Tokyo Scenery

The husband and I have just come back from a week in Tokyo, and while I'm sorting out the photos from the multiple food adventures, here's some photos showing the scenery - it was sakura season and we managed to catch the best of full bloom, right after the typhoon hit!

Canal at Naka-Meguro

Chidorigafuchi, northern moat of the Imperial Palace. Accessed via exit 2 of the Kudanshita subway station.

Yes, we rowed a boat too!

Yasukuni Shrine - maybe (just maybe) I can understand why Koizumi kept going there.

Close up of the sakura flowers

A canopy of white

Lake Kawaguchi, or Kawaguchiko in Japanese - One of the Fuji Five Lakes, accessed via the Chuo Line from Shinjuku Station, with a change at Otsuki for the Fuji Kyuko Line.

Going up the Mount Kachi Kachi ropeway next to Lake Kawaguchi

View of Mount Fuji from Kawaguchiko.

The foodie pictures will follow, as soon as I sort them out : )

Roland Restaurant

The husband, after reading Leslie Tay's book about the end of char kuay teow, was very keen to try out chilli crabs at Roland Restaurant, which was the successor to the original Sin Leong restaurant. Leslie Tay has a great write up on the history of Roland here.

We only wanted to eat crabs, but ordered veggies to make ourselves feel less guilty.

The first crab dish to arrive was the salted egg yolk crab with shredded yam and curry leaves. It came in a most impressively stacked dish, covered with generous helpings of the toppings. It was a wonderful sight to behold : )

Another look at the dish

We loved this dish. The crab was top quality, with firm, succulent and sweet flesh. The topping was a surprise - the yam added a bit more bite overall, and we ended up eating it on its own after we were done with the crab.

We ordered some mantou to go with the chilli crab.

Finally, the chilli crab that the husband had been dying to try arrived - the sauce was a surprise, after being used to watery versions, we found it thick, extremely full-bodied, with the chunky peanuts giving it a bit more bite than usual. After demolishing the entire plate, Roland's chilli crab now has our vote for best chilli crab in Singapore.

I loved it that the crab was full of roe.

And the two of us still had room for dessert! The mango with pomelo and sago was pretty decent, but nothing to rave about.

The details below are from their website:
Address:Roland Restaurant Pte Ltd, Block 89, Marine Parade Central, # 06 - 750 Singapore 440089
Email: sales@RolandRestaurant.com.sg
Tel: 6440 8205
Weekdays - Monday to SaturdayLunch : 11:30 am to 2:30 pm; Dinner : 6:00 pm to 10:30 pm Sundays & Public Holidays :Lunch : 11:00 am to 2:30 pm; Dinner : 6:00 pm to 10:30 pm

Oso - Restaurant Week Oct 2011

I've been having trouble with the blogger iphone app, and it's been messing up all the sequencing and formatting. Anyway, these are long overdue photos from last year's Restaurant Week that I just remembered thanks to this year's RW.

Dessert was a 70% dark chocolate soup with cardamon served with espresso coffee ice cream.

The main was a roasted veal cheek in milk with potato and nutmeg in a port wine reduction

The starter was a poached tuna loin with dill and chicken breast with parsely, served with green apple and mustard

This was a vegetarian spinach tagliatelle with mixed mushrooms, oregano and pepper - not as exciting as the veal.

The thick cod soup was a bit too fishy.

The parma ham filled with parma ham mousse, with a salad in balsalmic sabayon was really good.

Of course the breads were excellent, with the amazing olive oil.

Another shot of the veal cheek.

Overall, more hits than misses, which led to us going again for this year's RW...blog post to follow.

Infuzi

The husband organised our wedding anniversary dinner at this place in Biopolis that he had no idea how to get to. This place was highly recommended by his foodie boss, and she had earlier been teased that her favourite restaurant would need to close down soon. Pity about the obscure location because Infuzi really is quite an outstanding restaurant, with more than adequate parking. It was pretty quiet that night.

The iphone app for blogger is all messed up, so here's the dishes we had all mixed up. I won't go into detail for each dish, but generally the food was top quality and we enjoyed the dinner very much despite being initially worried that the place was too empty. We would go there again for any special occasion and hope that the place stays open a lot longer. The set dinner with 6 courses, which we had, cost $135++ per person.

Fresh berries tart with cracking chocolate and maple-walnut ice cream

Squid ink pasta with sauteed Hokkaido scallops and light cream sauce

Another look at the dessert

Carpaccio of US Prime Sirloin with Black Truffle Vinaigrette, Arugula and Aged Parmesan

Grilled Free Range Chicken Breast wrapped with Jamon Iberico and Aubergine with Mushroom Sauce

Butter-Roasted Maine Lobster with Raw Vegetable Salad and Shellfish Reduction

Sorbet to cleanse the palate

Pan-Roasted Lamb Loin with Rosemary Sauce

http://www.infuzi.com.sg/

Tenza Izakaya

We normally wouldn't have headed to Sunset Way for Japanese, but we had heard from various friends about this izakaya that opened probably about a year ago, with lots of (or at least with one) interesting Japanese beers.

We were there on a Saturday night and got a counter seat
There was no one else around, to my horror - it normally does not bode well.
Free salad with miso dip to start off with
The husband wanted to try this appetiser platter consisting various exciting -looking things.
There was a liver dish - I have no idea which animal it was, but I couldn't stomach it.
There was a fish egg thing, a fried fish thing and some weird preserved thing. Not very descriptive, but I really wasn't impressed with this dish.
The preserved roll thing was quite interesting, there was a piece of raw fish somewhere in there with vinegar. But nothing that I would order again.

What it really looks like under the dollop of sauce
We had a serve of tongue. This was tough and chewy
The husband had an unagi cooked in burdock stock with egg. Actually, it was more like an unagi omelette
Here's the unagi. I normally like burdock in the oden-like stews, but I think the burdock was weird, and the whole dish would have been better off without it.
We ordered the chicken wings. Good, but not as good as Aburiya Tei.
The husband had a normal yakitori and I ordered the nankotsu. These were not too bad.
I had a mentaiko ochazuke, and this was by far the best dish of the evening.
The tea/soup part was very gently flavoured, and the mentaiko was not too salty.
Another shot of my favourite dish with the chefs in the background

Lovely!

Overall I wasn't too impressed, but I would be willing to give it another chance if I was in the area (wouldn't go there specially though). Reviews online aren't too great, although this place has its supporters.

Phone: 6773 0093

Email: dine@tenza.com.sg
Opening Hours: Tuesday to Sunday . Lunch 12 - 2pm . Dinner 6pm - Late

Address: 106 Clementi St 12, #01-38D, Sunset Way, Singapore 120106

A tribute to E

I've been pretty quiet because I've had no motivation to blog about food - an old childhood friend of mine, in the prime of his life, succumbed to cancer exactly two weeks ago. He was a real trooper, pushing on when doctors said he only had months left to live, and proving them wrong. He was always smiling and positive, living life to the fullest playing golf, learning jazz piano and eating well.

We went to Otto and Osvaldo. He brought me to Japanese places that I would never have gone to, like Yakinikutei Aochan and Tatsu. He told me about other Japanese places like Otowa and Teppei, and said I had to try them.

This was taken during the last lunch I had with him in Dec 2011, at Mikuni. Why I only took a photo of the food, but not my dining companion, I have no idea.

E, you're an inspiration and I know you're having an amazing time up there now. We're all missing you here but are so grateful that we were in your life and you in ours.