Boon Tong Kee: only for chicken rice?

with colleagues

Many of us are familiar with Boon Tong Kee as a purveyor of fine chicken rice...hmm...that's doesn't sound quite right...ok...Boon Tong Kee as having power chicken rice...smooth, moist, tender chicken on fragrant, rice, and a chilli sauce with some kick. But did you know that they serve very good cze char style food at restaurant level?



We dropped by for lunch one day at their Whampoa West (next to Boon Keng MRT) stall. Kind of like a blast from the past...this row of shop houses right next to the MRT station. Boon Tong Kee occupies the corner lot, just next to the station entrance.

Inside, the decor continues on this 1970s theme. Quaint.

We started with the chicken, of course!



Also known locally as Pak Cham Kai...or translated as white, chopped chicken...I think...:-)...the chicken is steamed or boiled...with skin intact. The meat was smooth, almost creamy in texture and consistency, moist, and very juicy. Sometimes, in steamed white chicken, the white meat comes out to be dry, fibrous and chewy. But the BTK version was total opposite...nearly as smooth as dark meat, but the dark meat was even more succulent, even more tender, and any fibrous texture...small and interesting as it may have been on the white meat, is totally smooth.

But we came to sample the other dishes. Starting with the Khong Bak Pau:



Braised, pork belly...this was to be eaten between the folds of a steamed bun. The meat was less fat and meltingly tender as my benchmark Westlake's version, but it was quite tasty...a bit less collagen and fat, a bit more sinews and muscles. I prefer the smothering sauce and sinful collagen/protein mass served by Westlake, but the BTK version is quite good.

A dish not commonly found is the cuttlefish with kangkong...jew her eng chai:



The chef was generous with the cuttlefish. Typically this is either done from rehydrated dried cuttlefish which is more flavourful, chewy. Or with fresh cuttlefish, which is more gelatenous in texture. The traditionalists prefer the rehydrated version. I am not sure what was used here, but the cuttlefish was very springy, nice and not too chewy. The eng chai, or kangkong was quite young, and leafy. I truly dislike the use of old kangkong...these end up being fibrous, tasteless...and thankfully BTK had chosen to use young kangkong...which is fresh, crunchy instead of chewy, and tasty. The sauce, a kind of dark bean sauce...sweet, salty, spicy, punctuated by fragrant, lightly toasted sesame seeds was perfect.

Regular readers of this blog know I have a soft spot for well made, fragrant, soft tofu...



The special tofu served up at BTK does not disappoint. The home made tofu was cubed, coated with a batter, and deep fried. The batter provides a crispy exterior in golden yellow...protecting the smooth, creamy, silky fault, and wonderfully fragrant tofu interior. Wonderful.

And the piece de resistance...the ter kar...braised pork trotter



One of my absolute favourites, but totally destroys diets...and only to be imbibed once in a while, and only the very best, the braised pork trotter is excellent. The trotter is de-boned, and braised for a long time to achieve the consistency, and tenderness to be separated by fork. A thick layer of collagen and fat sticks to the skin...which has a springy, slightly tougher consistency than the super tender meat it conceals. The braising sauce could have been a bit stronger in flavour...I found the trotter in PuDong Kitchen and recently a tasting in Zhou's Kitchen to be better, but the BTK version is more elegant, lighter in flavour (though not lighter in fats and cholesterol), and milder. Nonetheless, within my top 5 great braised pork trotters.

And of course, we rounded up the meal with ohr nee:



The yam paste was quite nicely done, thick, gooey consistency, a bit of the powdery texture of ground yam could be detected, and very fragrant. The ginko nuts added the traditional taste, and the use of pork lard eased the paste to a smooth pulp. Nice.

Overall, a nice restaurant for the chicken rice and also cze char style dishes. The braised pork knuckle is quite excellent.


Boon Tong Kee
34 Whampoa West #01-93 Singapore 330034
(beside Boon Keng MRT)
Telephone 6299 9880

Paradise Inn: Is this really the taste paradise?

on several occassions, with friends and colleagues



The Paradise Group is a chain of Chinese Restaurants which is raising and keeping the heritage of local Chinese cuisine. Many of the restaurants offer very fine food, and because of convenience, I have eaten at the Funan branch several times...proximity to hifi, computer and camera shops...:-)

This review is an amalgam of some of the highlight dishes I have sampled.

Deep fried cod:



This was a very special dish...the exterior batter created a very crispy, tasty shell, and the insides, the fish is just rightly cooked, hot, steamy and moist and delicious.

Salted egg yolk prawns



The richness of the salted egg yolk complements the fresh, succulent, crunchy prawns. Lovely. Crystal Jade Palace at Paragon does a similar version - in comparison, CJ does the smothering salted egg yolk sauce more finely...the Paradise version you can feel the texture of the sauce, in the CJ version less so. Which is better? Six of one and half a dozen of the other. I will eat either any day.

