Pan-fried snapper fillets with lemon-herb-mustard asparagus

I am really beginning to enjoy buying my seafood and vegetables from my local wet market. And my two favourite stall owners have stopped laughing at me trying to speak to them in my terrible Mandarin – either my Mandarin is getting better, or they recognise me, either of which is good.

This morning my fish shop had the freshest looking snapper – he kindly filleted both sides of the tail of a large snapper, the rest to be sold as cutlets. Then across from them at my vegetable stall there were the largest, juiciest looking asparagus spears I have seen in ages. I simply had to have them, and so that decided what was for dinner tonight.

Ingredients for two

1. 2 snapper fillets
2. 6 large spears of asaragus
3. 1 tbl lemon juice
4. 1 tbl extra virgin olive oil
5. 1 tsp honey
6. 1 tsp dijon mustard
7. 3-4 basil leaves, chopped, plus a few small leaves for garnish
8. salt and pepper

Method

1. Normally I would snap the woody ends of asparagus off but these were so big I just trimmed the ends and added the spears to a hot pan, drizzled generously with olive oil and seasoned with salt – I find this method enhances the flavour of the asparagus rather than leaching it out when you boil in water
2. Turn the asparagus over as they char
3. While the asparagus is cooking, lightly coat the snapper fillets with oil, season with salt and pepper, and cook on a hot pan, skin side down first, so it crisps up, then flip over and cook the other side until just cooked through – you don’t want to overcook such a beautiful piece of fish
4. Mix the lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil, honey, dijon together and whisk till emulsified. Stir through chopped basil
5. Serve fish with asparagus on the side and drizzle the mustard dressing over the asparagus with a few fresh basil leaves to garnish

 

Crab-crazy

Dry-style salted egg crab 

Strange heading but we do like our crab in Asia, and especially so in my household. After the delicious salt-egg sauce crab at Mastercrab, I wanted to try to find a dry-style salt egg crab and we recently went to Seafood Paradise at the Singapore Flyer for this.

One thing that makes Seafood Paradise unique is that they offer to deshell your crab for you. You can look at this two ways. I recall many years ago in Malaysia, driving for an hour to get to a steamed crab “hut” (because that’s all it was, just an outdoor space that served steamed crabs), where you sat down at a table with cheap plastic stools, were served whole steamed crabs on a wooden board, and were given a plastic bib and a hammer – and told to go nuts. And boy did we – with gusto. The whole experience of being able to make as much mess as possible brought out the child in us all, and it was one of the most messy and fun experiences I recall.

Eating that same crab in a fancy restaurant requires much more restraint and skill, often still ending up with bits of crab flying everywhere or slipping out of your hands onto your (or someone else’s) lap. So the offer of the restaurant deshelling the crab, and serving the meat served in the shell was too good an offer to refuse. How posh and spoiled we felt !

The impressively deshelled crab in white pepper sauce

Having said that, I have to say that once it was presented to us, flesh neatly contained in the shell of the crab, much to my own surprise, I found out that part of the enjoyment (for me, anyway) of eating crab is dealing with getting the fiddly bits of delicious crab meat out of the frustrating shell. Who’d have thought ? (We still ate it all – there is a surprising heat from the white pepper sauce that goes well with the fresh spring onions)

Luckily the main reason for our visit, the dry-style salted egg crab, came in the shell. The waiter actually recommended that we enjoyed the crab in the shell, as this style is about enjoying the combination of the lip-smackingly salted egg yolk baked on to the shell, with the sweet crab meat inside. It’s one of those dishes that’s rich to the point where you can’t eat too much but really wish you could.

Either way, I’d totally recommend this place if you’re looking to enjoy crab – in any of the many styles they offer. Afterwards, you can take a leisurely stroll around the Singapore Flyer to walk off your dinner, and as a bonus even ON TO the F1 track near the pit stop area.

Seafood Paradise @ the Singapore Flyer
30 Raffles Ave
#01-01 Singapore Flyer
Singapore 039803
Tel: 6336 5101

Opening Hours:
Mon – Fri: 11.30am – 3.00pm / 6.00pm – 11.00pm
Sat, Sun & PH: 11.30am – 11.00pm

Corta Sconta

The beautiful courtyard at Corta Sconta

Venice is a bit of an anomaly with the rest of Italy – it’s one of the main cities, but few people wax lyrical about the cuisine or share all of their great food experiences there. The locals cater to the masses of tourists, so expect to find trattorias with lots of pasta and pizza options on the menu, and expect to pay a premium to eat anywhere within sniffing distance of St Mark’s Square or with a view of/near a canal.

