Privé restaurant

This restaurant was one of the 4 recommended as Singapore's best steak places on CNNgo website. Out of the four, Morton's was tops. Since CNNgo seems to agree with our verdict, we thought we could try the others. Bedrock had already been tried, and didn't impress us. So out of the remaining two, we chose to try Privé for Lynn's birthday dinner. While googling for Privé's menu (to make sure my pockets won't be injured too much), I came across a blog that talked about the restaurant. 


Excerpt from ladyironchef:

“Our steak is better than CUT Steakhouse”. Yuan told us at the start of dinner.

Having heard raved reviews about the steaks at CUT Marina Bay Sands (my foodie friends boldly proclaimed that they have the best steaks in Singapore), I was a little sceptical initially.

My partner and I were left speechless when we had our first bite of the steak. It was SO GOOD – definitely one of the best steaks I’ve had. And you know what? I wouldn’t exchange this steak for any kurobuta pork.

I sent a snapshot of this to Lynn, and got her super excited. You see, we had always wanted to try out CUT. BUT, from what we gathered online, CUT's prices were known to cost patrons some $1000 for 2 pax. Sounds too scary for us to check out. So seeing this post was making us feel that hey, we have a chance to try that standard of meat for a fraction the price! Privé puts up their entire menu on their website, so I had no problem finding out the prices.

We ordered the eye of Ribeye off their Josper Grill menu. Quoting the menu:"The Josper Grill is the latest professional tool that has taken the international culinary world by storm, with lauded chefs such as Heston Blumenthal, Gordon Ramsay and Jason Atherton creating Josper-centric menus in their current establishments. The Spanish hybrid indoor barbeque grill/oven powered by Bincho-tan ‘white’ hardwood oak charcoal is well-known for being able to grill meat, fish and vegetables swiftly, and more importantly, perfectly." We also ordered a duck confit, partly because we remembered Ember's fabulous one, and partly because theirs comes with foie gras mashed potatoes. How tempting is that? Of course there were our regular appetizers of pan-fried foie gras, cream of mushroom with white truffle oil and cheese. Subsequently added a creamed spinach side because the small serving of spinach that came with the foie gras was so good. We also had Pinor Noir - a glass each. We ended the meal with a dessert platter, in which we substituted their sticky date pudding for an additional profiterole.

Before our orders were served, we were served three variety of breads with butter, and some cheese something that I couldn't catch the waitress mumbling. Out of the three breads, I liked the hard roll and and foccacia. The last raisin roll I didn't like since I don't care for raisins too much, although Lynn did de-raisin half a roll for me. We had seconds for the foccacia and hard roll, which came hot. Love hot bread with butter!!

The soup came just when we were starting round two of the breads. The server had thoughtfully split our soup into two bowls for us. The mushroom soup was rich, full of mushroom bits, with a mascarpone and parmesan crisp. The fragrance of the truffle oil floated up to our noses the moment the soup was set down. Sadly, we could smell it but couldn't quite taste it. The crisp was so cheesy and good with the soup. Subsequently found out that if we let the soup sit for a while and the temperature drops a little, we could taste the truffle oil better. Yum!

The foie gras was a little of a disappointment. Wasn't quite as soft and melty as we liked. In fact it was quite similar to that of Bedrock's, in that I wasn't seduced to want to have it again. (Bedrock was my first time having foie gras, and I didn't get hooked. Only got hooked when we went to Brawn). I think it's not quite as fatty, which will explain the less-than-ideal aroma, and the harder than preferred consistency. Oh well, means that this was a slightly less cruel meal right?

Then came the steak. It wasn't wagyu, so did not have the rich fatty aroma that I so love. However, the meat was lean yet tender, with a very good chew. I agree with ladyironchef - this was a very very good piece of meat. The eye of the ribeye is supposed to be the best part of the ribeye. Our 340g shared between the two of us was a very nice portion. There were occasional fats at the edges that tasted more aromatic. There were some parts that was a little too charred - doesn't bother me but Lynn didn't seem to like it.

The duck was a let down again. It didn't match up to Ember's, and there was no foie gras taste at all in the mashed potatoes! The fats weren't quite melty enough, and by the end of the meal, I was quite sick in the stomach of the fats. The creamed spinach was very nice on the first mouthful - creamy and smooth. Towards the end, it started tasting a little like curry vegetable. Not sure why, must be a full stomach warping my senses.

Our dessert platter was selected because we couldn't decide what to eat. We were told to eat them in a specific order - Lychee Granité and lemon meringue tart first because the sourness helps clear our palate. Then the apple strudel, then the profiterole, and finally the Valrhona Chocolate Mille Feuille. We ended up sampling the Chocolate Mille Feuille first because we love Valrhona chocolate. Then we did everything in our own time and sequence. Lol. I mentioned a birthday celebration during my reservation and Privé gave us a complimentary, nicely decorated slice of birthday cake. Unfortunately they didn't inform us earlier, so with that entire dessert platter, we had to forego half the cake. 

