Having been to Beauty World Centre, half my life, I have definitely eaten my fair share of XLB and dumplings from You Peng noodle dumpling house. This time, however, I decided to try something new, their fried red bean pancake. ($4.80)
They also have fried onion pancakes, but red bean trumps all.
Red bean is life.
The enthusiastic server handed us the beeper and we sat down to enjoy our dessert we also bought from Food Mapping. (Their review is next!). I guess the wait wasn’t excruciatingly long, but it did take around 8 to 10 minutes. (I wasn’t counting! I was busying slurping up the dessert)
Finally, the beeper buzzed, as though waking up from the dead. I hurriedly shoved my boyfriend towards the stall.
The pancake came in a perfect circle, divided into 8 pieces and the top covered with sesame seeds. The pancake was piping hot and it was burning my fingers. Probably the reason why they give you chopsticks!
After taking a bounty of pictures, I took a sensible chunk out of one piece. I pulled a ‘meh’ face, while my boyfriend grinned and took another bite. It turns out that there were not enough red beans in mine, whereas, he got a nicely filled piece.
The red bean paste wasn’t distributed evenly *insert a sad face here* (Two pieces were nicely filled with red bean and some pieces were 99% dough) If you are unlucky like me, you just end up with more dough than red bean. I dissected one piece and what I ended up with was the Singapore Horror Story. Most of the pieces had less than half a teaspoon of red bean spread around it, only two lucky pieces were densely filled.
Taste wise, the pancake had a nice doughy feel and chewy. The sesame seeds gave the top a nice crisp texture. The red bean wasn’t overly sweet and it didn't have an artificial taste to it. (My pet peeve=Artificial tasting red bean paste!)
One thing noticeable was that it leaves your fingers oily but the pancake itself wasn’t overly greasy.
It seems a little pricey being a $4.80 pancake, but it comes down to being $0.60 per slice. So if you share it amongst a few friends, it’s actually relatively affordable. (Just be the first one to grab the thick piece, because it’s probably filled with more red beans J Muahahaha..)
Overall, this pancake looks tempting but I found it a little underwhelming, due to shortage of red beans. Nevertheless, it's not exactly something you can find everywhere.
Making it to the judge’s scorecards: 7/10
While waiting for our Crispy Pork Burger, we decided to order a plate of Nasi Lemak. The stall is located right in between Top 1 Homemade Noodle and Hambaobao, the signboard only stating “Nasi Lemak”. You could say it was run something alike, ANANAS, with a few set options available.
We ordered Set A ($2.20), which consisted of the regular, fried egg, chicken and the ikan billis. As my boyfriend brought the plate back to the table, you could say my first reaction was “What is this?”
The rice, egg and chicken were messily dumped onto the plate. What was more concerning was the measly amount of ikan billis and peanuts she offered. Yes, I actually counted, 5 tiny ikan billis and 10 peanuts. I must say I was disappointed. But, what could I have expected based on its price point…
(Closing one eye, I attribute this to the fact that she was closing the stall and must have ran out of ikan billis)
When it comes down to taste, what more could I say? The rice was sub par, however, the owner did give more rice than what you would say was a usual amount. (Probably because she wanted to finish off the remaining rice) The fried egg was cooked and to my delight, the yolk was still a little runny. She chopped the chicken into three pieces, drumstick, wing and that boney part of the wing. Better than expected, the chicken was actually pretty tender and not dry. Halfway through the meal, my boyfriend did point out that she had neglected to give us any sambal.
Overall, I really can’t complain much as the entire plate was only $2.20. But I honestly wouldn’t be back for another plate sadly.
Chancing upon a small food eatery called Macau Express. My friends and I were planning to eat at Pasta Mania at first, but after looking at their menu, we said what the heck.
Most of us ended up ordering the curry chicken pasta and the black pepper chicken pasta. The pastas came relatively fast, with your personal beeper lighting up to tell you to collect your dish at the counter.
The curry chicken pasta had a good amount of chicken with carrots, green peppers and celery adding colour to plate. A generous helping of curry sauce ladled over top. The pasta was honestly boxed pasta, but chicken and curry sauce, I enjoyed. The sauce wasn't too salty and the chicken was tender.
