Imperial Treasures La Mian Xiao Long Bao @ Marina Square

Had dinner with my family at Imperial Treasures La Mian Xiao Long Bao restaurant last Sat. Queue for approx 20 mins before we got a table. It was super crowded that day as alot of people were in that area to catch the Fireworks for that night.

Our personal Fav – Fried Rice with Fresh Prawns. I only try a bit of the fried rice without the prawns and I loved it so much. There’s this ‘wok mei’ in the fried rice. Hubby and my kid said the prawns were very ‘crunchy’

Stir Fried Fish Slices with Black Fungus. Initially when we looked at the picture in the menu, we thought they used ‘sheng yu’ to cook. But it’s actually cod fish. Oh my, it’s so delicious. The fish slices simply melted in my mouth. Very nice dish. $14 per plate.

La Mian with Wanton Soup. The La Mian were very nice and Q. I love the wanton too. The wanton skin was paper thin.

Steam Chives Dumpling. The dumpling skin was thin and the filling was alot. But hubby don’t really like chives dumplings so he gave this a miss.

We also ordered Pan Fried Gyozas but I forgot to take a picture of that. Hubby love this alot cos the filling is mosting minced pork and very very little chives. As usual, the dumpling skin was very very thin.

We ordered these Golden Balls to try. It has red bean paste and banana filling wrapped with egg white scouffle and the deep fried to golden brown and dusted with icing sugar.

Not too sweet but a tad too oily for my liking

Total Cost for the meal comes up to approx $60 (including taxes and other misc charges).

We also ordered 3 glasses of Soy Milk $1.80 each

Imperial Treasures La Mian Xiao Long Bao

6 Raffles Boulevard,

#02-138J Marina Square,

Singapore 039594

Tel: 6338 2212

Mayim Chinese Cuisine @ West Mall

Had family dinner at this very very popular chinese restaurant @ West Mall. The food is great and the prices are reasonable. Serving size per dish is quite small so we decided to order more dishes since there are at least 6 of us.

Ordered 3 pots of tea to share.

Superior Chrysanthemum Tea

Shou Mei with Wolberries Tea. I like this tea the best among the 3 pots of tea ordered. Very light and refreshing taste.

Blend of Jasmine Tea with Rose Bud. We found this a tad too bitter for our liking. Maybe too much Jasmine Tea instead of Rose buds.

Stir-fried egg plant with minced meat.

This dish is very well prepared. The egg plant wasn’t overcooked and not too soggy and at the same time it absorbed the sauces very well. I love this dish. Complement plain rice very well.

Sliced fish cooked with black fungus and straw mushrooms. The fish soup was delicious and there’s no fishy taste at all. Fish slices were very soft and nice.

Stir-fried spinach with chinese sausage slices (ie lup cheong), roasted pork slices and bacon bits. This dish is very nice too. Din know that spinach can taste so delicious when cooked with lup cheong. Yummy.

Ordered dumplings that comes with soup and the other boiled and served with braised sauce and chilli oil. Frankly speaking I prefer the latter as it’s more favourful. The dumpling skin are really thin and the meat filling is generous.

Scallops fried with spring onions and fried flat fish. The scallops are very nice.

So how big and juicy the scallops are.

This has to be the best calamari I had eaten so far. The calamari rings are thick but they dun taste chewy at all. Instead it’s so easy to bite. Soft on the insides and crispy on the outside. Dip this with the accompanying chilli sauce… simply heavenly.

Handmade seafood tofu fried till golden brown and top with avocado mayo. Tofu was very soft on the inside and crispy on the outside. Ate it with the avocado mayo provides a very unique taste.

Fried Udon with pork slices, chives, black fungus shreds and mushrooms. Very delicious too.

Fried Cod Fish with Ginger Shreds. Cod fish cooked in this manner rid it of any fishy taste and beneath the crispy surface are very soft cod fish meat tat still retains its meat juice. Eat it with the ginger shreds while it’s still hot.

Honeyed pork ribs with fried garlic bits. Pork is soft and tasted sweet.

Total Cost for all the food and drinks we had ordered is $139.95 (inclusive of service charge and GST). Pretty reasonable.

Mayim Chinese Cuisine
1 Bukit Batok Central Link
#02-04 West Mall
Singapore 658713
Tel: 6794 1590

Reservations are highly recommended as the restaurant is always full of people and you can see long queues forming outside it during dining hours.

Melben Seafood @ Toa Payoh Lor 8

Treated my mom to a nice seafood dinner to celebrate her birthday as well as mother’s day. Went to Melben Seafood Restaurant @ Toa Payoh Lor 8 for the dinner. They have other branches but we chose the one at Toa Payoh since my mom wanna shop around Toa Payoh after the meal

Ordered their famous Crab Bee Hoon. The soup was very tasty. Cost of the crabs are charged by weight. We ordered 2 crabs and total cost is $83.

If you want more soup or bee hoon for your dish, you have to pay for the extras.

