Lunch at Raku Japanese Restaurant & Bar – Greenwood Ave – 20 August 2009

Wanted to go to Le Braceria for lunch but instead ended up at Raku Japanese Restaurant & Bar. Have not been to this Raku though I have been a couple of times to their first outlet over at the Holland Village area. But those were a few years ago and I am not sure if the outlet at the Holland V area is still there.

When the two of us stepped in at about 12.30pm, the restaurant was half filled (can also say half empty;-)). The interior décor is dark which is the same as its Holland outlet but it looked a bit more spacious than the Holland outlet if my recollection serves me well. As usual, we asked to sit at the counter so that we could see what they have and how the chefs are preparing the food.
I wanted to ask for an Omakase course but decided against it as we did not want to eat so much. The lady manager recommended a couple of dishes which accordingly to her were very fresh and some were their specialties.

They gave us a Nama Uni Sushi (Japanese vegetable salad). I thought that this was free as I didn’t order it. It was part of the bill;-(. Nevertheless, I quite like the salad and find the dish cold and refreshing. It was a nice starter with such a hot weather that day.

Next dish was an Arakabu sashimi. I was told that the Arakabu is in the same grouping of fish as the Kinki (which I love) and that’s why I ordered it. We observed the chef deboning and preparing the Arakabu in front of us. We suspect him to be relatively new as he was deboning the fish very slowly and not that skillful. We didn’t really like the taste of the Arakabu as it was not as sweet as we expected. Nevertheless it was crunchy. The bones were later used as a base for clear soup and again we find the soup not to our liking. I should have asked them to steam the fish instead.

Next on the table was Tsubugai (a type of Japanese seashell) sashimi. The chef separated the meat from the intestines and the intestines were soaked in soy sauce. I quite like the intestines. They tasted like century eggs albeit a bit harder.

After the Tsubugai, the dishes came too fast for our liking. I guess the staff was not experienced in observing the eating pace of the customers. This is something that should not happen in a Japanese restaurant. Some of the dishes are not meant to be taken together as they have different flavors.

We were given the tenderloin beef teppanyaki, the Nama Hotate Miso (grilled scallop with the shell and seasoned with miso), and a tray of uni sushi, ikura (salmon) belly sushi, toro (tuna belly) sushi, mekajiki (swordfish) sushi almost all at the same time. So, if you are into Japanese food, you will know some of the dishes will overwhelm the others. And because all the dishes came at the same time, they filled up the space we have at the counter! Then we have to hurrying consuming them as Japanese food will not taste nice if one leave them for toolong. Sigh! BIG BIG SIGH!

However, I like the tenderloin beef teppanyaki . This was the best dish of the lunch. It was “teppaned” nicely and juicy.

The Nama Hotate Miso was too sweet but still okay for me. The toro sushi was a big letdown. It did not taste like toro at all, did not look fresh and was dry with an after taste in my mouth.

Will I go back again? I don’t think so; unless one of my customers need to have a quick Japanese lunch and does not like to travel far for it. I rather travel a bit further to Matsuo-san or pay more over at Tatsuya to satisfy my Japanese food craving.

A Visit to a Pu'Er Tea centre in Kunming, Yunnan - 22 July 2009

When in Kunming, you have to pay a visit to a Pu’er tea shop. So the Yunnan Luyu Tea Culture Exchange Centre was where we all ended up in the afternoon of 22 July 2009. Our guide told us that the research centre is run by the Yunnan Agricultural University. Of course, trust the business-minded Chinese to also sell Pu’er teas to the visitors to make some tourist money and commission for the guides. From the look of the place, I think the various Pu’er tea there are the real stuff.

The centre is like a tea museum depicting the history of Pu’er tea in Yunnan. On display were the large leaves which are processed into Pu’er tea leaves,

the old tea horse route which was used to transport the tea leaves to various parts of China,

the various types of tea packagings,

the various grades of Pu’er tea , the types of tools and weights to package the tea leaves,

the types of transportation used by the locals to supply Pu’er teas to various parts of China etc.

