Potatoes

Saveur Art (Review)

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Saveur Art (Review)

I wasn’t sure if I was saveuring the simplicity in the art or the art of simplicity. In more ways than one, Saveur Art as a restaurant is truly a pleasant dining experience. Discrete and notably classy, so different from the many restaurants that tries its best to impress the discerning customer.

The nicely done medium Australian Angus Bavette was served with delicious mash potato and pickled red wine onions. The meal was executed with a technical excellence that only an expert with meats would understand. Simple and absolutely enjoyable. None of the frills of seasonal vegetables as accompaniment.

Maybe it was because it was located in a rather atas place at the iconic ION Orchard (level 4). Or maybe they already decided to set a different experience for their customers, slightly different from their small chain of simple but fantastic French cuisine.

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I ordered the pumpkin soup for starters and I must say it was a welcome surprise with bespoke foam of some sort and a hint of spice. The soup was very smooth and savory, and we all loved it. It kind of reminded me of roasted pumpkin soup but this one tasted really good.

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We loved mushrooms, so we ordered a serving of the sauteed forest mushrooms. It was an acquired taste for the family though, as we were usually familiar with the few varitel types like button, oyster and portobello. So the selection of mushrooms served at Saveur Art took a little getting used to. And as the name suggests, the selection had a deep earthy taste. I like mushrooms so it didn’t bother me all that much but my wife skipped it altogether.

Service-wise, the staffs were discrete and understood service and that meant a lot to me since we eat out quite a fair bit. Two thumbs up for me. I would definitely revisit and try something else, but the Angus holds dear to my heart.

Dancing Crab (Review)

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Dancing Crab (Review)

So it’s Father’s day today and my wifey planned a secret lunch for me – how sweet. I can only say I was happily and pleasantly surprised when she brought me to the Dancing Crab for Father’s day lunch.

At the door I already had visual hallucinations of how it would be like, like the colourful pages of a Singapore Cookbook that I saw at the book store. I can’t wait to sink my teeth into the crabs and be so totally satisfied. This is the second outlet as compared to the first one which is located at some inaccessible location. So this outlet at Orchard Central makes sense for a lot of customers.

The friendly staff made the lunch experience special. Although the pseudo American accent was a tad too much for me. I guess it is after-all an American styled diner with country music and whiny guitar solos.

We ordered the Combo #1 and that came with the Sri Lankan crab, prawns, clams and some vegetables all mixed in a mild spicy ang mo styled tomato sauce. It tasted mildly fusion as I was half expecting to eat boiled crabs and shrimp and had hope to savor in all that fresh juiciness. Maybe we should have chosen a different sauce? Was there a different sauce? I didn’t really check and just said “mild” when prompted for the level of spiciness.

It’s always a good practice to take the least spicy level when you are not familiar with the place. Make sure you start at the bottom and work your way upwards. But the sauce made the crab taste like a chilli crab recipe that kind of “lost its way” while trying to cater to the Boston palate.

Also, I thought our Sri Lankan crab looked a wee bit tiny as compared to the guys they displayed in the fish tank. So we checked with the waitress and she confirmed that it was Sri Lankan.

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So our crab and shrimp combo came in a pot and we were supposed to eat it with our fingers and get our hands dirty. The tables were all covered with plastic sheets so that we can pour (literally) our meal all over the table. Interesting idea, just that the tables were a tad too small for us to do that without having our food falling off the table.

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The mild spicy tomato based sauce kind of masked the taste of the seafood for me and for some reason, I couldn’t enjoy my seafood like I usually do. But you might like it, who knows, different tastebuds and preferences. But it didn’t work the magic for me this time.

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The truffle fries were very nicely done. We loved it – including our toddler. He munched and munched and totally loved it. The truffle flavour in the fries made us want to munch continuously and that is a sign that they got it right.

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The refreshing spin on the lemonades are good. I ordered two flavours, the pink thyme lemonade and the lavender lemonade. And as much as I hate lavender flavour in my foods (because lavender reminds me of the toilet because my office loves using lavender flavoured toilet freshener) the lavender lemonade tasted much nicer than the pink thyme which was strange, but good.

Conclusion

Would I go back there again? Maybe not, but I am sure it appeals to many many people.

Sweet Potato Soup

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Sweet Potato Soup

Comfort foods are what we need when we really need comforting. It’s like the mother/wife replacement when they are not around you or if you are traveling on a long journey to somewhere far away.

One such comfort food would be the humble sweet potato soup eaten more like a dessert more than a meal. It’s the quintessential comfort food that most Singaporeans would know and if you were to smell it from a distance with its signature spicy gingery flavour, it ust oozes goodness and warm feelings of home.

It’s also just about the easiest recipe to make as well. Just wash and cut the sweet potatoes into bite sized cubes, add ginger, sugar and water and its ready to eat when it is softened.

