Korean Food @ 2D1N Soju Bang

It seems that Tanjong Pagar is going to be the 'makan' hub for South Korean food! With a population numbering only 15,000 (roughly) in Singapore, it's no doubt that Kpop plays a damn important role in the unblockable wave of anything Korean.

2D1N Soju Bang may be considered as pop-style amongst South Korean restaurants (heard that from a fellow colleague who is a South Korean) but its authenticity seems to be unquestioned when i saw quite a few Koreans entering the restaurant for dinner.

With no intention for its popular meat buffet, the Gang of Four (Vannie especially since it's her official birthday meal) decided on ordering ala-carte.

Side Dishes

Looking forward to a large variety of side dishes every time i am in a Korean restaurant (thanks to Ju Shin Jung for instilling such an expectation), the five sides we had in 2D1N were initially thought to be too little.

Well, side dishes are only meant as complementaries and i have to admit that the caramelised sweet potatoes sprinkled with fragrant sesame seeds were so good, i cannot resist having seconds!

Spring Onion Pancake

(Panjeon)

When i first laid my eyes on this dish, i thought it looked almost like the unforgettable seafood omelette from Changi Village!

No heavy trace of egg though.

Mr Kon found this to be relatively bland although my elderly view was that this was simply just nice with spring onions contributing to the main flavour.

The blandness can be arrested by this sauce, which was too salty in my opinion!

BBQ Seasoned Ribs

(Dwaejigalbi)

The name suggests ribs which i assumed to have bones. For humans who prefer to have a mouthful bite, this is the dish for you!

Painstakingly sliced from the boney ribs, the well marinated pork was good on its own. However, the sesame seeds proved to be a perfect idea as we were totally hooked on this dish. Until the tenderised meat slowly hardened up with each passing minute.

I love picking up the remnants that served as the bed of flavour infusion for the meat. How can anyone resist onions???

Bulgogi with Octopus Hot Pot

(Bullakjeongol)

Bulgogi didn't register in my brain and i expected a seafood hotpot. It's not as it's a big pan of beef stew with a generous amount of octopus, beef, vegetables and glass noodles!

This sweet and spicy broth had an obvious hint of rich pumpkin and proved delicious to my taste buds.

The bulgogi (beef) was tooooo tough! It was a torture to chew them after a while!

BBQ Chicken

(Dakgalbi)

Served with tapoki (Korean's new year rice cakes), the serving was again too big!!! I have a health check in a week's time and i can imagine how this dish (or this meal) can affect the health statistics... negatively!!

By this time, the spiciness had already gotten to me and it's not helpful that this BBQ chicken was spicy too! I had tapoki from Bugis Junction a year ago and had never touched it since, due to the high chilli level that is just not agreeable with my system!

I bet an elaboration and evidence of how unagreeable my system is, will not be welcomed.

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Overall, the gang of four generally likes what we had in 2 Days 1 Night Soju Bang. My sisters and mom will most likely enjoy this place!

Time to plan for a family session!  

Location

44/46 Tanjong Pagar Road

Valet parking is available at no additional charge.

(Please call 6227-6033 for more information)

Price

Spring Onion Pancake - S$15.00

BBQ Seasoned Ribs - S$20.00

Bulgogi with Octopus Hot Pot - S$35.00

BBQ Chicken - S$25.00

Subject to Service Charge only! Side dishes and plain water are refillable while plain rice is chargeable at S$2.00 per bowl.

Irritating Facial Hair

One bloody inconvenience of being a man is the issue on facial hair!

When laziness sets in, i will leave them unmaintained and at times, i really want to give up and let the human whiskers grow as much as they want!

For all you know, i may have the look of a pugilistic master with a long, flowing beard!

Coupled with a formidable crescent blade of course.

Unfortunately, my fingers just cannot resist leaving those irritating sprouts alone!!! My fingers may not have the expert dexterity for online gaming but my nails are almost as good as tweezers!

A piece of advice for men who hate that ugly, rough and uncomfortable stubble; use tweezers instead of the conventional shaver! If you are blessed with a lot of facial hair, good luck.

LAN Gaming @ Colosseum Tornado

I am not a gamer.

In fact, my online gaming dexterity is bad enough to be always ranked last in games like counterstrike! Therefore, i used to cringe whenever my game-crazy friends suggested going to those LAN shops.

Not anymore! At least not since the launch of this game called Left4Dead [of course, we all know that there is a Left4Dead 2 (L4D2) now]!

Well, to set the record straight, this is the ONLY game i am usually not rank last; the truth that they have ranking for various categories is beside the point!

After trying quite a few LAN shops with crappy system, small monitor, uncomfortable seat, unresponsive optical mouse and/or lousy graphic cards, i (or should i say Mr Kon) finally found one that is, so far, the best in Singapore.

Yes, it is the Colosseum Tornado at Illuma Shopping Centre (Bugis)! But why do we tag "the best" for this place???

1) Full leather seat that doesn't restrict your movement and yet is comfortable for a little nap while you are dead (in the game).

2) It's a big venue with over two hundred computer terminals! Playing in a small area can be really embarrassing when you need help from friends (in the game) and shouting is at times, the only way to get your message across.

3) Huge ass LCD screen that stretches your peripheral vision! It's because of this monitor screen that i finally decided to buy a 22" LCD monitor!

4) They use Razor mouse!!!! That's like the best brand for gamers! Krait may not have a lot of fancy functions but it is still much better than many others in the market.