 

This is the other crab dish we ordered. It’s called Creamy Butter Crabs. I love to dipped the fried mantou into the buttery creamy sauce and eat it. Tasted heavenly

 

 Looks how meaty the crab’s claws are.

 

We also ordered a plate of longevity noodles since it’s mommy’s birthday. My dad said it’s very very delicious. And he polished off most of the noodles haha

the prawns are huge and crunchy. I did not ate them but my bro did.

Guinness Stout Pork Ribs. The meat was very very tender and it absorbed the taste of the sauces very well. But i can’t really taste the Guinness Stout.

 

Ah this is my dad’s fav. Brocolli with Sea Cucumber and Braised Mushrooms. Cost about $15.

Lastly we ordered a Steamed Fish done in Teochew style. Fish was very big and meat was very tender. But we found it a bit too salty as the chef uses too much salted veg. But overall this dish is good.

 

Total cost for all the above dishes ordered is $200. The lady rounded down the bill to $200 and do away with all the cents.

I find it a bit pricey but the food is good. The shop is opp a hawker centre and there were many stalls selling durians there. If you wish to have your dinner there, please make reservations in advance. Else you have to queue for a long time for a table.

I saw many people drinking red wine. Not sure if the shop sells wine to go with the food or they brought their own wine from home.

Mellben Seafood

Blk 211,

Lorong 8 Toa Payoh

#01-11-15

Tel: 6353-3120

 

 

 

 

冰馆 Ice Monster @ Plaza Singapura

After movies, I was feeling really famished. Din know where to eat and ED suggested just finding a place to have dinner at Plaza Singapura. In the end I decided to have Zha Jiang Mian (Braised Minced Pork Noodles) at Ice Monster (located at the basement)

We ordered 2 bowls of Zha Jiang Mian, a plate of Gyozas (6 pcs) and a bowl of fresh fruits with shaved ice.

We waited for quite some time before the noodles came. The food totally disappoint us. Noodles were cold and the sauce was really diluted. It wasn’t nice at all.

The gyozas hadn’t arrived even after we had finished our noodles. When it finally came, it doesn’t taste nice either. Filling is really little and it was too oily.

Finally our shaved ice was here. We ordered the mixed fruit shaved ice that comprised of strawberries, kiwis and mangoes cubes on top of the ice. Only the mangoes tasted sweet. The other 2 fruits are simply too sourish.

Overall, the food wasn’t nice at all. Don’t think we would go back there again.

Bosses Restaurant 黑社會 @ Vivo City

Had a great dinner with my family at Bosses Restaurant 黑社會 @ Vivo City. Reservations had to be made earlier as the place is always packed with people. We ordered the dinner set instead of ala carte.

Instead of the usual peanuts where most restaurants serve as tidbits, Bosses serve a type of nuts coated with honey and sesame. They tasted really sweet and crunchy

The waitress asked what sort of tea do we want to order. She said each pot serves only 2 persons and recommend that for a table of 10 persons, we could order 4 pots to share. We order a pot of white chrysanthemum, a pot of Dragon Pearl Tea, a pot of Bi Luo Chun and a pot of Tie Guan Yin. Amongst them, I love Bi Luo Chun the best. It has a very nice fragrant smell and refreshing taste.

A pot of white chrysanthemum in a nice glass pot

Here’s what we ordered

First dish: Lovers Platter. A nice refreshing mix of fresh mango, honeydew shreds mixed with roasted chicken, roasted duck shreds and crispy you tiao (fried dough fritters) bits drenched with tangy sweet sauce that has a tinge of sourness in it. Simply refreshing. Loved it so much

The sharks fin soup came with lots and lots of sharks fin. Wow.

Add some pepper and red vinegar to your sharks fin soup before eating. It really enhances the taste of the soup.

The baby abalone was succulent. Every bite is so soft and nice.

Loved the deep fried goby fish. A pity that I found the fish a little too small. It’s so nice I I wanted 3rd helpings :p

I did not really like the chicken as I felt the garlic taste is a bit too strong

This beancurd skin with xiao bai cai with papaya dish is too salty for my liking. If only they reduce the saltiness of the dish, I think it would taste really great. The fish soup is nice but too bad it’s too salty.

The fried la mian is very nice too. Noodles has a certain bite and not too chewy nor soggy. But again, too much salt to this dish and it spoilt the taste. We suspect the chef might be too busy cos the last few dishes are too salty.

The noodles were individually served to us. Same goes for the sharks fin soup where they also scoop out the soup into individual bowls before serving to us. Also the waitress changed our plates before every dish served. Service is quite prompt and good.

The last dish is the famous Custard Bun dessert.

The small fluffy buns has very thin skins and the custard with salted egg filling would ooze out once you break open the skin. Be careful .. the filling is piping hot

So what’s the total damage for all the nice food. It’s approx $1200 for 20 pax.