Cream cheese something

Bread and butter

Mushroom soup with white truffle oil and mascarpone and parmesan crisp

Pan-fried foie gras

Eye of ribeye - half portion

Duck confit

Foie gras mashed potatoes

Dessert platter

Profiteroles

Apple strudel and vanilla bean ice cream

Valrhona chocolate mille fueille

Lychee Granite

Lemon meringue tart

Prettily decorated cake plate

Like the rainbow and the hearts!

We really enjoyed the steak here, tasty to the very last bite. Next time we probably will skip the foie gras, stick to the soup, and see if we can't order something else. I did remember that the other stuff on the appetizers list didn't tempt us too much. The seafood platter on the Josper menu looked pretty good though, may try it next time in substitution of the duck confit. Steakwise, this place scores. Saw a few vegetarian options on their menu too, may bring my hubby back for some special dinner some day.

Paradise Inn (Funan)

This dinner was essentially decided by Groupon. Haha... I chanced upon a Groupon which was $8 for a Traditional Double Boiled soup worth $17.90. Expecting myself to have some solo lunches because of hubby's alternate Saturday work schedule, I purchased it months ago for one of those Saturdays. Turned out I never had that solo lunch. The groupon was expiring this week, so I finally headed to Paradise Inn on Monday at Thomson Plaza, only to discover that the soup is meant for 2-4 pax. No way I could finish that alone (maybe I could, but I didn't want to look like a glutton trying).

So I asked Lynn out for dinner yesterday to make use of this deal, and we decided on the Funan branch. Initially she was asking who else was going, before I pointed out that two of us soup lovers falls within the '2-4' pax. Not because of our larger than average appetite. You do need to know that 1 serving in a Chinese restaurant typically means a small rice bowl full, which really isn't a lot.

We chose a Spareribs with Winter Melon with conpoy soup, and added on fried white bait fish, three egg fried spinach in stock, and a Supreme Seafood fried rice. The soup came in a pretty large pot, which divides out to about 3 small bowl-full of soup for each of us. The soup was rich, very sweet from the conpoy and spareribs. The ribs were tender. Lynn found them a little to 'porky', but nothing a dip in chilli with soya sauce can't solve. Guess the groupon made it worthwhile - $8 for a huge crockpot of soup. But not something I will pay $17.90 for... I'd rather go to Soup Restaurant for that kind price. I mean, I do like it, but not at this price. (And seriously, both my moms can fix a soup at this standard...)

The fried white bait were quite small. Very crispy all the way through. Nice in a kind of way, but we prefer those slightly bigger ones which are crispy on the outside, but you can still feel the fish inside. These ones were just crispy - a little like fish flavored potato chips or something. The spinach, hm... wasn't bad, but I had better ones elsewhere. Still, it was a good complement to our fried rice and fish, considering we were both having bad throats and really should be avoiding fried food... The fried rice was very regular tasting fried rice with good portions of shrimp meat.

Small bowls of soups dished out for us by the server

The main pot of Spareribs and Winter Melon soup with Conpoy

Three egg fried spinach

Fried white bait fish

Supreme Seafood Fried Rice

Overall the food weren't too bad, but wasn't something we would rave about. Pretty pricey actually. I always say Pu Tien serves very regular homestyle food for ridiculous prices, but with what I just paid for, I'd rather go to Pu Tien. I do think Pu Tien's chef does a better job. The service staff who collected our payment wasn't very nice too. He was literally waiting with his arms outstretched while I was trying to look through the receipt entries. And our card wasn't returned to us after 15 minutes. We had to go to the cashier counter to ask for it. Not exactly the best service...

Shin Kushiya (VivoCity)

My foie gras craving hit again, and I needed to return Lynn her truffle salt (which I had carefully weighed out exactly half for myself). She suggested Shin Kushiya for their foie gras kushiyaki. Sounds awesome, and it seems to match the truffle salt...

First round of orders were all kushiyakis. The foie gras with caramelized apples came first. Slightly crispy on the outside, so soft and melty inside, and oh-so-blissfully yummilicious. The truffle flavor got lost in the sweet teriyaki sauce so we didn't go too much in that direction. Two generous pieces of liver for about $10. We were carefully savoring every morsel of it. Every thing else came in a single platter. We ordered chicken balls, stuffed shitake mushrooms, Ton Toro (pork neck), pork belly, asparagus wrapped in thinly sliced beef, premium beef, and mozzarella wrapped in thinly sliced pork. The chicken balls were aromatic, and mushrooms were good. Pork neck had a lot of tendon in it that I couldn't chew through and didn't care too much for. The pork belly was a little tough too. Asparagus was horribly tough, too 'old'. I couldn't even bite through the stem. We couldn't taste the cheese in the the mozzerella wrap. The highlight of this platter? The premium beef. It was fantastically enhanced by our truffle salt, so we had that blissful silence for a little bit. (This 'blissful' description is coming up quite a bit, but we've somehow started describing our food that way... can't find a better way to represent our feelings at that point of time.)

