Not A Magical Meal

 

Themed Restaurants

 

How many diners would go to a themed restaurant and expect to be served great food?   Thankfully, we didn’t.  We decided to step into the magical world of Platform 1094, a Harry Potter / Wizard – themed café that had just sprung up near our hood, just for the sheer fun of immersing ourselves in a Hogwartish atmosphere and perhaps, whish our wands around to turn a bucket of truffle fries into a 2-bucket portion.

 

Well, can I just say for the record that the restaurant IS Platform 1094, and not Platform 9¾.  So never mind the quality of the food, the look and feel of it is as far from Hogwarts as Daniel Radcliffe is to Daniel Craig.

 

Step up to the Platform

Platform 1094

 

The first indication of  having been transported from the street off Serangoon Road to a magical place is to open the glass door to a shelf full of wizardry paraphernalia from the Halloween costume shop that says Mrs Lich Wands, Trinkets and Curios.  Cute.  Some of my friends who had been to the restaurant encouraged me to put on the witch’s hat, robe and brandish a wand.  No thanks.

You want to be Harry Potter or Voldermort?

After settling down at my table, we were served water in lab beakers while we browsed through their menu. So far, still cute.

Yup, its water. Not a pee sample.

We had decided to start off with some drinks.  The hubby ordered Mr Lich’s Flaming Brew which looked like a goblet of lemonade and blue curacao torched with a spoonful of bacardi and sprinkled with cinnamon powder to create some sparks of magic.  If it was not an alcoholic drink, kids would be thrilled with it.  For old fogies like us, we cupped our faces in our hands and rolled our eyes to the fact that it was such a lame gimmick that tasted like cough syrup.

So Tacky.  Blue Tack...see what I did there? Get it? Get it? 

The boy ordered the Butterscotch Ale which was a white foamy liquid topped with sugared star sprinkles.  I thought it was a pretty, girly, frou frou drink and a good one for my boy who was allergic to alcohol and believed in unicorns.

Unicorn Milk

Not enamored by the drinks, we then went on to the food, hoping to be mesmerized by the magic of their culinary skills even if everything else from theme décor, to service to drinks fell flat on their faces.

As I was an avid nibbler, we ordered almost everything from their list of appetizers.  We had the Spam Fries, which was strangely breaded and deep-fried but still tasty.  It’s Spam Fries, you can’t go wrong with Spam Fries. We also ordered the Truffle Fries, Platform Wings and Meatballs.  So far, these were just ok. One could really not find fault with anything deep-fried right?  The meatballs however were a heap of cheesy, tomatoey mess that looked unappetizing and way too over-saucy.

Spam Fries

A bowl of glob they called Meatballs

We also had their Mushroom Soup and Carrot and Beetroot Soup which were served in black cauldrons.  How witchy. So cute. These, I had to admit, were delicious, hearty and substantial as a meal on its own.

Mushroom Soup in a cauldron

Truffle Fries saved the day

For main course, the hubby had the Da Bomb Burger.  It was Da Bomb alright.  It was Da Bomb in his face.  No doubt the serving was huge.  However, it was a huge disappointment because it was too dry, and the patty was almost tasteless that he had to douse it in ketchup.  The accompanying french fries was served stone-cold.

The Burger that bombed

The boy had the Pesto Mayo Pork Ribs.  Although the meat on the ribs was tender and fell off the bone, he felt that the pesto mayo marinade made the pork ribs too saucy. In his words, “It was okay. Edible.  But I wouldn’t travel all this way for this.”

A plate of glob they called ribs

Now, that was how we felt about the restaurant, the drinks and the food.  Let me tell you about the service.  I am most finicky about service.  Quality of food and drinks can be improved.  However, with the lack of long-standing, good service staff faced by most restaurants in Singapore, I often wished that most restaurant owners would invest in proper training and nurturing of their service staff.