We were given a presentation by the centre on the history and health benefits of Pu’er tea which inevitably led to us making many purchases. Good marketing by the folks there. My boss was so impressed that he wanted to employ one of the presenters (hahahhaha).

I must say that my knowledge of Pu’er tea increased substantially from that visit. Of course, substantially lah if you know nothing much in the first place ;-).

Drinking Pu’er tea on a daily basis can maintain and improve one’s health and it is said that it can prevent some types of cancers especially the aged tea leaves (shown below is supposedly a 20 year old 2 kg aged Pu-er tea leaves (this packaging is called a "brick")

The 20 year old Pu-er tea brick is expensive and thus to "add value", it is packed into a small nice wooden box.

I know quite a few of us in that group who visited the centre are now drinking aged Pu’er tea on a regular basis. Cheers!

Pluots????? - 14 August 2009

Was at my usual favourite fruit outlet on Friday afternoon. This time around, I bought some Oregon blueberries, Canada cherries and California pluots. Also bought passion fruits and a miniature watermelon from another shop. Photo above shows 2 ripe passion fruits and 3 pluots.

Pluots??? I had no clue what pluots are and thought they are apricots (I was 30% right). There is no such entry in both my Oxford and Chambers pocket dictionaries. A quick google revealed that pluots are a hybrid of plums (70%) and apricots (70%). They are highly sweet. The pluots that I bought have a initial sour taste followed by sweetness. They are juicy. Read that they are full of vitamins A and C and are cholesterol and sodium free and very low fat content. Definitely this is another fruit that I will like. They are only available from late May to September and growth in the Central Vally in California.

Penfolds Grange Wine Dinner at St Pierre – 13 August 2009

While having wines at Petro Centre the other week, Alain asked if we could like to have a Penfolds Grange Dinner over at St Pierre. Of course we all jumped into it when we were told that there will be Grange wines in the 70s, 80s and 90s with Emmanuel Stroobant at the kitchen.

And so it was a table for ten at St Pierre and what a stupendous dinner it turned out to be. It was a 9 course dinner and every course was paired with great wines.

We started with Amelia fruit tomato with fleur de sel and Japanese tuna carpaccio and paired with a Meursault 2003 Domaine et Selection made by Coche Dury. Yes, the one and only Coche Dury. Any white burgundy made by him will be excellent! Thanks to Alain who unselfishly contributed this bottle ;-).

Next came roasted king scallop with vanilla scented parsnip puree and grilled chicken jus and paired with Penfolds Grange 2000 and 1999. It is seldom that someone combines scallop and chicken for a dish but the chef in black was able make a glorious combination. However, every one of us was throwing praises at the Grange 2000. The wine was simply delicious. We will definitely be looking out for this wine.

The third course was a low temperature hen’s egg with fricasse of girolles and black truffle marmalade. This dish was my favourite that night.

Eggs with truffles will always be one of my favourite dishes. Emmanuel was generous with the truffles so I suspect that the truffles may have come from Australia……kekekeke. This was paired with Grange 1994.

After that, we had the oyster scented mini risotto with bottarga. I am still getting used to the taste of the bottarga and find it overwhelming on the risotto. I have to remind myself that I still have some bottarga in my fridge which I have to consume soon.

The risotto was paired with the wine of the night (to most of us) - the Grange 1971. This wine is 28 year old but it still has a lot of oomph in it. It was simply heavenly drinking it and a few of us quietly asked for a second pour. I think this wine will still go on for at least another 10 years.

The braised Boston lobster with shiraz dressing, glazed baby turnip and vanilla scented Fiji apple was next and it was paired with Grange 1991 and 1996. Lobster is also one of my favorite seafood and I wished there was more lobster meat ;-).

The lobster course was followed by roasted pigeon with caramelized figs and braised ratte potato in pigeon sauce which was paired with Grange 1983 and 1986.

