While at the Kim Gary restaurant, I decided to order the spicy noodle that comes with dumplings and some vegetables. My first observation is that they put a lot of bean sprout into the noodle, which I simply do not like at all. The soup was also rather spicy and I doubt weak chilli eaters can withstand the spiciness of this dish. At first the noodle tasted nice but when you tasted it a few times, the spiciness nature of the dish simply make your tongue numbed. Would I recommend this dish to you? You can try if you are a dumpling lover or if you like spicy food.

This is their Signature Chicken Chop rice. It comes with fried rice, huge piece of chicken chop and a stalk of vegetables. The chicken chop tasted nice and juicy. However the fried rice was a total disappointment, with the rice that tasted half-cooked and hard.I also ordered the pan fried dumpling, which took at least 15 minute to prepare. I love the crispy nature of the pan fried dumpling. It is yummy!!!

My colleagues and I were heading to Orchard ION to have our lunch when we happened to chance upon this new Vietnamese restaurant on their first day of opening on the 19th Nov 2012. Looking at the crowd in the restaurant and also chancing upon a lunch promotion, we decided to give this new restaurant a try.

Here's a photo of the menu of the lunch promotion:At a decent price of $9.90, this lunch promotion consists of a bowl of either pho chicken or pho beef steak slices noodles, fresh southern rolls with sweet shrimps, egg, and fresh herbs and lastly either a choice of the classic iced coffee with condensed milk or iced lotus tea. Best of all is that the food are prepared without any MSG. Healthy food choice and would definitely appeal to the healthy conscious individual. Also there were no service charges.

I ordered the pho beef steak slices noodles and here's the photo:Surprisingly, the soup broth was clear but tasty. The beef slices were smooth and tender and were simply yummy. However I found that the beef slices were slightly too thin and it will be good if the thickness of the beef slices can be increased or improved.

The pho (Kway Teow) was served with the piping hot soup broth and I felt the Pho was cooked just nice to my liking, neither too soft nor too hard. The translucent looking and springy pho went well with the rich soup broth. If you noticed, this bowl of noodle had too much spring onion. I think it doesn't make any difference to the noodle to have so much spring onion and it will be good if the chef can reduce the quantity of spring onion used. Also, a unique factor of this dish is that you can squeeze the small slice of lemon into your noodle to enhance the taste of it.

Next dish is the fresh southern rolls with sweet shrimps, egg, and fresh herbs:The fresh and sweet shrimps was wrapped with a thin layer of Vietnamese rice paper together with the egg and fresh herbs. I think the accompanying sauce contains a mixture of peanut, chili, garlic and some other ingredients that I was unable to discern but overall, when you dip the southern rolls into the sauce, it tasted fantastic.

Classic iced coffee with condensed milk:To top it off, this lunch promotion comes with a cup of classic iced coffee with condensed milk. It tasted nice and if you are observant, you would have noticed that the cup comes with the traditional word that people used during weddings, the word "Xi".

Overall, I think the noodle portion was just alright but the shrimps roll portion was small as there were only 2 rolls given. Also the coffee portion was little too. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 as mediocre and 10 as very yummy, I would give the overall dining experience as a rating of 6. The meal tasted average and the only novelty would be to try out how the Vietnamese food tasted like.

I was rather famished after work and as it was quite late and most of the shops were closed, so I decided to pop by Hong Hu Express again to have a quick dinner. Decided to try out something new, so I ordered their Fuzhou ramen. Here's the photo of my meal:Fuzhou Ramen

The serving portion is generous, with 5 Fuzhou balls in total and plenty of cabbage, which I think will appeal more to health conscious individuals. Also, the soup base was so bland, which I don't like. I prefer my noodle or soup to be tasty. The ramen portion was also quite a lot.

I really like the Fuzhou balls. You will get to see the yummy meat sauce oozing out of the ball when you bite into it. Also the minced meat in the ball tasted nice. I think the Fuzhou ball is the only saving grace for this dish. If the Fuzhou ball is not yummy, I definitely won't order this dish again.

If I didn't remember wrongly, my dish cost $6.50 in total. In my opinion I think the price is reasonable, given the generous serving portion. But as the soup base was bland, I don't really like this dish.

We were actually contemplating whether to dine at Swensen's or Lai Lai before we finally decided on having our dinner at Lai Lai Casual Dining. Here's a picture of how the restaurant looks like:We ordered 2 set meals. Each meal comes with a side dish and a drink. For my set, I ordered the beef soup noodle, and chose the fried chicken and Chocolate Freeze drink.

Here's a photo of the beef soup noodle:Do not be deceived by the plain and ordinary presentation of the beef soup noodle. One sip of the soup and I am sure you will be amazed by the nicely blended soup that has a little herbal taste and smell to it. Not forgetting the soft and tender beef slices that can be found in this dish.

Fried Chicken:Although the serving portion was huge, I felt that this fried chicken dish tasted average only.

Here's my Chocolate Freeze drink:I love the taste of the Chocolate Freeze drink. It tasted smooth and nice.

We also ordered the oyster mee sua and here's a photo of it.The oyster mee sua tasted average only. Also, we felt that the serving size was too little.

We also ordered the pig trotters as part of its side dish and also got a drink and here are the photos:The pig trotters tasted great and I would recommend anyone who likes to eat pig trotters to give it a try. The meat was yummy and tender and the sauce was nice.

Here's their special chili that is mixed with fried onions. Although it is yummy and addictive, I still think that it's a bit too oily and unhealthy.Overall, we enjoyed our dinner tonight. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 as mediocre and 10 as very yummy, I would give tonight's dinner a rating of 6. Although the beef soup noodle, pig trotters and Chocolate Freeze drink were yummy, I still think there's lots of room for improvement for the other dishes.