Pu Tien
Tampines Central
B1-K19/27
Tel: +65 6781 2162
One of the major differences between my mother’s palate and those of her offspring is that she tends to lean towards gentler, more refined flavours. Not for her the spicy brashness of Szechuan or Hunan cuisine, nor even the earthier notes of say, Taiwanese cooking – but her true allegiances lie in the simple, light nuances of Heng Hua (or Xinghua) cuisine. So it was that when her birthday rolled around, she asserted the right to pick the restaurant with minimal hesitation. We were going to Pu Tien.
Putian is a prefecture in Fujian province, whose people are referred to as Heng Hua. The cuisine is, as I said, light and non-spicy, and – because it is coastal – lean heavily on seafood as both a base for stocks and broths as well as a final product. Pu Tien is a chain of restaurants in Singapore purporting to replicate the Heng Hua classics, a job which it does quite well.
The original and flagship Pu Tien outlet is along Kitchener Road, but it is a nightmare trying to find parking there so we settled for the suburban alternative in Tampines Mall. I have to say that shopping malls are way more complicated now than the days of my youth – a large part of which was wasted hanging around shopping malls. Back then, the format of malls was the same everywhere: a boxy layout that facilitated walking around in a structured manner, with cookie cutter shop spaces clearly marked and defined. Nowadays your average shopping mall is likely to be proliferated with kiosks set up along the walkways, and – to me at least – always seems to be laid out in the most confusing manner possible. Maybe the trick is if they make you walk around enough you will eventually buy something.
I walked around for three minutes trying to find the restaurant and of course, chose the perfect time and place to give up and ask for directions. The lady I asked looked at me as though she thought I was crazy – and then pointed out the Pu Tien storefront which I would have seen had I only taken three more steps. It’s a good thing I am accustomed to looking like an idiot.
Everyone arrived more or less on time, and we began the exciting process of selecting dishes almost immediately. The captain was very persuasive in recommending the set meal for 4 – which at $88 was quite frankly a steal – and so we went with that while picking out other dishes that we wanted to eat as well.
It was a slow day, and we were one of maybe only five or six parties. As a result, we were fussed over by the waitstaff, who were all efficient and personable. Very few restaurants make the leap from service to hospitality successfully, and while this restaurant certainly is nowhere near some of the other establishments I have had the great fortune of dining at, it was at least a very refreshing departure from the typical terrible service in the Singapore restaurant scene.
The food was good without being great, but what is particularly impressive is the Pu Tien chain’s ability to replicate quality across a number of locations. I have eaten at one other location, and I must say that the food has the same taste, the same feel at either one. Stocks had similar heft, sauces hit all the same notes. It was a testament to how good the management had been at buttoning down recipes and processes, and I silently marvelled at this success.
One dish that bears particular mention was the longan pork. This was a variation of sweet and sour pork – breaded pork nuggets flash fried in a sweet and tangy sauce, which in this case was made with the addition of longans. The fruit gave it a piquancy that brought out the other flavours very well. But what was also impressive was the skill of the chef in flash-frying the nuggets. The exterior was crisped perfectly, while the meat inside remained tender and moist.
Other standouts included the Heng Hua bee hoon. I find it very difficult to cook bee hoon well because the individual strands are so thin. It takes skill and experience not only to prevent clumping, but also ensure that each individual strand is covered in sauce, or flavoured with the accompaniments. One thing peculiar to Heng Hua cuisine is the use of clams in their base stock. You can actually taste the difference in the final product. My mother cooks Heng Hua white “lor mee” as a Sunday treat from time to time, and tries to mimic the Pu Tien recipe (as well as that of other Heng Hua establishments); but she never uses clams in her stock, and it is never as good as the restaurant versions.
There were some misses, though – the bamboo clams were quite poor and tasted of garlic but not much else. For the price you pay for these (a lot) it was definitely not worth it. The herbal prawn soup in bamboo was interesting in that they make individual size bowls out of bamboo stems (which are hollow in the middle) and then boil soup in it. The version here had a strong ginseng taste, which to me is a big no-no. The best ginseng is always understated.