 

Customer Service

At Platform 1094, the staff were not engaging enough.  This was a themed restaurant.  Customers would be visiting this restaurant in the hope of having a fun meal.  Could we have some life please?

Our dishes, beakers, and cauldrons were left piling on our table as we polished off each dish.  Staff were walking past our table and had not had the common sense to remove the dirty dishes.

Could someone please take these away?

When a staff took our order, and it was a long list of order, he seemed to be struggling to remember everything that we ordered. So I asked him if he would like to write them all down.  However he said, “No need.”  Well, he was wrong, because we were accidentally served with yet another bucket of Spam Fries that we had not ordered. 

When I tried to make a reservation earlier for dinner at 6.30pm, the staff that took my call said, “Sorry we are fully booked for dinner.”   So I decided to ask if I could then make a reservation for 5.30pm, perhaps we could be there for drinks and see if we wanted to stay on for dinner if it was not too crowded.  He said that was ok as the restaurant would not be too busy then.  He was right, the restaurant had more life than my underpants at that time.  But even when we finished our meal at about 7.30pm, I still had more life in my underpants.  There were several empty tables around us with reserved signs on them.  What a waste!  If I was a restaurant owner, and I knew that I could have the potential of filling my restaurant throughout the evening, I would never tell a potential customer that the restaurant was fully booked for dinner.

I know this post may be quite scathing about the restaurant.  To be fair, I had no high expectations of the food when I had decided to pay Platform 1094 a visit.  However, from the décor, to the service to the food and drinks, at least try to score on a couple of winning factors that would bring your customers back right?  I would not think of coming back just for the Carrot and Beetroot Soup served in a cauldron. Really.

 

Verdict?  -  BELLY ‘FALL-FLAT-ON-THE-FACE’ DISAPPOINTING

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.

 

Nasi Lemak At The Coconut Club

Is It Really That Expensive?

I came across a few blog posts about this new kid on the block along  Ann Siang Hill which "serves that expensive Nasi Lemak". I am not a Nasi Lemak fan but the amount of press about this local dish which was priced at S$12.80, got me really curious, and ready for that hike across the CBD to find out why it was worth that hefty price tag. I think I found my answer.

 Value For Money

The Nasi Lemak came with Ayam Goreng Rempah which was a  perfectly marinated fried chicken that was crispy on the outside and so tender on the inside, ikan bilis,  peanuts, a fried egg and a dollop of chili sambal which I liked but my lunch companions thought was not spicy enough.  It was a substantial dish. Yes you can get something similar for less and tastes better at more renown  Nasi Lemak stalls at food centres like the one at Changi Village or at Adam Road.

But we were on Ann Siang Hill right? And we tucked into a great meal within the cool comforts of an air conditioned restaurant where we were served by very engaging staff. I think that price tag of S$12.80 isn't about the Nasi Lemak you see. We were delighted by a complimentary bowl of Sayur Lemak which is an Indonesian style vegetable dish in a thin coconut broth. We also finished our meal with a complimentary piece of Kueh Salat each for dessert. I must add, that Kueh Salat was so soft and yummy. And here's why I truly think my Nasi Lemak meal was worth S$12.80 and will be going back for more....The serving staff said," We are offering you these complimentary dishes as we would appreciate your honest feedback before deciding whether or not to add it to our menu." Wow! I was bowled over. How many eateries out there do value customers' feedback? 