I don’t like pigeon and try to avoid it as much as possible; reason being that I hate the “wild game” taste. You sometime get this type of taste when eating a duck but the pigeon “wild game” taste is always so much stronger for my liking. But this was different. It was roasted to perfection. The “wild game” taste was barely there and it was juicy good. Many pigeons I tasted were usually tough and dry.

It had been a long time since I finished a pigeon dish placed in front of me. The Grange 1983 was great but I think it should be decanted for a longer period.

By this time, it was getting late into the night and we were all quite full and tipsy. But we were all eagerly waiting for the star dish of the night – certified ribeye wagyu beef from Japan and cooked for 72 hours with wasabi scented gnocchi, Madeira emulsion and organic broccoli puree. But it came out to be a disappointment for most of us as there was simply too much fat in it. I guessed because we were very full and high on alcohol by that time. All of us dreaded taking in more fat even though I took a piece and found it agreeable. The wagyu paired with Grange 1990 and 1998. The Grange 1998 is another wine that I remind myself to look out for.

It was way past 11 pm and most of us could not touch the desserts and 24 months old comte “trou de souris”. Luckily it was not epoisses in which I would have wallop it;-). I settled for a cup of good old coffee to keep my head clear for going home.

Overall this dinner was excellent especially with such excellent range of Penfolds Grange wines. It is only once in many moons that one will come across such a range of wines in one sitting.

Homemade Lor Mee for lunch - 10 August 2009

We were so excited when Mom said that she will be making lor mee for lunch today. Obviously a couple of appointments for the day were cancelled so that we could all be home for Mom’s lor mee.

Mom seldom makes lor mee as it involves a lot of preparation. One will need braised belly pork, eggs, fish, fish cakes, garlic, potato pastel spring onions, celery, bean sprouts, dark soya sauce, light soya sauce, thick yellow noodle, chili – minced and cut, pepper and a couple of others. It can easily take more than two hours to prepare and less than ten minutes to consume a bowl of delicious lor mee.

My Mom’s lor mee can easily beat lots of other lor mee in the food courts and hawker centres; and I think it is better than my favourite lor mee stall at Old Airport Road;-).

What A FRUITful Day! - 7 August 2009

My fruits inventory is getting very low. So with some self-declared available time for the afternoon, I gathered 4 colleagues and squeezed ourselves into my car and drove down to my favorite fruits shop – Freshmart – over at Pasir Panjang Wholesale Centre. On our way, we stopped at the food court over at Fusionopolis for a quick lunch. The variety of food stalls there is actually quite wide and the food is actually not bad. No wonder they have a good lunch crowd. I tried the Indian naan with mutton and loved it. Will definitely go back and try the other stalls.
Reached Freshmart at about 1.15 pm. As usual Lilian is there to serve us.

I love to buy fruits from Freshmart as the prices are about 40%-50% cheaper than that at Cold Storage. Moreover, the fruits are fresher as we are buying direct from the importers. They sell to the surpermarkets and fruit stalls. They import the fruits from US, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Pakistan etc etc but not from Malaysia as we can easily get these from elsewhere.

This time around, for the five of us, we bought –
· 4 crates of Canada cherries (5 kg per crate). They are one of the biggest cherries I ever seen;
· 4 boxes of Pakistani honey mangoes (5 mangoes per box). The shapes of the mangoes do not look nice and we were told that they are very sweet.
· 1 crate of American strawberries (4 boxes per crate and 20 strawberries per box). Again these are very big and with the stalk and leaves intact.
· 10 boxes of champagne grapes.
· 10 boxes of sweet prunes (1 kg per box)

Of course, I have the biggest share with half the allocation. Popped by Andrew’s place to give him some of the fruits.

Was trying the fruits just now at home. Simply love all except just one slight complaint that the Canada berries will be fantastic if not for them being a bit soft. It may be due to me putting them way too long in the car boot as I was having dinner at the in-laws’ place. Let’s see how tomorrow after being in the fridge for a whole night.

Planning to go back to Freshmart again next week;-). Yeah!