To further echo that theme, it was an understated birthday meal, of understated cuisine – which was just what my mother wanted. As you get older you grow a little more tired of celebrating birthdays – for all they do is remind you of your age. That’s what my mother thinks, anyway. Yet I am still of the opinion that you only get that one day in a year where everyone has to be nice to you, so you might as well make the most of it.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Sunday, August 02, 2009
Staying classy at the Conrad
Golden Peony
3/F Conrad Centennial
2 Temasek Boulevard
Tel: +65 64327482
It is coming to almost ten months since I moved back to Singapore, and by all accounts I have well and truly settled back in to the land of my birth. I have, I think, regained some measure of familiarity with the local dining scene – sussed out enough old favourites and sampled enough new ones. But the one thing I still cannot get enough of is fine Cantonese cuisine.
If it falls to me to suggest a place to eat, my initial thoughts are always of Cantonese restaurants, be they humble tze char outlets or high-end restaurants. Luckily, there is no shortage of these places in Singapore, and there are some very, very fine ones on the list. I recently had the chance to sample Golden Peony at the Conrad Hotel, and left very, very impressed.
More so than in the Western world, the best restaurants in Asia are often located in hotels. The thinking here is that for any hotel worth its salt, it is almost imperative, as a point of reputation – to have a stellar in-house restaurant. It helps to build the hotel’s brand, and has become a prerequisite for the top hotels, which often spare no expense in recruiting star chefs. For the top chefs, it is a win-win situation: they have the backing of a larger organisation to handle all the HR, procurement and other support functions – so they can concentrate on the cooking.
Given how I talked about setting in my previous post, the one thing I have always found regrettable is how cookie-cutter the approach to setting is at fine Cantonese restaurants. After a while they all begin to look alike: light, muted colours like cream and ivory, starched white tablecloths, stiff-backed chairs and cutlery laced with gold. There are a few places that have unique settings (Summer Pavilion springs to mind) but by and large you could be in any one of these fine restaurants and not know the difference. The central challenge for the designers of these places is to keep the space classy without creating a caricature.
But if you have grown up going to these types of restaurants, then you don’t really mind, and sometimes it even provides the comfort of familiarity. (This is quite evident when you travel abroad to non-Asian cities, where a large part of the draw of Chinese restaurants is the ubiquitous setting. Speaking as a former Chinese diaspora, I can attest to how these places always made me feel at home despite the inevitably disappointing food. It is like a Frenchman stuck in a random Chinese city and frequenting what passes for a bistro because of the lacquered wood bartop.)
So despite its less than remarkable interior, it is the food at Golden Peony that is the main draw. The pickled vegetables set out as an amuse-bouche were excellent and very addictive – just the right blend of spice and tang to open your palate. Regrettably, we did not have the time (nor was anyone comfortable enough with everyone else) to deliberate and order a la carte, so we went with one of the set menus.
One of the key reasons I love going to Cantonese restaurants is the soups. The Cantonese love their soups, and despite how easy it is to make soup, it is one of those things that you definitely get what you pay for. It may be psychological, but I feel that for soups, cost is definitely correlated with quality. The more expensive the restaurant, the better the soup. And I would gladly pay top dollar for an individual serving of double-boiled goodness. At Golden Peony we had the good fortune of trying their shark cartilage soup. This is one of those standard soups you find in most good Cantonese restaurants, and is deceptively difficult to do well. Shark meat has high concentrations of urea, which turns into ammonia after the shark has died. So you pay a premium for the speed at which shark cartilage has to be processed, and you pay top dollar for fresh shark cartilage. Otherwise this ammonia taste has to be treated some way or another, and many places try but fail at pulling it off. Golden Peony’s version was just milky enough, had a clean, clear taste and the right consistency: not too thin and not too starchy.