e outside and so tender on the inside, ikan bilis, peanuts, a fried egg and a dollop of chili sambal which I liked but my lunch companions thought was not spicy enough. It was a substantial dish. Yes you can get something similar for less and tastes better at more renown Nasi Lemak stalls at food centres in Changi Village and Adam Road. But we were on Ann Siang Hill right? And we tucked into a great meal within the cool comforts of an air conditioned restaurant where we were served by very engaging staff. I think that price tag of S$12.80 isn't about the Nasi Lemak you see. We were delighted by a complimentary bowl of Sayur Lemak which is an Indonesian style vegetable dish in a thin coconut broth. We also finished our meal with a complimentary piece of Kueh Salat each for dessert. I must add, that Kueh Salat was so soft and yummy. And here's why I truly think my Nasi Lemak meal was worth S$12.80 and will be going back for more....The serving staff said," We are offering you these complimentary dishes as we would appreciate your honest feedback before deciding whether or not to add it to our menu." Wow! I was bowled over. How many eateries out there do value customers' feedback?e outside and so tender on the inside, ikan bilis, peanuts, a fried egg and a dollop of chili sambal which I liked but my lunch companions thought was not spicy enough. It was a substantial dish. Yes you can get something similar for less and tastes better at more renown Nasi Lemak stalls at food centres in Changi Village and Adam Road. But we were on Ann Siang Hill right? And we tucked into a great meal within the cool comforts of an air conditioned restaurant where we were served by very engaging staff. I think that price tag of S$12.80 isn't about the Nasi Lemak you see. We were delighted by a complimentary bowl of Sayur Lemak which is an Indonesian style vegetable dish in a thin coconut broth. We also finished our meal with a complimentary piece of Kueh Salat each for dessert. I must add, that Kueh Salat was so soft and yummy. And here's why I truly think my Nasi Lemak meal was worth S$12.80 and will be going back for more....The serving staff said," We are offering you these complimentary dishes as we would appreciate your honest feedback before deciding whether or not to add it to our menu." Wow! I was bowled over. How many eateries out there do value customers' feedback?

Verdict?  -  BELLY WORTH IT

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.

 

Singapore Welcomes Pizza Express

Pizza Is Not Junk Food

 I know I know, not another review about yet another pizza restaurant.  We can’t help it.  My brother Jerome and I love our pizzas.  He preferred the thick crust version and I adored the thin crust ones.  At home, Mom called it junk food. 

When we were younger, Jerome and I were brought up on Mom’s cooking of low salt and low fat dishes daily,  that we often had to sneak out for an unhealthy snack of chicken nuggets, burgers or curry puffs.  I remembered that even Dad had big meals during lunchtime at the office, anticipating a rather bland dinner.  He often had  roast duck, roast pork,  roti prata and soup kambing or anything else that would not have passed Mum’s scrutiny, governed by her “quack nutritionist” certification.  

Jerome and I can attest to the fact that pizza is not junk food.  It is worthy of claiming its own food group, under the label of “Healthy Food”. This is particularly so for the pizzas served at Pizza Express. How can a pizza that is made from premium flour, hand tossed and served with the freshest ingredients full of goodness from the garden be unhealthy?

So yes, there is cause for celebration.  Jerome had just informed me that Pizza Express had just opened its first outlet here in Singapore at Scotts Square.  In the past, I often looked forward to work trips to Hong Kong so that I could dash into Pizza Express at the airport for a quick meal before heading back to Singapore.

This post is a review done by Jerome when he visited Pizza Express yesterday for dinner.  No, I was not invited.  Sometimes, my brother can be quite useless.

 Pizza Express In Singapore

 Pizza Express was founded by Peter Boizot, a restaurateur and philanthropist in 1965 when he first obtained a pizza oven and hired a chef during his trip to Italy and set up the first outlet in Wardour Street, London. The rest is history and Pizza Express has since expanded regionally and globally over the years into the rest of Europe, Asia-Pacific and the Middle-East.

Jerome loved his pizzas smothered with tomato sauce and the creations at Pizza Express hit the spot with a good slather of homemade passata. The pizzas are available in both the classic (original and unchanged since 1965) and Romano crusts with the former being thicker and the latter being a thinner and crispier version. These are made from freshly kneaded dough that is prepared daily from premium flour.

A good range of pizzas are available and it was impossible to resist having a few at a single sitting.  Jerome ordered 3 whole pizzas for 2 persons to share.  So I am quite annoyed he had not invited me to dinner last night. 

