Claypot Fun at Big Splash

Claypot rice. Some love it, some are neutral, some hate it. As for me, I love it.

One of my favourite places to eat one is at Le Chausseur who uses long grain, fragrant basmati. But recently, at the old Big Splash, we spied one interesting restaurant...called Claypot Fun...interesting name. One of my friends have eaten there before and recommended it...and on a rainy afternoon, we had lunch there.

We started off with, wel some starters...chee cheong fun...

I am not sure if they steam the pasta themselves...chee cheong fun is made by steaming a rice base gruel mix into thin, light sheets, which are then rolled, sometimes, as in this case, filled with ingredients, and dowzed in sauce. Quite nice CCF. Definitely one of the dishes to re-order.

But we came for the claypot, and its the namesake of the restaurant...so we ordered two different claypot rice...first the minced pork patty with salted fish.

Reminds me of the traditional steamed rice and pork dishes I used to eat as a child. They used Thail long grained fragrant rice. Nice. Firm texture, beautiful fragrance. The aromas from the salted fish punctuate the savoury richness of the pork. Magnificent with rice and some cut chilli padi, and just a dash of either soy sauce or fish sauce.

And the piece de resistance, the kampung chicken claypot with Chinese sausages

Beautiful, huge chunks of tender, juicy chicken. Mix the pot, and one finds the treasures of the sausages

With the thick black sauce, the dish really shines. The sausages are dried, and probably fried before being popped into the claypot. The claypot keeps the heat well distributed and focussed within, rendering the chicken ultra tender, and the releases the beautiful flavours and fragrance of the sausages. Very nice!

Overall, a nice restaurant, with good food. Prices are a bit steep for a place outside of the CBD, but not prohibitively so. Recommended.

Claypot Fun
902 East Coast Parkway
Blk B Playground @ Big Splash #01-11
6440 7975

Fei Kee Claypot Chicken Rice

Claypot is one of the traditional dishes in the Chinese culture...carried forward into modern Singapore. Chicken cooked over rice in an claypot on a hot stove...warms the heart.

This little store, tucked near the Jalan Sultan/Arab Street enclave is a gem. My friend, who frequents this place tells of a tale of a fastidious cook, who insists on making the dish from scratch...ensuring a waiting time of at least 15 minutes while the rice cooks.

You can call ahead, so the uncle starts cooking your dish...ready for consumption when you arrive...make sure you are not late. Note that he starts with uncooked rice in the foreground, and his poster states skinless, grade A chicken thigh is used.

When delivered, the rice and chicken with lots of chinese sausage (lup cheong) and covered by cabbage and sprinklings of dried shrimps. Smell was heavenly. The thick black sauce was pre-mixed, unlike the one at Le Chausseur where the waiter mixes the sauce at the table.

Fragrance wafts...an important criteria in claypot chicken. On stirring, the hot rice cooks the cabbage, rendering it done, but still with a crunch. The rice was nicely done, still a bit moist, fluffy, but not a match for the superior basmati Andy uses in Le Chausseur. The chicken is boneless, and skinless. Nice tender chunks. The saussage portion is generous...and as Chinese sausages tend to do, lends a wonderful aroma. The rice was getting slightly burnt around the edges of the pot (compared to Le Chasseur's which by the end of the meal would have been a gorgeous, blackened, smokey crust), and makes a great smokey flavour.

Overall, excellent dish. The chilli was quite good too. But for me, I am spoilt by the gorgeous Le Chausseur claypot chicken with the power sambal...so this has to take second place.

Fei Kee Claypot Chicken Rice
Luk Lu Eating House
341 Beach Road
8222 6360
Mon - Sat 11am to 730pm

Le Chasseur: Talk of the town

Le Chasseur. What an interesting name for a Chinese Cze Char style restaurant in Singapore. The word is French for The Hunter. And it came about because the owner and chef Andy Lim used to run a restaurant of the same name in Mauritius.

This restaurant...I am tempted to call it small, as the atmosphere is congenial and Andy comes out to talk and give running commentaries on his food...but it is hardly small. It occupies 2 whole shophouses just across the road from The Central.

We asked Andy to make his recommendation, and this was the menu...first up, though it takes a full 20 minutes or so to prepare is te claypot chicken rice.



Andy insists on starting from scratch, with the rice cooked in the pot with the ingredients, so as to achieve full infusion of flavours. And also to char a nice, thick, burnt layer at the bottom of the pot...giving a beautiful smoky flavour. The chicken was very tender..and de-boned. This is a pet peeve...many times for me, a claypot of chicken rice is spoilt by having to weed out the chicken bones. And the home made, tangy, tart, pungent, hot chilli sauce complements it very well. A real winner. And for this dish alone Le Chasseur is worth the visit.



Andy uses Pakistani Basmati rice to make the claypot rice. This is very fragrant, long grained basmati. And very fluffy when cooked, and much more able to absorb flavours than regular Thai jasmine rice. This is the first commercial establishment I have come across which elects to use this much more expensive rice in its claypot. We do use basmati at home for claypots, chicken rice, nasi lemak and when we cook curries. Nice touch.