The other dishes passed in a blur – partly because we were having a serious conversation, partly because they were so good that I gulped down whatever they put in front of me in double-quick time. I am quite a quick eater, and even more so when the food is good – but when I looked around, everyone else was wolfing down their plates at the same speed as me. They must have really enjoyed it because their faces had that look of muted wonderment, as if they were on the verge of breaking out into wide smiles because they were surprised at how good the food was. Golden Peony is technically very impressive – flavours are refined to razor-sharpness, ensembles are carefully thought through. At the same time the heartiness of the dishes was not compromised, creating that rare class of food that both stimulates the palate and satisfies the stomach.
Right before the dessert course we were served a shotglass of kalamansi juice as a palate-cleanser. This was a nice touch, for you do not often see this in Chinese restaurants. Their thoughtfulness in no way prepared us for the dessert, which I thought was absolutely stellar – an aloe vera mint jelly that did everything you would expect of dessert. It satisfied your sweet tooth, cleansed and rounded off your taste-buds, and filled whatever space you still had in your stomach after the meal.
Let me just say, before you get any ideas, that you pay a pretty penny for the quality of Golden Peony. It may not be in the price point of Hai Tien Lo and My Humble House, but it is still expensive enough that it – for me, at least – falls exclusively within the realm of special occasions. There are other Cantonese stars of the Singaporean scene that you wouldn’t mind going to on any random Friday or Saturday night, as a little treat for the week’s labours: Wah Lok, Hua Ting to mention just a couple. This is not one of those places.
For a special occasion, though, this is quite a delightful place. The service is thoughtful and attentive. The food is exquisite. By all means, count me in just as long as somebody else is paying.
3/F Conrad Centennial
2 Temasek Boulevard
Tel: +65 64327482
It is coming to almost ten months since I moved back to Singapore, and by all accounts I have well and truly settled back in to the land of my birth. I have, I think, regained some measure of familiarity with the local dining scene – sussed out enough old favourites and sampled enough new ones. But the one thing I still cannot get enough of is fine Cantonese cuisine.
If it falls to me to suggest a place to eat, my initial thoughts are always of Cantonese restaurants, be they humble tze char outlets or high-end restaurants. Luckily, there is no shortage of these places in Singapore, and there are some very, very fine ones on the list. I recently had the chance to sample Golden Peony at the Conrad Hotel, and left very, very impressed.
More so than in the Western world, the best restaurants in Asia are often located in hotels. The thinking here is that for any hotel worth its salt, it is almost imperative, as a point of reputation – to have a stellar in-house restaurant. It helps to build the hotel’s brand, and has become a prerequisite for the top hotels, which often spare no expense in recruiting star chefs. For the top chefs, it is a win-win situation: they have the backing of a larger organisation to handle all the HR, procurement and other support functions – so they can concentrate on the cooking.
Given how I talked about setting in my previous post, the one thing I have always found regrettable is how cookie-cutter the approach to setting is at fine Cantonese restaurants. After a while they all begin to look alike: light, muted colours like cream and ivory, starched white tablecloths, stiff-backed chairs and cutlery laced with gold. There are a few places that have unique settings (Summer Pavilion springs to mind) but by and large you could be in any one of these fine restaurants and not know the difference. The central challenge for the designers of these places is to keep the space classy without creating a caricature.
But if you have grown up going to these types of restaurants, then you don’t really mind, and sometimes it even provides the comfort of familiarity. (This is quite evident when you travel abroad to non-Asian cities, where a large part of the draw of Chinese restaurants is the ubiquitous setting. Speaking as a former Chinese diaspora, I can attest to how these places always made me feel at home despite the inevitably disappointing food. It is like a Frenchman stuck in a random Chinese city and frequenting what passes for a bistro because of the lacquered wood bartop.)
So despite its less than remarkable interior, it is the food at Golden Peony that is the main draw. The pickled vegetables set out as an amuse-bouche were excellent and very addictive – just the right blend of spice and tang to open your palate. Regrettably, we did not have the time (nor was anyone comfortable enough with everyone else) to deliberate and order a la carte, so we went with one of the set menus.