However, there are some definite brilliant hidey holes and Corta Sconta is one of them.

Carpaccio of sea bream and tuna 

For a start, the entrance to the restaurant is a bland blink-and-you’ll-miss-it hole in the wall, but walk through the small indoor seating area and you’ll pop out the back to the most gorgeous courtyard. It feels like you have entered a secret garden, where some diners eat alone with their books and a glass of wine, amongst groups of locals catching up over never-ending spritzers – a refreshing mix of Aperol and prosecco.

There is a standard menu with a list of fresh pastas, made on the premises – sauces are whatever is available that day, which the owner and hostess, Rita, will happily share with you.

Steamed local clams with white wine and ginger

The daily menu consists of dishes made from strictly seasonal products – with the great option of letting them choose for you.

We started with a tuna carpaccio marinated in balsamic vinegar and sea bream marinated in orange. The fish was delightfully fresh and firm and I loved the sea bream but thought (secretly) to myself it was a shame to marinate gorgeous tuna in such a strong flavour as balsamic.

Next up we had clams steamed with white wine and ginger which were awesome. The sweetness of the clams were released into the broth that was quickly mopped up by crusty bread.

Sardines and prawns – two of the “six fish from laguna”

Third (and for us, final) dish was a dish consisting of “the six fish from Laguna” – the Venetian Lagoon. The six “fish”- recommended to be eaten from the more delicate to the more robust flavours – were cuttlefish roe, mantis shrimp, spider crab in cream on top of crusty squares of bread, prawns, octopus and sardines. Most were simply steamed and served with a generous drizzle of olive oil and a good squeeze of lemon.

We really did consider ordering some of the pasta dishes we saw served at other tables but by this stage both of us were full of seafood and prosecco but if you can squeeze it in, based on the quality and flavour of what we ate, I would definitely recommend it.

There’s such a strong feeling that the family are cooking for you, their friends, at Corta Sconta – it’s a place where you could easily spend the entire afternoon to escape the hustle and bustle outside.

Corta Sconta
Castello 3886
Calle del Pestrin (Arsenale)
Venice
Tel: tel 041 5227024
Email: corte.sconta@yahoo.it

Master Crab

Master Crab’s salted egg crab

You had better cook a good crab dish if you want to call yourself Master Crab. That’s what I thought when my friend told me where they had had incredible crab recently. The “restaurant” is actually a tze char stall in a coffee shop. Tze char literally means “cook and fry” and it means that you order off a menu that is similar to a restaurant, just in a coffee shop environment.

There is no airconditioning, cheap plastic tables and chairs and fluorescent lighting that makes you feel like you can get a tan while you eat. Absolutely no frills, and where you can call to book a table, but when you get there, you get the feeling that it’s on a first come, first served basis, as this stall is all about turnover.

We were on a crab mission, though – in particular salted egg crab, so luckily it was a cool evening and they had a table for us to eat. We tried to order two crab dishes – salted egg and white pepper crab, but we were told that there was a minimum of two crabs per type of sauce, and each crab weighed just under a kilo.  With just three of us, we thought we’d stick to one (salt egg) and then order other dishes.

Some of the dishes we had were pretty disappointing – the sambal kankong - chilli water spinach – was really overseasoned and overcooked, and the crispy baby squid was too sweet.  The fried rice, on the other hand was delicious. Lots of wok hei (see my attempt at an explanation of this here).

Now to the crab.  I’ve subsequently heard that other crab dishes here are only so so, but the salted egg crab, my goodness, it’s worth it to visit just for this dish alone.

Firstly the crab was super fresh. The meat was flaky and sweet and smothered in a golden yellow sauce that is finger licking good. It’s rich and thick and has a wonderful balance of salt (presumably from the salted egg) and sweet and it is, quite simply, magnificent. I love pretty much anything with salted egg, and I wondered if it was too Asian for D’s more Western palate, but he loved it almost more than I did !

