De Burg Cafe (Closed)

Ready for burgarasm?

De Burg is arguably said to serve the best burgers in the west in terms of quality and value. Located within a humble coffee-shop which is just walking distance from Alexandra Food Village. The environment has totally gave me a total change of my impression to a neighbourhood coffeeshop as all the stalls were selling westernized food and not the usual rice and noodles stalls that was all along in my mind. Even the usual kopi stall has been transformed into selling German Beers. Perhaps if you want a cup of kopi or tea, we have to divert our steps back into the hawker Centre.

Stall of De Burg Cafe in Coffeeshop

Occupying 2 unit space in the coffeeshop, they are considerably one of the biggest stalls. Helpers were all dressed in black polo tee - their uniform. Service was friendly and efficient.

Ordered the 200g heavy Cheeseburger with onion rings and ranch beans for its sides. American serving of burger was big as expected with thick juicy yummy beef patty sandwiched in between and loaded with lettuce. Buns with sesame were spreaded with a thin later of magarine at its bottom.

Sides like onion rings were fried to golden crispy perfection and even for the beans, they were semi-sweet and perfect choice for the dish.

Mushroom Cheese 200G - $15.90

Overwhelmed by the availability in its menu, I had finally came to my decision after some struggles and I had chosen a safe choice which was De Burg's signature, with tatter tots and balsamic vinegar over salad.

De Burg's Signature - $18.50

Tatter Tots was actually mini crunch harsh browns. These bites were good with some sauces to go along.

Tatter Tots

Looking at the beautifully stacked up burgers  were not only eye pleasing but irrestiable as well. Piled up with tomato slices, lettuce, enomous slice of fungi with cheese and bacon over the tender patty, presenting De Burg's signature. Just in case any of them slips off, a wooden stick was used and punched through it to ensure that everyone was in tact.

Nicely Stacked up Burger

Here's even a better shot on its burger. Are you drooling now?

Close shot of the burger

With the help of the sharp knife and fork given, I got a cross section view of the burger. I bet you cant hold any longer after looking at these glorious looking stuff ! Enough said, let's head down to have a bite! Have a great sensual pressure indulging them and pamper yourself after a long day of work.

Cross Section of the burger

Rating: 4 / 5

De Burg Café

Location: 119 Bukit Merah Lane 1 #01-40, Singapore 151119

Ah Loy's Thai Thai Cuisine

Oh! It's shocking to see Ah Loy's Thai Thai Cuisine had ventured their business into the kopitiam now. Most of us would have known for its Thai Cuisine for they are quite reputable from its branch in Cityhall, thus having a queue was a norm in any situation. However, the queue and ordering system was rather disorganized which caused some customers to be fed up and left the queue.

Ah Loy's Thai Thai Cuisine

A device was given after ordering and once the dishes were ready for collection, it will buzz off.

Alert for collection & Receipt

Ordered Phad Thai as my main course. One can see the cook preparing the dish at the stall. For its phad thai, though they have the wok smell, I would say that flavours were not really that strong and did not have any resemblance of a Thai cuisine.

Phad Thai - $6.50

We ordered its pineapple rice too. While I have expect the rice to be towards yellow in color. Though raisins and pineapples cubes were part of its ingredients, the plate of pineapple rice was lacking fragrance and the taste of fish sauce which one would normally taste in a plate of authentic fragrant thai pineapple fried rice. But to emphasis one thing is that, it had another kind of smell which was the "wok-hei" fragrance.

Thai Pineapple Fried Rice - $6.50

As I was figuring out what were those floating white ingredients on the bowl of curry, I got a shock. What? Fishballs in thai green curry? It was the first time I had seen such combination. Nevertheless, it was sweet added with a little spice and herbs smell which was good that such dish can stand alone by itself. Another point to note was that the chunks of chicken came with frozen smell.

Thai Green Curry - $6

Each costing $2.50. I cant imagine having such expensive Thai dishes over the mall's food court. The chicken was well marinated and was rather tasty on its own. In my opinion, dipping the given sweet and sour thai chilli will make a disaster to its original taste.

Thai Pandan Chicken (2 pcs) - $5

To sum up, the level of standards was not matchable to what I had previously in their main shop. Given a choice, I would rather choose to dine in their main shop or alternatively, Jurong Point's Thai express.

Rating: 3/ 5

Ah Loy's Thai Thai Cuisine
Location: Jurong Point, 1 Jurong West Central 2 #03-42 , Singapore 648886

Ji Xiang Confectionery

Ang Gu Kuay anyone? When translated from the hokkien language, it literally refers to "Red Tortoise Dumpling".  The default color of the Ang Gu kuay is red as it is an auspicious color in Chinese Tradition.

Ang Gu Kuay - Peanuts Flavour

Recently, I got a chance to taste the fmous Ji Xiang Confectionery located in Everton Park. The Kuehs were packed in a styolfoam box illustrated with a Tortoise cartoon pushing a cart.

Packaging

Indeed, these Ang Gu kuays were legendary. Its skin was thin and soft. What's more the peanuts flavoured Ang Gu Kuay that I had its peanuts grated and was finer instead.

Green Tea Flavour

Having tried its peanuts, I would like to make a trip there and try other flavours especially when I'm a fan of Tau Sar Ang Gu Kuay!


Rating: 4 / 5


Ji Xiang Traditional Ang Ku Kueh
Location: Blk 1, Everton Park, #01-33 Singapore 081001
Tel: 62231631
Operations Hours: Mon-Sat, 8am - 5pm (Closed on Sundays and Public Holidays)

Hong Ji Shu Shi

Besides having the famous Pontian Wanton Mee from 505 Jurong West Market and Food Centre. Here's another good alternative for you: Hong Ji Shu Shi. Having been around over the years, Hong Ji Wanton Mee was well-liked by the neighbourhood. Just on a weekday night, I had to queue for about 20 minutes in order to secure a plate of their Wanton Mee.

