I think of all eating places in Singapore, none have divided the foodie community more than Geylang Lorong 35's Sin Huat.  At the centre of the debate is the value of its (in)famous crab bee hoon - how much would you pay and how much bad service will you put up with for luscious strands of delectably smooth "thick" bee hoon coupled with loads of Sri Lankan crab meat and roe?  Adding fire to the debate is the famed Anthony Bourdain's episode of A cook's Tour where he raved about the deliciousness of Sin Huat's bee hoon.  Plus of course K. F. Seetoh's praises about it.  Three of us - Yanjie, Jiakai and myself ventured last weekend to find out what all the fuss was about.  

Any self-respecting Singaporean foodie must have at least ventured into the Geylang Lorongs once or twice in search of some mystical food item - be it dao huay (been curd) or ter kah (braised pork trotters).  So three of us did just that.  Bringing steely balls and wallets we ventured to Lor 35 and sought out the famed Sin Huat, that looked something like this in the evening twilight:

Our evening began with a 5min wait for someone to attend to us.  Ok, to be fair, we were served our cutlery and peanuts pretty promptly after.  The cutlery (peanuts notwithstanding) remained clean for the next 15mins as our orders remained unwritten because, apparently, some crazy guy had pre-ordered maybe $10k worth of bee hoon (which may not be that much, as you'll find out later).  So after 15 mins, our orders were taken.  It was over in 15 secs, just one curt guy (could be the boss), no menu, no asking of portions, just scribbles on an order sheet.

Then came T.H.E G.R.E.A.T W.A.I.T.

It was 30mins before our first dish came.  It was simply our baby kailan that we ordered.  So it was just plain kailan eating for another 30mins before the next dish came:

Steamed Frog! I can't fault the freshness of the tiny buggers, the meat was outstanding.  But I thought the garlic was a bit over the top.  And no, they didn't serve us 'original' essence of chicken, it had already been so-called 'processed' or, for want of a better word, diluted, with other liquids.  I suspect soy sauce and/or oyster sauce.  And then we waited again ... 20mins this time:

Yes, this is what we affectionately call the gong-gong.  Other than a term used for your pesky little sister, it was a pretty convenient name for the Strombus Canarium, a member of the conch family.  Once again, freshness was tip top - couldn't fault it.  The highlight apparently is the tear-jerking sticky chilli/honey concoction by the side.  Jia Kai said that he read somewhere online they take half a day to prepare it.  Extremely fiery.

Then it was another 30mins of us discussing career options, politics, geology, property and TV sets before the piece de la resistance, the epitome of Sin Huat, the famed CRAB BEE HOON (2 X Sri Lankan crab) came:

To begin with, i actually found it a little bit too salty for my liking.  But what I immensely enjoyed was the crab roe and the silkiness of the noodle.  Plus, the gravy sauce, not too much to over-drench the noodle but robust and little enough to seduce you and make you just want to stuff your face with more noodle.  Not to mention the fact that we were ravenous by that time (10pm).  Yes, you can taste the richness of the sea in the sauce, no kidding.  Apparently, the legend is that tourists request just the gravy to be packed for take-away.  So finally, our night of gastronomy ended on a crabby note, the one dish at the one restaurant which you either hate or love.

Oh did I forget the bill? Our waitress aunty was obviously smirking and lording over us as she came over with (credit cards are accepted at this kopitiam btw):

Food 9, Service 1, Atmosphere 0.5, Value for money ?

Sin Huat Seafood Restaurant

Geylang Road (Geyland Lor 35)

Tel: 6744 9755

This was a simple off-the-cuff dish that I just felt like doing on a busy weeknight.  (Come to think of it, any weeknight where I have time to cook can't really be considered busy).  Plus PY loves mussels so I thought I'd surprise her.  I had cooked mussels a couple of times in London but always mariniere style with lots of butter, parsley, onions and white wine.  I thought I would do a tomato based this time.  Always remember to buy good quality mussels and inspect each one to see that the beards have been removed (otherwise you might have to sit on the loo many nights)

Ingredients above

900g frozen NZ mussels

1 can stewed tomatoes (you can use puree if you prefer)

1 cup of seafood broth or stock

2 medium shallots, finely chopped

4 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 large chilli, finely sliced

2 bay leaves

Dried thyme (about 2 teaspoons)

Dried basil (about 2 teaspoons)

Black pepper

Sea salt

-Thoroughly defrost your mussels and debeared them.  Heat up three tablespoons of butter and a tablespoon of olive oil over medium high heat.  Saute your shallots for about one minute then throw in the chilli and garlic for another minute

-Pour in the can of tomatoes, bay leaves, dried thme and basil, and your cup of stock and bring to a boil.  Let simmer for 10-15 mins, covered.