I am now wanting to try Let’s Clap ! At Railway Mall where they apparently do a dry version of salted egg crab. That would be such an intense taste sensation.

So is Master Crab the master of all crab places ? Absolutely, if what (and all) you want is salted egg crab. Leave everything else for another place.

Master Crab Seafood Restaurant
Blk 19 Ghim Moh Road #01-229
Tel: +65 6314 1868

Open Daily 5pm – 10.30pm

Standing Sushi

Shiro maguro (white tuna) and sake (salmon) sashimi

Standing Sushi is one of the best places to eat super good sushi in Singapore.  Their shiny new premises at Marina Bay Link Mall are a bit more difficult to get to than their now-closed outlet at OUB Centre, but I quite liked eating somewhere that wasn’t 2 feet away from the crazy hustle and bustle of lunchtime at OUB Centre/Raffles Place MRT.

The menu was very simple – sushi, sashimi, donburi, salads and maki – I don’t recall any cooked food.  One of the recommendations from the friendly waitress was shiro maguro -white tuna – something that I have not ever heard of before.

The chef served this sashimi style, marinated for 5 hours in his secret blend of sauces before slicing and serving on a plate with equally generous slices of salmon.

The texture is smooth with the same softness of fresh salmon sashimi and has a slightly salty taste (presumably from the marinade).  It was absolutely delicious and I wonder how different the texture and taste would be when the fish is served unadulterated and fresh.

Sashimi platter with prawn, squid, octopus, salmon, tuna and white tuna

We also had the sashimi plate and the sashimi salad.  Every piece of seafood, from the usual salmon and tuna, to the more unusual prawns and squid and scallops was wonderfully firm and sweet, needing just a little dip into our soya sauce with wasabi.

If you are looking for somewhere to eat fantasticly fresh seafood, this is the place to go.  It’s not situated in the main corridors so looks out for it – it’s behind the Four Seasons Gourmet Market.

Standing Sushi Bar
Marina Bay Link Mall
8A Marina Boulevard
B2-51 Marina Bay Link Mall
Tel: (65) 6634 7068

Opening Hours – Mon-Sat 11.30am – 9.00pm
Closed on public holidays and Saturdays following public holidays on a Friday

Pan-fried sea bream with fresh tomatoes and cauliflower mash

I hate low carb. I hate the fact that they have taken the joy out of enjoying warm crusty bread rolls fresh from the oven. And biting into perfectly al dente pasta. And loving the fact that the rice absorbs all the flavours of curries on your plate. And creamy, fluffy, buttery mashed potatoes filling my mouth. I wish they would tell us that starchy carbs are not the enemy. But enemy they are. And as we get older, we have found that we need to watch what we eat, just that little bit more.

One of our favourite fish dishes (apart from my salmon, corn and herb salad) is pan-fried fillet of fish with fresh tomatoes on mashed potatoes. I tried something today which, surely does not replace potato mash, but manages to have the same consistency – sort of fooling my brain – with the mild taste of cauliflower, which we luckily happen to love.

The mash of course is not the hero of the dish.  The hero is pan-fried fillet of fish (tonight we had sea bream) with a fresh tomatoes, flash fried in butter, and poured over the fish almost like a dressing, or sauce.  You can, of course, go nuts with potatoes instead of cauliflower – just don’t tell me about it. (I’m even being cheeky and categorising this under “healthy”)

Ingredients (for two)

1. 2 fillets firm white fish fillets – snapper, bream whatever you have access to
2. handful cherry tomatoes, chopped
3. 1 tbs butter plus a nob extra for the mash
4. half a small head of cauliflower
5. salt and pepper

Method

1. Start the mash first.  Cut the cauliflower into pieces and cook till very soft.  You can either boil or microwave – I boiled mine but I’d imagine microwaving it might make for a dryer, firmer mash
2. While the cauliflower is cooking, season the fish fillets with salt and pepper, and pan fry in some olive oil until crispy on the outside and still tender inside.  Depending on the thickness of the fillets, this usually takes about 3-4 minutes on each side of a hot pan
3. Once the cauliflower is soft, mash or use a stick blender and whizz till creamy.  Add butter, salt and pepper to taste.  You could even add in grated cheese or cream for a richer flavour
4. Take the fish out of the pan and in the same pan, melt the tablespoon of butter until frothy and toss the tomatoes in for 30 seconds until they release their juices and mix with the butter to make a silky sauce
5. Serve the fish with the mash, topped with the buttery tomato mix

Oooh…Kinki…@ Customs House

Snapper carpaccio with truffle oil 

Having a drink at Oyster Bar on a Monday night, a friend and I decided to try our luck at Kinki without a reservation.