One of the key reasons I love going to Cantonese restaurants is the soups. The Cantonese love their soups, and despite how easy it is to make soup, it is one of those things that you definitely get what you pay for. It may be psychological, but I feel that for soups, cost is definitely correlated with quality. The more expensive the restaurant, the better the soup. And I would gladly pay top dollar for an individual serving of double-boiled goodness. At Golden Peony we had the good fortune of trying their shark cartilage soup. This is one of those standard soups you find in most good Cantonese restaurants, and is deceptively difficult to do well. Shark meat has high concentrations of urea, which turns into ammonia after the shark has died. So you pay a premium for the speed at which shark cartilage has to be processed, and you pay top dollar for fresh shark cartilage. Otherwise this ammonia taste has to be treated some way or another, and many places try but fail at pulling it off. Golden Peony’s version was just milky enough, had a clean, clear taste and the right consistency: not too thin and not too starchy.
The other dishes passed in a blur – partly because we were having a serious conversation, partly because they were so good that I gulped down whatever they put in front of me in double-quick time. I am quite a quick eater, and even more so when the food is good – but when I looked around, everyone else was wolfing down their plates at the same speed as me. They must have really enjoyed it because their faces had that look of muted wonderment, as if they were on the verge of breaking out into wide smiles because they were surprised at how good the food was. Golden Peony is technically very impressive – flavours are refined to razor-sharpness, ensembles are carefully thought through. At the same time the heartiness of the dishes was not compromised, creating that rare class of food that both stimulates the palate and satisfies the stomach.
Right before the dessert course we were served a shotglass of kalamansi juice as a palate-cleanser. This was a nice touch, for you do not often see this in Chinese restaurants. Their thoughtfulness in no way prepared us for the dessert, which I thought was absolutely stellar – an aloe vera mint jelly that did everything you would expect of dessert. It satisfied your sweet tooth, cleansed and rounded off your taste-buds, and filled whatever space you still had in your stomach after the meal.
Let me just say, before you get any ideas, that you pay a pretty penny for the quality of Golden Peony. It may not be in the price point of Hai Tien Lo and My Humble House, but it is still expensive enough that it – for me, at least – falls exclusively within the realm of special occasions. There are other Cantonese stars of the Singaporean scene that you wouldn’t mind going to on any random Friday or Saturday night, as a little treat for the week’s labours: Wah Lok, Hua Ting to mention just a couple. This is not one of those places.
For a special occasion, though, this is quite a delightful place. The service is thoughtful and attentive. The food is exquisite. By all means, count me in just as long as somebody else is paying.
Saturday, August 01, 2009
More than just four walls and a door
The Lighthouse @ The Fullerton Hotel
1 Fullerton Square
Tel: +65 68778933
I don’t deny that when it comes down to it, the quality of the food is what distinguishes one restaurant from another in my mind. But I am increasingly convinced that the setting, or the space, is a key factor in distinguishing one dining experience from another. This is why, long after having forgotten what I ate there, I still remember the wonderful midday light shining through the spotless glass windows at the Blue Duck Tavern, or the soaring ceilings and grandeur of Eleven Madison Park. Singapore has its fair share of good restaurants that offer special dining experiences, if you know to find them.
I have always wondered how the market for fine dining in Singapore not only maintains its size, but keeps increasing from year to year. More glitzy new restaurants get added to a dining scene that has already a sizeable number of familiar favourites and old mainstays. Bear in mind that financial success is tremendously difficult for any restaurateur: since there is so much good and cheap hawker food around, there is no way the fine dining restaurant can compete on price. So setting, then, is a key differentiator.
The Lighthouse at the Fullerton Hotel opened in May of this year, replacing what used to be San Marco. The cuisine, though, remained the same – contemporary Italian. I was there recently for a business lunch, and as in telling people about my experience it was curious how much more recognition I got for saying ‘the old San Marco’. I had never been to San Marco, so I wondered how long it would take for The Lighthouse to step out of its shadow.
