O'bean the Organic Soya Vegetarian Restaurant

Many thanks to the vegetarian pal who brought me here! With a reservation, we need not have to worry about shortage of seats. Having visit couple of Vegetarian Restaurants before, I must say that O'bean has her uniqueness as they incorporate Soya Bean into its organic food. This not only promotes healthy living and they also emphasize that their organic soya milk powder are suitable for people with Gout, Arthritis, Uric Acid & Diabetes.

O'bean

Having Soya as their theme, there are of course lots of Soya Milk in the menu for their beverages. However we thought we might leave the stomach space for food instead as Soya Milk will fill the stomach.

Vit C + Grass Jelly (Cold) - $4.60 / Lime Juice - $4.60

I admit that the first mouthful of it had already blown my mind away. The fragrance braised items was perfectly done without being too salty and was not over powering. Vermicelli was soft and tasty. The hot Claypot was nicely hold in a basket which aids in handling.

 Braised Basil Vermicelli Claypot - $15.80

If you patronizes a vegetarian stall in the Hawker Centres or Coffee Shop, the dish may sound very usual. However, how the set platter stands out from the rest is its their kway is make of Organic Soya Bean served in a bowl of soya. Platter consist of Tau Pok, braised peanuts, preserved veggies, you tiao, beancurd, mock pork belly, braised egg and mock pork intestine.

Teochew Braised Mixed Platter - $7.20 (1 Pax) with Soya Kway Chap - $1.80

Meat Platter

Kway Chap

Their Signature Braised Rice was served in a bowl whereby ingredients was nicely stack up on top of the rice though it was compact, it makes sharing a little bit challenging over here. It comes with a set with a bowl of soup and rice includes ingredients like mock pork belly, preserved vegetables, seaweed, coriander and pickles vegetables with pineapple. It's quite special for me and as a soup lover, the bowl of soup was natural sweetness made up of sweetcorn, carrot, old cucumber, red dates and chinese wolf-berry.

Signature Braised Rice  - $3.30

Signature Braised Rice

Signature Braised Rice

Braised Rice

Served like a plate of 10 inch pizza loaded with coriander as garnishing. Seaweed Century Fried Egg was fluffy and interesting in presentation. Does it look like a pizza to you? There was not very heady smell of the century egg and texture of the egg resembles a good plate of cooked oyster egg.

Seaweed Century Egg Fried Egg - $15.80

Coming to the last item of our order, we had a hot dessert. It was served in an elegant glass, topped with red bean and a little scoop of vanilla ice cream. It really makes the experience of having "Pulut Hitam" unique. The dessert by itself was non-sweetened and tasted bland, however, if you scoop some ice cream and pair it up with the dessert, it goes very well!

Ice Cream Black Glutinous Rice & Red Bean (Hot) - $6.60

One side note, their dish uses a lot of coriander leaves as garnish and totally a perfect choice for someone who likes it. For those who do not like the taste, perhaps it will be better to let the servers know and remove them.

Having said so, being always curious about vegetarian food, they always amazed me with their mock meat dishes and now, together with Organic Soya Milk, the idea of old school kind of vegetarian (Bee Hoon and a selection of preferred vegetables) had been completely removed in my mind. As this promotes healthy lifestyle, it's no wonder that we need a reservation prior to our dining to avoid disappointment!

Rating: 4 / 5

O'bean
Location: 30-32 Tanjong Pagar Road 088453

Tino's Pizza Cafe

Hiding at one unobscured corner of the mall, you will get to find Tino's Pizza at the first level of Tiong Bahru Plaza. Interior of the Cafe is comfortable and you can still feel that its a near shop as everything smells and look new in the eyes.

Tino's Pizza Cafe

From the cafe name we all knew that they are serving pizza Pizza and what's so special about it? They are made base on Italian Feast, hand-tossed and baked.

Wall in the Cafe

Behind the usual dining table in the cafe, you will get to see the modern setup we had nowadays in Tino's Pizza Cafe itself. It gives an modern old school feel here with metal chairs and high dining table.