It’s at Customs House with entry via an elevator at street level. A hostess greeted us, asking us if we had a reservation and then escorted us up to the second floor where another waiter asked if we had a reservation.  A bit of overkill ?  Perhaps, but then Kinki isn’t the sort of establishment that is understated, starting from the crazy Japanese graffiti on the floor and walls as you enter, to the grand view of Marina Bay Sands as you walk to your table.

We had prime position at the counter, and the friendly chefs recommended what was a stunning dish – thinly sliced snapper carpaccio with ponzu sauce and drizzled with truffle oil.  He actually asked “do you like truffle oil” – is there anyone that doesn’t ???

The snapper came sliced so thin you could see the glass plate it was served on.  Wonderfully fragranced with the truffle oil, the fish was sweet and delicious.

As for the rest of the meal…I have to say that they do try hard in terms of presentation, but for the price that you are paying, I have come to expect a much higher standard.

Sashimi plate – kingfish, sea urchin, salmon, swordfish and tuna

We started with a selection of sashimi – what sort of fish we left to the chef, which usually means you get the best of what they have that day. There was kingfish, uni (sea urchin), salmon, swordfish and tuna (which was hidden behind the shiso leaf) and whilst the uni, salmon and kingfish were freshly firm and sweet, the swordfish and tuna, which I expect to taste rich and almost creamy, had a disappointingly watery texture.

Perhaps then the dish we had after was poorly ordered but we ordered a dragon roll and a spicy tuna roll, and I almost felt like I could have ordered the same thing from a sushi chain like Sushi Tei.  Nothing special at all about it, and the rolls were very loosely rolled so everything fell as you tried to navigate it from plate to mouth.

The place is buzzy and fun, and the chefs behind the counter are all friendly and chatty but I got a feeling that this place lacked authenticity – perhaps I am more accustomed to Japanese sushi chefs who are almost sombre when they are preparing their food – their concentration is so great.  Add that with the sashimi dish, I am glad I finally went, but think it will be a once off for me.

Salmon pasta

A deliciously creamy pasta that is freshened by a good squeeze of lemon.

Ingredients: (for two)

1. 1 onion, diced
2. 1 glass of white wine
3. 200g hot smoked salmon, flaked (you can also use normal smoked salmon)
4. 150g dried pasta – I like to use spaghetti
5. 200ml cream
6. Salt and pepper to taste
7. Juice of 1/2 lemon, plus extra to serve
8. Handful fresh dill, chopped – other herbs that would work if you can’t get fresh dill would be chervil or flat leaf parsley and you can also use dried dill if your supermarket is like mine and always seems to have the fresh herbs you don’t need that night

Method:

1. Cook the pasta according to the instructions on the pack
2. While the pasta is cooking, sweat the onions until translucent
3. Turn the heat to high, add the white wine and cook for 3-4 minutes to cook off the alchohol
4. Add the cream and cook on medium heat for another few minutes until thickened
5. Season to taste – remember that the salmon will add salt
6. Add the salmon
7. Add the lemon juice and herbs
8. Add the cooked pasta (should be juust al dente as it will continue to cook a little in the sauce).  Reserve some of the salted water that you cooked the pasta in and you can add that to thin out the cream sauce to make it silky and coat the pasta.
9. Serve with lemon wedges and a sprinkle of chopped fresh dill

Gong Xi Fa Cai !

Yu sang – prosperity salad

Happy Lunar New Year !  This post is dedicated to the star of our Chinese new year dinner – yu sang, or prosperity salad, which we started our dinner with at the Red House at Robertson Quay.

Yu sang (also called lo hei in Cantonese) is essentially a raw fish – usually salmon or mackerel – mixed in a salad of shredded vegetables and a variety of sauces and condiments.  As with most special Chinese dishes, the dish is named after the key ingredient – in this case, fish – which, when pronounced, has another meaning – abundance.  So the serving of yu sang during Chinese new year is to wish everyone an abundance of prosperity, vigour, health…all the good things to start a new year with.