Hong Ji Shu Shi

At that instance, the stall was manned by a family of 3, where by the guy would do all process of the cooking and preparation while the soft spoken uncle went down the queue to talk the incoming orders from his customers. The lady who was standing in between the two guys in the stall would help up with the condiments before handling the ordered item to us.

Wanton Mee with soup - $2.50

Noodles were thin and springy with not much of the "ki" smell. For the $2.50 portion, there were only 2 wanton given, they were just the ordinary.
 The light douse of chilli oil with its thinly sliced lean Char Siew Meat was perhaps the starring part among all that makes the dish delectable. Meat was sweet tasting with no presence of fatty portions.

Thinly Sliced Char Siew

To make my queue worth the while, I bought a bowl of dumplings soup (comes in 7 pcs per bowl) so that I can test them out. Since its Wanton was ordinary, I would like to emphasize that their dumplings were doing much better.

Dumplings Soup - $3.50 (7 pcs)

The usual dumplings would have packed chestnuts and minced meat wrapped with dumpling skin but Hong Ji had given these little pouches more taste by adding chinese wine in it.

Dumpling

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Hong Ji Shu Shi 鸿记熟食

Location: Jurong West 505 Market & Food Centre, Blk 505, Jurong West Street 52, #01-188, Singapore 640505

Golden Rooster

Golden Rooster is one of the Tenderfresh subsidiaries and they have been very popular over the years as a western food stall famous of its farm fresh chickens. This western food stall is easily accessible as they are within walking distance from Clementi MRT station as well as bus interchange.

This stall has been around for 10 over years and in fact it had even expanded its territory in the coffee shop after its renovation.

Golden Rooster Stall

 Retaining the good old school western food presentation with coleslaw and fries as sides for the slab of chicken chop, the dish came with a golden fried bun which pack additional fragance as well as filling up a portion of the stomach space. The chicken chop, however tasted not as good as before even though it was still tender and did not have the kind of frozen meat taste. It was still not at its best for its meat was not thoroughly marinated.

Chicken Chop - $6.50

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Golden Rooster
Location: Blk 450 Clementi Ave 3 #01-305 S(120450)

Face Ban Mian

The stall of Face Ban Mian has an interesting logo make up of letter Es and with an mirror image. It's bright florescent light had drawn my attention as I took a glance through all available stalls in the coffeeshop.

Stall of Face Ban Mian

It's Signature Ban Mian is the all time favourite with slices of pork belly cost $4.50 per bowl. It comes with either dry or soup version and I had opted for the latter.

Signature Ban Mian - $4.50

At a closer look, the bowl of Ban Mian looks appetizing with its fresh greeny leaves as well as its spring onions and dried Ikan Billis that topped the the dish. As compared to most Ban Mian from the coffeeshops and hawker centre, I would say the noodles were slim, chewable and did not have any trace of dough texture. The stock was sweet and tasty with not too strong of MSG.

In fact, if I were to grade, I would prefer Face Ban Mian to Qiu Lian's.

Closer look on the Ban Mian

Rating: 4 / 5

Face Ban Mian
Location:  450 Clementi Ave 3, Singapore 120450

Southwest Traven

I came to know of Southwest Tavern through words of mouth from my friend. Lauded for its cosy and laidback environment hidden in the midst of the Tradehub buildings, this casual American Restaurant has a cowboy theme.

Menu

Decors with hints of cowboy adventures were well displayed in the area. What's more the place was airy with natural breeze blowing at intervals and not forgetting the big fans that keep the dining place ventilated.

Laid Back Environment

Staff over in Southwest Traven were helpful and friendly. Not only that they were attentive in topping up the plain water. Thumbs up for that.

Bar Counter

The place was also relaxing as serve a very good place in chilling out especially after a hard day of work. What's more it has a pool table and should anyone wishes to have a game or two, they can always inserts some coins and have fun.

Sheriff or Jail

Ice chocolate was cooling, it was blended on the spot and one could actually hear the blending sound from the bar counter. Chocolate Flavours were good enough and it was not too sweet. In fact, I love the feeling of having the icy cool glass of blended beverage as the wind breeze blows into my face.

Drink

Initially I thought that the Chicken Fingers were over cooked with its dark brownish fried color but as I munched on its first bite. I had a different perspective, no doubt it was hot,it was very tasty paried together with the bowl of mushroom dipping sauce. These skinless soft and tender meat played a very good bites while waiting for our main courses.

Chicken Fingers - $10

When comes to food, the portion were generous, the typical American portion and it is recommended to share for smaller eaters. Thus we had the slab of beef shared between 2 of us. Though it took quite some time for them to prepare the course but I would emphasize that they were worth all the wait. Meat wellness was cooked to perfection - medium well done! The glossy looking criss cross grilled lines on the meat were appealing. Sides were chosen by ourselves out of its menu and we had coleslaw and mashed potatoes.  Potatoes were smashed but traces of potatoes chunks were included which gave a different level of texture in it, what's more, the fragrant was further enhanced by the creamy mushroom sauce that was spreaded on top of it. Yum Yum!

Steak with coleslaw and smashed potatoes

Visiting Southwest Traven was enjoyable and perhaps it is located somewhere along the way back to where Im staying. Perhaps for the next try, I will like to try its beer butt chicken. However it is advisable to call in to do reservation as that dish requires a wait of about 40 minutes.


Rating: 4 / 5

Southwest Traven
Location: Tradehub 21, 8 Boon Lay Way #01-33, Singapore 609964