The former needs no introduction I believe — I’ve written about it several times — but their take on the dirty chai has been one of my favourites for a long time coming. Fragrant but not overwhelming spices, well-balanced with a solid shot of espresso, and just enough frothed milk to smoothen it all out 👌🏻🥰

I can’t ever resist fried chicken, especially not when it looks as massive, golden, and beautifully crunchy like this. And trust me, the chook in this Yuzu Karaage Burger was every bit as delicious as it looks here. The batter’s thin, well-seasoned, and boasts a fabulous crunch; chicken’s juicy and super tender. I really enjoyed their fluffy and sweet buns as well. In fact everything in this burger was on point for me, save for the sauce 🤔 I’m not sure what went in there, but it had that pungent kick reminiscent of wasabi. Now I’m not too big a fan of wasabi myself so this wasn’t quite up my alley, but if that’s your thing then I’m sure you’d enjoy this plenty. I’d also have liked the yuzu element to come across more discernibly here — that’d really take this burger up a notch.

The hallmarks of a good sheng jian bao, to me, is a soft, fluffy, relatively thin and slightly elastic wrapper with a beautifully golden and crunchy bottom + characteristically xlb-like juices bursting right out on the first bite. I’ve heard a lot about Ding Tele’s sheng jian baos so I was super excited to try em — especially since I wasn’t gonna get my fix overseas anytime soon. They were indeed tasty and really not too shabby, buuuuut I was a wee disappointed tbh. Don’t get me wrong: super tasty mince they nailed; crisp pan-fried bottoms a big thumbs up; shiok bursting juices also a yay. What I found lacking was their technique in sealing the little baos. See that disproportionate amount of dough at the base? If you zoom in you’d notice that the mass of dough’s quite dry in the middle, while the rest of the bao dough’s rather silky smooth and hydrated.

While imma firm believer that no chocolate cake can go wrong, there’re still of course clear distinctions between mind-blowing and slightly meh ones. Made using Ocoa chocolate, a 70% dark chocolate, the cake layer’s set on top of a crisp French butter biscuit, and topped with a dollop of what I presume is crème fraîche/chantilly/or something along those lines. It’s tasty for sure: chocolate-y enough, tender-crumbed, and has a sort of flourless chocolate cake-like custardy texture. It was aight, it just didn’t wow me. And at $8.80 I’d much rather have a go at the other, more intricate desserts they’ve got on display.

Let’s start with what I liked about this Tamago Sando ($7): I love how the homemade egg mayo wasn’t overly cloying or rich, so it was really light and easy to eat. The freshly cracked pepper was a great and discernible touch as well, keeping the sandwich from getting stale after the first couple of bites. What I didn’t quite like: the shokupan, as promising as it sounded, was neither fluffy enough nor toasted evenly. That meant a toast that’s not exactly soft or fluffy, not exactly crisp either, with extremely chewy crusts (I don’t mean that in a shiok way). It was very generously buttered, but without even toasting certain parts of the shokupan tasted solely of melted butter. I also found the sous vide egg in the centre a tad overcooked; so instead of a creamy, luscious yolk, we got a drier grainier one. This really was a very decent tasting sando and an exceedingly affordable one too, so really I ain’t complaining — I’m not that big of an idiot. But I definitely wouldn’t head down specifically for this.

I’m usually not a fan of wagyu cause I (very controversially) dislike fatty cuts of meat. I know fat’s flavour and all — I get that — but I really hate that waxy, oily feeling fat usually leaves on my tongue and lips. So wagyu’s always been an iffy thing with me, and when I saw this Hoshi Wagyu Steak on the menu I really wasn’t expecting much from it. Very hesitantly took my first bite, and the first thing that came to my mind: “so fucking juicy and tender, without all that insane marbling and melt-in-your-mouth fat?!” 10/10 up my alley. It blew my mind. Honestly idk my wagyu enough to comment on their Australian Wagyu Picanha (MBS8-9); but I can tell y’all with 100% certainty that I enjoyed every bite of this.