-Then put in the mussels without increasing the heat.  Stir constantly so that every piece is evenly cooked.  Remember not to over-cook as the meat becomes hard  Give it about 5 mins.  

-Season with pepper and salt and serve immediately.

-An alternative step is to remove the mussels leaving the soup behind in the pot.  Then add in parmesan cheese and maybe a bunch of coriander or parsley and let simmer for another 10-15 mins.  The longer the tomatoes are cooked, the richer and tastier and gravy becomes

So there!  The mussel juices mixed with the tomatoes and herbs can be considered one of the best comfort foods around.  And mussels are healthy too with loads of omega oils that oils your joints and protects your heart and brain.  Try pairing with a semi-dry red wine and crusty brown bread .

(Somewhere along the jumble of ingredients and the scurrying to and fro, I think I might have made some RSN history of my own.  I can *probably* safely say that I'm the first to concoct a stewed pork leg bee hoon in the galley of RSS Stalwart, state of the art strike frigate of the Singapore Navy.  "Ho hum", "big deal" you might say, well, if Singaporeans can go through the trouble of creating the world's longest popiah, then I can't see why I, true blue Singaporean, with green ic, can't have a little personal victory in the Singapore's most expensive kitchen.  Yes, going by per square foot calculation, excluding equipment, a frigate's gallery is worth at least $5 million dollars.

I digress.)

Ah, the wonderful stewed pork leg.   It doesn't matter whether it is Narcissus or Gulong brand, they all probably taste the same once trashed about with with some rice vermicelli (bee hoon), soy sauce and pepper over a roaring fire.  I had to do breakfast this morning onboard the ship and I thought I might as well use the chance to do some cooking.  So from Sheng Siong, I got:

(To feed 12 hungry souls)

-5 cans of stewed pork leg

-2 jars of mushrooms

-1 jar of olive vegetable

-1 packet of wolfberries

-2 500g packets of bee hoon

The excellent thing was that there was an offer going on for the pork leg where every can bought entitled you to a free jar of mushrooms, so good for me!  But you can use shanghai or white cabbage or shredded carrot as a substitute.

First of all, soak the bee hoon into a large pot of hot water.  20mins then drain.  Soak also half or two-thirds cup of wolfberries with a little water.

Second, empty the cans of pork into a large tray and fish out the pork bones.  If you want to easily remove the lard, leave the cans overnight in the fridge so that the fat coagulates.  But then I suggest fifteen extra minutes on the treadmill rather than let the wonderful animal go anywhere but into the bee hoon to liven things up.

Then heat up a large wok or a humongous "nasi biryani"-type stainless steel pot (which I used).  You might want to cook in two batches.  Put in a few tablespoons of vegetable or canola oil.  I threw in the olive vegetable first, just to bring out some flavour from it.  Fry for about 1 minute, then throw in the noodles.  Standby a bowl of water as the bee hoon dries up quickly.  What you're aiming for is a wettish kind of char bee hoon, not the economic bee hoon type.

If you have raw vegetables, cook them first for about 2 mins before adding the olive vegetable.

As the bee hoon starts to absorb water and cook, about 2-3 mins, throw in the pork leg.  The art here is the stirring: aim to stir from the side and inwards, trying as best as possible not to break the bee hoon into small pieces.  I generally disregarded this step as I had to wrestle with a giant spatula and the giant "nasi biryani" pot.  Mix the meat and starch thoroughly. 

Season to taste with a few tablespoons of pepper, a generous pour of sesame oil and dashes of light soy sauce.  You can also use oyster sauce.  In effect, the stewed juices that comes with the pork leg lends the main flavour bulk to the dish.

Lastly, add in the wolfberries.  These for sweetness and colour.

Transfer to a serving apparatus and then serve! What I did for condiments was buy a jar of Singlong sambal belachan and some large red onions.; I chopped and diced up about 4 medium onions and caramelised them in some oil over high heat.  Then poured in the sambal mixture, added about two tablespoons of sugar plus pinch of salt and voila! 

Well, this dish is just simply delicious as the bee hoon soaks up all the wonderful flavours.  I was heartened that seconds were actually taken!  I also like the unique taste of olive vegetable prepared this way.  Well, I hope you give it a try at home!

PY and I have done something that probably few, very few, very very few, Singaporeans have done.  We've actually walked all the way from Orchard MRT to Tanglin Mall, and then crossed to the British Council, left into Dempsey road and all the way in to the Dempsey cluster.  It took a grand total of 30mins and probably 500 calories.  That was done about a year ago.  On that 'roadtrip' I noticed we passed by a quaint looking white church building opposite the famous Au Petit Salut.  I didn't pay much heed to this until I discovered a few months that this was the newly established White Rabbit restaurant.

