Sunset Railway Cafe

Having visited so many times to the Clementi Arcade for Cakes and Ice Cream, I have never noticed Sunset Railway Cafe until one day it was suggested that we will be having our breakfast there.

They do local breakfast sets from Kopi O, Roti with Kaya to serving chicken Macaroni. Environment was nostalgic with some old school stuff around and it kind of feels homely.

Interior

We have the Soft Boiled Eggs as "Starters" before the main meal. The eggs were skilfully prepared for they were not too cook or uncook. Simple dish but grabbing its timing to get the correct texture of those eggs are rather tricky.

Soft Boiled Eggs - $2.10

One of the local favourites, Mee Siam was deliciously prepared in the mild spicy gravy topped with chives and fried shallots. The gravy was sour, tangy and appetising in its taste. Ingredients were quite straight forward with hard boiled egg and cut tau pok. Perhaps the only difference is that they have added some prawns.

Mee Siam - $6.50

Basmati rice was packed of coconut fragrance. The default Nasi Lemak came with fried peanuts anchovies, cucumber, rendang chicken and some crackers. Surprisingly the rendang chicken was deliciously good. We have added Otah to complete our meal.

Nasi Lemak - $7.80 added with Otah $1.20

They are pretty popular for the traditional peranakan dishes and having tasted its rendang chicken, it will be most possible that we will be back again for it.  Though the mains in the menu were rather limited, they are serving some homely cooked food with love. Service was friendly and it has a good ambiance if you want to hide away from the crowd.

Rating: 3 / 5

Sunset Railway Cafe 
Location: 41 Sunset Way Singapore 597071

Ruth Chris

Ruth Chris is known as one of the places for quality steak and going here had been in my mind for quite sometime as Marina Mandarin Hotel is a memorable place for us.

Ruth's Chris Steak House

Interior was posh, with wooden thick wall panels, thick carpets across the dining floor, a classy chandelier in the center. Tables were spread with white table cloth and with some leather chairs allocated to them. Most of all, the environment was quiet and definitely a good choice of place for a romantic date or even a business meeting.

Interior

The menu was classy in an old fashion style book.

Menu

Once order was made, we were served with the starters. Loaf was warmed and went pretty well with the butter.

Starters

Server offered the option to have our portion of Lobster Bisque separated into 2 since its for sharing.
I'm totally bought over by the creamy crustacean soup. It had a good balance of crustacean and sweet tangy savoury taste. I just hope to have more of it.

Lobster Bisque - $28

These Oscar Style are one of the Entree of Ruth's favourite selections and a real bang for the buck. Love its slight charred crispy crust and the flavourful crab cake with asparagus and Bearnaise sauce.

Oscar Style - $18

We will caught off guard about this little parcel until the server those us that we can squeeze it on the Oscar Style to enhance the taste. Its actually half a lemon wrapped within.

Lemon

Mains will always be accompanied by sides and we had ordered the recommended sides from the Vegetables Menu. They do have a varieties of potatoes side to choose from too.

Fire-Roasted Corn - $18

I like the Pan-Roasted Mushrooms that was flavored and juicy, furthermore they were cut into sizes just nice for bites.

Pan-Roasted Mushrooms - $20 

Ruth's Chris specialization in steak. They are served sizzling in butter on a warmed plate. As advise by the server, I had agreed to go for the medium done-ness instead of the medium well as the temperature of the plate do play apart on their finest custom-aged Midwestern beef. The petite Filet comes in 2 options, 6 ounce (170 grams) at $65 or 8 ounce (230 grams) at $80. Though it mentioned petite but very cut was tender and definitely attained the ideal done-ness that I had opted for. Yes, certaintly, they do what they preached ~ broil it exactly the way we like it at 980Degree C to lock in the corn-fed flavour.

Petite Filet - $65

USDA Prime Ribeye was outstandingly served at its best. The well marbled beef was tantalizing and juicily presented in its charred crisscross patterns drizzled with seasonings. The quality and cut was impressive.

Ribeye (340 grams) - $80

A little surprise for us, Ruth Chris Steakhouse had actually prepared a mini cheese cake on a plate with their warmest greetings. So sweet of them!

Mini Cheese Cake

Their creamy homemade cheesecake light and not cloying in taste, its also served with fresh berries.

What A Surprised!

We were contented with the quality of the meal and dining experience, the service rendered by the crews were professional from the moment we walked into the steakhouse. Not only that, servers were detailed, observant and quick to response to the servings. It's a memorable one indeed.

Rating: 4.5 / 5

Ruth's Chris Steak House Singapore

Location:  6 Raffles Blvd, 4th Level, Marina Mandarin Hotel, Singapore 039594

Website

Penguin's Kitchen

Looking for some authentic Thai Food without breaking the bank? Penguin's Kitchen might be just the place that you are looking for. The place is not hard to find if you know the famous fish head steamboat, Tian Wai Tian, at Upper Serangoon as its just located behind.

Interior

Refreshing drink for me and kind of beat the spice at a later part when spicy food arrived.

Thai Iced Lemon Grass Tea - $4

The so called healthy dish that many may turned to. The vegetable was pretty tasty with distinct "Wok-Hei" taste. The sauce that drenched the greens were savoury too. Crunchy and smelled good with fried onions topping.

