Ratana Thai Seafood Restaurant

It was New Year's eve and we reckon that most places would be crowded so we decided to head to some "outskirt" place for lunch. Since we were travelling along Upper Serangoon Road, we decided to check out if there is anything interesting to eat there. Found that some shops were closed because it has past lunch hour.

We settled down for lunch at Ratana Thai Seafood Restaurant

27 Teck Chye Terrace S545729

Tel : 6285 9092 / 9766 5737

Ordered a Tom Yam Chicken Soup. Had moderated the level of spiciness and sourness.

This Garlic fish looks interesting and I was rather suprised that it came with nice presentation... I am not sure what fish it was since it was almost fully covered by the garlic and onion garnishes. The entire fish was deep-fried and every part was very crispy, which also means if you like to taste the tenderness of the fish meat, you will be disappointed.

The hotplate tofu was a little disappointing as it somehow lack 'character'... it only seemed like a plate of rojak with everything tasting alike.

Garlic-fried seasonal veg... it was just normal.

Thai Lemon Juice. Besides the sour taste, there is also a light stint of saltiness. Maybe it is the characteristics of Thai Lemon Juice.

Generally, it was a very normal meal for a normal day on 31 Dec 2007.

Olio @ Holland V

There is a new Olio Cafe, located at Holland V. The place used to be Gelare, the ice cream parlour.

There was a good choice of food but I opted for something not too heavy - Olio Gourmet Pie with Red Curry Chicken ($12.90). I'd had imagined the curry to be the traditional red curry but it turned out to be "fusion" curry. Just imagine that it is something with a stronger spice taste and little coconut milk or perhaps none at all.

I was a little disappointed.... the puff pastry was the saving grace.

Fortunately, we ordered some desserts, which were yummy and nice in presentation. The Olio style brownie ($7.50) came in a chocolate hot plate, just like the gravy in hot plate tofu. The brownie itself has a level of vanilla gelato in the centre.

Another saving grace for this meal was the tiramisu ($6.80). It tasted rather milky, which I like. Am not bothered that it has very coffee taste :P

My conclusion would be to always choose something that is recommended by the chef, at least at Olio Cafe.

Singapore Curry

Believe it or not. Whipping a dish of Singapore Curry is as easy as 1, 2, 3. Thanks to Prima Taste which comes with ready packed curry paste and necessary mix. Do note that the portion in the recipe serves 4 to 6 pax.

Here it is. No secret at all.

Prepare about 3 potatoes.

Prepare some chicken. Was told by a friend that if you use bone parts, it will add to the flavour.

Follow the cooking instruction on the Prima mix and ...

TADA! A pot of Singapore Curry!

Pasta @ Pepper Lunch

Pepper Lunch is sizzling with new item on their menu. This time round it is pasta. The 2 new pasta dishes are salmon cream pasta and Japanese curry chicken pasta.

I had wanted to try the curry pasta, unfortunately, it was sold out by dinner time. So I ordered the salmon cream pasta.

It is quite refreshing to see this new idea of having pasta on a sizzling hotplate with the cream sauce bubbling when the food arrived. However, I found the salmon a little too salty and the cream a little under-flavoured.

The signature pepper rice was better. Another salmon dish that we've ordered :)

It tasted good with the garlic sauce.

Ice Cream Balls @ Sushi Tei

Have recently discovered this interesting, delicious and value for money ice cream balls from Sushi Tei. 15 pieces for $2.80. Unbelievable, right? It came with 2 flavours - coffee and chocolate. A great snack to do along for afternoon tea.

Set Lunch @ Secret Recipe

Went to Secret Recipe recently and found out that they have a new set lunch menu now. The selection includes.... Spicy Turkey Carbonara, Tom Yum Spaghetti, Gourmet Laksa, and 2 other dishes.

For the set lunch, a free drink is included.

I ordered the Spicy Turkey Cabonara. It was spicy because of the chilli padi slices. I had accidently eat a slice which was hidden into the pasta! Hoohoooooo! The turkey was actually turkey ham. And the dish came with loads of straw mushroom. For a non-mushroom eater, I was lucky that a colleague helped me finished up the mushroom :)

Damage : $10.90

Shanghai Eater (真知味上海小吃)

The Shanghai Eater (真知味上海小吃), located at Jalan Leban, is actually opened by a middle-aged Taiwanese couple. It is a homely, simple food outlet which opens everyday except for 1st day of lunar new year. But need to check their opening hours before heading there as operating hour may vary from their usual hours.