Recipe

Ingredients

2 large pieces of Sweet Potatoes (for one person)
5 thin slices of Ginger
Sugar (level up to you)
Water (just enough to cover the sweet potatoes)

Method

1. Wash and cut sweet potatoes, of course peel the skin first. Cut into bite sized pieces. Easy to eat.

2. Cut 5 thin slices of ginger, any type will do. Add water to cover most of Sweet potato in the pot can already. Too much water is pointless.

3. Add Sugar to taste. Up to you. Once cook, and the test is to be able to smell the fragrance. Then serve.

Bon Appetit!

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Swee Bo sweet potato soup

Wagyu Steak in Anchovy Butter

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Wagyu Steak in Anchovy Butter

Dinner time has been mostly steam fish this boiled vegetable that. So for tonight’s dinner, I am making a very simple wagyu steak in my favourite anchovy butter sauce.

I came across a rather large wagyu steak on offer at Cold Storage and knew at once that this was going to be a very nice dinner. It was on specials and honestly I couldn’t tell if it was any different from the normal priced wagyu steaks. So I got myself a whole slab. Yum.

The problem with steaks of any kind is usually the preparation of the meat. Cooking time is essential if not critical to the success of the dinner. You can fry up all the premium ingredients to complement the main, but if the doneness of the steak fails, you would have also failed miserably.

For the vegetables that accompanied the steak, I had stir fry Japanese button mushrooms, whole garlic cloves and white button mushrooms with boiled cherry tomatoes and baby potatoes. But what makes this steak really special is the anchovy butter sauce. So simple, just mix the anchovy with the butter in the pan with rosemary herbs and you have a very light butter sauce that works very well with the meat.

Recipe

Ingredients

Main
700-800 grams Wagyu Steak (if you’re not living near a specialty butcher, you could opt to order online Wagyu Kobe Steaks)
Sea Salt
Black Pepper
1 tbsp Olive Oil

Anchovy butter sauce
A small can of Anchovy in Olive Oil
20 grams of Unsalted Butter
A sprig of Rosemary (herb)

Assortment of Vegetables
A pack of Japanese Button Mushrooms
A punnet of White Button Mushrooms
A punnet of Red Cherry Tomatoes
6-7 cloves of Garlic
6 pieces Baby Potatoes
Olive Oil
Black Pepper

Method

1. Boil the baby potatoes in a small pot for about 10 minutes or until a skewer can pierce through. Once done, remove the potatoes and blanch the tomatoes for about 30 seconds. Then remove and arrange vegetabkes on serving plate.

2. In a wok, stir fry the Japanese mushrooms and mildly crushed garlic cloves in 2 tbsp Olive oil for about 2-3 minutes. Quart the white button mushrooms and add the whole lot into the same wok. Continue stir fry. Do this for another 5 minutes. Mushrooms shoukd either sear or shrink down in size. This is common as it loses water content. Once done, dish onto serving plates.

3. Sprinkle the steaks with sea salt and black pepper. In another pan, heat olive oil until smoking, then reduce heat to low. Place the steak into the pan and start pan-searing. 3 minutes on the first side and then another 2 minutes on the other side. Check doneness for medium rare. The meat centre should be a rose pink. If it is a dark red, then maybe you have to cook it a little longer.

The reason why I chose low heat as opposed to high heat is because I don’t want to over-cook the steak. So you have to time the steak strictly. Cut the middle to check for desired doneness. As the wagyu steak is very fatty, it is better to cook over low heat so that the fats will be tender. Once cooked to desired doneness, place it on serving plate.

4. In the same frying pan with the steak infused oil, add the butter and two fillets of anchovies. Break the anchovies and mash it into the butter. Throw in a sprig of Rosemary leaves. Cook until the sauce bubbles and spoon it into the steak. That’s it!

Pair it with a Cabernet Sauvignon or a spicy Shiraz.

Bon Appetit!

Chicken and Potato Soup

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Chicken and Potato Soup

My wife said to me one day, “can you cook some other kind of soup?” That to me is a sign that I have to constantly innovate and come up with new concoctions of soups. I guess I have been a little lazy as well, opting to cook the convenient Easy as ABC types of soups and admittedly, we have been drinking a lot of those soups as well, especially the Lotus and Radish Soup which I have been cooking week-in, week-out. Maybe wifey drink until scared liao.

So I asked her, “what kind of soup would you like to drink then?” The answer was kind of unexpected because she wanted a really simple Chicken and Potato Soup. That sounds like Chicken Soup for the Soul (think: Best Selling Book). Well, as I love a good challenge, and since we already have the required ingredients in my well stocked kitchen, I set out to develop a simple recipe. I think it’s gonna be great!

So I decided that I would bring together my great collaborators – Chinese Scallops and Yellow Onion. They are distinctively different, but yet somehow, they add to the great flavour that is Chicken Soup. I can already smell the flavours coming together. Here’s my recipe for Chicken and Potato Soup.

