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2014-09-13
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For full review - http://midas400.blogspot.sg/2014/09/dinner-at-crystal-jade-steamboat.htmlI recently attended a food tasting session, organized by Pinstripes and Crystal Jade, with my friend Wendy. Crystal Jade has recently revamped their menu from casual Cantonese dining to a new hybrid concept that includes a All-You-Can-Eat Steamboat Buffet plus Ala Carte Cantonese delights. We will be sampling steamboat buffet with two recommended soup base and selected all time favorites from the Ala Carte
I recently attended a food tasting session, organized by Pinstripes and Crystal Jade, with my friend Wendy. Crystal Jade has recently revamped their menu from casual Cantonese dining to a new hybrid concept that includes a All-You-Can-Eat Steamboat Buffet plus Ala Carte Cantonese delights. We will be sampling steamboat buffet with two recommended soup base and selected all time favorites from the Ala Carte menu.
The customized Steamboat table that has a built-in induction cooker. The digital temperature control is located by the side of the table, that means no more having to adjust temperature with greasy buttons...cool!
The brand new Ala Carte menu still contains quite a bit of offering from the former Crystal Jade Kitchen's extensive menu. Popular Cantonese Roast Meats and Dim Sum items are retained, along with a range of popular HK style dishes.
A glimpse of the price points of their affordable Steamboat buffet that includes a wholesome spread of more than 35 ingredients, free flow beverages and soft-serve ice cream.
We did a quick recce around the buffet counters and found a good spread of ingredients including fresh mussels, mushrooms and assorted vegetables. A few kinds of carbos like instant noodles, beehoon, steam rice and porridge.
Fresh meats includes thinly sliced shabu pork, chicken and beef and two kinds of marinated minced meat paste (chicken & pork) for making meatballs in the soup. The meat slices are stored in the fridge where patrons can make unlimited orders thru the waiting staffs.
The condiments station, has a myriad of more than 10 types of sauces including Crystal Jade's Homemade special sauce, Sambal belachan, Sesame sauce etc. and fresh scallions and coriander to add flavor to the sauces.
Crystal Jade's QQ rice that is a blend of quality Thai jasmine rice and glutinous rice with a springy texture. A special Scallion oil is available for pairing with the QQ rice.
Drinks and Dessert stations, with assortment of soft drinks, coffee & tea and soft-serve ice cream (3 flavors) with two choice of toppings.
We were served with two kinds of soup base, the most popular Japanese style Pork Bone soup and the new HK style Curry soup. Four other soup choices available are Tomato soup, Miso soup, Superior soup, and Spicy Mala soup. Patrons can select two kinds of soup bases per pot.
We munched on some snacks available at the buffet counter while we waited for the soup to heat up. Crispy Fish Skin, Fried Chicken Skin and Fried Mushroom Stems, they were pretty addictive to eat.
Apart from Steamboat, we were also served a Roasted Combination Platter $25.80++ and a couple of Dim Sum items for sampling. We had Roast Duck, Honey BBQ Pork (Char Siew) and Roast Pork Belly, served with Plum sauce and Mustard sauce.
Needless to say, the roasted items were prepared with quality ingredients and high standard execution. The roast duck meat was plump, tender and moist with a slightly crispy skin, the roast pork belly has nice crackling skin and the char siew was sweet and juicy. Recommended.Shrimp Dumpling $4.60++, has chunky fresh prawns wrapped in translucent skin. Prawns were crunchy and succulent, delish.
Siew Mai $4.20++, with well marinated minced pork and topped with a whole prawn and a dollop of crab roe. Another nicely done dim sum item.
Deep fried Yam Puff w/ Minced Meat $4.00++, light and crispy birdnest-like crust with smooth fragrant yam paste beneath and savory minced pork filling. Very tasty albeit a little messy to eat though.
Pan-fried Fish Cake w/ Radish $4.00++, an old-school dim sum in HK that is now difficult to find. Fresh fish paste with shredded radish sandwiched between crispy fried wanton skin. It'll be perfect if served with some creamy mayo dip.
Our soup is finally coming to a boil, we quickly added in the raw ingredients to cook.
I had a taste of the lighter pork bone soup first, and found it to be sweet and flavorful, with or without the ingredients. It was really good and I had 3 servings of it before moving on to the curry soup.
The curry soup has a heavier taste and was a tad greasy, I felt a bit jerlak after having only 2 small servings. I personally prefer the pork bone soup to this one.
At the end of dinner, I was feeling rather full but still gotten myself one serving of the soft-serve ice cream to complete the meal. Soft-serve is a type of ice cream that is softer than regular ice cream, as a result of air being introduced during the freezing process. It was light, velvety smooth and not too sweet...yummy.
We had a great time sampling the new menu items from Crystal Jade. The Steamboat Buffet is good value for money, with unlimited serving of shabu meat, beverages and dessert. We would've prefer them to include fresh prawns to the spread though, but for the price they are charging, one wouldn't feel short changed. I would recommend it to my family and friends.
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