The Lighthouse is located at the top of the Fullerton Hotel, in what did indeed use to be a lighthouse. To me, the Fullerton Hotel is gorgeous: pre-war neoclassical that oozes grandeur, with Doric colonnades of stately grey granite – the kind of building that are a dime a dozen in London or Paris. But Singapore does not have the history of a London or Paris, so a building like that is hard to find.
There is a private elevator that takes you up to the Lighthouse – a nice touch, but the elevator is tiny and claustrophobic. Once you step out of it, though, you are greeted by a sprawling view of Marina Bay – which would be quite impressive except for the fact that most of it is currently taken up by construction of the new integrated resort.
My dining companions had arrived before me, so I did not have time to take in the space, but as I sat there through the meal it found me instead. The Lighthouse is a small space, but filled with lots of natural light, which lends it a certain charm and puts the diner at ease. The view, of course, is impressive. And for such a small space, the management at least had the good sense to spread out the tables enough so as not to give a cramped feeling.
I think one of the reasons I love bread so much is that I am too lazy to make it for myself. So when it is made for me, I appreciate it all that much more. The rosemary rolls at The Lighthouse were great texture-wise, but taste-wise they were overly salty, and the herb butter was worse. Perhaps I should caveat this, though: I don’t know if my palate has changed – since Singaporean food as a general rule is very sweet.
I had a starter of Wagyu beef carpaccio, which was pounded so thin to the point of disintegrating. I couldn’t, and still can’t, decide whether it would have been better tinged with a little mustard. On the one hand you don’t want to do too much to good beef, and on the other I think mustard does wonders in certain situations, this being one of them. The jury’s still out on this one. The butternut squash cannelloni came in a thick, rich sauce and topped with bits of pancetta. I thought the pasta needed more egg, but the squash was nice and light and not too sweet.
Overall the food at The Lighthouse is pretty decent. It is a long way from amazing, but then again we are not in Italy. There is a certain je ne sais quoi with good Italian food, I think, because the best of the best has a certain lightness to it, which stems partly from not doing too much to the ingredients. But the best Italian food also has strong, pronounced, flavours, which stems from using top quality and fresh ingredients. How do you balance the two? The role of the Italian chef then becomes taking these top ingredients and making sure that whatever little he or she does to them, it is with the sole aim of accentuating their best qualities.
We did not have any wine at lunch, which was a pity, but I took the opportunity to check out their winelist, which did not impress me all that much. I think one of the advantages of dining out is access to great wines. I’m talking about the high-end, fantastically expensive bottles, which the normal consumer typically finds difficult to procure. Unfortunately I don’t get the opportunity to drink these very often, but it’s nice to know that I could if I wanted to.
But for a new restaurant, the Lighthouse does everything else quite well. The service is excellent – efficient and yet still personable. The human element of the setting, I think, cannot be ignored. Part of the vibe you get in a restaurant comes from the people that inhabit that space. If the waiters and the managers are not happy to be there, it shows most markedly. And if they are not happy to be there, chances are that you will not be either.
All said, you could definitely do worse than the Lighthouse. I hadn’t had Italian in a while so this was an enjoyable experience. As we took the elevator down I got that feeling that you get when you have left a room but haven’t said all you that you wanted to say. Perhaps some day I will return to say it.
1 Fullerton Square
Tel: +65 68778933
I don’t deny that when it comes down to it, the quality of the food is what distinguishes one restaurant from another in my mind. But I am increasingly convinced that the setting, or the space, is a key factor in distinguishing one dining experience from another. This is why, long after having forgotten what I ate there, I still remember the wonderful midday light shining through the spotless glass windows at the Blue Duck Tavern, or the soaring ceilings and grandeur of Eleven Madison Park. Singapore has its fair share of good restaurants that offer special dining experiences, if you know to find them.