The Lava from the classic range was topped with fresh olives, burrata, mozzarella, sweet cherry tomatoes, whole basil leaves and passata. The creaminess of the burrata created a delightful burst of flavours with each bite. He favoured the thicker crusts but the Romano pizzas here had made him rethink his preferences. The Pomodoro Pesto (Romano) was the pièce de résistance for him with its thin crust, which still provided a very satisfying bite. Crowned with mozzarella, passata, cherry tomatoes, garlic pesto sauce, basil leave and pesto Genovese, this pizza had left him impressed with how all the ingredients complemented each other to create a wonderful symphony of sensations for the palate.

The third pizza, a Margherita with the classic crust was a creation of mozzarella, basil and passata. So simple, so comforting and definitely a perennial crowd-pleaser.

 

His Verdict?  -  BELLY HEARTY YET HEALTHY

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.

 

Hawker Food For A Cause

I think I found my answer to indulging in great hawker food without the guilt.  No I am not talking about following in the footsteps of fitness fanatics who might opt for fish soup without the noodles, plain rice instead of chicken rice,  Fried Carrot Cake without the Carrot Cake or Fried Hokkien Mee without the Mee, at the hawker centers.  I am talking about indulging in great hawker fare for a good cause.

Singaporeans within my age group will remember Rasa Singapura Food Centre, an iconic hawker centre that was located at the current Tudor Court in Tanglin during the 1970s-80s.  As a child, I remembered having a feast of Fried Carrot Cake (fried to a crisp), Char Kway Teow (complete with lots of sweet dark sauce and cockles),  Satay and more for supper with my parents. When this beloved hawker centre had to go to make way for new, modern and soulless buildings, our entire nation grieved.   I think very few people understood that Rasa Singapura Food Centre, meant more than good food to us.  It was a place that bonded families and friends over great Singaporean Hawker fare, my uncles took their then girlfriends there for date nights, we fell out with our siblings over the last stick of Satay there, we chatted about our career ambitions, new love, upcoming marriage, getting keys to our new HDB flats, kids, and just about everything about a typical Singaporean life, at Rasa Singapura Food Centre.  Of course, I grieved when the bulldozers came for a piece of my childhood.

 At the end of 2015, Josephine Ng launched the New Rasa Singapura, at the old premises of the Tanglin Post Office, just across the road from the former Rasa Singapura Food Centre.   The New Rasa Singapura, tries to preserve the traditional flavors of our well-loved local hawker delights.

More importantly, the reason why one could indulge without the guilt, was that Josephine had established New Rasa Singapura as a social enterprise with the aim of providing training and jobs that could help the disadvantaged reintegrate into society.  Through New Rasa Singapura, Josephine had been helping the less fortunate including people with physical or hearing impairment, recovering stroke patients, and mature vulnerable individuals.

Her menu boasts a wide selection of dishes that ranged from familiar favourites  which are reasonably priced like Mee Rebus, Hainanese Chicken Rice, and Soup Kambing.  Did I mention the weekday lunch specials cost only $8?

We tried the Dry Laksa, Beef Rendang, Chicken Wings and Satay.  I found the Dry Laksa not spicy enough and a little too soggy but the serving staff told us that we could request for a spicier version in future and they would be happy to entertain any special requests like “less oil, less salt etc” so my fitness fanatic friends would be happy to know that.  The  Beef Rendang is not called “Must Try Beef Rendang” for nothing.  It was so full of flavor and there was quite a lot of tender chunks of beef in the dish.  We had to stop ourselves from ordering an extra helping of rice to go with the delicious gravy.  The Chicken Wings was the husband’s favorite.  He loved the traditional prawn paste chicken that we often ordered at Cantonese restaurants.  The Chicken Wings served here were also marinated with prawn paste and fried to a crisp.  They did not go overboard with the marinade so I was glad the dish did not turn out too salty, like other versions served at most restaurants.  The Satays were well grilled and I liked that the meat was so tender that they fell off the skewers.  I was glad the peanut sauce that accompanied the Satay was not oily at all, unlike those served at some hawker centres which came covered with a thick film of oil.