We also tried the deep fried ter ka...pork knuckles, or what Andy describes in his menu as deep fried pata.



The style of deep frying the knuckle and the sauce is described by Andy as Filipino style. But this is a much more elegant dish than the lechon baboy in Manila. Though deep fried, the knuckle remains remarkably dry and un-greasy...both in appearance and in the mouth. The skin is a dry crispy crunch. The meat is also fried till almost crispy. The dark brooding sauce provides a bit of acid to heighten the meat and diffuse the richness. Very good. My lunch colleagues proclaim this as superb, and better than the one done by Siang Hee. For me, I feel the taste of the Siang Hee deep fried pork knuckle is better, but also more greasy. Too close to call which I prefer.

Another signature of Le Chasseur is the prawns



The prawns are a live prawns...from a supplier who delivers only 1kg a day to Le Chasseur. Interesting...why such small quantities for a restaurant, especially for its signature dish? I am not sure as Andy did not really answer directly, but hinted that the prawns is very special. The prawns are live, and boiled in sea water till medium-rare. Then brushed with oil and grilled. The grilling produces a charred bits of the shell, and legs, and the wonderful smokey aroma which permeates. The prawns itself are very fresh...afterall they were live. And the method of eating, as Andy explains is to open the head like so...



Suck out the fat under the head. Deshell and proceed to eat the flesh. No sauce is provided for the prawns, the taste is superb. Sweet, crunchy, with a hint of the sea and smokey aromas.

We did have two vegetable dishes...the eggplant and the sambal long beans...but I felt they were good, but not specatacular.

Focussing on the spectacular, we also tried a small portion of the vinegar pork leg...ter ka chor.



A favourite of many...though not of mine. I prefer the richly braised pork knuckle. But a mandatory dish for ladies who have just given birth during the confinement month, this is a traditional dish. For me, its good, but I find the tart-ness of the acid in the vinegar to be a tad overpowing. But for Ray and Janet who are fans of this style of pork knuckle, this was a great dish. Ray rated this 9.5/10, and Janet rated it 9/10. High praise indeed.

For desserts, we tried the house special black fungus:



I found this to be quite good. The fungus was thick, and crunchy. And the soup was nicely balanced sweetness.

But the tau suan was excellent:



The peas used were beautiful. Nice, halfs. The peas are cooked just right...the consistency is not too hard, not too soft. The thick sweet sauce smothered the peas. One of the best tau suans I have had in a very long time.

The restaurant was getting quite busy on a Friday lunchtime, when were almost finished with our meal at about 1pm...we arrived at 12 noon, and it was nice and quiet. Andy recommends reservations for weekends, when it can get rather crowded.

Excellent food, reasonable prices. Definitely worthy of multiple re-visits.


Le Chasseur
31, New Bridge Road (opp Central)
Singapore 059393
11am to 11pm daily
63377677
91440322

Claypot Kings: Uncle Sam's

Postcards from Germany is interrupted for two posts on meals eaten in Singapore>

I used to frequent the Uncle Sam's outlet at Robinson Road. My office was just around the corner, and with the colleagues there, we even worked out a timing when we could get to the restaurant, not experience any queues, eat and get out within about 40 mins. This was classic Shenton Way office lunch hour eating...in, out, fast, hopefully a delicious, nutritious meal.




When I saw a new outlet at the new City Square, I told Kin, we just have to eat there. And imagine...no queues, no crowd. And yes, even a lunch special! Maincourse - any of the claypots, plus drink, plus dessert for $7.50. Great value.

Kin had the noodle claypot:



This was Kin's favourite in Uncle Sam's...she always ordered the same. The claypot intensified the flavours of the rich broth. And the noodles, and ingredients were very nice.

I had the Thai Tom Yam claypot chicken



The version served here was a bit on the wet side, with a generous helping of the sauce. The balance of saltiness and slight sweetness was just nice. The chicken was cubed, and I think cooked together with the sauce and rice. It was supremely tender, and also with the smokey flavour. Very nice. In my opinion, one of the better claypot rice around.



The rice was cooked in the claypot...leaving a thick crust of burnt rice, giving the rice its characteristic smokey flavour. I just love eating the burnt crusty rice at the bottom.

Dessert was also typical. Kin had her usual cheng thng, and I had my usual chendol



The cheng thng was rather nice, with plenty of ingredients.

And I found the chendol to be quite good too...especially after the disappointment in the Penang Teochew Chendol recently.



The ice shavings were very fine. And there was sufficient ingredients. The chendol noodle itself could have been a bit more springy, but I found it to be acceptable. The coconut milk and gula melaka was quite generous, and provided the richness, creaminess and the smooth texture and mouthfeel. Nice.

Overall, I felt quite satisfied with the meal, both in terms of taste but also interms of its relative ease on the pocket and value for money.