Second round of order included a garlic fried rice, pumpkin salad, fried octopus and squid in batter, and grilled onigiri (triangular rice ball) with bonito flakes. The garlic rice was really good - fragrant, with each rice grain separately well from the next, but still sticky the way Japanese rice is. The pumpkin salad was nice, but nothing spectacular. In fact, we found they used potatoes to bulk up the salad before added pumpkin to the top, so there wasn't a lot of pumpkin. The fried octopus and squid was quite heavily battered and a little too oily. Though the seafood were fresh, I couldn't quite tell which were the octopus and which the squid. The onigiri was almost forgettable, until we realized it's blandness went well with our truffle salt.

Grilled foie gras with caramelized apples

All our kushiyaki - (from left) stuffed mushroom, chicken ball, pork neck, pork belly, pork with mozzarella, prime beef, asparagus with beef

Garlic rice

Roasted pumpkin salad

Fried octopus and squid

Grilled onigiri with bonito flakes

I think I had better kushiyaki at a Japanese restaurant at Cuppage, I can't remember its name offhand. Except for the foie gras of course, that was the utmost highlight of this meal. The premium beef kushiyaki too. I can come back just for these two items. We actually saw wafu steak and beef katsu (beef cutlet) on their menu. Those looked tempting, but we weren't sure of the quality of Japanese steaks. I mean, yes, some of the best meats comes from Japan, but we're not sure the chef is eloquent at cooking steaks. Badly done steaks will be a damper, no? But the beef katsu sure looked interesting, and we may try it the next time, given the premium beef kushiyaki was so good.

Gangnam Garden Korean BBQ (City Square Mall)

After our truffle-blissfulness at Ember, we hunted down truffle salt at the supermarket at Ion Orchard. Since it was pretty pricey for a small container, we decided to share. The plan was for Lynn to bring it home, split half of it into a zip lock bag and pass that to me. And since I had some errands to run at Jalan Besar, we arranged to have dinner at the nearby City Square Mall.

Initially we had wanted to eat something that will go well with the truffle salt that she brought out for me. Aston's queue was quite long, and this branch was particularly small, so we passed. We then thought of Saizeriya, a Japanese-Italian restaurant. Not wanting to limit ourselves, however, we decided to take a walk around to see what else City Square had to offer. Chanced upon Korean BBQ quite by accident. It used to be BBQ Chicken restaurant, and part of the signboard wasn't removed yet. So there I was telling Lynn that BBQ Chicken isn't nice, when she noticed the Korean BBQ signboard at the other end of the restaurant. We also caught a whiff of the smokey BBQ aroma floating out of the restaurant. Upon closer inspection of the menu, we found that it only costs $25.88 for their buffet dinner. Pretty good selection of meats, and with the aroma tempting us, we gave in.

The buffet included a good 70 items you can choose from, drinks not included. Some items require top-ups. We went for a first round of pork belly and chicken chop platter, plus cold noodles with soup and kimchi soup. I actually ordered a bibimbap but that was forgotten. These were served alongside crisp lettuce and 6 appetizers of kimchi, cucumber salad, two kinds of beansprouts, macaroni salad and coleslaw. The cold noodles were springy, and the cold soup very refreshing. Definitely a must-have. The kimchi soup was very diluted and forgettable. The platter was served with some golden mushrooms and shitake mushrooms. The girl did a very meticulous job of cutting all our meats into bite-sized pieces. We took a small spoon of our truffle salt out onto a plate. While the mushrooms tasted fantastic with the salt, the marinate in the meats completely drowned the truffle. So we realized that the truffle salt may be wasted, unless maybe we order more mushrooms. The meats were cut so small that we needed multiple pieces to get a good 'chew' when we wrapped them in the lettuce. Although the platter was supposed to have pork belly and chicken in 3 different marinates, I felt all of them tasted pretty much the same. 

We then noticed the Korean family beside us having the Bulgogi platter, and it looked a lot better than the pork belly one. So round two was the Bulgogi platter, plus a plate of fresh pork belly (unmarinated). The girl again started off the initial cooking of the meats, but we found that she failed to separate the thin bulgogi meats properly, so they were clumps of meat that were uncooked in the centre. We had to cut them with the scissors provided to get the centre cooked. Again all the marinates tasted the same. The highlight of the evening was the fresh pork belly. Because it was unmarinated, it was incredibly enhanced by our truffle salt. Every bite was heavenly, we had those blissful pauses. I think the other tables must be wondering what in the world we were eating that we were so thoroughly enjoying. Think pausing everything and closing our eyes to savor the truffle-filled flavor of the pork belly. We went for a second serving of the fresh pork belly. It was THAT good with the salt!