 While New Rasa Singapura can never bring back the same atmosphere and the old world charm of old Rasa Singapura Food Centre, the fact that we were still served good local fare, for a great cause was enough reason for me to spread the word and make a return visit to try the other dishes that I have yet to try.

Beyond the good food, I am awed by the tremendous effort and energy put into New Rasa Singapura as a social enterprise that aims to serve the community with its heart-centric business sense.

 

New Rasa Chicken Wings

 

 

Satay

 

 

Must Have Beef Rendang

 

 

Dry Laksa

 

 

Our Verdict?  -  BELLY GOOD FOOD FOR A GREAT CAUSE

 

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.

 

Breakfast Will Not Be Boring Again

I swear Singapore has got to be a nation of “Brunchers” promulgated by many restaurants which offer All Day Breakfast on their menus.  Many would not mind paying up to $24 for a plate of breakfast fare consisting of 2 eggs, a pallid strip of bacon and a couple of under-cooked chicken chipolatas in a restaurant that served All Day Breakfast.  I however, am so bored with some of the hits and misses with the same breakfast choice and often wonder how some restaurants could get the basic eggs-bacon-sausages-toast combo so wrong.

So we set out on a hunt for more unusual breakfast fare that could make our Sundays a wee bit more interesting.

 

Epicurious

Top on my list would be the breakfast served at Epicurious, situated along Robertson Quay.   Firstly, Epicurious would always be my favorite choice of a restaurant for brunch because dining by the river presented us with a perfect spot for people-watching as we sipped our coffee. Secondly, Epicurious’ spritely proprietor Helena, was always experimental with the food she served and she went by the principle that she would only serve food that she too could enjoy. That would explain why her dishes on the restaurant’s menu were always wholesome, healthy fare peppered with a bit of fun.  The current talk of town right now, is her rainbow cheese toast which my son is dying to try soon.  I truly enjoyed Epicurious’ pretty healthy dish of egg foo yong with shrimps, red rice and sauté potatoes. That to me, felt like I had come home to a hot plate of home-cooked goodness that Mom would prepare for me after a tough day at work.  I can hear the usual skeptical question, “Is that breakfast food?”  Hell yeah! There are eggs in there right? If there are eggs, it got to be breakfast food…my philosophy anyway.

Another hot favorite of the family would be the crispy poached eggs.  We often get our cheap thrill from taking a video of the moment we cut through a crispy poached egg.  We would get excited by the crackling sound as our knife sliced through the golden breading and watched in awe as the yolk oozed out like liquid gold.   We do usually lead boring lives as you might well realize.

 

Our Verdict?  -  BELLY YUMMILICIOUS, LIKE HOME-COOKED COMFORT FOOD PREPARED BY A BIG SISTER WHEN MOM AND DAD ARE AWAY

  

The Lokal

 

Another firm family favorite would be The Lokal, situated at the junction of Neil Road.  One of the dishes I thought ticked my list of being nutritiously filling without adding too much unnecessary carbs was the Baked Eggs which was made up of spicy beef or pork, 2 eggs, beans, potatoes, bacon, onions and mushrooms served in a sizzling pan.

The hubby tried the Black Pearl BLT which came with bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, and a fried egg served between toasted charcoal buns and a side of homemade tomato ketchup.  Well, you can be assured that BLT would not be a boring one. 

 

Our Verdict?  -  BELLY DELICIOUSLY UNIQUE

 

The Provision Shop

Nondescript is how I would describe The Provision Shop.  Located within the Everton Park vicinity, the area had quickly become a hot bed of hip cafes and restaurants that sprung up quite quickly. The Provision Shop is situated below a block of old flats and you can tell, they are more focused about the quality of their food than whether or not they are hip, chic and trendy.