Stir Fried Kai Lan

This was the first time we ever had a mixed mushroom clear tom yum soup rather than seafood, chicken or prawns as ingredients. The clear Tom Yum soup had its temperature maintain as it was served in a hot pot under the fire. Tasted sour and fiery even with us removing the chilli padi from the pot. Though it feels "shiok" but the spiciness gets intense as we drank more. Luckily we had ordered some non spicy food to munch on, balancing our taste buds.

Tom Yum Soup Clear (Mixed Mushrooms)  冬炎杂菇汤 - $10

The Thai Prawn Cakes were definitely worth mentioning here. Though price was abit on a high side, I guessed that's the quality we paid for. Besides serving piping hot, exterior was crispy. It was soft when we bite it down and dipping the plum sauce makes this bar bite tasted so perfect.

Thai Prawn Cakes - $10 (3 Pcs) 

All of us love the Thai Basil minced meat. Its a great dish to order especially for sharing and was marked as a recommendation in the menu. We had chosen pork over the other 3 selections like chicken, seafood and mixed mushrooms. Yes, this dish is best to go with a bowl of white rice.

Stir Fried Hot Basil (Pork) 九层塔猪肉碎 - $12

Crispy omelette was offered in onion, minced pork, minced chicken or prawns with each cost differently. It looked pretty interesting, serving in a wrap form and its not our usual kind of omelette that takes the circular size of the plate. Its soft and delectable.

Crispy Omelette (Onion) 洋葱炸蛋 - $8

Added the Papaya Salad with salted egg. It tasted somehow different from the ones we usually had with bigger shrimps included.

Papaya Salad (Som Tum Thai) added with Salted Egg 木瓜沙拉加咸蛋 - $10 

It was a definite spicy experience for us. Nevertheless, it had reminded us that the original food in Thailand do have such level of spiciness. Overall, there are both hits and misses from Penguin's Kitchen. If you love hot stuff like the true blue Thai people, you will probably find the food to your liking.

Rating: 3 / 5

Penguin's Kitchen

Location: 9 Opal Crescent, Singapore 328404

The Sushi Bar

We was moving about in Orchard and suddenly my friend suggested we should have Japanese food for dinner and we headed to The Sushi Bar.

There were some items at 20 % and some promotions running on in this Far East Plaza outlet. Soon as we arrived and made our orders, all tables were gradually filled up by customers.

Sake - $5 Each

Thick and fresh slices of Sword Fish and Salmon Sashimi is definitely irresistible. I bet that explained the crowd and the "Trip Advisor" label on its glass door. For those who like Chirashi, they do offer this dish too.

Mekajiki $7.90 & Salmon $5.90

Vinaigrette Seaweed and cucumber was appetizing.

Wakame Kyurisu - $5.90

Perhaps, this has the better taste out of all items ordered but it was not served warmed.

Soft Shell Crab Salmon Aburi - $17.90

Each stick has 3 pieces of bacon wrapped enoki skewers. Aesthetically, it looked good with vibrant colors and as for taste wise, it would be better without the generous input of peppercorns.

Enoki Bacon - $7.90 2 Sticks

We had Teriyaki Sauce over salt on these 2 sticks of chicken skewer. It was heavily coated with sauce making it quite salty, however we find that there was too much of a frozen chicken taste in it.

Tori Momo - $6.90 for 2 Sticks

Its quite interesting to know that there are 3 outlets of The Sushi Bar located at Ngee Ann City, Far East Plaza and Tampines, each with different menu. Overall quality of food seems average to me and service standard was kind of unexpected from a Japanese eatery. Servers gave a feeling that passion was lost and only follow orders systematically. It lacked the kind of human touch that will complete the entire dining experience.

Rating: 3 / 5

The Sushi bar
Location: Far East Plaza, 14 Scotts Rd, #04-28 Singapore 228213
Website

Restoran Ka Hoe Kway Teow Kia ( 榕樹下美食坊 / 榕樹下粿條仔)

A trip to Johor Bahru over the weekends to fix our stomach with their local breakfast. We were looking for Kway Chap but in Malaysian Style, they only offer Kway Teow Kia instead of the bigger size Kway we have back in Singapore.

Location of the eating place is just a stone throw away from Plaza Pelangi. Eating place was run down and occupying 2 shop spaces.

Eating Place

Head over to the stove area to order our items. There is no standard set meal and patrons just order the items available base on their own preference which I find that its simple and straight forward.

Preparation Counter

Here's our Kway Teow Kia breakfast with pig offals. The stock for the Kway Teow tasted on a salty side though it has some herb taste in it.

Breakfast for RM 47

With the fried shallot and oil, thin slices of pork taste better. However I do not like the Tau Kwa as it had an unusual taste, different from my expectation.

Pork And Tau Kwa

Good thing to note that each item were thoroughly cleaned and braised with mild herby taste.

Intestines

We feel so comfortable eating them when they handled the cleanliness so well.

