Posts Tagged ‘Raffles City Restaurants’

Watami Japanese Casual Restaurant at Raffles City

February 12th, 2011 365days2play

Watami is another one of those Japanese casual restaurants so prevalent in Singapore. Their special niche is that they offer up quite a number of interesting hot pots. They also have some Korean dishes such as Bi Bim Bap! The restaurant at Raffles City is pretty big, but you don’t find it cavernous, as it kinda occupies a long and narrow strip, previously occupied by Kushiya. It’s right next to Din Tai Fung. I find the lighting a bit too stark bright. As you can see, my photos have suffered due to the harsh lighting.

Croquette

Watami - Cream Croquette

Cream Croquette Balls $6.80 – These came piping hot and were so delicious. I loved the creamy inner core while the outer shell was crispy. They were excellent while hot. Unfortunately I left 1 on the plate while I devoured my mains. When I got back to it again, the inner core had sort of mushed together with the outer skin such that it was no longer liquidy inside.

Watami - Gyu Eringi Kushi

Gyu Eringi Kushi $4.80 – Mushroom stems wrapped in thin beef slices. Very tasty and the mushrooms had a good crunch. I wonder who first developed the idea to wrap meat or bacon around mushrooms. Seems to be a match made in heaven.

Watami - Mixed Sashimi Rice

Mixed Sashimi Rice $13.80 – This was an absolute star. Firstly, the sashimi rice was flavoured with some sweet vinegar so it was more tasty than usual. Just eating the rice alone without anything else was already quite fabulous. 2ndly, they were quite generous with the amount of seafood provided. There was salmon, squid, sweet prawn, egg and something else which I forgot. Absolutely loved the prawns, they were so flavourful and I could just taste the strong “sea” flavour in them. Still dreaming about it now actually. If there’s one thing wrong, it’s that I would have liked just a little bit more rice since it was so nice.

Watami - Unagi Pot RiceWatami - Unagi Pot Rice (2)

Unagi Pot rice $12.80 – The Partner ordered this. The waitress asked us if we minded waiting 25 minutes. It was a bit long but we said okay. After 15 minutes, they brought out this contraption. We thought, “hey that didn’t take too long after all”. To our horror, the waitress proceeded to tell us to THEN wait 25 minutes for the rice grains inside to cook from scratch! While the unagi pot rice did taste very good in the end, I wouldn’t want to have to wait 40 minutes just for this! Is this some new tactic to save on employing extra chefs?

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Canelé Pâtisserie Chocolaterie

November 21st, 2010 365days2play

Canele is finally back at Raffles City again. In fact, most of the restaurants and eateries are now open, except for the bit next to the the original fountain where Out of the Pan used to be. The basement is so changed it is like being in a completely different mall altogether. Some old names are still here, such as Cedele, Aerins, The Pizza Place and Teahouse The Asian Kitchen, with new decor and layout. There are a lot of new takaway stalls: – Best Fries Forever, Chewy Junior, Awfully Chocolate, 1A Curry Puff and Potato Depot to name a few. You won’t go hungry when you are at Raffles City Shopping Mall, that you can be sure.

Anyway, back to Canele. They have this maroon pink decor going on, which looks quite nice. The lampshades they have all over the place look pretty and makes the place feel special. And they still have the huge glass counter with different coloured macaroons displayed neatly and all calling out your name. It’s so distracting!

Menu-wise, it seems the same as before so I knew exactly what to order.

Canele - Croque Madame

  Croque Madame $13.50 – I used to like this dish, but now I feel that I am just eating empty calories with very little nutrients. It’s basically bread drenched with lots of cheese and a few slices of ham.

Canele - Cheese Burger

Canele Cheese Burger $15.50 – The burger was nice but pretty average. The chips were great though. Based on the texture, it seems the chef sliced and fried these potato chips onsite instead of getting them from a packet.

Canele - Carrot Water

Mint and carrot water is complementary

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Double Bay Australian Dining & Bar

November 6th, 2010 365days2play

I’d been avoiding Double Bay for a long while now after my 1st visit there. Not that the food wasn’t good, it probably was. I have a thing about fish. I only like certain types, and if it isn’t the type I like, no matter how well you dress it up, I will not be able to fully appreciate it 100%. It happens they didn’t have any type of fish I liked, so I never went back again.