There are other reasons like the use of private rooms, great computer systems with high-end graphic cards and economical rate (i thought it's a steal for such premium location)!

Its close proximity to Bugis with so much good food is a big big bonus!

Know why i blog about this? Because it's been a long time since i last played L4D2 in Tornado!! Who is game to join me anytime?!

I need to destress!!!

Pepper Crabs Once Again @ Eng Seng Restaurant (永成餐室)

Pepper Crabs Once Again

@ Eng Seng Restaurant

(永成餐室)

Mom finally had her chance to have a taste of these delicious black peppers crabs i blogged back HERE. In order to have more dishes, i roped in both my sisters and Alex to share the cost! *high credit card bill again*

Besides the famous black pepper crabs (which did not disappoint), i took the opportunity of share costing to order a few other dishes i did not manage to order the last round!

Salted Vegetables Tofu Soup

(S$5.00)

Thinking it will be just salted vegetables and tofu, i was surprised to find that it's a hotpot of ingredients that included slices of fish, squid, prawns and tomatoes! 

An amalgamation of flavours that proved to be just right without being overly skewed towards saltiness. Quenching indeed!

Stir Fried Kailan

(S$10.00)

When i first had this less than a month ago, the gang of four was really impressed of how different the kailan was compared to many others in the market.

However, it was plain normal this time.

Fried Rice

(S$4.00)

The last time i had this, it was disappointing.

This time we had it, it was much much much better with its heavy use of eggs that made all the difference! Gosh, even the color looked different!

Yu Tiao with Sotong

(S$10.00)

It's the norm to have a plate of pepper crabs on every table. It's also 'almost' the norm to see a plate of deep fried crunchy yu tiao (crullers) stuffed with squid paste on each table!

A normal dish that would not have stand out if not for the thick white layer of sweet-salty mayonnaise sauce!!!

Coupled that with a generous amount of sotong paste and you have a winner! Like the pepper crabs, this is a must have dish every time you are in Eng Seng. 

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Additional Information

Reservations are allowed for dine-in or take-away. Please call 6440-5560 to make your booking.

Want to beat the crowd? Come at 5pm! Diners start to stream in after 5.30pm! We were brought immediately to a table even though we did not mention that a reservation had already been made!

For the address and more information of my first post just a month ago, please click http://cavinteo.blogspot.com/2010/12/pepper-crabs-eng-seng-restaurant-from.html.

Hidden Gem @ Tampines, Singapore

It was purely a day of mere coincidence that i chanced upon a small path in the midst of greenery while driving along a quiet road in Tampines.

For those who may not notice the path, the above shows a clearer picture of it.

Dispelling any thoughts of illegal immigrants and/or illegitimate activities (plus the fact we were waiting for both Kon and Van to finish their work), Alex and i walked into the small clearing and were immediately captivated by the view right ahead of us!

Not knowing what the hell this place was (the maps app on iphone drew a blank), i was suddenly reminded of this apparently haunted lake in Tampines that had rumours of a water ghost drowning humans who were caught trespassing his/her territory. 

But it was still day time! And at least ten human beings were together with us! Reason? Playing rc (radio controlled) boats on the pond!

The excitement from the fun race between two rc boats drove up our adrenaline and we were kept occupied for roughly ten minutes before the owners decided to call it a day.

Alex is now contemplating whether to get one just for the fun of it! Let's hope he is in that "san fen zhong re du" (three minutes heat) mode!

Since there was still some time to kill, we strolled to a less crowded area where anglers were patiently waiting for their preys.

The loud noise generated from the rc boats seemed to have no effect on the guppies (i think) just tens over meters away! That said, obviously those anglers were not expecting guppies at the end of their fish hooks!!

They were waiting for big fishes! Like this lucky man who got a catfish that was approximately the length of my arm! From my conversation with him, he had been waiting for half an hour!

This kind of patience is undeniably lost on me!

I am going to keep the location of this tampines pond a secret first (it could be an open secret from all i know). Maybe i will explore it again at night when time permits!

Jessica and Yiwen (Paranormal Kakis); On?!?!?

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[Update]
Exact Location can be found here.

Poy Kee Yong Tau Foo (培记酿豆腐) @ People's Park Hawker Centre

There's a very famous Yong Tau Foo stall in Chinatown but with a queue numbering at least 25 persons and time has always been precious, the Gang of Four decided to try another not-too-bad-one in the same hawker centre.

Poy Kee Yong Tau Foo had a queue as well although it was significantly shorter than the famous one!

Soup

The kind of soup i would not mind to have every day; it had an addictive savouriness to it that was refreshingly sweet yet not overly salty.

Noodle

With my sensitive nose picking up that appetising smell from noodles that were fresh from the boiling water, it was disappointing to find that the noodles had basically no flavour!

Thank god for this small saucer dish that had a mix of sweet sauce and spicy chilli sauce.

Ingredients

In general, i was damn impressed with all the ingredients; fishballs had a filling satisfaction to them and this thing with beancurd skin was delicious even though i used to perceive that anything with beancurd skin was best eaten deep fried (without being soaked)!

Lastly, for a person who tries to ask for the removal of ikan bilis in all his dishes, the version in Poy Kee was amazingly crunchy with a light pork-lard goodness to them! They were just great to have!

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Location

People's Park Complex Food Centre,

Block 32, #01-1066, New Market Road

(Exit C from Chinatown MRT Station)

Price

S$3.00 for a small set. From what i know, you cannot pick and choose like most yong tau foo stalls.