Food Republic at Causeway Point

With a total of 17 stalls and 3 mini restaurants among its tenant mix, Food Republic at Causeway Point serves up a variety of local food delights as well as restraint style Korean food at affordable prices. In August 2012, Food Republic has opened it 9th outlet at level 4 of the newly revamp  Causeway Point Shopping Mall which brings in new dining concept as compared to the previous food mall.

Below are some of the stalls that we have tired during the media tasting which is organised by Food Republic, Causeway Point.

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I LOVE YOO!

"I love Yoo!" has an very unique Chinese name call 老油鬼鬼 which translate as "Lao You Gui Gui". Although causeway point outlet is their first branch in Singapore, but I love Yoo! has been serving well-loved traditional Malaysian dishes and snacks in Malaysia since 2007.

Above are some of their signature items such as You Tiao - 油条 (S$0.90 each) and Mix Bun - 夹粽 (S$1.00 each). This is my first time trying mix bun and I love the combination of the fragrant bun skin that surrounds the chewy mochi like dough in the center of the bun.

On the other hand, they also have freshly made Sesame Balls with assorted fillings such as:- red bean, lotus and peanuts at S$1.10 each.. To enhance the taste of these traditional snacks, I would recommend you to order a cup of their fresh soya bean milk which freshly made daily. For a more filling breakfast or brunch, grab a bowl of their Dried Oyster Peanuts or Dried Scallop porridge together with their freshly made You Tiao would definitely satisfy your craving too .

FUNAN WENG IPOH HO FUN

When this dark sauce hor fun arrived at our table, the first thought that comes to my mind is the Crayfish Hor Fun from Hong Lim Food Complex which I love when I used to work around that area. Above is the Signature Prawn and Chicken Ipoh Ho Fun (S$$4.80) from Funan Weng that served with their specially brewed herbal dark soy sauce, ultra-smooth ho fun and fresh tiger prawns as well as tender chicken meat.

If you love prawn dumplings, remember to order a bowl of their Gourmet Dumpling Soup (S$5.50) where the dumplings are made with fresh pork and shrimps to retain it's freshness and taste.

LI XIN TEOCHEW FISHBALL NOODLE

For a non fish ball fan, I always avoid ordering fish balls noodle whenever I could but after trying Li Xin's Fish Balls Noodle (S$4.00), it actually changed my mind set on this. I love the springy noodles which coated evenly with their special homemade chili sauce as well as the crispy lard that perfect the taste of this simple dried noodles.


According to the Li Xin's boss, their fish balls are made twice daily using superior yellowtail fish and kept chilled in cold water rather in the freezer. Most of us loves their Fish Ball Soup (S$4.00) which comes in a bowl of 8 bouncy fish balls that soak in tasty soup broth.

MIAN MIAN JU DAO

I have tried this Dao Xiao Mian (Knife Shaved Noodles) once at Food Republic (VivoCity) and it does not taste as good as the one over at Causeway Point outlet as the noodle were rather overcooked.

Just to share for those who had not tried Dao Xiao Mian (Knife Shaved Noodles) before, the one shown above is their Stewed Beef With Noodle Soup (S$6.00). If you like herbal broth base with handmade noodles and beef, perhaps you would like to give this a go.

PADANG RAYA

Padang food is well known for its robust flavours that come from the use of rich coconut milk, chilli and aromatic spices. The folks at Padang Raya are committed to using only natural ingredients to retain it's original taste and health benefits. Ikan Asam Pedas Set (S$5.00) serve with Rice, Ikan Asam Pedas (sour spicy fish) and Cabbage.

Curry Ayam Set (S$5.00) on the other hand is serve with Rice, Ayam Curry Drumstick and Long Bean Balacan. Their Ayam Curry is fragrant and not too over-power with the spices and coconut milk taste. And the Long Bean Balacan is just nice with at crunchy texture which I love.

SHAMI BANANA LEAF DELIGHTS

Shami Banana Leaf Delights is one of the popular food stall in Northpoint Shopping Centre since 1993. I still remember during my secondary school days, a group of us would always order their Chicken Briyani which was only S$5.00 pet set.

Now with another two additional outlets at Sembawang Road and Food Republic Causeway Point, patrons can easily enjoy their favourite briyani at more convenient locations without joining the crazy queue over at Northpoint. For us, my all time favourite is their Chicken Briyani Set (S$7.00) which I would always ask for more gravy to go with the rice.

If you don't fancy chicken you could also choose from other optional such as Boneless Mutton Briyani Set (S$8.00), Mutton Briyani, Tandoori Chicken Set or Sambal Fish Set.