Interior

Ordering their Set recommended for 2 Pax at $34.90 which consist of 1 Neapolitan Pizza, 1 Spaghettini and 2 soups of the day. There is another set which is cheaper at $29.90 where Spaghettini is replaced by Tapas.

Adding on to the set with drinks at additional cost, do not forget to try out their signature drink. It's quite refreshing with a mixutre of pineapple, lemon and melon tea.

Drinks - Pineapple Lemon Melon Tea ($4.50) & Tino's Iced Fruit Tea ($4.50)

Soup of the day was cream of mushroom drizzled with some fragrant herbs. Pleasant and delighted with the refreshing taste of the sour cream that was poured into the soup. What's more, instead of having some toast for pairing we had pita breads! Cool!

Soup of the Day - Cream of Mushroom

We did not regret ordering this! This hearty Duck Caponata pizza (6 Slices) thin crust were well executed. The unique roast duck recipe coupled with mozzarella, broccoli, capsicums, onions and basil. Color of the pizza is eye catching. Pizza as compared to the usual chains pizza restaurants, Tino's Pizza Crust are more to the chewy texture but that does not mean it is not crispy.

Duck Caponata

Indulge in Tino's smoked chicken pesto recipe with al dente pasta served in hot pan. The handles of the pan was dressed up with silicon to prevent the server from scaling. Be careful not to hurt yourself by touching the steel pan too, its very hot.

Pesto Pollo

Topped your pasta with the bottle of shaved cheese on the table and enjoy this plate of yummy food. Love the riots of texture I had over from the plate of pasta, especially the walnut that change the way of enjoying it with crunchiness.

Close up

Ambiance was not too bad, quiet. Service is also prompt and overall, its a pleasant experience with Tino. Will be back for its pasta!

Rating: 3.25 / 5

Tinos Pizza Cafe
Location: Tiong Bahru Plaza 302 Tiong Bahru Road #01-160 Singapore 168732

Royal London Duck

Royal London Duck is another venture opened by Fei Siong Group after parterd its way from their debuted London Fat Duck's Singapore outpost at Scotts Square last year. Besides the main one in Mandarin Gallery, they have spreaded their wings into the neighbourhood malls and have more than just 1 restaurant now.

Royal London Duck

Interior and Furnishings

Royal London Duck

Drawer for Utensils

Honey Lemon and Yuan Yang

Excite your taste buds with some pieces of Royal London Duck. The Roasted duck has crispy skin and leans towards more of the thin version without fatty meat. It sits among a pool of the home made duck sauce that tasted quite subtle. And for real, dab the meat on the sweet plum sauce given for some delicious treats!

Royal London Duck (Quarter) - $13

Delicious Duck

This is not your typical Char Siew. Not only was it well caramelized, it was well marinated too. It lends a sweet taste with lean meat and less fat seen. However the bad side was that a small quantity cost a bomb. Perhaps that's the most expensive Char Siew I ever hard.

Signature Honey BBQ Pork - $16.80

Like any Cantonese fare, you can get the typical bowls of Congee from the restaurant. I had the Pig Giblet Congee which consist of liver, intestine, stomach and minced meat balls. Texture of Congee is smooth and generally plain in taste. Add some Soya Sauce to enhance it.

Pig's Giblet Congee - $8.80

There was no option to have a combination of meat platter for us to order and thus we order a plate of Crispy Pork Rice to tried out all their roasted delicacies. Rice was plain and was shock that if you are ordering plain rice separately, it costs $2.50. Crispy Pork was served in big cubes size.

Crispy Pork Rice - $8.80

Crispy Pork Cubes

Overall, not very much of a WOW factor to me on their roasted delights. Perhaps if I were to revisit, I will like to try out their Dim Sum Items.

Rating: 3 / 5

Royal London Duck
Location: 1 Bukit Batok Central Link West Mall #02-04  , Singapore 658713

Wei Wei Shi Pin 威威食品

This is a long overdue stall that I always wanted visit and never got the chance as my previous attempts failed due to that they were closed for the business day. Popular for their Seafood Soup and highly raved in the social media industry, it's time to try now. Wei Wei is located very near our Woodlands Checkpoint and you won't be surprise by the number of people ahead of your order, thus expect to be patient here.

