Ya Kun Kaya Toast

What do you usually have for breakfast? A slice of bread with butter and jam, some fried noodles, or either some cereal with milk? No matter what you have, in Singapore you won't be troubled by food. You can have all kind of choices range from Western to Asian depending on what you prefer for that day.

Most of the Singaporean will like to have this quick and easy breakfast of the half-boiled egg with kaya toasts that served with a cup of freshly brew coffee for their morning breakfast or even afternoon tea-snacks. You can find this type of combination served in local coffee shop or specialized cafe like one of this called "Ya Kun Kaya Toast".

They many branches located in Asian countries like Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Vietnam and etc. And they have about 30 branches located in different shopping area around Singapore. Their range of Egg & Toast set comes in different combination that you might want to take a closer look in their menu.(click here, check under Ya Kun Menu) Although most of us here have already known and eaten these but just for the interest of some other readers, I will roughly introduce some of the usual orders that most of us will take.

~ 1. Half-boiled Eggs which is freshly made upon ordering and it's usually eaten with some pepper & dark soy sauce. But most of us will like to dip or soak the toast in the egg and eat together with it.

~ 2. Singapore Style Coffee which is rich and full of aroma. This is very different from the western coffee which you really should give it a try. It usually consists of a few combination like, Black Coffee(Kopi O), White Coffee(Kopi - coffee with condensed milk) or Kopi Si(coffee with evaporate milk).

~ 3. French Toast & Kaya which is fried bread with beaten egg and served with some extra Ya Kun Kaya as dipping sauce or spread.

~ 4. Kaya Toast is actually two slices of toasted bread sandwich with butter and Ya Kun very own signature Kaya.

Ban Leong Seafood Restaurant

Ban Leong Wah Hoe Seafood Restaurant (万隆华和海鲜菜馆) is situated the residential area of Casuarina Road which is near the Upper Thomson Road. They served Great "Seafood Zhe Char" at an incredibly affordable prices. As this stall is extremely occupied during weekends, it is best to call ahead to reserved a table in order to save time on waiting. Other than dine-in, they also provided take-away orders on the phone too.

We arrived at about 7.10pm and almost all the tables were occupied and each of the tables will have at least one crab order which is either their signature Chilli Crab or whatsoever. While waiting for the food to be served, Rey and I went around the restaurant to take some shots on their seafood.

As we are celebrating Mum's Birthday with some friends and relatives, we ordered quite a number of dishes which a few of it I didn't managed to take a clear shot of them due to the poor lighting late in the evening as well as our table position. So I will just leave you with these 8 dishes:-

~ 1: Stir-fry Kai Lan which is not over cook and still remain crunchy and it comes with a special fragrant seems like pepper......

~ 2: Birthday Noodles was actually a plate of Fried Mee Sua with generous amounts of squid, eggs, bean sprouts, prawns and surprised some deep-fried quail eggs(which resemble mini fishball).

~ 3: Xia Zhao(虾枣) which is similar to Wu Xiang but is deep-fried in individual pieces consists of minced meat, prawn, yam, water chestnut and spices. The Xia Zhao here is rather crisp on the outer skin and it goes well with their special sweet dipping sauce. I prefer this more than the shrimp-paste fried chicken.

~ 4: Shrimp-paste Fried Chicken is seasoned with shrimp-paste and some other ingredients then coat with fry and deep-fried until crisp on the outer skin but still the inner meat is still tender and juicy.

We ordered 3 crabs but cooked in two different methods which one is their signature Chilli Crab while the other one is in Butter flavour. Other than the crabs, we also have deep-fried fish with dark soy sauce, sweet and sour pork and hot-plate deer meat(铁板鹿肉).

~ 1. Signature Chili Crabs that served with gorgeous amount of egg sauce gravy and deep-fried mantou. As I am not a great fan of Crab, I only eat the mantou with the gravy. But overall, the taste is great.

~ 2. Butter Crab has a very unique fragrant and taste which covers with a thick layer of crispy fritters which I think is deep-fried egg. It has a very nice butter taste and most of us prefer this than the chilli crab.

~ 3. Deep-fried Fish cooked with dark soy sauce is rather salty on the sauce, but overall the fish is still fresh and not oily even though it had been deep-fried.

~ 4. Sweet & Sour Pork is one of my brother's favourite dish but then I find that their gravy is kind of sour. Maybe they have added too much plum sauce or tomato sauce.

The Manhattan Fish Market

This is one of the new eat-out places in the newly renovated NorthPoint near Yishun MRT. When my boy and I first saw the wooden signboard during the renovation showing the name "The Manhattan Fish Market" on it, my boy still told me that it might be a FISH MARKET opening soon..... But to my surprised it is actually a western restaurant selling all kinds of Seafood Delights.

The Manhattan FISH MARKET at Northpoint branch consists of two different dinning environment. You can choose to have your meal inside the restuarant itself and enjoy some videos of fishing tips or you might prefer an out-door concept where you can enjoy another view of the shopping mall while eating.

They have all kinds of eateries on the menu(click on the menu link), range from Soup, Salad & Green, Starters & Appetiser, Pasta, Seafood and etc..... The menu also comes with a very cute lobster shape kid's menu which with good choice of items at reasonable price. Since this is a new outlet at Northpoint, at their promotion, customer are given a S$5 discount voucher for their next dine-in.

And in conjunction of celebration with our 44th Singapore National Day. Thy also having a promotion with DBS Credit Cards holder on this S$44++ NDP Platter during the month of August. So do check up the nearby outlet for more information.

We order a set of "Perfect Catch" which comes with the Soup of the Day and a big tall glass of Ice-lemon tea for just S$4.90. A "Flaming Platter for One" which consists of one piece of Grill Fish Fillet coated with special herbs, garlic rice, chips and their award winning Flaming Prawns for S$18.90. I love the taste of the Flaming Prawns, the stuff will use a blow touch to cook the prawn right in front of you before serving. The prawn is top with something like a sweet mayonnaise-like sauce which will melt over on the rice when it is done.

For dessert we are tossing between their Manhattan Mud Pie or Tuscan Tiramisu. But in the end as I am craving for some coffee dessert, we choose the Tuscan Tiramisu. Since there is no picture on the menu, we will surprised to see the Tiramisu to be serve in a cup rather than the usual slice form. Their tiramisu is absolutely great in taste, the texture thick, smooth and the scent of coffee is blending well with the overall ingredients.

Other outlet includes:-
~ The Manhattan Fish Market (Plaza Singapura)
#06-07, 68 Orchard Road
Plaza Singapura, Orchard
Singapore 238839
Tel: 6835 9300

~ The Manhattan Fish Market (The Central)
#02-79/90, 6 Eu Tong Sen Street
Central, Clarke Quay
Singapore 059817
Tel: 6534 7903