For a slightly different taste, wasabi prawns



Reputation says that Sam Leong, of Tung Lok created this dish...and indeed Tung Lok serves a wonderful version. As does the always delectable Peach Garden (I prefer the OCBC branch, but the Novena branch is good as well) does a superb version. Compared to these doyens, the Paradise Inn's version is humbled, but only slightly...and is good value for money. The wasabi was pungent, but not overly so...though for my rather extreme tastebuds, I would have opted for a heavier hand at the wasabi.

Khong Bak Pau.



Braised pork belly, served with fluffly steamed buns. Triggers umami sensors! Rich, smothering braising liquid, thick slices of fat pork. Wonderful. Compared to the benchmark standard set by the venerable Westlake Restaurant, this one compares well. Weslake would still get the nod from me, because the braising liquid is more tasty, and the pork rather fatter. But Paradise Inn's version is not to far behind, and not much to choose from.

Ohr Nee...a traditional and typical Teochew dessert of mashed yam, pumpkin and ginko nuts.



Delightfully sinfull, carefully prepared with copious amounts of lard and sugar, to counter the dry-ness and stickiness of mashed yam, and sweetened. Then mixed with mashed pumpkin. Finally add ginko nuts, and optionally first pressing of coconut milk. Gorgeous. The yam and pumpkin mix was smooth, tasty. Only improvement suggestion is a less watery syrup...but ensure the syrup is totally combined with the lard and hold the yam and pumpkin in a suspension.



109 North Bridge Road
#02-10/11 Funan Digitalife Mall
Tel: 6338 4018
http://www.paradisegroup.com.sg/ParadiseInn/index.html
Open daily: 11.30am - 9.30pm

The Forgotten Teochew? Tai Seng: still serves excellent food

with Larry, Prof. Horolographer, SJX

Another interesting joint introduced by Larry, this time acting as the perfect Teochew Ah Hiah, and recommended a Teochew restaurant.

Tai Seng, hidden in a corner of People's Park Centre, this restaurant is a gem of Teochew cuisine. Run by 3 brothers, we met with the eldest sibling - Johnny. Johnny is a veritable encyclopedia of all things Teochew foodie...he was able to wax lyrical of the ingredients of the dishes he served that afternoon.

We started with a superb hae cho.



The dish was very fragrant...whifts of prawns and pork in the very crispy bean curd skin made my mouth water. The pieces were somewhat larger than the regular hae cho at the usual cze char stall. These huge balls were the size of golf balls.



Cutting one open, reveals even more intense fragrance. The insides were made from a mixture of minced pork and prawns. Wrapped in bean curd skin, the balls were deep fried in very hot fat, rendering the bean curd skin very crispy, and the insides very juicy and tasty.

As I mentioned before, the hae cho standard in Singapore is very high...many establishments serve excellent samples. Tai Seng's was a bit special...hints of crab were detected, and the prawns and pork mix were very tasty.

One does not eat Teochew without eating Braised Goose.



Tai Seng's braised goose was excellent. Carefully braised, the meat was soft, tender, and still retains the juices. The skin provided some umami support with a thin layer of fat, but not too much. The entire ensemble was meant to be eaten with a Teochew style chilli...called sng-nee, it is a concoction comprising of garlic, vinegar and chilli.

Soo Chye, a typical Teochew dish was up next:



Johnny was particularly proud of this Soo Chye. He told us that in versions of this, up to seven ingredients are steamed together, including button and Chinese mushrooms, seaweed or fatt choy, kai lan or kar nar in teochew, mustard greens and pek chye or wongbok. The version we had today had some 5 vegetables. And being close to Chinese New Year, the fatt choy was particularly relevant...in the hopes of raising the prosperity index in what some have forecasted as a tough ox year.

But one taste, and one's spirits are lifted. Perhaps its the mild, tasty sauce that provides this solace. But also the different vegetables are expertly blended into one cohesive whole...each complementing the other. I enjoyed this dish very much.

Then, all broke loose with the Teochew Char Kway Teow with kar nar (kai lan)



Kin and I often reminisce about the superb Teochew CKT served by the now defunct Swatow Garden restaurant at the Golden Shoe Carpark at Market Street. Since the restaurant closed, nowhere could we find a similarly tasty CKT. Fried dry, with kai lan (the Teochews and Hokkiens call kar nar), and using a semi-transparent kway teow...I don't know if it is the case, but I imagine the kway teow to be dry rice sticks like those used in Thai Kway Teow. The dry sticks are soaked in some warm water just before frying, rehydrating in the process, and gaining a springy texture, and a translucent appearance. This kway teow is not as greasy as the wet type used in the hawker CKT, but had a tougher texture.

The kar nar was not bitter, but provided crunchy accompaniment to the CKT. Excellent2.