Why Shanghainese food? The lady boss said that, Taiwan is like a cosmopolitan city for Chinese food, due to the influence from migrants from different parts of China.

The shop is small compared to the restaurants found along this stretch of shop house. So look out for this sign board.

Side dishes - beancurd strips in sesame oil and crunchy seaweed. (Note: cost of side dish included in bill. I think is $2 or $3 per dish).

上海炒年糕 (Shanghainese Fried Rice Cakes)

The white slices of chewy rice cakes tastes like Korean Teobokki. It is fried with pork, mushroom and cabbage. The dish was overpowered by its saltiness so remember to ask them not to add too much salt. As such, I find that it lacks its distinctive taste. I always find that China food are too generous with salt used.

馄饨汤 (Dumpling Soup)

Can't remember if there were 6 or 8 pieces. These dumplings are wrapped like a 元宝. The dumplings are not too bad. The seaweed soup tastes quite good. In fact better than the dumplings.

韭菜煎饼 (Pan-fried Chives Cake)
The best dish of all that we ordered. Each plate comes with 3 pieces. The filling is a mixture of chives with vermicelli. Quite special and it does very well with their special sauce dip.

葱油饼 (Pan-fried onion pancake)
This one is also quite good if you like onion pancakes. Besides the green onions, it seems that it is pan-fried using onion oil as the onion fragrance is quite strong.

Total damage : About $30.

Homemade Italian

Found this outlet 'Homemade Italian' by chance after a gym session at Raffles Place California Fitness.

Address: 50 Market Street, Golden Shoe Carpark #01-32,
Meixin Foodcourt Stall 10
(It is just across Republic Plaza)
Tel : 65358223



It serves main courses such as Poccini Chicken, Pan Fried Garlic Fish, Beef Lagsana, Meatballs etc at $7.90, pizza with 2 toppings at $5.90 and pasta (seafood, carbonara, aglio olio) from $5.90 to $7.90.



I tried the garlic fish and love it! The serving portion is quite generous and it comes with garden salad.



However, if you are cautious about garlic taste in your mouth for the next 12 hours, then you might not want to finish the entire garlic sauce. :)

~ Edited on 8 Oct ~

For some people, Raffles Place is probably the last place you wanna be during the rush lunch hour, people use tissue paper packs to 'chope' seats! Like that also can ah.

Despite the long queue, the chef still managed to whip up a delicious breaded chicken dish for me, after a wait of approx 10 mins. The serving portion is really big for the price of only $7.90. Very good value :)

It is a piece of deep fried chicken breast meat covered with bread crumbs, with cheese and ham strips on top. Also comes with a generous serving of garden salad.

Swensen's Topless Five

Who can resist ice creams that are so tasty? I love Swensen's ice-cream, especially those creamy flavours such as Vanilla, Butterscotch, Rum & Raisin.

I just realised that it is much more worthwhile to order a topless 5 cos it is 5 scoops for $7.50, unlike if you get a single scoop for $3.60.

But to be fair, topless 5 scoops are smaller but it does not matter to me cos I just want variety!!

In my ice cream bowl - O' Fashion Vanilla, Banana Split, Sticky Chewy Chocolate, Chocolate Peanut Buttercup, Yummy Raisin.

Romano Ristorante

Sembawang Hill area is another cosy little town in the private estate area of Seletar/Sembawang. The downside is that it isn't very accessible unless you have your own private transport.

This time round, I checked out the Italian Restaurant - Romano Ristorante. It reads Italian Casual Dining on the orange cheery signboard.

10 Jalan Leban Singapore 577551

Tel: 6453 3778

Operating Hours:

Mon closed

Lunch 11.00 am - 3.00 pm (Tue - Fri)

Dinner 6 - 10.30 pm (Tue - Fri)

11 am - 10.30 pm (Sat, Sun, PH)

I ordered my almost all time fav - Carbonara Linguine. Although I had hoped that it would come with an egg yolk, I soon forgot about the disappointment of not having the yolk cos the cream sauce was quite impressive. If you are a 'milk person', you'll like this. Surprisingly, my other half who doesn't like milk says that the cream sauce taste great! :)

He ordered the Chicken Milanese. This is a colourful dish with very tender chicken breast meat wrapped in a layer of fried egg. It came with some potato cubes that were slightly fried and charred. It has a small serving of spaghetti in tomato sauce.

I think it is one of the chef's recommendation dish.

Total damage : $32.

There were couple of other diners in the restaurant, who had ordered Tiramisu. The dessert looks quite yummy. Shall KIV this for my next visit :)