I took the one and only fatty piece. While writing this post, I realized the menu allows us to indicate either tendon or thigh for the Pig Trotters which we left it out. Maybe that was the reason they have given us mostly lean meat.

The Teochew style Prawns with Beancurd has to be everyone's favourite. The prawns were big and fresh. The beancurds were smooth and silky. The gravy was the highlight that made this dish so tasty. It was so good that I couldn't resist taking a few spoonful of it even though we have finished the prawns and beancurds.The Preserved Radish Omelette had a nice balance of flavours and was not too salty. The preserved radish also gave the omelette a crunchy texture.

It was our monthly "kaki" meeting and one of my friends recommended Coffee Stars by Dao at Wisma Atria. Coffee Stars by Dao is a new star in town that serves Thai and International cuisine. Coffee Stars by Dao is from Bangkok, Thailand which has several branches in Bangkok known as Coffee Beans by Dao. There were 9 of us and we ordered quite a number of dishes to share. We started with Soft Shell Crab Salad and Som Tum Guava with Shrimp Salad. The Soft Shell Crab Salad was fresh and refreshing. The Som Tum Guava with Shrimp Salad was very good. My friend tried it before and specially recommended it. An authentic Thai Salad full of sour lime, hot chilli and fish sauce tastes.

The Black Olive Fried Rice was fragant and nice. It came with cucumber, lime, cashew nuts and chopped chilli.

The Chicken wrapped in Panda Leaf was nothing special. The chicken had a nice panda fragant and not oily.

The Chicken Basil came with rice and an a fried egg. It was a simple and yummy dish for one.

The Sesame Shrimp Toast was something unique with shrimp batter over bread toast. It was deep fried and sprinkled with sesame. It was not oily and had a nice crisp texture.

The Pad Thai Shrimp and Rice Noodle was another authentic Thai dish that came with fresh middle sized shrimp.

The Crispy Skin Grilled Chicken came with glutinous rice. It was a bit disappointing. The chicken was cold but tasty.

The Lad Na Pork was the favourite among us and it was very special. Bascially it was "Hor Fun", wide rice noodle served with some stir fried vegetables and pork. The wide rice noodle was pan fried on both the outer sides giving it a crispy texture and leaving a smooth silky texture in between.Coffee Stars by Dao not only serves Thai and International cusine. It also has a wide selection of cakes. One of their signature is the Coconut Cake. It was soft, moist and had fresh coconut meat. The rest of their cake selections were pretty good too. Coffee Stars by Dao is a nice place to go for high tea and snacks beside lunch/dinner.

Forlino is one of the top Italian restaurants in Singapore. I have wanted to check out this place for a long time after reading so many good reviews. Knowing that DBS credit card was having 1 for 1 promotion for the Gourmet and Degustation Menu until end of October 2010, I made a dinner reservation before it ends and had the Degustation Menu which was $148 ++ per pax. Considered a sell since I only need to pay half of the $300++ bill.

The restaurant is located on the 2nd floor of One Fullerton with a beautiful view of the Marina bay front. A bit disappointing was the noise from the bar. It was quite noisy and loud. Fortunately it was for a while as the crowd at the bar left shortly.

The menu started off with the Amus Bouche and freshly baked foccacia. The Amus Bouche was light and nice. With a pinch of salt added to the freshly baked foccacia, it was soft and tasty.

Nexts up was the Crab Salad with wild rucola, sweet pea leaves and cantaloupe. Another artistic, light and refreshing dish. The cantaloupe sauce was a good complement for the salad.

I can smell the aroma of the Pan Roasted King Scallops from far when it was served. Complementing the huge and fresh scallops were french beans and hazelnuts. I really enjoyed the dish, every bite was filled with the freshness and pan roasted aroma.

This is my first time having the tradition Italian pasta, Tagliatelle. The tagliatelle was served with duck confit and goose liver. The duck confit alone was a bit salty to me. However eaten together with the tagliatelle and goose liver, the taste was balanced.

was looking forward to this dish wondering how an Italian restaurant will present the suckling pig in its menu? I was pleasantly surprised when I am served with a big piece of pork instead in a thin slice where how Chinese restaurant normally served it. The skin was crispy and the pork was moist and tender. A very well executed dish.

Dessert was creme brulee and raspberry ice cream. Simply fell in love with the creme burlee with its moist custard base and burnt caramel on the top. How I wish the restaurant could have served in a bigger portion.

The dinner was rounded up with a cup of coffee and petit fours. I googled and petit fours meant small confection generally eaten at the end of a meal or served as part of dessert. Its a french name meaning "small oven".

My friends and I went to check out this new dessert buffet restaurant at Bugis after much media publicity. It is a new Japanese buffet concept brought in by Japan Foods Holding Ltd, which also runs Ajisen Ramen, Manpuku, Botejyu, Fruit Paradis and AOBA.

The restaurant is divided into two main sections, one for desserts and the other for savory items. Each table is given a time limit of 60 minutes for lunch and 80 minutes for dinner to complete their meal. There was a timer counting down and the alarm will sound when your time is up. It was rather stressful looking at the timer counting down so we turned it around.

As we are rather hungry, we started with the savory section first. The food was generally good across the board. The fried chicken and omelette were my favourite.

Over at the dessert counter, there were a colorful display of mousse, jellies, puff and cakes but way short of the 40 over varieties of desserts they said they served. Of what they were serving, some were even sold out. The cakes were my favourite among the desserts. The mousse were nice too. However, the jellies were bland. Overall, we did not get the sugar rush experience and we stopped at only one round of desserts.