Food Pet Peeve - Pre Cooked Hor Fun

Fancy beef hor-fun made by pouring hot beef over cold pre-cooked hor-fun?

What is wrong with Zi Char places in Singapore?

Almost all places I've went to, from the small hawker Zi Char, to respectable places like Zi Yean, their hor fun is utter crap. Vomit inducing shite.

You might ask me, why?

If you don't know already, usually they pre-cook their hor-fun earlier in the day (just stir fry the hor-fun dry in a wok, pour soy sauce) and keep it in a warmer.

When the customer order, ie seafood horfun, they simply cook the ingredients + sauce in the wok, and pour over the hot sauce over the cold/lukewarm pre-cooked hor fun.

The simple fact to this is that, in the name of efficiency, many places has compromised on their standards.

Sure, it saves time, you remove the tedious procedure of cooking the hor-fun, then cooking the sauce with the hor-fun.

Now you just pre-cook the hor-fun hours before, and later cook the sauce and pour it over when an order arrives.

Until you've eaten a real piping hot beef hor-fun made lovingly from scratch, you'll always accept this lazy method of cooking as normal, and pay good money for it. This is the ultimate tragedy.

It may be acceptable to most patrons, but it is not good enough for me.

Please tell me I'm not alone.

茶葉蛋

Sometimes, something as prosaic as tea egg can be a revelation to the taste buds.

When one thinks about tea eggs, almost inevitably, we think of crowded pasar malams where spring rolls drenched in oil are placed side by side with sweet corn, and maybe a hotpot cooking tea eggs.

And then you decide to try the tea eggs, out of whim.

You take a bite, and the awful tasting sauce, together with the overcooked, powdery egg yolk is unforgettable, for the wrong reasons.

You always tell yourself to swear from buying tea eggs from pasar malams again. Until you visit the pasar malam the next time, and promptly forgot the promise, and buy one again.

The tea egg I tasted in Tea Bone Zen Mind (Yes, they don't only serve tea), is nothing like that.

How amazing can a tea egg be? You ask? An egg is an egg right?

If its done right, very good. I took one bite into it, half-expecting the powdery egg yolk to assualt my tongue.

No. I was so wrong. In it, was the soft, moist, custard-ly goodness of a half boiled egg yolk. With the jelly-like egg white and the warm gooey egg yolk, you finally realise how wonderful a tea egg, cooked well, can be.

And after you eat it, you will always remember your promise never to eat pasar malam tea eggs again.

Yes, they do have quality control over here, where they make sure every egg yolk is not fully cooked;

like when they make sure (perhaps by turning the eggs time-to-time when boiling) that every egg yolk is at the centre of the egg, and not at its side,

or that they make sure the sauce is done right, or else they throw way the whole batch (which they did when they initially experimented with the recipie, i'm told)

For $3, its a bargain, considering the effort to make sure every egg, its yolk, its sauce, is done to perfection.

Pizza Hut scares me

Note: This is not a review about pizza hut.

I dunno about you, but Pizza Hut's "pizzas" scares the hell out of me.

Its not about the faux pizza with curry chicken and other exotica as toppings.

Its not its shite pizza dough, which looks/tastes like bread, rather than pizza crust.

It is not its abysmal salad bar, with its limp lettuce and its diluted worse-than-campbell soups.

It is not its other side orders, which includes gems such as the "Salad Tortilla Bowl" and the "Spagetti Tortilla Bowl". [link]

Anyone who dared to pair two Proud National foods, Mexico's Tortilla and Italy's Pasta, in such a ghastly manner, ought to be taken out and shot, for crimes against good taste.

No, Its not even the pizza itself, which is the mutant offspring between Asian and American food sensibilities, and tastes/looks nothing like the original Italian pizza.

I can look pass all these mistakes.

Cheese oozing out like a burst pimple... Mmmmm

I was watching the television when I saw this. The new Cheesy Lava pizza. No. I have not eaten it, nor will ever attempt to eat it.

Why? Don't know about you, but to me, the pizza crust looks like it just burst a pimple.

Tea Bone Zen Mind

I had the pleasure to spend two consecutive Saturdays in this delightful little teashop cloistered in the corner of City Hall.

It is not your typical Chinese Tea shop with a dated Chinese decor with dragon/phoenix motifs and ink paintings.

Situated right above a korean restaurant, on the second storey of a pre-war shophouse, the decor is modern, very much like the living rooms you see in Wallpaper Magazine, with fresh blooms in handmade vases on every table.

They serve a selected range of fine teas, from Single Estate Darjeelings teas to high-end Chinese Teas. They made alot of effort in presenting the tea for you, as the pictures below attest. Effort was made to match the color of the tea with the serving vessel.

When you are in this place, you feel very at ease, a perfect place to have a nice chat with a friend, or just have a nice cup of pu'er alone.

The service is impeccable, and unobtrusive.

They serve you and leave you alone to enjoy your tea, not like generic places like Starbucks, where rubbish jazz is used as a sorry excuse for background noise, where teenage busboys howl out orders at the top of their voice, and where you always feel hurried to drink up and vacate your seat, and leave.

No. I don't work for Tea Bone Zen Mind, and I really recommend this place just to get away from the mad hustle bustle of the city.

also see umami's review of the place


Lace Curtains and Pre-War Windows


Pomelo Tea and Pu'er