As the self-proclaimed cream puff queen, I decided to venture outta my usual haunts to check out this Milk Pie ($3.80) by Tokyo Milk Cheese Factory. Their take on the classic Japanese custard puff sees a part-choux-part-pie-pastry dough encasing a filling of Japanese mascarpone cheese and cream. Verdict: meh I’d rather hit my daily dairy consumption elsewhere. I was envisioning somewhat of a cross between a cream puff and fruit pie, with a buttery tender pastry and some mega smooth and rich filling. What I got instead was an extremely dry, stiff, off-the-rack sorta puff pastry, holding in an extremely tiny amount (bordering on stingy really) of rather tasteless and lacklustre cream. It actually looked rather curdled in fact, so you can imagine the texture being quite lacking.

Tbh I’ve never liked affogatos. I’ve always found the resulting drink a lot more lacklustre than what the idea of rich, smooth, creamy ice cream and hot nutty espresso promises. Now, the only reason why I tried the one by PUNCH was cause they’ve got a mini brownie cookie in there as well. And boy oh boy was I surprised to find this the very fucking first affogato I enjoyed?!?! The espresso was bold and nutty, ice cream EXCEEDINGLY creamy, and what I particularly enjoyed was that the chilled espresso wasn’t at all acidic! I mean sure of course there was a lil acidity in there as with all well-pulled shots, but this had juuuuust the right amount of it. And then we’ve got that beautifully crackly cookie on top to seal the deal 🥰

For $14 you get fried spam, caramelised onions, scrambled eggs, and some sriracha mayo in a bagel. I’m not gonna lie: in a basic-ass bagelwich like this, the only component I could possibly rave about would be the bagel — which, here, is unfortunately nothing noteworthy. In fact it was hardly what I’d call a bagel at all, boasting a texture more akin to a French roll sans the crisp crust. Don’t get me wrong this wasn’t bad at all — one can hardly fuck up spam and eggs — and it definitely was satisfactory enough to hit the spot. Would I recommend intentionally having it? Naaaaah.

Did I think I’d enjoy a Nori-flavoured ice cream? Certainly not, and I’d think most of us would be rather taken aback as well. But (and you know what’s coming next) as savoured my very first teeny weeny teaspoon, I was intrigued. And then I took a larger spoonful, and another and another and oh lord I was done with it and wondering how the ingenious chefs of @tomspalettesg managed to make this crazy idea work. The nori comes across very discernibly but in a completely unobtrusive manner, it’s earthiness and subtle saltiness nicely balanced out with sweet white chocolate and crunchy slivered almonds. It does take a little getting used to, but I promise the flavour does grow on you and gets rather addictive actually. If you, like me, are a fan of savoury and sweet dessert combos but find this still sound a wee too adventurous for you, then I’d suggest you stick to their Parmesan ice cream — made with parmesan reggiano and white chocolate crackers 🥰🥰🥰

We checked out this quaint little lok lok stall barely weeks into their operations, and was mighty pleased with their food 🥰 I mean you can’t really go wrong with deep fried food, but what I especially love about Yummy Singapore is their wide range of ingredients + UHMAZING homemade sauces. There’s a fucking solid satay sauce, an honestly punchy chilli sauce, and a rather addictive sweet chilli one as well — one for any occasion really 😉 And what more, every ingredient was fried perfectly (read: nothing was burnt) which isn’t something you can always be assured of across the causeway.

I’ve known about Tok Tok for years now. I can’t quite say why it took me so long to visit; but I guess it was the combination of Indonesian friends swearing by them for 10/10 authentic Indonesian grub + the complete inability to visit Bali, that finally got me there. And might I say I was disappointed in myself for not having gone there sooner? This Nasi Campur was everything I remember of Bali: fragrant hot rice, a sweet crunchy kicap manis-ridden tempeh, a rich tender rendang, and tons of other tasty af components — served with a fucking punchy sambal on the side. FYI they make a fucking solid teh susu like yo I couldn’t stop reaching for the damn straw.