Wei Wei Shi Pin

The service makes waiting time worse. We had ordered 2 different kind of Seafood Soup with add on but when they came, both were the same (Crayfish Seafood Soup with Scallop). The server insisted that it is different and told us to take it, then he walked away. That wasn't cool as he was shortchanging us with the price differences. We took back one of the bowl and said that it was wrong. The one who was taking the order had make a mess and the cook mentioned he will prepare the right one for us. After another round of wait, he served the Red Grouper Seafood Soup but without the Scallop. In the end, the server made a return trip to have it add on.

Crayfish Seafood soup looked yummy with other ingredients like fish maw, cherry tomatoes, prawn, fish meat and big pieces of minced meat ball. The light orange colored soup kind of remind me of Sin Kee Seafood soup which I like. Amount of soup was quite miserable and on the very fish mouthful of it, it broke the record of highest level intake of salt that I had from one spoon. Horribly Salty!

Crayfish Seafood Soup - $10

Crayfish Seafood Soup - $10 with Scallop add on at $2

Yes finally, the bowl of fish seafood soup is served with our additional scallop ordered. I'm kind of upset with its soup as the salt level of this bowl was a vast different from the Crayfish Seafood Soup. It turned out to be more diluted, sweet and tasted decent of course. No doubt fish were fresh, the difference in their soup base was something I would never have expected.

Red Grouper Seafood Soup - $12 with Scallop add on at $2

Another View

What a mess! It was an unpleasant experience to have series of blunders just to get a bowl of seafood soup. Its inconsistency taste and especially attitude of service were a disaster. This seafood soup was something I longed to eat this but ended up, the ideal craving was kind of smashed and I wont be back definitely. What a wasted and disappointing trip.

Rating: 2.5 / 5

Wei Wei Shi Pin 威威食品 
Location: Blk 4a Food Centre, Woodlands Centre Road, #02-11 Singapore 731006

Chin Choon Prawn Noodle [Moved]

Lately a colleague of mine had given me a new breakfast idea / choice in Upper Bukit Timah area when we were sharing about food findings in the district. I was told about the famous prawn noodle in the vicinity and usually it runs out quite fast in the morning. If you are familar with the area, its just along the stretch of shop houses where Ga-Hock Seafood is.

Coffee Shop

I experience the kind of human traffic as what my colleague had mentioned. The coffeeshop is fullhouse and there was constant flow of diners coming in for breakfast and parking along the side of the coffeeshop was packed.

Stall

We have ordered prawn noodles with pork intestine and pork meat. The prawn noodle soup was rather clear and tasted decent, light in flavour unlike the usual ones I had, they had the full loaded prawn taste.

Prawn with pork and intestine noodles - $6

Chin Soon Prawn Noodle has a different style in their prawn mee especially the soup where it was sweet in taste and wholesome.

Closer to the ingredients

Having tried its soup version, I also heard good comments on its dry version. Besides having prawn noodle in the coffeeshop, there are other option like duck noodles stall and Indian Muslim stall selling roti prata.

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Chin Choon Prawn Noodle
Location: Chun Sheng Yuan Eating House, 826 Upper Bukit Timah, Singapore 678154

New Hong Kong Street Chun Kee Restaurant

With so many Hong Kong Street Tze Char Restaurant around, it almost had me confused and I realized that each of them operates differently, at least for the dishes that it specialized in. While I was walking down the eateries along Bukit Timah, I notice a few changes in the shop and New Hong Kong Street Chun Kee Restaurant looks something new to me. We took a look at the menu and was told their White Bee Hoon is similar the popular one from White Restaurant in Sembawang.

Buah Kedondong - $3.50

There are mini sides that you can order. The selection is good as it is ideal for little bites as well as people like me who are dining as a pair and cannot finish even the smallest available plate of side. Prawn Rolls were relatively average in taste, deep fried to golden brown and you will be given the sweet sauce for it.

Prawn Roll - $5

Quite an disappointment for their salted egg yolk sotong as it was a total lacklustre. Salted egg taste was not very prominent and quite bland. Luckily we order the small bites and portion was still fine with us.

