Marutama Ra-men @ Central review

heeey.... another food blog again.... and again.... its Raaaaaaaaaaaaamen.

Told you I'm a noodle lover mah. Heard about this shop at Central quite long ago, and everytime I would definitely see a long queue outside this store. I don't like to wait at long queues, cos its just non-productive and tiring and sometime it just doesn't worth queuing at all after tasting!!! Well, we Singaporean just like queues, the longer the more curious you are... Long queue = Good stuff, but this equation is not absolute wo!!

Central @ Clarke Quay MRT station to me is really a badly design shopping center. The layout is horrible and the shops are just too 'unique'. There is so many hidden corners inside the shopping center that if you are adventurous to explore, you will never sees them. I just feel pity for all the shops hidding away from the main atrium. Everytime I walk into the 'hidden' wing, the number of opened shops is getting lesser. The owners are so bored that they actually stand outside chatting with each other. I am sure no matter how actively they advertise the mall on TV, using Japanese songs and colorful items to portrait the 'fun and in' image of the mall, the truth will be shown when you visit the mall.

The only interesting thing about Central mall is the relative large number of restaurants operating there. Besides that, one can forget about going to Central to shop. Ok, enough of bitching lousy shopping center. Let go back to ramen....

Name: Marutama Ra-men

Address: #03-90/91 The Central@Clarke Quay

Price: $15-$20

This shop is located at the 'restaurant wing' of the Central Mall. You can see the shop or the queue from ground floor by looking up the atrium. My friend and I went there early about 6pm on Saturday to avoid the long queue. Even so, the shop is nearly full, and we have only the counter seat to choose. The menu is very simple, selling mainly ramen and some side dishes.

The difference between this shop's ramen and others is that they are selling ramen in chicken soup base; whereas other ramen stores are generally using pork soup base. I ordered the 'Special' creation, the 'Aka ramen', which is addition of 7 nuts mixture onto their basic chicken soup base. My friend ordered the 'Mara karashi ramen', which is spicy chicken soup ramen.

First impression when it arrived was that it looked tasty with relatively thick soup base. Interesting part was that it comes with a slice of lemon too. Kinda funny when you are squeezing lemon juice into to soup noodles? It also came with 3 chicken meat balls and generous amount of spring onion and coriander leave. The soup taste relative thick, however, overall is not really fantastic. Although it does taste better than normal Jap restaurant's ramen. What I did not like is the overloaded amount of spring onion and coriander leave, they are simply too overpowering and cover up the delicate chicken taste. Personally I don't like coriander leave, so its really a turn off when coriander leave taste is on every mouth of soup and noodles.

I also tasted my friend's spicy chicken soup ramen. Well I can say that it is really nothing fantastic, and taste like normal chicken soup and again with loads of spring onion and coriander leaves. Without the nut mixture, the soup taste even thinner. And for a Singaporean standard, the spiciness is no kick. The ramen is thinner than the usual ramen and first look on it, one may think that it is just the 'you mien or mee kia' found in wanton noodles. Texture wise, its no big deal too, not really springy and it taste really like 'you mien'. The chicken balls are a dissappointment too, not much taste and dry.

The serving portion is rather small and for a $15 bowl of ramen, you only get 3 chicken meat balls and that's all. It is definitely not enough for a healthy and active young man like me!!! While my friend's version only have 1 piece of char siew!! Think of it, it is kinda expensive.

Overall, this ramen store fails to impress me. I would not purposely revisit again in near future though.

3 Stars are awarded by me.

Fried Hokkien Mee @ Geylang review

Its time to for the next food review....

I am a noodle lover..hee. Given the chance, I will like to try all kinds of noodles available!!! This time, my friend had recommended me this Fried Hokkien Mee (福建炒麺) in Geylang Lorong 29. To make good Fried Hokkien Mee is not easy. The most important ingredient is the prawn stock used to flavor the noodles. Besides that are the lard, sambal chilli, lime and pork.

Name of stall: Swee Guan Hokkien Mee
Place: Geylang Lorong 29 Coffee shop

This stall in hide inside a corner coffeeshop along Geylang Lorong 29. There are other food stalls available like satay and fish noodle soup. The Hokkien mee is not cheap though, one plate cost $4. I was expecting to be a decent big plate... but when it arrive 15mins later... the portion is pathetic. It is smaller than a normal $3 hawker center Hokkien mee.

