Korean Grilled Cuttlefish at Chinatown

If you've been to Seoul and tried the street food in Myeong-dong, you'd probably have seen a roadside stall selling buttered cuttlefish.  To my pleasant surprise, there is a stall outside People's Park Complex selling this delicious Korean streetfood.

In case you're not familiar or confused with the building names at Chinatown, People's Park Complex (PPC) is the building next to OG departmental store and accessible from Chinatown MRT exit.  Occassionally, there are some buskers performing outside this MRT station.

The flattened cuttlefish was first cooked in the machine on the left side for about 2 minutes. Thereafter, the cooked cuttlefish was cut using the orange-coloured machine on the right side. For this $5 portion, you get one and a half piece of cuttlefish.

Tada!  Fresh, juicy and chewy cuttlefish that is almost as good as what you can get in Korea! 

Astons Express

Astons Express
Blk 19 Ghim Moh Road
Wang Wei Li Coffeeshop
Tel: 6466 2325

Had craving for western food for lunch a few days ago and decided to check out Astons Express.  A few other people were already in the queue before me and I overheard their orders - mostly for the grilled items.  I thought that perhaps a better way to "cut-queue" would be to order something that isn't grilled so that the chef can prepare my food concurrently.  Sounds good?

Decided to order Crispy Fried Fish as the main coure and for the 2 side orders, I decided to go for hot side dishes - onion rings and french fries.  Sinful, isn't it?  All the deep-fried and unhealthy stuff.  Sigh...

For $6.50, I felt that it was really value-for-money.  The one big slab of fish was longer than the plate.  No complaints for the fish fillet, it was good enough for $6.50.  However, the fries was nothing to shout about.  Though it looked like it was sprinkled with seasoning, it tasted rather bland.  The onion rings were just passable too... BK onion rings probably tasted better.  But anyhow, how much can you expect from this price.  =)

Dian Xiao Er (店小二)

#B2-02 Ang Mo Kio Hub
Tel: (65)6484 2268
Mon - Fri:  11.30am - 4.30 pm, 5.30pm - 10.00pm;
Weekend and Public Holiday 11.30am - 10.00pm

Where do you go if you have craving for steamed chicken with garlic dip?  - The Soup Restaurant?  Where do you go if you have craving for roasted duck in herbs? - Dian Xiao Er has to be among your choice of restaurants.

Check out this Duck Roasted in Ten Wonder Herbs (十全烤鸭).  The crispy roasted skin with its tender meat infused in the 10 herbs sauce.  If you're health concious, you can remove the thin layer of fats beneath the skin.  Otherwise, the duck is quite good.  Apparently, the duck has been marinated in the shop's special 10 herbs before being roasted.  The herbs are supposed to help revitalize one's body.

If you love hotpot tofu with generous amount of egg sizzling in the scorchy hot pan, you gotta check this out.  I am guessing... perhaps 3 or 4 eggs have been used?  The layer of egg is just so thick and delicious.  Of cos, the highlight of this dish is still the tofu, which was smooth and silky.  Garnished with minced pork and spring onion, it was a flavourable dish to go with plain white rice.

For under S$40, you get the above 2 dishes with 2 bowls of rice + chinese tea and tidbits (roasted peanuts).

Hansang Korean Family Restaurant‎

Hansang Korean Family Restaurant
10 Sinaran Drive, #03-33 Square 2
Tel: 6397 6752‎

Known as Little Seoul, Square 2 gives the most complete Korean shopping experience at the 3rd level with 2 Korean restaurants (Hansang and Seoul Yummy), Korean rice cake shop, Korean Supermart, Korean hair salon etc.

Hansang Korean restaurant is the more expensive restaurant between the 2.  Seoul Yummy operates much more casually and the food is cheaper.  Whereas at Hansang, you're served with 10 side-dishes, authentic silver chopsticks and spoon.  You get to choose to seat at the BBQ or non-BBQ section inside the restaurant.

BBQ set meal for 2 persons starts from $65 before taxes and you get the following...

This is a starter dish, individual portions served.  Depending on availability, the cold tofu may sometimes be replaced with a scoop of potato salad.  Portions are dividually equally so if 3 persons are sharing a 2-pax set meal, 1 person may need to forgo the starter.

Next is the pa-jeon dish.  Again, it is 1 set person.  Each set comprises of 1 piece of fish fillet pa-jeon and 1 piece of seafood pa-jeon.  There is also an individual serving of soy sauce for the pa-jeon.  The seafood pa-jeon was much delicious than the fish fillet pa-jeon.

Next dish that was served was the glass noodle dish.  The noodles are fried with carrot strips, green veggie and mushroom; and garnished with egg and seaweed.  This dish was rather flavourful, especially the noodles. Highly recommended if you're ordering ala carte.
 

There was also a small pot of rice, korean rice with a piece of carrot, pumpkin and sweet potato and a red date.  With the added ingredients, the light taste of sweetness came through the rice.

 

I must say that the stew dishes at Hansang is really good. Besides the bean paste soup, kimchi chigae is also highly recommended. The soup stew is thick and you can tell that they have cooked the stew dish for hours. The kimchi flavour has deeply penetrated into the veggie, tofu and noodles.

This is the highlight of the day - BBQ pork.  For the 2-pax set meal, a choice of pork or chicken is available.  For pork BBQ, there are 3 types of pork available and we had opted for collar meat and ribs.

For ala carte BBQ dish, a minimum of 2 portions is required and each portion costs at least $25.  Hence, I figured out that it is more worth-while to opt for the set meal.  For $15 more, we get to try out a selection of other dishes including pa-jeon, chigae and rice noodle. 

For the set meal, coffee/tea and fruits are also served at the end of the meal. But if the above is too much for 2 persons to stomach, it is perfectly find to share the 2-pax set meal among 3 persons.

But great food comes with price, be prepared to pay at least $76.50 for a meal for 2 if you're going for the dinner set meal.

Related Posts:
Bq Korea (click)
Hyang To Gol at Amara Hotel (click)
Odaeyang (click)

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Just Buns

If you happen to be at 313@Somerset and looking for something to snack, do consider these soft cinnamon buns from Just Buns (located at B3-49), next to Prima Deli stall.  The ones you see below are Cheese & Almond bun and Oreo bun.

The buns ($1.50 each) are freshly baked and are really soft and fragrant.  Fret not the strong cinnamon smell, the cinnamon taste in these buns are light and just right.  Just check out the cream cheese topped with almond and chocolate fudge topped with crushed oreo, they are simply irresistable!!

There are also other interesting flavours such as Just Durian, Just Chempedak, Just Banana etc, which I will return to try them one of these days.