Salted Egg Sotong - $6

If you are comparing this plate of white bee hoon to the popular one in Sembawang, its a far cry. We topped up the plate with seafood like Cray Fish and Lala at additional cost. To think that they told me this is their signature dish, I'm kind of disappointed. The Bee Hoon and its gravy totally lack the potent seafood taste.

White Bee Hoon (Medium) - $10

Freshness of the Crayfish was not as expected. As an overall, the dining experience was below my expectation and it will be kind of the first and last time to be there.

Slipper Lobster - $4 , Lala - $2

Rating: 2.5 / 5

New Hong Kong Street Chun Kee Restaurant
Location: 20 Cheong Chin Nam Road Singapore 599744

D'SHANGHAI [Closed]

Thinking about the number of Dim Sum Places we had went in Johor Bahru and we decided to "refresh" our to go list with somewhere we have not been before. No doubt that D'Shanghai is also available in KSL City and Permas Jaya, we went to the one at Sutera Mall. Taking advantage of the attractive currency exchange rate, we planned to have some food in Johor while spending our time on a public holiday there no doubt there is additional charges required over the Customs now.

D'Shanghai

While walking to Sutera Mall, I bet that we won't miss out this oriental looking entrance painted in bright red. It looks grand and that's D'Shanghai. The place was quite crowded however, there were enough seats line up at the waiting area.

Menu

"Not Bad Eat" (Translated from Hokkien: Buay Pai Jiak) ! Sweet with marinates accentuating deep enough. I would say this was a perfect choice as I have been longing for "Paper Chicken" like this for some time.

Deep-Fired Chicken in Tin Foil 梧洲纸包鸡- RM 10.50

Meat

Porridge was smooth and awesome. Even though there was not too much of lean meat in in, the texture of the porridge standing alone is good. Pairing along with the bits of Century Eggs, shredded gingers had been placed in the porridge too,

Century Egg with Pork Porridge 皮蛋瘦肉粥 - RM 4.80

Generously soaked in the sauce and I'm simply addicted to the smooth rice rolls encasing the lean pieces of Char Siew. Fragrant and tasty, if I did not order this, I would have miss something good.

Steamed Char Siew Riced Rolls 广州叉烧肠粉- RM 6.50

Initially, I had given this dish alot of hope while browsing through the menu but in reality it was such a disappointment. The combination of meat floss, century eggs together with the sauce tasted not quite pleasant for me. The texture of the Tofu was not as smooth as what I would have expected.

Cold Tofu with Century Egg 皮蛋冰豆腐 - RM 7.80

There are 2 versions of Liu Sha Bao, the fried or the steamed version. It was not too fascinating as these buns seem to be run of the mill. More like those pre-packet item that you can easily get from the super market shelves.

Steamed Liu Sha Bao 皇朝流沙包 - RM 6.50

Simple with fish roes and not too oily.

"Siew Mai" Pork Dumpling 鱼子干蒸烧卖皇 - RM 5.20

Pretty ordinary for me. To eat or to skip, I will leave the decision to you.

D'Shanghai Prawn Dumpling 大上海虾饺皇 - RM 5.80

One of the recommended items by the Chef, Xiao Long Bao is good with tasty soup and as usual the fragile thin later of skin that needs us to be additional careful when picking them up from the tray. Taste wise, its of average and of course nothing comparable to Din Tai Fung's.

Signature Xiao Long Bao 灌汤小笼包- RM 5.20

It was supposed to come last when we have finished our meal. However, I guess our request was not taken into thus the mistake made. Nevertheless, the bowl of Hashima Dessert is tasty in its sweet red dates longans taste and in its chilled condition.

Hashima Red Lotus Soup 红莲雪蛤- RM 10.00

Overall, environment was good, spacious and cosy with friendly services. In fact, I felt quite comfortable as their ambience was good and embraced by elegant furnishings and with glass panels along the restaurant, the natural light coming into the restaurant makes me feel good. If you want to dine in air-conditioned place and in big groups, D'Shanghai will be for your consideration.

D'Shanghai
Location: Lot L1-501, Sutera Mall, No. 1 , Jalan Sutera Tanjung 8/4, Taman Sutera Utama, 81300 Skudai, Johor Bahru.