Recently, my colleagues chose Double Bay as the venue for a birthday celebration. I didn’t object (anyway I was outnumbered), since I was hoping to find some other dish I would like. Turned out to be a pretty good evening after all.

Double Bay - Mussels in Tomato Broth

The Mussels in Tomato broth was really good. We ordered this as a starter, but apart from the broth being a little hard to share, I really have nothing but good words for this. The tomato broth was so tasty I wish I could just take the pot away from the rest and slurp up the goodness myself. The mussels were very fresh and had a nice bite to it. Apparently, no salt is added to this dish at all. All the flavours come naturally from the mussels. It can get too salty sometimes so when ordering, get the chef to give a good rinse to the mussels so there are no hidden traces of seawater.

Double Bay - Barred Cod  Double Bay - Barred Cod (2)

You know what? It seems one can make the same mistake twice. I ordered the Barred Cod, thinking that it was cod, my favourite fish. Turns out it isn’t cod at all! Man…I was quite disappointed because I felt the fish was tough and cardboardy. The pureed potato was nice to look and tasted good, but it didn’t fill the gap. It felt more like a thick sauce rather than a substantial staple.

Double Bay - Pasta Aglio Olio with Squid

Double Bay - Pasta Aglio Olio with Squid (2)

Pasta Aglio Olio with Squid – This looks like a really healthy aglio olio, with all the olives and tomatoes. The squid was pretty bland though. Even the waitress knew this and had warned my colleague in advance not to order this dish. Nevertheless, the next time I’m there, I’m going to order this. Shall treat this as a delicious vegetarian pasta, and if the squid is done well, that’s a bonus.

Double Bay - Crabmeat Linguine

Double Bay - Crabmeat Linguine (2)

Crabmeat linquine – The ultimate star of the main courses we ordered that day. Chock full of crabmeat! Everyone who ordered this loved it!

Double Bay - Fish and Chips

Fish and Chips – Can’t remember what the person said. But I personally would advise against ordering fish and chips so that you can test the true skills of the chef.

Double Bay - Banoffee Pie

Banoffee Pie – It’s not often you get something like this in Singapore, although it’s common in the UK. According to Wikipedia, Banoffee pie is an English pastry based dessert made from bananas, cream, toffee from boiled condensed milk (or dulce de leche), either on a pastry base or one made from crumbled biscuits and butter. Damn good, made tastier by 7 people having to share this.

Double Bay - Chocolate Cake Molten Chocolate Cake – Doesn’t look like the usual molten chocolate cake, but rest assured this was oozing with chocolatey goodness. I gotta come back again to Double Bay just for their desserts!

Double Bay - Hot Chocolate

Hot Chocolate

Double Bay - Hot Tea  Hot
Tea to wind down

Double Bay Australian Dining & Bar

Tel : +65 6334 6530

Fax: +65 6334 6107

Raffles City Shopping Centre

252 North Bridge Road, #01-22A

Hours of Operation
Monday to Sunday
11.30am to 2.00am

Double Bay Facebook

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O’Gambinos

June 30th, 2010 365days2play

I’ve been so busy lately I haven’t even have time to have a relaxing dinner meal outside, let alone blog. But I know the one thing about blogging is that once you stop for an extended period, it just gets harder and harder to start again. So here I am, attempting to type this in a record 5 minutes.

Today after work, I met up with the Partner for dinner. Raffles City has once again closed off yet another section of its basement so now even the escalator near Starbucks has been closed off. This is apparently done for them to build a connection to the Esplanade MRT, or so the signs say from what I saw from afar. I think only Out of the Pan, Din Tai Fung, and the restaurants near Shokudo are still opened.

Anyway, we decided to eat at O’Gambinos in the end. It was 7.30pm but we were surprised that we were the 2nd group of customers to be there for dinner. The few other occupied tables were people having drinks. It must be because people think O’Gambinos is some pub or drinking place that more people don’t come here for dinner. But really, the prices and selections are quite good.