Larry also recommended a special siew mai...



Made in the premises (in horology speak...inhouse!!) the pork is wrapped by hand in a skin made of rice flour, instead of the more typical Cantonese version which uses wheat flour skin. The skin was softer, and had no flavours of its own. I did not find this better than the Cantonese version, but Larry and SJX loved this dish.

Finally, a piéce de resistance...ohr nee



They were generous with the ingredients - yam, finely ground, and still very fragrant and light...pumpkin, ginko nuts...stirred incessantly whilst being steamed with pork lard. This was smooth...indicating the lard was generous...the lard also provided for superior taste, and provided the anchor for the yam to break free from being absorbent and dry to being smooth and creamy. The pumpkin fortified the creamy mouth feel, and the ginko nuts provided some crunch. Very good ohr nee.

Great Teochew restaurants in Singapore are not many. Hang Kang used to be excellent, but for me, it lost something along the way when they moved a few doors to their own building some years back. Swatow is sadly no more. Huat Kee in Amoy has gone upmarket, and even offers wine pairings. I find the food good, but not excellent. Tai Seng, on the other hand offers a taste of tradition. And keeps on the traditional taste. Larry suggests that the lobster noodles is another killer dish...to be tried for another lunch. We didn't order the classical Teochew steam fish as we had wanted space in the stomachs to taste the interesting dishes Larry suggested...I am sure the steamed fish would be good.




101 Upper Cross Street
#03-32 People's Park Centre

Tel: 6220 3830

Restoran Ah Meng, Johor Bahru

with Kennard, Ken, Alice

We found ourselves in Johor Bahru, a grand diversion with multiple stops, but actually the excuse to go try out a few eating places. Our first choice was a Teochew restaurant near Pelangi, reputed for their Ohr Nee. But we were a bit late in arriving...about 3pm, and we settled for an air-conless restaurant a short drive away. Ken, the native Johorian recommended this Cze Char shop.

Their signature dish is a flat, dry fried bee hoon...some say this is the chow tar bee hoon, some simplly call it flat bee hoon...I call it delicious.



The bee hoon must have been fried with a rich stock, imbuing some magical taste powers to the strands of rice noodles. Chives, some vegetables, chicken, eggs make up this interesting dish.



The noodles were soft, slightly flattened in the wok and slightly charred by the immense heat of the wok. Wok hei is there in spades. Shiok.

We also had the pork rib curry.



Some regular readers might know that my mom cooks a mean Nyona curry, be it chicken, fish head, squid (real power curry! Really to die for), and pork rib. But Ah Meng's version is not too far behind...I loved the rich, coconut gravy. If they used curry powder, it was not evident...no powdery taste this one. The rich shallots, lovingly tumis to fragrant golden brown form the backbone for such flavoursome gravy.

The potatoes are first fried to slightly crisp/charred/caramelised before being inserted into the curry. The pork rib is from succulent ribs, and floating ribs - rendering the meat soft and tender, and the cartilage almost edible. (indeed they were crunchy and good bite).

Steam fish, with chye por was next.



The fish was fresh. Steaming done just right. Bits of fish around the backbone remain just slightly rare to require a small amount of force to seperate it from the bone...the meat was tender, and sweet. The chye por added crunch and punch.

We also ordered the ngor hiang.



Innocent looking enough. The skin was translucent, and this was the first hint that this ngor hiang was going to be special. Pick up a slice, and the roughly chopped ingredients gives the second hint. This was not mass processed ngor hiang. This was bodering on artisanal.



The ingredients are quite ordinary for a ngor hiang. A quick fry in hot fat seals in the taste, the outside is golden brown crispy, the vegetables inside still slightly rare and crunchy. Each mouthful is full of flavour - the crunch of the crispy skin intermingled with the carrots, meat, seafood (I think there is some seafood...prawns in the mix).

Of course, the must have vegetable...polisang choi (hmmm how do you spell this?) was lightly blanched and drizzled with some oil. Al dente to the bite, the cook demonstrated great precision in his cooking.



For dessert, Ohr nee.



This is a signature dish of a Teochew restaurant. Made with fragrant yam, steamed, mashed, stirred with generous amounts of pork lard, and served with boiled, smashed pumpkin and ginko nuts. Ah Meng's version is not as fine as those typically found in the great Singapore Teochew restaurants like Hang Kang. The yam was discernable as bits, offering a rough-ish texture...not quite rough enough to feel individual bits, but not quite a smooth paste. The dish was not greasy...perhaps lack of pork lard caused it to lack something in full flavour.

Total price for 4 persons: RM90.


Restoran Ah Meng
38 Jalan Sultan Aminah
Taman Iskandar
Johor Bahru, Malaysia


Photonotes: no theaterics were attempted. Usual equipment, typical workflow. Shot inside the restaurant on a wet rainy day. No flash, no tripod.