The amount of noodles is sadly little. However, the amount of squid ring and prawn are relatively more than the normal Hokkien mee elsewhere. Important thing is, the prawn is not smelly and its relatively fresh. It is a sin for some hawker to sell Hokkien mee using stale and smelly prawn, and not to mention that I even eaten mushy prawn before in some other stalls. Yucks!!

It smells really good after mixing in the sambal chilli and lime juice. First taste is not bad, very tasty and nice. This dish, however, is not for people with high blood pressure and heart problems. As it contains VERY GENEROUS amount of fried pork lard. No wonder it is so tasty. There is so much lard pieces inside that you will definitely able to bite a few pieces for every mouthful of noodles you are eating.

As I always says... Tasty food is usually not very healthy!!!

However, after eating a few mouthful, I had found a negative point. The chef apparently use such a high and powerful stove fire that I actually can taste the burnt ash note in the noodles. It is different from the usual 'wok taste' that you found in most 'zi cha' food. It is kinda of overcooked to me, but my friend found it acceptable. Most probably he has already accustomed to this burnt taste as he eats it frequently. I actually found a few pieces of burnt noodle.

Obviously, the portion is too small to fill my young and healthy stomach. So I had ordered some pork satay from stall next to the Hokkien mee. It seem quite famous though as it has quite a few appearance in those TCS food hunt show. In short, quite a good Chinese style pork satay, not forgetting the more pieces lard can be found again!!

Conclusion: Tasty gravy with generous amount of lard, squid and prawn. The portion is small for a healthy young male. Burnt taste kinda offensive if you don't like.

I will give 3.5 stars.

Painful run - The Southern Ridge

I had sign up for the Standard Chartered marathon at the end of the year. This would be my first time to run 21km, since I was able to 'escape' during my army time. Well, couldn't believe i actually sign up. But since it is free (company sponsored la!!), may as well go and give myself a challenge.

Started running last month with a few colleagues up to the Kent Ridge Park. Its a nice and cooling place to run with all the trees around you. Given that its a ridge, it not going to be a smooth ride through. The up slope part is horrible, with some place near 45 degree. With the park connector built recently, Kent Ridge park is connected all the way to Mount Faber, which collectively called the Southern Ridge. There are 2 designer bridge connector along the way - Alexandra Arch and Henderson Waves.
(The pictures are from Npark websites, www.nparks.gov.sg)

Ok.. so much for the introduction. Today my colleagues are not free, so I decided to run myself. I had decided that in order for me to complete the 21Km run in a piece, I should run consistently. Well, at least once a week for my case, though the recommended training program should be 2-3 times a week!!

At least, I still have my taichi and tennis to supplement my training la (hope they help!!!). I missed my last week running session as the weather was so unpredictable recently. So although today is still cloudy, I took the chance to run or I will miss another week of run.

So I started running from South Bouna Vista road, up Kent Ridge Park, across Alexandra Arch, up Telok Blangah Hill, across Henderson Waves and finally up to Mount Faber. Ok, its a long run and its a pain up slope run. Guess missing one week of run really affect my body. On the return trip, I knees start to signal problems from my old injury. And I had problem running when reached Telok Blangah Hill. All the down slope and up slope is making the injury worse. Gosh, its a long way back. So try to do some stretching and massaging my right knee to ease some pain but it wasn't effective.

Guess what, I only could do brisk walking from Telok Blangah Hill all the way back to Science Park 2. Its already 7 plus when I reached South Bouna Vista Road and sun already set. Those driving along the road must be thinking what an idiot walking along this ulu forest road man!! At least I was able to get back to office and change. With no money and handphone with me, I just had to bear the pain and walk and walk.......

Guess the strain will take a few days to heal. Will have to limp for awhile then!

So lesson learned: Running cosistently is important, and don't over stress if your body can't take it, especially you have weak knees!!

Ramen review - Santouka @ Central

My first ever food review starts.....

It's a Friday night, which I meet my secondary school classmate, Bryan, for dinner. I had always like to eat noodles, all kinds of noodles. Being to quite a few recommended ramen shops around Singapore before, but I can say that I still cannot find the one that is on par with the one I ate in Japan last year. However, they are still pretty good and above average than your usual ramen found in most Japanese restaurant. I will post my reviews on them next time when I visit them again.

