The bun was pillowy soft, while the exterior had a thin crisp layer - all toasted buns should aspire to be like that!! The Hainanese kaya was not bad, not too sweet, nicely caramelised, but I wish that it was more consistent - the first time I had it, it was quite fragrant, but on my second try it didn’t taste as good. But the combi of the kaya + butter was very good! The butter added just the right amount of flavour and richness. Just be sure to eat it immediately / separate the buns if not it’ll melt too quickly bc of the heat from the buns.

Prices have gone up slightly but it’s still very cheap! I’ve reviewed this before - it’s not say *super* good but it’s something we keep going back to, it’s good enough. I prefer the black sauce one (this is the white one), bc the noodles are a bit alkaliny and the black sauce masks that. We opt for no charsiew bc it’s quite dry. Fried wantons are crispy and boiled wantons are slippery smooth, not very alkaliny. Noodles are springy and very nice when piping hot! Green chilli is a must.

We got 5 dips/spreads (from left to right): spinach, eggplant, Persian yogurt, walnut, hummus.

In general, compared to greek ones, I feel like these were healthier, not as salty / strongly flavoured. Could be interpreted as plain, but as someone with a lighter palate, I liked it! I particularly enjoyed the spinach (borani esfanaj), which was very flavourful, probably due to the sweet onions within, as well as the Persian yogurt (mast), which was served cold and was rather thick with a pleasant sour flavour. The walnut (muhamara) was p good and rather interesting - nutty and sweet from the bell peppers mixed in. Kinda like upgraded nut butter. Hummus was alright, it’s tasty but I’ve had better, and the others outshone it. Eggplant (kash-e bademjan) was like babaganoush but more fibrous, would have preferred it to be more smoky but it was still rather tasty.

All the charcoal grilled items come with a bowl of rice! The basmati rice was very light and all the grains were separated, decently fluffy. It could have been more aromatic though.

We managed to feed 6 with this. Minced lamb was a bit gamey but was still alright with it bc it’s pretty juicy. Both the chicken and fish were tender and succulent, prawn was well marinated and firm, tho it did kinda taste like shrimp, not prawn? Beef was done medium rare, juicy and not tough. Came with some greens, which were decent. I liked that the meats were all properly done, none of them fell short!

Leicha was alright, not bad but not outstanding. Could do with more roasted peanuts. Opted for brown rice shao fan, the brown rice is p decent, not v hard. Overall tastes quite healthy and more plain compared to most, which I didn’t mind - most of the saltiness stemmed from the heibi so it wasn’t v salty. I liked the cabbage, it was cooked the way I like it - soft and tender with a slight crunch, but not raw. Not very oily! Soup is kinda diluted / bland, didn’t like it. Added on a fried taukwa ($1) which was quite large, not bad - tofu was soft and fresh, the meat paste was quite well-seasoned. Might add on a meatball next time to try, that’s cheaper at $0.50. Also, it’s $4 for white rice!

Got this as a gift! Donuts were v soft and fluffy, chewy & bready. Dusted with icing sugar, not rly sweet. Slightly oily but not too greasy, it’s like a nice bread. Enjoyable, but not particularly amazing - this was more bread than donut to me.

This was by far, the most disappointing dish I’ve had this year. Never mind that this $42 plate only had 4 slices (ok thick slices) of pork collar. It was disproportionately filled with fat. Was pretty disconcerting to find that this supposed “main” was just a plate of fats. I’m better off at Fei Fei Roasted Noodles, or Laifabar for their char siew. Or even any decent hawker roast meat stall, or a Chinese restaurant 😤 Taste-wise, it was just alright, nothing outstanding. The salsify tasted like a regular root vegetable. Pork and apple do go together, so the natural sweetness of the apple purée was welcome. But definitely would not recommend this dish and it unfortunately spoilt the dining experience - the better dishes were not good enough to make up for this lacklustre dish.

Octopus was grilled decently, wasn’t chewy/rubbery but I’ve had better! The squid ink zhoug gave a herby angle to the dis. Again, it’s not a bad dish, but not impressive either. Though for $18 I would think the portion of octopus is pretty reasonable.

This felt a little like Esquina’s Sucrine Lettuce. Baby romaine was charred alright, but it could have been done with a little more finesse - it ended up looking a lil burnt. The green goddess dressing was tasty, a bit herby a bit citrusy, and the hazelnuts were nicely roasted and crunchy. There were some herbs to tie everything together. Objectively, not a bad dish, just that the vegetable dish at Esquina were more enjoyable.

The rum baba gave me tres leche cake vibes - a similarly “holey” cake, but soaked in rum syrup. The rum syrup was rather sweet and boozy. The vanilla ice cream was alright, there were *some* speckles of vanilla but not much, and it unfortunately there wasn’t rly much of a smoky taste. I didn’t think this was a bad dessert, just not particularly impressive, and at $16 per serving I definitely could get better desserts elsewhere.

This seems simple but it was well-executed! Crisp chocolate tart shell, smooth chocolate ganache filling. The ganache was infused with cep mushroom; there was Fleur de sel Geurande (translation: *speshal salt*) and Masoa EVOO within the tart too. A bonus surprise lies within the ganache - a smoked (beef) bone marrow caramel. The smoky and very slight savoury flavours imparted into the tart by that tiny amount of marrow caramel was very impressive. Fascinating and very tasty!