Steamed razor clams with garlic and glass noodles

The salad ingredients are presented and as the server proceeds to add ingredients such as the fish, the crackers and the sauces, they say auspicious wishes as each ingredient is added, typically related to the specific ingredient being added. For example, the sweet sauce they add is meant to wish all at the table sweetness and harmony in their lives, the oil that is added wishes a smooth year ahead, and the fish wishes abundance.

All the diners at the table then stand up and on cue, proceed to toss the shredded ingredients into the air with chopsticks while saying their own wishes for the year out loud. It is believed that the height of the toss reflects the height of the diner’s growth in fortunes, thus diners are expected to toss enthusiastically.

It’s such a fun way to celebrate the lunar new year.  And it helps that the salad is delicious !

Braised tofu topped with seaweed and mushrooms

Red House is quite unique in it’s interior design – it felt as if we had walked in to a restaurant that was housed in a large warehouse and that had started to fit it with the usual Chinese restaurant design – lanterns, wooden tables and chairs etc, but had only completed the fish tanks and the private rooms.  The main dining area felt almost unfinished with industrial steel fans on the ceiling.  The acoustics of the place are not great for the large tables they have in there, meaning you have to really shout and also making hearing your friends/family difficult.  The food is not bad – I think there is a pretty decent standard for seafood restaurants and the dishes they prepared were good, but no greater than any other Chinese seafood restaurant available around Singapore.

Lobster noodles

We ate the set menu on offer, which consisted of stir-fried asparagus, steamed razor clams with garlic and glass noodles, steamed prawns, chilli crab, braised home-made tofu topped with seaweed and mushrooms and lobster noodles.  All good.  Although nothing that stood out.

The benefit of eating at Robertson Quay is all of the bars that have popped up around that area, where you can take a slow stroll by the river to get to.  If you’re lucky like we were last night, there will be a lovely cool breeze, making it even more pleasant.

All in all a wonderful way to herald in the lunar new year.  Gong xi fa cai everyone !

Red House at The Quayside
#01-13/ 14 The Quayside
60 Robertson Quay
Tel: +65 6735 7666

Smiths Authentic British Fish and Chips

 

Haddock and chips

Last Wednesday I went to visit a friend in Joo Chiat and we decided to head down to Tanjong Katong Road for some fish and chips.  It’s in his locale so he often goes there for a lazy Sunday lunch.

Smiths claims to serve authentically British fish and chips.  Not having grown up in Britain, I had to rely on my friends who delightedly exclaimed how it reminded them of their childhood, and for me, it brought back memories of the places around Sydney (like Watsons Bay) that used to sell fresh fish, battered and fried on order, and then wrapped up in newspaper to be eaten in one of the nearby parks overlooking the harbour.

Sean, the owner, used to be the head chef at the Singapore Cricket Club, so I guess has been around the British clientele long enough to know that there is a need for authentic British fish and chips.  And when I say proper, I mean serving cod, haddock, and even scampi, cooked to order and served with thick cut chips and wrapped in butchers paper, where you take them to your table to add salt, tomato sauce, HP sauce and the all important malt vinegar generously on your fish and chips.

It’s where there is a completely separate menu that is equally as long as the fish selection, that covers side orders, like mushy peas, curry sauce, gravy (for the fries), picked onions, pickled eggs and pickled gherkins.  Perfect for cutting through the grease (although the onions were a tad tricky to cut with the plastic cutlery they give you – slippery little suckers).

I ordered the haddock and chips and quickly unwrapped my serving as soon as I got to the table.  The chips would be soggy from the vinegar I would soon add, but the fish needs to stay crispy.  And crispy it was !  And the sweet taste of the haddock was not lost in the batter and oil.

You can even enjoy British beer like Boddingtons or a bottle of wine with your fish and chips.

I am thinking that it might soon be a regular for us on a lazy Sunday afternoon as well.

Smiths authentic British fish and chips
230 Tanjong Katong Road, Singapore
Tel: +65 6345 9855

Opening Hours
Tue–Sun: 12pm – 11pm
(Closed on Mon)