Uncle Sam's Claypots
180 Kitchener Road
#04-26/29 City Square Mall
Tel: +65 6509 6080
Daily 11am – 10pm

Traditional Cze Char? Or unusual? Old Mother Hen

with colleagues



Recomendations from champagne and reading a few blogs, we decided to adventure at this seemingly traditional eatery in Geylang.

Many proclaimed the KL style Black Fried Hokkien Mee to be the best in Singapore...perhaps the rival to the one served by The Big Eater. I have tried the BFHKM at The Big Eater, but found it to be a lame excuse for the intensity and power of its namesake in KL.



When it was served, it showed great promise...a rather large heap of lard bits signified potential greatness. The glistening black sauce invites a second look...but on closer examination, one finds the sauce to be not black, or thick enough. The noodles were close to the right kind...fat, thick, egg noodles. But the taste was disappointing if one was looking to relive the KL experience. On its own, sans reference, it was quite good tasting, but in comparison to the wonderful stuff one can easily get in KL...this one pales. The bits of lard were not the crispy kind, but rather the softer.

The attraction, as recommended by champagne was the pig's fallopian tubes...a curious dish. Exotic. I have never even contemplated eating fallopian tubes or other reproductive organs...um, yes, the closest I have tried is Whale and fish sperm in Tokyo.



When I suggested the menu to my esteemed colleagues...they raised eyebrows, and joked that eating the dish would make it easier for the ladies to get pregnant. I must admit, the thought of eating the organ was at the same time intriguing (especially after the reports that it indeed tasted excellent), curiosity mixed with a bit of disgust.

A closer look at the fallopian tube dish...showing the curly bits.



Each piece...looked like it was sliced from a larger piece...though I cannot imagine how large the entire fallopian tubes can be. Crunchy is perhaps the best way to describe the organ. Good bite, and like intestine or stomach, it seemed to have absorbed some of the flavours from the spicy, sweet sauce. The crunch, and taste was similar to that of escargot.

Maggie is a great fan of petai, and on seeing it on the menu, she wildly exclaimed that this is a must order.



This was indeed an excellent choice. The petai was fresh, with a nutty, slightly crunchy, but slightly rubbery texture. The sambal sauce was rich, and wonderful tasting. The deep fried anchovies provided a nice crisp balance to the dish. I would rate this excellent.

We also ordered the butter fried squid:



Squid was sliced into rings, and battered, deep fried in hot fat and butter. Crispy bits batter, curry leaves, chilli complete the dish. Very tasty.

We also tried the herbal pork leg.



It came in a rather large claypot, black soup, and a piquant, herbal fragrance. Slices, rather chunks of pork leg was swimming in the black soup. Rather unusual ter ka, after being raised on braised pork leg and deep fried varieties. This was rather more like Bak Kut Teh with ter kar. If one thinks in terms of BKT, then the dish was rather tasty. The cut of leg was very fat, with skin.

Next up, for me the best tasting dish...the House special Tofu.



Home made fragrant tofu is carefully deep fried till it retains a crisp crust. A rich sauce made from minced prawns, minced chicken meat, and carrots, and garnished with spring onions smother the tofu. I found this very delicious. The crunch of the crust, the fragrance and silky softness of the tofu within, and the intoxicating sauce all collaborate to produce a taste sensation. Wonderful!

Ken ordered the sweet potato leaf.



For me, this dish was less remarkable...a bit unadventurous. But it is in line with my theory that if you start with a good cook, with excellent feel of ingredients and how to mix and match the flavours coupled with ability to control the fire...almost anything within his genre ability will be good. Indeed this was the case. This simple dish, typical peasant fare, was superb. The chilli sauce had just the right amount of zing and punch. The vegetables themselves were right - not too young (too firm) or too old (too chewy), and cooked just so.

As one enters the restaurant, one would observe the claypot cooking area...as my first picture on this post shows...claypot over charcoal fire.



This is not your short-cut claypot rice. But rice cooked in the pot, with ingredients...in this case preserved Chinese pork sausage, and boneless chicken. I also tasted bits of dried shrimp and perhaps a hint of salted fish.



The claypot kept the dish piping hot...cooking the contents slowly, but with great intensity. A beguiling thick, sauce - very slightly sweet, but mostly salty adorns. Stirring the rice when it arrived caused plumes of fragrant smoke to rise and meet the nostrils...engaging and teasing. Rice cooked in the claypot tastes different from those cooked in a rice cooker and transferred to a claypot just for show.

The rice had a glorious smoky flavour, and was rendered al dente...somewhat like the Italians do their risotto. This was a winning dish, loved by all in attendance.

A thick crust of rice formed at the bottom of the pot, and this made for a super crisp, super smoky treat.

Overall, a visit worth the journey...yes, this is Singapore, and the "rather long" journey is about only 10km from our office. A few of my colleagues said they enjoyed it so much, they will return for another visit.

Old Mother Hen Traditional Herbal Soup
136 Sims Ave (between Lorong 17 and 19)
Open daily 11am - 2.30pm; 5pm - 1.30am
Tel: 9128-2793