Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Paradise Inn Lunch sets
Since I always eat with my girl, it's tough for me to find quality chinese food at affordable prices. There just seems to be a lack of afforable chinese resturants that caters to two people.Thankfully, Paradise Inn recently released an individual lunch set menu where you get to sample a little bit of everything. There are four fixed menu and you get a choice of soup.
I chose the summer menu which came with smoked duck, wasabi prawns, 3-egg chinese spinach and stirred fried HK noodles, and my soup of choice was pork ribs with sea whelk Everything on this menu was good, but the real star in this place is their double boiled soup. The soup is extremely tasty and the ribs are boiled till really tender. I think the special ingredient is dried oysters.
The girlfriend had the autumn menu as she wanted to eat something with rice. The autumn menu had seafood fried rice, sweet and sour pork, pork floss prawns and poached lettuce. her soup of choice was yellow melon. I didn't like the lettuce but everything else was good as well.
Special mention should go out to the add on drink. We had the passionfruit with lemongrass tea and it was really refreshing and a great compliment to the meal.
It's unfortunate that we forgot to take pictures as the presentation is quite elegant without looking overly chi-chi. It is real value for money for people who want to try a little of everything. 4.5/10
Posted by Gerald at 9:26 PM
Changi Village: Is it worth the trouble?
Without a car and living in the North, getting to Changi Village is a real pain in the neck. Add to that the stuffiness of the hawker center and the difficulty in finding seats, it culminates in an unpleasant dining experience.The only redeeming factor is the food on offer. Everyone knows the Nasi Lemak here is very popular, but I tend to give it a miss after hearing people using the old complaint "standard drop".
My FAVOURITE FAVOURITE stall here is the Ipoh hor fun from Wing Kee Ipoh Hor Fun(Changi Village Hawker Centre Blk 2 #01-04). I cannot describe how amazing this Ipoh Hor Fun is. If you watch them prepare, nothing stands out as special. Neither does each individual ingredient. But when the char siew, mushroom, chicken, noodles and the sauce enters your mouth combined, you won't want to stop and every mouthful is a read pleasure. 4.5/10
My girlfriend bought Ngoh Hiang and Penang Char Kuay Teow from an old grandma stall (Changi Village Hawker Centre Blk 2 #01-21). I thought both were meh. The Ngoh Hiang to me was too dry and I commented that the Penang Char Kuay Teow tasted like Phad Thai with chinese sausage. Ngoh Hiang: 3/5 and Penang CKT: 3.2/5
The carrot cake had wonderful wok hei the previous time I tried it but this time it tasted extremely ordinary. I wish the hawker added more garlic and poh chai to kick it an added crunch and flavour. 3.5/5
Changi Village is so damn inaccessible! The Ipoh Hor Fun though is simply fantastic and makes the trip less torturous. I also noticed alot of people at Charlie's corner, this restaurant beside the hawker center. I remember seeing it there since I was young but never made much of it. Only now do I realise that they have a wide variety of beers and food is affordable. I would love to get comments on if it's worthy to try.
Posted by Gerald at 9:07 PM
Grocery post of the week
Laugh at me for being sua ku, but I only recently realised that A&W have repackaged their root beer and also introduced a new flavour, cream soda. I tried the cream soda and I felt the frothy aftertaste was pleasant, but the distinct taste of A&W root beer seems to be missing. If you have tried A&W root beer with ice cream in other countries, this is what it tastes like.