Owned by Wee Teng Wen, son of Wee Cho Yaw, UOB Chairman, and whose kitchen is helmed by Daniel Sia (who started out in Delifrance and then went on to do stints with luminaries such as Michel Roux and Marco Pierre White), The White Rabbit serves contemporary European fare.  Unsurprisingly, early reviews were not exactly savoury, with the bugbear being the service.  A foodie friend of mine who went had to even put up with a rude waitress; it seemed that service suffered particularly during busy periods.  But thankfully, there was less complaint about the food, the worst review being 'ordinary'.  So why did PY and I make special time from our precious saturday to make our way to Dempsey (thankfully we took a cab this time) when I could have gone to Lavender where I know at least the wonton meet will be good?

Well, its because TWR is one of the few locations for our London-themed wedding celebration lunch.  Yes, we decide to do away with hotel packages with their useless wedding favours and obiang invitation cards.  Plus, TWR seemed an ideal place for our theme!

But then, of course, we were concerned about the quality of the food and the standard of the service too since our guest list was going to be pretty small and exclusive.  But what I couldn't fault was the location, the stained glass as seen above was a nice big plus.

The wooden facades, the more casual design of the furniture and the spaciousness was also in line with what we envisaged.  But then for us, the killer punch could only come from two things: price and food.  So from their brunch menu:

First up we had their chopped cobb salad with cherry tomatoes, quail eggs, red onions, avocado, Roquefort cheese and red wine vinegar dressing.  Cobb lettuce is a type of lettuce similar to butterhead and also known as Boston lettuce.  Personally, a good salad needs only two things: freshness and composition.  Any salad which has these two components done right would be delicious even without dressing.  I like the combination of avocado and blue cheese in this classic salad.  The tomatoes were also sweet and juicy.  I also appreciated the fact that the vegetables were free of water before being mixed in.  I would have preferred the dressing to be a little more tangy though.

For mains, PY had another classic dish, the eggs benedict with smoked salmon.  The perfectly poached eggs on top of fish and muffins.  I thought the poaching was excellent, with compliments to the culinary skills of the chef.  I did my share of egg poaching in London and the two key variables of time and water temperature had to be exact.  What I thought could be much improved was the hollandaise sauce (one of the five key sauces of French haute cuisine, and probably the most finicky, consisting of butter, lemon juice or vinegar and egg yolks).  It was neither rich and buttery, smooth and creamy or tangy.  The sauce didn't seem to have emulsified properly.  I also thought maybe a dash of cayenne pepper or sea salt might have added life to the sauce.

Something better I had was the Main lobster cheese souffle.  On the menu, it said that it was twice baked, though the reason why escapes me.  But what was great was the texture and fluffiness of the souffle which itself hid bites of lobster meat and a quail egg.  Another thing was the wondrous brown lobster bisque surrounding it that had all the flavours of the sea as its aroma wafts through your nostrils.  What I need to harp on is the price, at $28++, the souffle, no bigger than the biggest muffin from my neighbourhood bakery, was pricey.  I wouldn't have minded if maine lobster were not used, just fresh lobster.  Hell, 19 out of 20 persons on the street wouldn't even have heard of Maine.

Next up:

Something you have to eat at least once and something you must order in any good restaurant : a Baked Alaska.  This is not something you can easily recreate in the home kitchen.  It is essentially an large scoop of ice-cream surrounded by a case of sponge and meringue.  The whole thing is baked in an extremely hot oven to brown and harden the meringue.  The meringue, a bad heat conductor,  keeps out the heat and the sponge preserves the integrity of the meringue.  This dish was executed perfectly at TWR so kudos to the chef once again!  Why it is called an Alaska is as mysterious and contentious as why Roti John and called Roti John...

Finally, we end off with a bit of bacteria and spoilt milk:

Nothing adds a bit of class to an establishment than a food trolley.  I remember Petrus, which Marcus Wareing helms in Knightsbridge, which had not only a cheese trolley but also a grand chocolate truffle trolley with golden curls and trimmings.  So I couldn't resist shelling out another $15++ to have a go at the cheese:

There was brie, roquefort, ossau iraty, le nantoise loire sache, saint marne and a tommette cheese among others; each with its own flavours and textures.  I also enjoyed the "jam cubes" which went pretty well with most of the cheeses there.  What I found disappointing though was the limitedness of the selection of cheeses.  I thought that the range of textures, fermentations and milk type could have been expanded.  I personally thought it was a mistake to restrict the trolley to just french cheeses.  Throwing in some spanish iberico, smoked sheep feta or a stinky bishop would have made the cheese trolley more fun.  And instead of pretentious extremely-hard-to-read-font cheese labels, I would have preferred a clear sign telling me the name, type, origin and general taste of a particular cheese.  