GORYEO KOREAN RESTAURANT

A few months ago I was catch with Korea fever that watching a few Korean drama which inspired me to cook a few of their local dishes such as Bibimbap, Ginseng Chicken (samgyetang), Korean Rice Cake (Tteokbokki) and etc.

Kimchi Soup (S$7.50) served with steamed rice is perfect for raining day or when you crave for something spicy and yet light from the usual meaty soup.

Bibimhap (S$7.50) which is also known as Hot Stone Pot Rice comes in either  chicken / pork / beef  that you could choose from. The bibimhap sauce is served separately with kimichi as banchan (side dishes) so that you could add the amount of sauce into your rice according to your preference.

Andong Jjimdak Set (S$11.90) also known as Andong Steamed Chicken is serve together with steamed rice. This Korean style steamed chicken consists of spinach, carrot, potato, chicken and glass noodle which is a prefer one dish meal with meat and vegetable all in one.

Bulgogi Salad (S$8.50) is something light for weigh watcher who still want to have some bits on meat other than rice or noodles. I love the refreshing dressing and the bulgogi indeed added some bite and taste to the salad.

CAFFE REPUBLIC

Most of my friends told me that when ordering dessert at Food Republic, Chendol (S$2.80) is a "must try" on the list as they have quiet a good reputation on serving decent Chendol that you would fall in love with. Overall the coconut base is just smoothing without overpowering the taste of the red beans and gula melaka and indeed it's something nice to have after a hearty meal.

We are surprised and delighted to find an ice cream counter over at Caffe Republic where they offer warm Belgium waffles with a choice of 18 different flavour of Gelato Ice Cream such as chocolate, cookie and cream, strawberry, green tea and etc.

Personally I love their Chocolate and Green Tea Gelato which is taste quiet decent as compared to those branded Gelato stalls.

Another key point of Caffe Republic is their style mod cafe showcasing popular Western coffees such as Cafe Latte, Cappuccino, Espresso and etc which you could get a cup to perk up your day with some snacks or after meal drinks.

Below are another 2 stalls that my family and I tried on during another visit to Food Republic, Causeway Point.

SERGEANT HAINANESE CHICKEN RICE

My boy loves the Chicken Rice from Sergeant Hainanese Chicken Rice. Their rice is infused with lemongrass fragrant and it's not greasy as compared to some other stalls. They have quiet a range of items to choose from such as Steamed Chicken, Roasted Chicken, Chicken Cutlets, Curry Noodle, Thai Sauce Tofu and etc.

GRANNY FINE SOUP

As a herbal soup lover, my attention was draw to this Granny Fine Soups during our tasting at Food Republic. Although the price might be slightly higher as compared to other herbal soup stalls but I still decide to try this Double-boiled Black Chicken With Cordyceps Flower which is around S$8.00 per serving. The soup taste quiet decent, but for personal preference I would prefer more herbal taste which would be better.

A3 Signature Combo Set Meal @ Promotion Price S$6.80 (Usual Price S$7.60)

Apart from the chicken rice and herbal soup we also tried the combo set from Funan Weng Ipoh Hor Fun Express mentioned above and overall it still taste great as compared to what we had during media tasting.

Lastly I would like to thank Food Republic and Touch Communications for the invite media tasting.

Homemade Granola By Maameemoomoo

Granola is a popular breakfast choice or snack in western countries. It usually consists of rolled oats, nuts, honey and sometime dried fruits such as raisins, dates and etc are added to it. Recently one of my bestie Sherie, from Maameemoomoo is selling her homemade Granola (read more here) to friends and readers who loves this delicious breakfast snack.

As you can see from the photo above, Sherie is very generous with her Granola ingredients and you can easily spot Rolled oat, almond, cashew nut, sesame seed, cranberry, wheatgerm, Flaxseeds and even wolfberries! Occasionally, Sherie would also add in a "surprise" ingredients on top of the usual ones to surprise the customers too. And guess what I think I found dried Jack fruits in my recent pack that I have purchased :p Below are some of the ways that I have incorporate these delicious healthy snacks into my daily meal.

{For Breakfast/Dessert/Snack} You could serve Granola together either Oats Porridge or Plain Yogurt (such as Greek Yogurt). I love mine with either homemade (recipe) or store bought yogurt from Yogurt Place, Yammi Yogurt or etc.

{For Breakfast/Snack}This is super yummy! I love to scatter some Granola on top of my Peanut Butter Toast for that extra crunch and texture. Imagine biting the crust of the thick toast with generous spread of peanut butter together with those crunchy oats and almond....... Yummy!

{Salad} Instead of adding Crouton (small pieces of sauteed or baked bread) to your usual salad, why not try to add in one or two tablespoon of Granola plus some strawberries or orange segment to perk up your lunch diet. I love the mixture of the greens, with juicy fruits and crunchy bits of tasty Granola.