My score: 6.5/10 🤔
The black pepper chicken pasta, my boyfriend ordered wasn't too bad either. It just wasn't as nice as the curry chicken. I could tell that he wasn't enjoying his meal. I decided to give his a try. The sauce was not peppery enough, and this is coming from someone who doesn't like black pepper. There was a hint of a mushroom taste, which wasn't really helping either.
My score: 5/10 😐
Pasta aside, the shining star of Macau Express are their *drumroll* Portuguese Egg Tarts. Already salivating at the thought of it, I must finish this review before I drool.
We had ordered the egg tarts before our pasta arrived. As we all simultaneously sunk our teeth into the pastry, all you could hear was UMMMM... The pastry was flaky and the egg custard was so fluffy. There was a good ratio of egg custard to pastry. You couldn't even fault it.
As you peer into the glass casing where they display their tarts, you may notice a little note written by the owners. I don't remember the exact words but it came across something like this "Don't judge us by the way we look"
It's not that the egg tarts look bad, they just aren't all similar looking. Some with more caramelization than others. But, hand on heart, they all taste amazing. I would gladly eat the entire try to testify.
Just to demonstrate, how good those tarts were. All of us bought either one or two tarts each before our pasta arrived. After finishing our pasta, we ended up buying more. Amongst 5 of us there, a total of 13 tart devoured on the spot and an extra 5 dabaoed by my friend.
We even waited 20 minutes for the second round as the babies were baking in the oven.
The tarts were fresh out of the oven and still sitting their individual tins. The uncle told us to wait a while before eating as they were really hot.
Let's just say that I ended up with a burnt tongue. It was worth the pain 😛
My score: 9/10 (only because there might be a better tart out there)
So far, I haven't had any better.
Tried the black pepper chicken chop! It's usually served with tomato sauce pasta but we requested for aglio olio, which the owner happily obliged.
The black pepper chicken chop was a nice sized portion and the sauce was not overly peppery like some places.
The pasta was nice with a healthy feel to it, without a over oily taste. It was also served with a side of crinkle cut fries and coleslaw. The fries were crisp and the homemade coleslaw was fresh and flavourful!
We did wait a little, however, understandable as it was made to order and the presentation was really nice and not just food dumped on a plate.
I had the Aston’s chargrill chicken (no sauce) with a choice of 2 sides, choosing the vegetables and the pasta salad. The chargrill chicken looked tentalising as it was served to my table, however, in further retrospect, it was too oily and I ended up having to dap up extra oil with the napkin. The portion appeared an acceptable size but if you aren’t a fan of eating the chicken skin, you honestly end up with a small portion. The vegetables were mediocre, I mean they were just broccoli and baby carrots. The pasta salad, on the other hand was quite nice. Was it worth it? $9.90 was the damage and no I wouldn't be back anytime soon.
My boyfriend had their ieat super burger ($14.90), which he was extremely excited about as he had it before at Aston’s Scape outlet. It's a ‘mega’ burger with the bun, burger patty, bacon , tomato, lettuce, cheese and a really good bbq sauce. I tried it and it was okay, not much a wow. The sauce did compliment the burger nicely. But it looked difficult to eat, you couldn’t pick it up and chomp down on it like a regular burger. My boyfriend did leave a little dissatisfied, complaining that the burger had shrunk, considering he had it at the scape outlet only a month back.
Only s’okay Astons…step up your game!
And your servers need a little perking up, just the young ones
I have been fortunate enough to visit One More Steamboat & Teppanyaki Buffet twice. The first time it was based on their regular price, and my second visit was during their $19.80/ $21.80 (weekend) 1 for 1 student promotion, which has sadly ended.
With a vast variety of ingredients available, you will be spoilt for choice. There are a lot of meats, including Chicken, Beef, Pork, Lamb & even Handmade Wanton/Dumplings. There were seafood choices like prawns on my first visit, sadly on my second visit there weren't any, maybe due to it being tea time slot?
The soup base I tried was the superior soup base which is apparently a mix of chicken, pork and sugarcane. (We couldn't choose for the student promotion :/ or rather we didn't want to fork out extra for the other soup base...) They also have Korean Kimchi, Italian Tomato, Assam Curry, German Sauerkraut soup available too!