The Partner ordered the Grilled Cod, which cost only $26. It was a humongous piece of cod for that price, and the cod was O SO FLAKY I almost regretted not ordering it myself. And considering I am extremely fussy with fish (I hate non oily fish), this was an incredible dish. As for me, I wavered between the lamb chops, shrimp scampi pasta, but I finally ordered the Pork Scallopine with white wine pasta. The pork was quite flavourful, and easy to chew (I find it is easy to overcook pork), and the pasta was al dente. I didn’t find it particularly spectacular, but then I am very fussy about pork. (Ok I think I am very fussy about how all meat should be cooked). I personally preferred the cod and I will definitely order that, or the cod fish and chips the next time. It is rare to find fish and chips made with cod, so  I will most definitely go back for that when the fish craving strikes.

Fish lovers can also to Double Bay next door, which specialises in a lot of fish dishes. I vaguely recall I didn’t enjoy my fish dish there because I found the fish too cardboardy. But don’t take my word for it because most other people don’t find fish cardboardy. But when I say a piece of fish is good, it is really good! Heh!

Total time taken for post: 12.5 minutes.

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Sapore Italiano

May 21st, 2010 365days2play

They say that when it comes to food in Singapore, the choices are unlimited. This is technically true if you consider every single establishment in Singapore. However, when you want something quick, fast and within like walking distance from the office, the choices are whittled down. And when it comes to places that you have never tried before, you’re pretty much lost for ideas, especially after a long and hard day’s work.

Yesterday, we finally decided to try Sapore Italiano. This Italian restaurant has probably been around for about a year but we just never had the urge to try it out. In fact, I had mistakenly read the name to be Sapporo Italiano when the place first opened. As a result, I was under the impression that it was a kind of fusion Japanese Italian restaurant. Or perhaps an Italian restaurant serving lots of beer? That’s about the only thing I know about Sapporo!.

Anyway, we finally decided to give it a try. The menu looked really promising. There were lots of pasta dishes and pizza dishes. I was particularly pleased to note that they had a number of gnocchi dishes and ravioli dishes on offer too. You seldom see gnocchi around, but I suppose I am comparing them to non-Italian restaurants that happen to serve a lot of pasta.

As you can see from the pictures below, I couldn’t stop myself from ordering the Spinach and Ricotta Ravioli, and the Partner ordered the sliced beef salad. Unfortunately, Sapore Italiano didn’t have the exact dish that I wanted, which was meat ravioli in cream sauce. They had a meat ravioli in tomato sauce and they had vegetarian ravioli in cream sauce, but just no meat ravioli in cream sauce!

The ravioli I ordered turned out to have a very interesting taste, which I think many Singaporeans may not like. Firstly, the ravioli was mostly Ricotta, so if you hate Ricotta, don’t ever take a bite of it. You might think the spinach taste would cover the cheese taste, but the filling is mostly cheese rather than spinach. The Partner tried a ravioli and had some trouble swallowing it. Luckily for me, I have no problem with Ricotta so I quite enjoyed the ravioli. The walnut sauce was very interesting to me. There was no hiding the nutty taste of the walnut. It was very distinct, in addition to the crushed bits of fine walnut mixed into the sauce.

As for the Partner’s beef salad dish, he found the beef tasty but a little too salty.

I think pizza lovers would like Sapore Italiano. Most other diners had ordered pizzas. The ones here are the thin crust type, and they look really humongous and cheesy. I’ll get a pizza the next time I dine here, or I’ll get the Partner to get the pizza while I get the gnocchi.

Finally, a comment on the decor. I didn’t like the decor very much. I happened to be facing 3 very large portraits of what I thought were rather ugly women trying to look sexy. The chairs were also not very comfortable given that they were oddly shaped. I am extremely particular about chairs because of my back problems. Lastly, I thought the lighting was a little too dim for the type of restaurant that Sapore Italiano is. Sapore Italiano looks like a place where groups of friends can hang out, and is certainly not a place for a romantic candlelit dinner. Click here for Sapore Italiano website.

Spinach and Ricotta cheese ravioli in creamy walnut sauce

Sliced beef on rocket salad bed

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