{Dessert}Trust me, if you have not try adding Granola to ice-cream before, you have to try this. The sweet, smooth and icy ice-cream makes it a prefect match to go with the Granola which is a tiny bit of salty plus caramel flavour from the honey. Great match!

For those who are new to Granola, perhaps you could go for the "Try First" pack at S$9.90 weighing 320g.

This is the "Wah, I like!" pack at S$15.90 weighing 500g with huge arse juicy figs, weight (80-90g) excluded from the 500g weight.

GRANOLA In 3 sizes:

~ Try First : S$9.90 per 320g pack

~ Wah, I like! : S$15.90 per 500g pack
(with huge arse juicy figs, weight (80-90g) excluded)

~ I want moreeeeee! : S$29.90 per 1kg pack

{To Order} You can email Sherie, maameemoomoo@gmail.com for more details, or you could check out her post on Granola HERE. Till then, have a great weekend everyone!

4 Quick Recipes On Soup And Dishes

Weekend is approaching and I am sure most full-time working mothers are looking forward to prepare some quick and easy nutritious dishes for the family during weekend lunch or dinner. In this post, I would be sharing 4 quick recipes (2 soup, 2 main dish) to inspire your weekend cooking for the family.

Since working mum has a lot of household chores to take care during weekend, I specially pick up dishes that required minimum preparation time and use "steaming" instead of "stir-fry" to avoid oily kitchen stove. So I am sure these 4 simple soup and steamed dishes would come in handy for your weekend meal ideas.

{Homegrown} Baked Oyster Mushroom Vs Sauteed Oyster Mushroom

Since early August when we first got hold of our mushroom logs we were very excited about having home grown mushrooms at home. Without any experience we started to follow instructions given from "Myceliapolis - Mushroom City" (more details; website and facebook) as well as useful posts from members to grow our very first "Oyster Mushroom" and "Black Fungus".

As we are still very new with this hobby, our first "fruiting" did not really turn out well and we have to scrap off all the "pinheads" and regrow before we managed to enjoy the "fruits" of our labour shown below. If you are interested about our home grown mushroom, you can read more on the mushroom post here.

BAKED OYSTER MUSHROOM

Oyster Mushroom (平菇) is named after its flat shape which resembling an oyster shell. These large mushrooms are cream in colour is frequently used in Asian cuisine for adding into soup or stir-fry with meat and other accompany vegetables. These mushrooms are a good source of niacin and it also supply folate and dietary fibre.

Here I used olive oil, ground pepper and some chili flakes to bake the mushroom to retain it's flavour as well as crunch.

(Serves: 1 | Preparation: 2 minutes | Cooking: 5 minutes)

Ingredients:
50g Oyster Mushroom (homegrown)
Drizzle of Olive Oil
1/4 Teaspoon of Dried Chilli Flakes/Paprika
Pinch of Freshly Ground Black Pepper
Salt to taste, optional

Method:-
1. Clean and wipe mushroom with a damp paper towel. Lay them on a baking tray.

2. Drizzle olive oil and sprinkle some chilli fakes and ground black pepper before baked/grilled it in oven toaster for about 5 - 8 minutes or till slight brown in colour.

3. Remove and serve.

As you might know although Oyster mushroom is not juicy just like regular mushrooms, but the flavor is irresistible! For a quick dish, just dissolve a dollar of butter in the frying pan, saute minced garlic till fragrant, add in mushroom and give it a quick toss, season it with freshly ground black pepper and salt. Super yummy!

[Wordless Wednesday] Kiseki Japanese Restaurant

This is my 1st visit to Kiseki after it shifted from Heeren to the new location at Orchard Central. Although the food items seems to be a lesser as compared to what I had previously (read more HERE) but all of us are still very happy with their food and overall services. (p/s: all photos in this post is taken using iPhone)

Super long queue during one of the weekday lunch.

Assorted Tempura such as Prawns, Pumpkins, Brinjal and etc

From the Grilled Station:- Yakitori, Prawns, Mushroom and even Salmon Fish Head

{Must Try} Japanese BLACK curry to go with the tempura.

I always love the Sushi and Salmon from KISEKI!

{Pasta Station} There are 3 different type of sauce such as Carbonara, Wafu and Tomato base.

Some of the dessert items but I prefer the Black Sesame Mochi most.

{Must Try} Waffle  and their assorted flavour Japanese Gelato are two must have when settle for after meal dessert.