There lots of interesting yong tau foo items, noodles, rice cakes, vegetables, mushrooms that you can fill up on too! Side dishes like stewed pork belly and their teppanyaki that you can order. (I had their teppanyaki on my first visit, but it wasnt included in their student promotion) They also have lots of sauces where you can create your own, mine was a combination of roasted sesame, thai sweet chilli and a good helping of garlic! SHIOK- ^^
They also provide drinks ranging from coffee to melon tea and my personal favorite, yam soya! Even after that, you have a selection of ice-creams to choose from, mint chocolate, yam, coffee, chocolate, vanilla and mango. Dessert doesn't even end there, with more fruits, cream puffs, puddings and mochi to try.
My recommendation is to try out their fishballs like fish roe fishballs (watch out for it's explosions), fuzhou fishball, meatballs. Also, their egg noodles, and these taro and onion ricecakes? They were quite unique! All their usual meats and vegetable were fresh and abundent. For drinks and dessert, try out their yam soya and the cream puffs were surprisingly bomb! However, the mochis were a little dissapointing. With flavours ranging from red bean, chocolate, melon and green tea. They pretty much tasted the same with a strong artificial flavourings. But, hey the ice creams and puddings are still good!
Overall, my experiences there were both great and you will definitely find the staff there to be really friendly and helpful, frequently topping out your soup base.
Lunch
Mon-Friday - $25.80
Sat/Sunday/PH - $27.80
Dinner
Mon-Thur - $30.80
Fri-Sun/Eve/PH - $32.80
My hunt for food brought me to Beauty World Food Centre this time. I remember coming here all the time when I was younger. All the memories of attending my dreaded tuition classes there. Let me just take a deep sigh of relief that I no longer attend any tuition.
I pre researched on what to get at the food centre. With the intention of buying a variety of dishes to share with my boyfriend. And Hambaobao was at the top of my list, having never tried it before.
We actually brought dishes from 5 different stalls and the damage was $17.70. Stay tune for the reviews of the other stalls!
🍔 HAM BAO BAO 🍔
We arrived at hambaobao at 630pm on a gloomy Wednesday. There was a queue already formed with two people in front of me. My boyfriend wanted to order the classic beef but I convinced him to try the crispy pork belly first instead. As I handed the lady $5.00, in exchange she gave me a key with the number 13 and told me it would be a 20 minute wait.
Written on the chalkboard menu, their options available are:
•The Classic Beef
•Dat Dory Fish
•Crispy Pork Belly
•Spiced Pull Pork
•Ayam Buah Kelluak (I want this next!)
•Add ons: Fairy fries/Extra cheese or bacon
(Really wanted to try more but I wanted a variety of different foods that day. So I'll definitely be back hambaobao!)
Back at the table at 635pm and at 655pm, the lady hollered out my number.
Served on a metal tray and brown dabao paper, it's a really different vibe especially when the stall sits in an old school hawker centre.
I would say it's kind of hard to actually pick it up and chomp down on it like a regular burger. Instead, we deconstructed the burger and ate the elements separately. (Don't kill us)
The burger consists of the bun which they toast up on the pan, which explains the crispy insides and the soft top. 4 thick slabs of pork belly, topped off with hoi sin sauce, english mustard and 3 slices of Japanese cucumber.
They were so generous with the pork belly, that my boyfriend and I got two slabs ( I really mean slabs) of pork belly each. The pork was really nice and tender, a bit chewy at certain parts. The fat melts in your mouth and the thick crispy skin is so crunchy, you could hear the crunch a table away.
In my opinion, the Hoi Sin sauce compliments the pork belly really well. But I would leave out the overpowering English mustard. Alike wasabi, the mustard shoots up your nose leaving you with a scrunched up nose and closed eyes. Me and spicy things don't really mesh well together, so I ended up scrapping off the English mustard. My boyfriend on the other hand enjoyed the mustard and Hoi Sin combination, to each his own.
Overall, it is a really unique burger and quite worth the $5. I didn't manage to try the fairy fries as CARBS. But I will definitely be back to try their other burgers.
Would I order this again?
Yes! Without the English mustard though...
Location:
Beauty world Food Centre
Level 4