Lunch-Jing Dian Seafood Restaurant, Sungei Kadut-6 August 2009

Thinking hard for a lunch place today. Suddenly recalled a recent TV food programme in which two celebrities drive around Singapore to review food. One of the restaurants featured is a newly opened seafood restaurant in Sungei Kadut. Sungei Kadut??!!!! That area is like “ulu” with lots of furniture factories and people like us on the street only go there infrequently on weekends to look at furniture. Nevertheless, without actually knowing where the restaurant location is, William and I decided to try our luck. TV programme introduced one must be good, right?! WHAT A MISTAKE, WHAT A MISTAKE, BIG BIG MISTAKE!!!!!!

At first, we could not find the place so we stopped the car to ask a lady and she pointed us towards the newly opened International Furniture Centre (IFC). She guessed that the restaurant must be there. Turned out to be right.

When we stepped into the restaurant, there was just maybe about 5 tables of patrons. We were given the menu which looks similar to that of House of Lobsters. But we do not think they are related to the House of Lobsters. We ordered the set for two which includes lobsters porridge and a vegetable dish. The Chinese waitress (nowadays nearly all waitresses come from China) recommended their so called signature chicken dish which looks like miniature chicken drum sticks. The restaurant began to fill up and it was downhill all the way until we stepped out of it.
First, I don’t like the tables and chairs. Either the table is too high or the chair too low, I find it difficult to place my hands on the table. The seat of the chair is too deep. I have difficulty leaning back. If Jo comes along, my bet is that she will feel very uncomfortable since she is short.
Second, they have this device on the table that one can press the small buttons to call for the waitress to order, make payment etc. This is actually the same device that they have at the Thai Shark Fin Restaurant over at Goodwood Park Hotel but with one major difference. You see, whenever, you press a button, a series of jingles that last for nearly 20 seconds will sound out from a speaker in the dining area of the restaurant. And the sound is irritating loud!!! And we had to sit just a metre away from the freaking speaker hanging over us! We complained to the waitress several times about the noise but to no avail.

Second, the waiting time for the three dishes was simply way too long! We nearly finished half the teapot of Pu’er before the lobster porridge came. And the porridge was nowhere near that of House of Lobsters which is much tastier and comes at the right sizzling hot temperature! It could have been better if Jing Dian porridge is a tad hotter. I think they used a lower grade of rice than that of House of Lobsters to make the porridge.

We finished our porridge but the signature chicken dish and the vegetable dish were nowhere to be seen! Each of us took about 3 bowls of porridge and the other dishes were not served!!! We were not the only one impatiently waiting for the food. Pity our nearest table of 6 who came in about 10 minutes later than us. They did not even have any dish on their table even after we footed the bill and left the restaurant. This was like more than 45 minutes after they placed their orders. If I was in their shoes, I would have walked out of the restaurant.
I shall not comment further on the so-called signature dish or the vegetable dish except to say that I cannot understand how they could call it “signature dish”.

And this is not the end. We went to the cashier counter to make payment thinking that it could save us some time as we already spent nearly an hour and a half waiting for 3 simple dishes. Guess what; we have to wait 6-7 minutes for someone to appear at the counter. There was also another customer waiting there but he was trying to tell them to serve the rest of the dishes. The waiter brought up a list of the dishes he ordered and asked him what had been served!!!! Goodness!!!

And guess what again, we were told by the waitress that the boss is also lunching with some guests at one of the tables. Gosh, he cannot see with his own eyes what is happening at the restaurant and that his customers that day are most likely not to come back again???? I did not see any captain around to manage the restaurant and I think he better go and find a good one. Even though the food is so-so but the place has potential as it is the only restaurant around there but if the service continues to be what it is today, then good luck. I am definitely not going back again if not for a long while. I am still wondering how come there is a TV programme on the place!

After today’s lobster porridge lunch, I really miss House of Lobsters which has closed its Republic Polytechnic branch. They have good food but it is not the right location for them.