I must confess that because I had been newly acquainted to this café, I had not tried a lot of their items on the menu.  It was by accident that I stumbled into The Provision Shop after a tough session at the gym and a fight with my personal trainer when he nagged me for not taking good care of my diet.  He muttered something like “Abs are made in the kitchen, Jo.” So to my delight, the team at The Provision Shop suggested that I tried their homemade granola served with coconut water.  How could something so healthy be so delicious? This was definitely breakfast of champions.  I think I might be back at The Provision Shop to try more items on their menu.

 

Our Verdict?  -  BELLY-PROMISING

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.

 

Honouring The Humble Pizza

 

The Belly Team has been quite quiet on this blog.  Ok, let’s be specific.  Half of the Belly Team has been quite quiet on this blog simply because I have been traveling for the past month.   However, worry not.  The other half of the Belly Team had been making his presence felt throughout some of the best restaurants in Singapore.  Jerome has devoured the most variety of cuisines the island has on offer with his voracious appetite, but the best for him, at least in my opinion, has probably got to be the humble pizza. To this, I had to agree in spite of my constant battle with healthy eating. 

 

When I was traveling across 4 countries last month, hopping from Hong Kong to Jakarta to Phuket and finally Kuala Lumpur, the amount of rich and spicy food I had turned my belly inside out with discomfort.  I finally settled for a vegetarian pizza at The Pizza Company in Phuket for fear of facing another spicy Som Tam.  Believe me, that pizza was the best dish I had throughout that month of traveling.

 

Tino’s Pizza Café

 

Jerome got his pizza fix recently at Tino’s.  A relative newbie to the already extensive quantity of pizza restaurants, Tino’s challenge was to serve up the best pizza that used the freshest, top quality ingredients.

He picked 2 types of pizzas, the Margherita and the Sicily Seafood.  The Margherita came loaded with mozzarella, padano, basil and cherry tomatoes while the Sicily Seafood came topped with tuna, calamari, shrimps, capsicum, basil leaves and padano.

 

Unfortunately, whatever Tino’s had promised to deliver, it really was not up to the mark.  The food was very average, uninspiring and the topping ingredients seemed cheap.  The portion of the food was also measly and not what one would expect from a restaurant that was established to focus on the hearty fare of good quality pizzas. We would question the sustainability of the restaurant against the competition of the “bigger boys” which offered better quality fare.

 

Jerome’s Verdict?  BELLY UNSATISFYING

 

Pizzeria Mozza

 

So we moved from a pizzeria that offered such poor quality fare to one that has consistently served up some of the best quality pizzas in Singapore – Pizzeria Mozza.  This goes back to the principles which Jerome and I shared.  To enjoy better quality food, one should not hesitate to pay a little more for it.  

At Pizzeria Mozza, one cannot go wrong with the pizzas served here that are inspired by celebrity chef Mario Batali. The restaurant was in fact the brainchild of Mario Batali, restaurateur Joe Basitianich and mentor and cookbook writer Nancy Silverton.  This local chapter was their first international foray, with their main restaurant headquartered at the prestigious Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles. Each pizza is baked to order in a custom-built wood-fired oven and topped with generous amounts of  the freshest premium ingredients specially procured from some of the best purveyors of quality produce in Italy.

 

I had eaten at Pizzeria Mozza several times particularly after a show at the MasterCard Theatre across from the restaurant. In fact, embarrassingly, because the pizzas were so good, I had even eaten at Pizzeria Mozza twice on the same day, once before a show and then again, after the show.  

 

Recently, Jerome visited the Pizzeria and ordered 2 pizzas.  One came topped with fontina, mozzarella, sottoccenere and sage.  The second was prepared with burrata, slow roasted tomatoes and Sicilian oregano.  Be careful about being too over-enthusiastic with the addictive crispbread served while waiting for the pizzas to be cooked.  It was extremely delicious and threatened to cause frivolous ordering of multiple servings of crispbread which might leave little room left for the even more delicious pizzas.