Kiseki Japanese Restaurant
181 Orchard Road
Orchard Central
#08-01/02/03
Singapore 238896
Reservation: (65) 6736 1216
Website: http://kisekirestaurant.com.sg

Operating Hour:
~ 11.30am to 3pm daily (Last order at 2.30pm)
~ 6pm to 10.30pm daily (Last order at 9.30pm)

King Pot Steamboat @ Big Splash

King Pot Steamboat which is located at Big Splash (East Coast Park) offers an unique casual atmosphere with fine dining experience when you set foot into the restaurant that makes you feel like King and Queen. Overall I find their service is good with attentive serving staffs who are quick and skillful in placing and arranging the platters of food on our table and also they are very observant in taking care of each individual needs such as making sure my boy could enjoy his food and hotpot under safety precaution too.

The photo shows the setup of the steamboat table at KingPot where we each has our personal "hotpot" that cooks using modern gas stove. The cutlers and plates used are quiet similar to those for fine dining which makes you feel so different when compared to those traditional steamboat which we had at home or coffee shop where we used those metal net scoop to hold and cook the food.

King Pot has range of soup broth that cater for each individual preference from the lightest Clear Wild Mushroom broth to thick and spicy Laksa broth. Overall we have tried their Mushroom, Herbal, Bak Kut Teh, Laksa, Minestrone and Szechuan Ma Lai broth.

Out of the broths that we tried, most of us agreed that Bak Kut Teh, Minestrone and Laksa are the "Must Try" whereas for lighter broth you could ask for Wild Mushroom or for strong and spicy taste, try the Ma Lai broth which a few of us find it too spicy.

My choice of Bak Kut Teh broth is very flavoursome and taste good with their complimentary rice. And to our surprised it is not normal steamed white rice but rather a bowl of very fragrant and delicious "chicken rice" to accompany the steamboat items.  Other than soup broth and rice, each set meal also comes with some vegetables (mushroom, black fungus, vegetables and etc), cellophane noodles (dong fen) and a dipping sauce of your choice.

Basically there are 4 types of dipping sauce available on their menu which are:- KingPot Signature Sauce, KingPot Specialty Sauce, Specialty Sauce and Satay Sauce. For chef recommendation, we tried their KingPot Signature Sauce (back) and KingPot Specialty Sauce (front, with sesame seeds topping).

Before using the KingPot Specialty Sauce, you have to use the chopstick or spoon to break up the ball (which resemble a ball of ice-cream) and mix it well with the sauce and overall it taste quiet like Japanese sesame dipping sauce but just with a hint of saltiness. And this goes well with meat, especially lamb.

There were also a few core set menus to choose from such as Meat lover Set (S$28.80++; UP S$39.90++), Seafood Lover Set (S$28.80++; UP S$36.80++), Vegetarian Pot (S$32.80++; UP S$42.80++), Combi Platter With Seafood And Meat (S$36.80++; UP S$46.80++) and Kids Meal (S$9.80++; UP S$12.80++) with the option to top up on individual items.

Above shows the Combi Platter With Seafood and Meat that range from Angus Beef Ribeye, Pork, Lamb, Fresh Black Prawn, Red Grouper, meat balls, Bitter Gourd Fish Paste Yong Tau Foo and etc.

The Seafood Lover Set comes with prawns, squid, fish, meatballs and accompany Yong Tau Foo items. The selections are fresh except they freeze the fresh fish slices and thaw before serving which I personally feel it would be even better if they used fresh daily supply instead of freeze and thaw.

{Ala Carte Order} This is one of the KINGPOT Special Roll which is known as Boneless Lamb Rack - French Cut (S$22.00/plate). If you look carefully from the photo above, you could see it is specially roll with two "cylinder hole" that enable chopsticks to pick up the cut and swirl in the steamboat  for quick cooking.

Accordingly to the chef, this lamb rack must go with their "Specialty Sauce" which covers 80% of the lamb odor. And the few of us did do a test on eating the lamb with and without the dipping sauce and it did proof on what their chef has recommended.

The set meal has a complimentary beverage of either Coffee/Tea together with cake (depend on what they have on that day) at the end of the meal. Although they might be be specialize on cake but their Tiramisu still taste quiet decent. 

Other than the complimentary coffee/tea that served from the set menu ordered, there are also some other beverages such as juices, sparking water, wine and etc on their beverage menu too.

King Pot Steamboat
902 East Coast Parkway Block B
#01-05 Big Splash
Singapore 449874
Reservation: (65) 6348 7997
Website: http://www.kingpot.com.sg

Opening Hours:
Monday – Thursday: 6.00pm – 10:30pm
Friday – Sunday: 11.00am – 2:30pm and 6.00pm – 10:30pm


Lastly I would like to thank Adrian from KingPot for arranging this tasting as well as all the friendly serving staffs who served and attended to us during the tasting.