Intestines

The blood Curd is a Chinese delicacy quite popular in Taiwan, Vietnam, China etc however due to some reasons we can never see them in Singapore again. For some Singaporeans who love having it, the closest we can find is in Malaysia. The bowl of curd will be good if they are softer in texture.

Pig's Blood Curd

Food is decent as an overall with us don't mind returning back for another meal.

Restoran Ka Hoe Kway Teow Kia ( 榕樹下美食坊 / 榕樹下粿條仔)

Location: 24, Jalan Maju, Taman Maju Jaya, 80400 Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia

Lu Ding Ji 卤鼎记

Looking at the name, it reminds me of the traditional chinese drama that we had during the younger days as the name were pretty close and rhymed. The location is a distance from the MRT guess that human traffic flow won't be too constant except for the nearby office during lunch hours.

Lu Ding Ji

Lu Ding Ji is represented by a male mascot in its traditional Chinese costume. They specialize in braised item and menu is kind of little different from the usual Taiwanese eatery we went.

Lu Ding Ji Menu

The menu for the bubble tea gives the consumer the choice of their tea (Milk, Red or Green Tea), flavour and topping of the drink. Therefore each cup is unique base on customer's preference.

Bubble Tea

Crispy XL Chicken was generously served. Batter was crispy and not too bad, best to consume while its still hot. Somehow, it was not that good enough for me to get addicted to this dish. This dish comes with curry and cheese flavours too. Let's save some stomach space for the others.

Original XL Fried Chicken - $7.50

Pork Bowl is one of the menu items not to be missed. The meal looked straight forward and simple with braised egg, braised pork and some cucumber greens to make the dull bowl looks lively. Its a popular dishes ordered among the diners. Likewise, for me, I do enjoy the richness of the braised items and the egg had thrown me a surprised with its onsen yolk.

Pork Bowl - $9.50

I like the concept of this mix and match claypot as most of the Taiwanese cuisine place we have in Singapore does not offer this.We need to pick a minimum of 2 items for the claypot. We ordered pork belly $6, Pig large intestine $7, Pig Stomach $5, Tau Kwa and Tau Pok at $2 each.

Claypot Mix & Match

I paired the claypot with a bowl of plain porridge at $1. Braised sauce from the claypot had complemented my bowl of plain porridge well. Sauce was not not overly salty and contained a balance amount of herb taste.

Braised pork belly was soft and easy on the jaws. The distinctive layers of meat with fat was so yummy.

Pork Belly

Big intestine was thoroughly prepared and skillfully braised to its even brown color.

Big Intestine

Braised items tasted above my expectation. Even the texture of the stomach was not too rubbery.

Pig Stomach

Environment and service are of average. Food wise, I believe that many of the patrons are returned customers and I observed that most of the family enjoy ordering their signature braised pork rice. With their quality food standard, I don't mind revisiting them again.

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Lu Ding Ji 卤鼎记
Location: 750, #01-13 Chai Chee Rd, Viva Business Park, Singapore 469000

73@Hillcrest

Nestled among the shop houses along Greenwood Avenue, you will notice this humble kopitiam shines as they are unique with its chalk board menus and joyful ambiance under the bright orange light.

73@Hillcrest

Interior is an upgraded version of the neighbourhood kopitiam with plants and pictures hanging at the sides. Furniture like tables and chairs were down to earth, coffeeshop liked. No doubt that this is located in quiet place, the customers traffic in the 73@Hillcrest was pretty good.

Dining Area

Home made drinks were pretty standard, they do offer alcohol too but we prefer the home made ones.

Lime Juice and Freshly Brewed Ice Lemon Tea - $2.50 and $3.20

Mushroom taste is quite rich without being too creamy. I felt that the cream used was quite light. Even though the mushroom has been processed quite finely but we are still able to make up the bits while eating.

Funghi Soup (V) - $4.90

Grab some bites while waiting for the mains. No doubt the recommended starter is their King Brown  Oyster mushroom with herbs and parmesan, we still go ahead with the Iberico on Toast as we were tempted by the pulled pork. Besides the toast, it was served with greens and cherry tomatoes.

Iberico on Toast - $8

Love the crunch on the toast as they were very addictive.

Pull Pork on Brioche

If you are going for Pork or Beef, Pork Neck Fillet Steak is recommended in the menu. Pork collar steak weighing 200g is chargrilled paired with mushroom sauce. Meat was tender and juicy, serviced with garden greens and fusilli. For meat eaters, there is 250g portion for you.

Pork Neck Fillet Steak - $15.90

Look at the charred pattern on the Pork Neck

Medium rare free range New Zealand beef ribeye glazed with garlic butter, greens and hand mashed russet potato. Wellness of the beef had met our expectations and no complains about that. 200g portion is also available at $21.90.

NZ Free Range Ribeye Steak - $29.50 (300g)

There is a choice of mushroom or black pepper sauce and if you wish to top up the potato to truffle mashed, it would be done for another $2.

Free Range Ribeye Steak

I think its worth going again as the quality of food is good and serving is quite reasonable for the price paid. We were be back again for other food especially in the day where it offers Asian, Western and local cuisine.

Rating: 3.5 / 5

73@Hillcrest

Location: 73 Hillcrest Road, Singapore 288945