 

Recipe

Ingredients

2 x Chicken Drumsticks

1 x Chicken Carcass

15-20 Chinese Scallops

5 medium size Potatoes

1 large Yellow Onion

Half a teaspoon of Sea Salt

 

 

Method

1. First of all, place the chicken carcass and the chicken drumsticks (frozen) into the pot. Boil a kettle of water, then pour it into the pot, make sure that it covers the chicken. Then add the scallops into the pot and turn on high heat to boil.

2. Then peel potatoes, and rough chop these into pieces. After that is done, add them into the pot to cook. Slice up a yellow onion and add in the pot last. Continue to boil for another 10 minutes. Add salt to taste. Then turn off fire and put pot into the thermal cooker. That’s all, easy.

Bon Appetit!

 

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Easy as ABC

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Easy as ABC

Day three of the new dawn. I am tired. My lifeforce seems to have been zapped by some mysterious incubus. Either that or I am still riling over the fact that baby didn’t like my black bean porridge that I made yesterday.

Maybe he wasn’t accustomed to the taste as yet; maybe it was his first time trying it. I have come to realize that kids take a while to like something. It was the same experience with ice cream. At first he didn’t like it. Now he does.

So maybe one day he will develop a penchant for my black bean soup. I spent quite a bit of time cooking his porridge last night, and used quite a bit of the soup to cook it as well. *Grr* I think he kind of humored me a little and ate some at the beginning but I guess the taste was too foreign for his liking.

So today, I decided that I would make ABC soup again. Actually I wanted to make chicken soup, but since I already started defrosting the ribs last night by mistake – I decided to heck it. Chicken soup can be for tomorrow. Or maybe tomorrow can be lotus root, peanut and pork ribs soup. Hmmm..

I also realize by now that I may have overbought my ingredients for the week’s cooking rituals. There is no way that I can finish cooking all that I bought for the week, by the end of the week. I need to buy less. I also realize that it is near impossible to cook for baby without eventually cooking the same stuff for myself. Ok, I admit I have been lazy.

If you want my recipe for my ABC soup. You can check my post soup for three. Baby loves ABC soup.

New Dawn (Musing)

Ho Sim Lang

New Dawn (Musing)

It’s a new dawn. Not the twilight sexy good looking kind of new dawn with werewolves running around in their skin tight furs. My parents are moving house, and that presents a couple of issues for us that we have taken for granted till now. If there is someone that says “you are taking your parents for granted” – then let me be the first to admit it. You don’t have to say it. I have always knew from day one that the current arrangement while being perfect for us, was really not a solution in the long run.

Ultimately we have to manage on our own how we are going to do this.

So I have decided that I would do the cooking from now on. I know I have been doing most of the cooking anyway. But going forward, it is now a matter of survival. I won’t be cooking for leisure or pleasure, this is the gritty stuff. I have to be determined to cook my way through. So the next thing is to embark on a plan. Yes, we are going cold turkey from next week onwards and how we balance it will show.

I woke up this morning and I had a severe case of heart burn. Possibly it could be reflux from the ginormous amounts of rainier cherries (I should do a post on that) my wife and I had consume the night before. And in between then and now, I had massive LS and multi-fartilosis. It was bad. You won’t want to be within range.

Anyway, so the heart burn made me really uncomfortable, and I knew the reason why, so I wasn’t so disturbed by it. I went to the wet market as it is my usual practice and this time around, I knew I had to refresh my kitchen condiments and stock up for the week. I wanted to stay within budget so the strategy for the wet market on saturday morning was to really buy the basics and then buy the rest of the items throughout the week. That way I can pace myself with what I want to cook. At the moment, my mind draws a complete blank. It is hard to think when you have heart burn.

I purchased my four best friends – sea salt, olive oil, thai fish sauce and light soy sauce. They have been with me for so many years, and I knew that I could always depend and count on them for flavour. My wife’s a picky eater, so I have to be very careful when I prepare my dinners. But really, food is to be eaten.

So my total marketing for the following groups today is $57.60. I got chicken, pork, fish and vegetables. Not bad for starters.

Now the problem is thinking what to cook and to do it efficiently so that it fits into my time schedules.

New Potatoes

New Potatoes

This is how I like my potatoes. Boiled, then pan fried without oil so that the skins will brown. I usually dry-fry with fresh rosemary leaves and a sprinkle of sea salt.

When the pan is reasonably hot and slightly smokey,  I will drizzle extra virgin olive oil and allow the oil to coat the potatoes and adhere the salt to the potatoes. I like new potatoes because they are easy to cook and are great for accompaniment with mains or stews.

Recipe – serving for four

Ingredients

New potatoes

Fresh rosemary leaves (two sprigs)

Sea salt

Extra virgin olive oil

Method

1. Boil the new potatoes in a pot of boiling water till they are cooked. Then douse the potatoes into cool running water to stop the cooking.

2. In a heated pan,  fry the new potatoes with rosemary leaves and sea salt until smoking. Then drizzle the potatoes with extra virgin olive oil.

Bon Appetit!