This particular ramen shop is recommended by my one of friend, who is also Japanese food/ramen lover. Other than just listen to him, I got to tryout myself!

Shop name: Ramen Santouka
Address: #02-76, The Central
Price: Affordable, ~$14-$20

This shop is kinda hard to locate, and I found this shop through accident when I look for toilet last time. It hide in one corner next to Billy Bombers and has the view of Clarke Quay. The shop is kinda some with limited seats, but I'm glad was there early about 7pm. Still, it was already full house.

They sold a few varieties of ramen with choice of soup base: Salt, miso, shoyu and spicy miso. I ordered a miso char siew ramen. The bowl is kinda small with a few thick pieces of char siew, some veg, bamboo shoots and a fish cake. The soup looks think but kinda oily as you can see oil floating on top, most probably from the fatty char siew. It does not come with the creamy stew egg!! and we have to order seperately, which cost $1.

To me, the soup is the heart and soul of a ramen beside the noodle texture. It taste good, but not fantastic. The miso added gives it a thick texture, but I must mentioned again that it is kinda oily. However, it does taste better than most normal Japanese restaurant ramen soup. The noodle is not bad too, with a good springy texture and not mushy.

It seems to be a very popular restaurant, with queue started to form immediate after I am seated around 7pm. So if you want to try, please be there early.



Overall, I will give it 3.5 stars.

Performance @ Hong Lim

Another Saturday activity after the cooking class.

Went back home immediately to take my spear and head on to Hong Lim Park (Not to go there to protest though!!!). I am going to my first solo public taichi performance ever! Guess winning Gold medals in the recent National Wushu Championship did bring some recognition to my hardwork.... oops.. praising myself. Though able to win in the competition did fulfill one of my dreams. The competition, however, had so much controversial debates in it that I shall not discuss!! Worth it or not, I agreed to my teacher's request to perform this time by not going to watch my FREE A-Mei concert!!

Well, there is a first time for everything, so just go for it. I only got to know the performance schedule on spot and.. gosh.. I'm in performance number 64!!! It is a martial art night organised by the Telok Ayer CC to promote Chinese culture. They invited 10 diffferent martial art organisations to showcase various style of Chinese martial arts. Most of them are external martial art, guess it kinda more interesting than seeing all taichi right?

Well, I went there too early without having dinner thinking that my small meal in the cooking class can last for awhile. After knowing I'm number 64, I better have my dinner first. So after dinner I went back to enjoy the performance while anxiously waiting for my turn. Well, I can say not all of the performance are great. Some look like they were just practicing their routine aimlessly and unwillingly. So dissappointing, didn't they realise and appreciate that few hundred people were out there watching them?

Things cock up though during my turn. My fellow mates were before me performing 'da dao'. The MC did not realise that I had not went my turn and she started to annouce the next group immediately my fellow mates finished. Lucky I had not walked out of the backstage or I will be so malu!!

Actually by the time I went out to perform, half the audience were already left (its nearly 10pm!). Still nervous, just do my routine and hopefully nothing went wrong and don't drop my spear!! Ok, it went well and applause is the best reward man.

And how I did I went home with my long spear??

Till next time.... :)

German cooking class

Oh yes... First posting after years of hibernation!!

Saturday was a busy day. It was the first time I actually attended a cooking class at CC!! There was no surprise most of them are AUNTIES. I am one of the 5 guys there, including 2 German chefs and a photographer. It was quite a relax and casual afternoon, with the chef trying to share their German culture with us and at the same time rushing out tasty food. But how can they forget to print recipes for us???? Sigh. Lucky it is not that complicated. And the best thing is I DID NOT bring a pen, gosh! Well, only can rely on my camera to capture the essentials.

They were as follow:

1. Pichelsteiner Eintopf (Meat stew with vegetables)
2. Rote Grutze (Sour cherry dessert) - Taste like cherry filling though!!
3. Roast pork Bavarian style - This is yummy with super crispy skin.
4. Bread dumpling - Simple and tasty food making use of leftover bread.
5. Red cabbage - Sauerkraut, they brought the canned type, just heat and serve.

Yummy crispy crispy roast pork....

Meat stew with vegetables

Dumplings, roast pork, red cabbage.

Sour Cherry dessert

All rights.. that's all for now...