Thursday 17 September 2009

Red Star Restaurant

"Red Star Restaurant - 红星酒家" located at level 7 of the HBD block in Chin Swee Road. From the official website, you can read about the history of this restaurant which is set up by two chef in around 1974. The operating hours starts from as early as 7am daily which they offer all kinds of hot piping dim sums that are ordered from push trolleys.

Since my in-laws was around Chinatown area doing some shopping, we decided to meet up for dim sum - 点心 lunch since this restaurant is somewhere near my working area. Since lunch hour was pretty rush for me, I didn't really have much time accompany them throughout the whole session. But they will very thoughtful, while waiting for me to arrive, they already ordered some of my favourite dishes to avoid the waiting time.

Although I personally prefer "Siu Mai - 烧卖" more than "Har Gua - 虾饺" but I find that the Har Gua that served here are very fresh, the wheat starch skin that used to wrapped the prawn was thin and the prawn filling it in is crunchy and sweet compare to most of the dim sum stall.

Next comes my favour which is the "Siu Mai - 烧卖", the serving here is just nice for the size as some outlet are serving those extra big size which making it feel so greasy upon eating. The fillings of the siu mai consists of ground pork, shrimp and chinese mushroom that is wrapped with a yellowish skin and there is often an orange dot on the center.

I am not sure what is this dish called, but it is wrapped with ground pork, prawns and chinese chives with a skin that is similar to dumpling skin. The taste was quite ok for me as the chives taste did not actually over powder the rest of the ingredients.

"Century Egg and Pork Porridge - 皮蛋瘦肉粥" is one of the most common Congee that customers will order while having dim sum. Normally, they will also have Chicken/Pork/Fish Congee in the menu, but the most popular orders will still be this century Egg & pork porridge.

"Fung Zhao - 鳳爪" are chicken feet that are being deep fried, boiled, marinated in a black bean sauce and then steamed. This cause the texture to be light and fluffy, while moist and tender on the inner area. When having dim sum with my mum, we will always ordered at least two plates of this because we simply love this dish due to it braising sauce.

"Fried Wontons - 炸馄饨" which is a great finger food to go with some mayonnaise dipping sauce for both adults and kids. This dish has to be served hot while the so that you can take the crispness of the wonton skin and the juicy filling in it.

Lastly, after all the steam and deep-fry food, it time to settle with something sweet to end with the meal. My in-laws are having "Black sesame paste - 芝麻糊" while me and my sis-in-law each grab a bowl of this "Almond Jelly - 杏仁豆腐" with Longan. The taste of this almond jelly is light for those who don't really keen with the Almond taste/fragrance. But to me, I still prefer those with a stronger almond taste flavour.


Sunday 13 September 2009

The Prata Place

The Prata Place located at the end of a stretch of shophouses at Thong Soon Avenue near Thomson. This shop is also Halal certified and they make the prata only after you place your order so the prata will remains hot and crispy when served at your table.

We arrived at the venue around 6.30pm on a Saturday evening and there are already a lot of people dinning inside the shop. So in order not to wait for seats inside, we choose a table outside the shop and starts looking at the menu on what we want.

Teh Tarik is always one of the drink that I would order when patronize any of the prata shop. I love the taste of that milk tea with that extra bubbles on top. The temperature of the tea is just nice, not too hot and it's very smooth and I just like that taste of it.

I guess no one can resists their wide variety of prata and their thin and crispy prata! We ordered their "Paper thin prata" and "Strawberry Prata" which is very crispy and fragrance. As you can see from the photo the strawberry prata is drizzle with some strawberry sauce and sprinkler with colourful bits and the texture of the prata are just as thin as a piece of crispy cracker.

After waiting for about 10 minutes, here comes our Chicken Murtabak which we ordered the small size serving that they cut into 6 portions. Their murtabak comes in different sizes like S, M, L, XL. We will kind of disappointed with their chicken murtabak which appears to be like some chopped chicken minced stir-fry with chopped onion and spices that wrapped between a layer of the prata skin.

Overall we still prefer the Egg and Cheese Prata which serves with a plate of their dipping curry sauce. The combination of egg and prata is so fragrance especially with the extra curry and you just can't seems to get enough of eating it.


Thursday 3 September 2009

Taste Of Thailand @ Yishun Industrial Park

Those staying around Yishun, Sembawang or Woodlands area would most probably have heard or patronize this restaurant called "Taste of Thailand" that used to have a store at the basement food court before Giant took over the basement level. After the partial renovation of the shopping center, the stall move from the basement up to the 4th storey. Now they have shifted out of the new Sembawang Shopping Centre to a coffee shop in Yishun Industrial Park A.


This is their famous deep-fried fish with Thai chili sauce the fish which is so nicely fried. The grouper is surprisingly fresh, crispy and succulent with a tender and juicy flesh, which most places would usually use “not-so-fresh” fishes for deep frying. But you definitely won't be disappointed with this restaurant. This dish come in 3 different serving size and from $10.00 for small, $15.00 for medium and etc.

Tried Stir-fry Baby Kailan With Beef during this visit rather than the usual Stir-fry Beef with Ginger and Spring Onion. This Kailan Beef was served with a gorgeous amount of tender beef slices which is very great value for the price of S$9.00 for a medium size plate.

Instead of getting a plate of their famous pineapple fried rice, we ordered this "Stir-fry Thai-style Thin Noodles" which I personally find it nice. But if they add a bit of chopped roasted on top before serving like most of the Thai noodle dishes, it will definitely add extra points to this dish.

They have a wide range of economic dishes which is very affordable for value of money. Like what we ordered above these 3 dishes come up to be around S$28.00 with medium serving portion for 2 - 3 person. Usually these two restaurants are well packed with customers during dinner timing around 5.30pm onwards, so it's best to be early in order to get a place.

They have another branch @
Bei Sheng Seafood Restaurant 北腾泰国小食

Block 701A #01-01
Yishun Avenue 5
(Opposite Chong Pang Market POSB Branch)
Telephone : 6756 4883


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