 

Our Verdict?  - BELLY AWESOME AND DANGEROUSLY ADDICTIVE

 

Motorino

 

This pizzeria traced its roots to Brooklyn.  It specialized in Neapolitan-styled pizzas that came topped with ingredients procured from various regions in Italy, resulting in the rich and robust flavours across their pizza creations.  

 

The way the proprietor of Motorino described the tomatoes used in the sauce base was enough to send us into a state of delirium.  He mentioned that the tomatoes were cultivated in Sicily “where the sun shines the hottest and the volcanic soil on which the crops were grown ensured that the harvest yielded exceptionally good quality produce”.  The tomatoes used were heirloom tomatoes which were open-pollinated and non-hybrid which resulted in much better, quality-tasting tomatoes compared to the large scale commercially grown variety.   If you find me hiding in the corner of a kitchen munching on fresh tomatoes, that would be why.

 

Jerome opted for the all-time favourites Marinara and Margherita pizzas because these classics would be a good test of the tomatoes and other ingredients used which the proprietor spoke to us about.  The Marinara pizza was made from tomato sauce, oregano, garlic, sea salt, organic extra virgin olive oil.  The Margherita pizza was made from tomato sauce, fior di latte, basil, pecorino and organic extra virgin olive oil.  True to promised, they passed the test.  The pizzas were so simple, yet transported us back to the old fashioned Italian kitchens in our minds where we could see a little, or not so little old lady pounding away at the pizza dough….”the way Mama makes” as they would say in popular food programs featuring renown Italian chefs.

 

Our Verdict?  - BELLY HEARTWARMINGLY GOOD, ALMOST LIKE A HOMECOMING

 

Pizzeria L’Operetta

 

Another one of Jerome’s favourites was the Margherita Con Fungi at Pizzeria L’Operetta.  This full 12-inches of splendour came topped with tomato sauce, mozzarella, mushrooms, basil leaves, and parmesan which was baked in a wood-fired oven.  This was simply delicious and they were obviously uncompromising in quality and freshness when it came to ingredients.  The oven which the pizzas were cooked in, bore an uncanny resemblance to Phalaris’ ancient torture device, the Brazen Bull.  Kept at a very high heat, it produced an absolutely delectable pie which was soft and with the right amount of chewiness.  The pizzas here were Vera Pizza Nepoletana which was a certification awarded by the Associazione Verace Pizza Nepoletana, a not-for-profit organization where members were bound to comply to the exacting standards of the traditional pizzas made in Naples.  This pizzeria belonged to the L’Opera group of restaurants headed by executive chef Seita Nakahara who had accumulated a wealth of culinary expertise with stints in Piedmonte, Sicily and Tuscany.

 

Jerome’s Verdict?  - BELLY AUTHENTIC AND WORTH BUSTING THE DIET FOR

 

About The Writer:

This blog post was co-written by my brother Jerome and I. Although we are siblings who grew up 11 years apart, shaped by differing experiences to see the world from different perspectives, we do share a common obsession – FOOD.  We celebrate our passion for life with food.  However, our attitudes to food are quite different and the way we celebrate our love for food are also quite different.  Jerome lives to eat and hoovers everything edible that crosses his path.  As he shovels food into his mouth with that fork in his right hand, he takes photographs of what he eats, and posts pictures and notes up on Facebook with his left.  Often, his beautifully written prose about what he had eaten would be 7 paragraphs in length and would not have any punctuations in between because he had been too busy multi-tasking. 

I, on the other hand, eat to live. It is not just about my attempts to eat healthily. As I am a “cam-whore” and “social media hussy”, I spend about half an hour styling my food, taking photographs, writing notes and posting them across my social media platforms before eating them, right after the hubby has paid for the bill and is about to head out of the restaurant.  I enjoy reading all my posts about what I had eaten because I know that I had lived fully in spite of watching what I eat.  Welcome to the foodie world of the quirky Ong siblings.