Verdict: The price is ok (comparable to other chinese restaurants). Food is quite good too except the last few dishes. My aunt suggested ordering ala carte instead as the dinner set do not allow us to choose our own dishes.

Bosses Restaurant 黑社會
#02-156 Vivo City,
Tel: 63769740

Nice Western Food @ Tanglin Halt Hawker Centre

Had this really nice western food from Tanglin Halt Hawker Centre.

I love their tender pork chops that cost onloy $4.50. It includes 2 pieces of pork chop, 1 baked potato, some fries and salad. Really value for money.

Other than pork chops, they also sell fish & chips, chicken cutlet etc. Can’t rem the exact stall number to this stall but this stall is easy to find in the hawker centre. The hawker centre is within walking distance from Commonwealth MRT station.

Nice Zi Char dinner at Seletar Hill Estate

Last night, I had a very very nice dinner with my family at this Zi Char stall tucked in a corner of a small coffeeshop at Seletar Hill Estate.

The food were very nice but we had to wait quite a while for it as there were quite a number of people having dinner there.

We ordered a medium portion of Deep Fried Oats Prawns. $12 for a small portion. My family members loved it very much. The prawns were crispy and favourful

Also order Stir-Fried Sambal Baby Sweet Potatoe Leaves. This veg is so tender and nice. The spiciness is just right and not too salty. Goes well with plain white rice. Can’t remember whether it was $6 or $8 bucks for the small serving.

As some of my family members don’t take spicy stuff, we also order stir-fried spinach with garlic. The veg was nicely done and tasted great

We ordered a plate of curry chicken with rice for our maid. She said the chicken meat was very very tender (chicken thigh were used for this dish) and the curry was very spicy and nice. She simply loved it.

Ordered this Yi Pin Guo that includes ingredients like prawns, sea cucumber, top shell, fish slices, brocolli etc. The sauce was really nice.

Also ordered a plate of black pepper pork. It’s quite nice except that I find that too much black pepper was used that it overpowered the original taste of the pork.

What is the name of this Zi Char stall? Well here it is

Fu Seafood Restaurant
2 Jalan Selaseh, Selatar Hills Estate
S(808433)

Here is the location map. Courtesy of SLA’s Streetmap.

PS: I later found out that this Zi Char stall used to be from the old Seletar Food Centre (which had been demolished now)

Homestyled steamboat

As I hadn’t been well lately, mommy decided to have steamboat for dinner since it’s soupy stuff and also it’s my fav. Mommy went to the market early to get all the neccessary steamboat stuff for dinner. So much food and all are my fav. Yummy.

Daddy helped to take out the electric steamboat and set it up on the dining table. Then mommy poured the stock into the steamboat. She uses some beans and fishbones and boil them for hours to obtain the stock. The soup base really tasted great. So favourful and rich.

The ingredients

All the food in a pot.

Fresh Scallops and fishballs. My fav. Yum yum

Mommy’s cooking … still the best :)

Whenever I have to eat out, I would greatly miss my mom’s cooking. Eating it brings back childhood memories cos I grew up eating her food. Though simple but it warms my heart everytime I eat it. Every meal prepared by mommy encompasses her love and effort. And I appreciate her hard work in going to the market to buy the ingredients, come back to prepare and cook it for the whole family.

Just wanna say thanks to all the wonderful mommys and specially to my own mom.

Took some pics of the simple dishes my mom prepared.

Sweet & Sour Fish

Silver Fish Omelette. Mommy told me you got to soak the silver fish in a bowl of water and drain it later to reduce the salt content.

Stir-fried Brocolli with Carrots

Pan-fried Tau Kwa (tofu)

So are you going home for dinner tonight?

My dinner at a Zi Char Stall

It is very common for most Sporean families to eat out these days as few people want to cook and wash up after dinner. I had mine at a Zi Char (cooked food) stall at a coffeeshop at Yishun St 11. The food is very nicely cooked and the price is quite reasonable.

 As I am too hungry while waiting for my ordered dishes to come, I ordered a plate of fruits rojak (from another stall) to fill my tummy. Rojak is a local salad where pineapple, guava, green apple, turnip, cucumber slices, toasted dough fritters and fried beancurd skin (tau pok) are mixed with shrimp paste, assam water, sugar, grounded peanut powder, grinded ginger flower and beansprouts.

Fruits Rojak $3

Broccoli with Pork Ribs marinated with honey and orange juice $12

Deep Fried Handmade Tofu Cooked with Broccoli and Braised Mushroom $8

I also ordered a big bowl of Fish Maw Soup cooked with seafood ($6 serving fills up 6 small bowls) and a plate of prawns omelette ($4). I ordered the smallest serving size for all the dishes ordered and it is adequate to feed 3-4 people.

The stall also serves all patrons with a bowl of longan with cube orange jelly on the house. Very good service by the serving staff too. I would definitely go back again for dinner.

Total Bill came up to $31.50. Really worth it

Jin Wei Seafood
Blk 418 Yishun Ave 11
#01-385
Tel: 6757 0127