I have always wondered how the market for fine dining in Singapore not only maintains its size, but keeps increasing from year to year. More glitzy new restaurants get added to a dining scene that has already a sizeable number of familiar favourites and old mainstays. Bear in mind that financial success is tremendously difficult for any restaurateur: since there is so much good and cheap hawker food around, there is no way the fine dining restaurant can compete on price. So setting, then, is a key differentiator.
The Lighthouse at the Fullerton Hotel opened in May of this year, replacing what used to be San Marco. The cuisine, though, remained the same – contemporary Italian. I was there recently for a business lunch, and as in telling people about my experience it was curious how much more recognition I got for saying ‘the old San Marco’. I had never been to San Marco, so I wondered how long it would take for The Lighthouse to step out of its shadow.
The Lighthouse is located at the top of the Fullerton Hotel, in what did indeed use to be a lighthouse. To me, the Fullerton Hotel is gorgeous: pre-war neoclassical that oozes grandeur, with Doric colonnades of stately grey granite – the kind of building that are a dime a dozen in London or Paris. But Singapore does not have the history of a London or Paris, so a building like that is hard to find.
There is a private elevator that takes you up to the Lighthouse – a nice touch, but the elevator is tiny and claustrophobic. Once you step out of it, though, you are greeted by a sprawling view of Marina Bay – which would be quite impressive except for the fact that most of it is currently taken up by construction of the new integrated resort.
My dining companions had arrived before me, so I did not have time to take in the space, but as I sat there through the meal it found me instead. The Lighthouse is a small space, but filled with lots of natural light, which lends it a certain charm and puts the diner at ease. The view, of course, is impressive. And for such a small space, the management at least had the good sense to spread out the tables enough so as not to give a cramped feeling.
I think one of the reasons I love bread so much is that I am too lazy to make it for myself. So when it is made for me, I appreciate it all that much more. The rosemary rolls at The Lighthouse were great texture-wise, but taste-wise they were overly salty, and the herb butter was worse. Perhaps I should caveat this, though: I don’t know if my palate has changed – since Singaporean food as a general rule is very sweet.
I had a starter of Wagyu beef carpaccio, which was pounded so thin to the point of disintegrating. I couldn’t, and still can’t, decide whether it would have been better tinged with a little mustard. On the one hand you don’t want to do too much to good beef, and on the other I think mustard does wonders in certain situations, this being one of them. The jury’s still out on this one. The butternut squash cannelloni came in a thick, rich sauce and topped with bits of pancetta. I thought the pasta needed more egg, but the squash was nice and light and not too sweet.
Overall the food at The Lighthouse is pretty decent. It is a long way from amazing, but then again we are not in Italy. There is a certain je ne sais quoi with good Italian food, I think, because the best of the best has a certain lightness to it, which stems partly from not doing too much to the ingredients. But the best Italian food also has strong, pronounced, flavours, which stems from using top quality and fresh ingredients. How do you balance the two? The role of the Italian chef then becomes taking these top ingredients and making sure that whatever little he or she does to them, it is with the sole aim of accentuating their best qualities.
We did not have any wine at lunch, which was a pity, but I took the opportunity to check out their winelist, which did not impress me all that much. I think one of the advantages of dining out is access to great wines. I’m talking about the high-end, fantastically expensive bottles, which the normal consumer typically finds difficult to procure. Unfortunately I don’t get the opportunity to drink these very often, but it’s nice to know that I could if I wanted to.
But for a new restaurant, the Lighthouse does everything else quite well. The service is excellent – efficient and yet still personable. The human element of the setting, I think, cannot be ignored. Part of the vibe you get in a restaurant comes from the people that inhabit that space. If the waiters and the managers are not happy to be there, it shows most markedly. And if they are not happy to be there, chances are that you will not be either.
All said, you could definitely do worse than the Lighthouse. I hadn’t had Italian in a while so this was an enjoyable experience. As we took the elevator down I got that feeling that you get when you have left a room but haven’t said all you that you wanted to say. Perhaps some day I will return to say it.
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