So that brings us to the end of the culinary adventure to TWR.  I am glad to report that I had good service with wait staff who were polite and attentive.  The food arrived in good time too and the bread selection was good.  PY and I spent a nett total of $114 for everything above with no drinks.  I thought it was pricey for a saturday brunch but the atmosphere was pretty good, not too crowded and spacious. Well, perhaps we might be back on 17 july next year for the Big One, until then!

It felt strangely satisfying to be smelling onions on my fingers and crockery clanging again after quite a while.  Well, this monster called Work has been preventing me from getting any serious cooking done; apart from throwing ingredients between bread.  This time round, the dish in question is French Onion Soup.  Why French onion soup? Because PY wanted French onion soup; which is as good a reason as any these days.  Plus, we tried the french onions soups at Vivocity's The Mussel Guys and Phin's Steakhouse at Tampines Mall which were just drab.  So I brought out my trusty Cook's Illustrated Best Recipes - yes, the one where every receipe for the dishes featured have been tested and evaluated by America's Test Kitchen.  So essentially, its a 'How to make the perfect ..." type of cookbook.  I decided to make French onion soup from scratch starting with a good'ole fashion beef stock.

Beef stocks are funny things: why is it that Maggi or Knorr stock cubes have lots of flavous except beef?  Or why is it that instant noodles usually have chicken seasoning rather than beef?  Well, according to Cook's Illustrated, weight for weight, chicken releases more flavour from its meat, bones and skin into liquid than beef does.  Hence, to obtain some serious beef stock, a whole lot of meat is required.  And precisely lots of meat is what is required for the rich beef stock recipe found in the Best Recipes book.

Here's the recipe:

1-2 tablespoons vegetable oil

6 pounds beef shank, meat cut from bones in large chunks or 4 pounds chuck and 2 pounds small marrow bones

1 large onion, halved

0.5 cup dry red wine

1 litre boiling water

0.5 teaspoons salt

-Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large stockpot over medium-high heat.  Brow meat and oniion on all sides.  Don't overcrowd and add more oil if necessary.

-Remove contents and add the wine and reduce till a brown syrup.  Return the meat and bones.  Reduce heat and sweat the meat and onions until a thick brown intensely flavoured liquid is formed, about 20mins.

-Increase the heat to medium high, add water and salt and let simmer, partially ocvered for 1.5 to 2 hours.  Then strain the contents and tada! 2 litres of ones of the best beef stock ever.  The patient people at America's Test Kitchen found that the traditional method of roasting vegetables for stocks did not really add much flavour; a simple onion did the trick.

 And for the soup:

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

5 medium red onions (3 pounds).  Sliced thin.

2 litres beef stock from above

0.25 cup dry red wine

2 sprigs fresh parsley

1 bay leaf

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Ground black pepper

Salt

-Melt butter in a large tockpot over medium-high heat.  Add the onions and a sprinkle of salt and stir the onions until thoroughly caramelised to a brown syrup.  30 to 35 mins

-Stir in the beef stock, red wine, parsley, thyme and bay leaf.  Loosen the bits at the bottom.

-Simmer to blend the flavours.  About 20mins.  Then discard the herbs (except onions). Stir in the vinegar and adjust the taste with salt and pepper.

For the top crusts

1 baguette, cut into 1cm slices

4.5 ounces swiss cheese, sliced.

3 ounces Asiago cheese, freshly grated (about 1.5 cups)

-Adjust an oven rack to the upper-middle position; heat the broiler.  Set heat-safe bowls or crocks on a baking sheet.  fill each with about 1.5 cups soup.  Top each bowl with 2 bread slices and then the Swiss and Asiago cheeses.  

-Broil till browned and bubbly, about 10mins.

The book also states that you can replace the beef stock (if you have no time to tediously make some
) with off-the-shelf 6 cups of low-sodium chix broth and 1.75 cups of low sodium beef broth.  No doubt about it, the combination of cheeses was found to be the best by the test kitchen.  And red onions gave the best flavour too.

What I did below was to put the bread and the cheese in to a soup pot and just baked the whole thing as I didn't have oven safe bowls.  I used a single layer of country bread, Swiss Emmental (not the same as Swiss cheese!) and mozarella as Asiago was impossible to find.  One mistake I had made was to let too much water evaporate (too focused on getting a nice, rich stock) that I ended up with a cross between a soup and a stew.  Don't be afraid to add water to your beef stock or onion soup.

So with the leftover meat from making the beef stock, I made some sandwiches from the leftover bread.  I shredded the meat, topped it with some gherkins and dijonnaise and, of course, any leftover cheese and voila! there you have it, a full course meal fro ma few simple ingredients.  But all of these took quite a lot of time though, two plus hours, if you're not an experienced cook.  But then good food, good fun, nothing really more I can ask for!