We were contemplating whether to order another cold noodles but decided to keep the stomach space for dessert elsewhere. We also saw the Korean family eating the hot plate bibimbap which looked quite good but we were too full to try. If I'm not wrong, that's available with a $3 top-up.

Appetizers

Green green lettuce

Pork belly and chicken chop platter with mushrooms

Cold noodles with soup

Kimchi soup

Fresh pork belly on the left, bulgogi meats on the right

Frozen pork belly serving #2

I think for the price, the variety is pretty good. The ventilation is limited though, so we did come out smelling of BBQ. For two of us, we were given a four-seater, so we were able to sit at the non-BBQ side of the table to limit smoke in our faces. If there's 3 or 4, 1 or 2 person will have to get face splatters. Their set up is pretty interesting with a hole in the centre of the pan for oil to flow out and collect into a little metal bowl. Makes you feel a little better about not eating that amount of oil. Lol... The marinates were getting a little too sweet towards the end. Next time I'll bring my truffle salt again and just attack the fresh meat. =D

SteakHotel-Holycow!

Lynn came across this stall in Lucky Plaza's foodcourt (the one beside MacDonald's) selling Wagyu steaks at $28. She was so obsessed with it that she kept bugging me to go there to eat, since I'm her one friend who appreciates beef the best. Ok, she has other friends, but I'm the only solo one without an additional half who have to tag along for the beef-fest, since my hubby's vegetarian.

So we finally made our way down on Friday. Their steaks prices are ok. $28 for Wagyu ribeye and sirloin. I think there was an ongoing promotion for Wagyu rump steak at $10. The non-wagyu steaks were going at average of $15 I think. We ordered a Wagyu ribeye and sirloin to share, medium rare (in case medium is too cooked), with the option of black pepper sauce. We were given a number tag and told to return in about 10 minutes time to collect. So we made use of the 10 minutes to hunt for a seat in the crowded foodcourt. Managed to snag one near the stall just before our number was called.

The stall provides pepper grinder which we were more than happy to help ourselves to. Sorry I divided our steaks before I remembered the camera. The steaks were tender, so definitely better than the steaks from your chain steak houses. I had preferred the sirloin than the ribeye, because I found the fats at the edges of the sirloin more aromatic than those in the ribeye. Lynn preferred the ribeye as she found it more tender. Of course, the meat can't compare to those of the high-end steak places, but at $28, who's complaining?

Their pepper sauce was a little too sweet for my liking. We did enjoy the thick-cut fries though. Both of us barely touched their sauteed spinach, which was completely bland. I think there wasn't even a grain of salt in there.

Wagyu steaks - sirloin on the left, ribeye on the right

We probably won't come back, since we are the kind who don't mind paying more for good food (steaks in this case), so we'll rather spend our stomach space at those places that we previously blogged about. That said, SteakHotel did manage to satisfy our unsatisfied steak craving rolled over from the unbeefy Restaurant Ember. For those who also like steaks, but aren't keen to spend too much on it, I think SteakHotel serves decent enough steaks at affordable prices. The servings aren't considered small, definitely bigger than the regular foodcourt-style steaks. I really do think $28 for a Wagyu ribeye steak is a steal. Oh, and its Halal, so muslim friends can enjoy too! Oh oh, and you can redeem a free steak on your birthday!!!!

Togi Korean Restaurant

I was introduced to this restaurant at Mosque St by HY when us colleagues were looking for a place to go for a lab dinner. Liked it enough to bring Lynn back, but that was before we started blogging and no pictures were taken. Recently met up some old friends for dinner, and they chose that restaurant without my input. I guess good food speaks for itself.

From what I gathered through A, Togi is opened by a Korean lady boss who married an African-American who speaks fluent Korean. Not that I'll ever find out if its true, I was surprise he even knew this fact. I never dig around information about who open the places I dine at. The other Korean guy who help in running the place is the lady boss's brother.

Togi serves up pretty good Korean food. I love their bibimbap, ginseng chicken soup, fried rice cake, kimchi pancake, kimchi soup etc... The six side dishes are free flow - kimchi, braised potato, fried ikan bilis, some cold noodle thingy, cucumber salad and sauteed chives (I think). All are pretty good. I especially love the kimchi and the potato. This time round we ordered quite a few of my favorites: Chicken bibimbap, ginseng chicken soup and fried rice cake. Additionally we ordered fried dumplings and BBQ pork, which I have yet to try. I also ordered their citron hot tea, which is very similar to the Japanese Yuzu tea. It contains pomelo pieces I think. Very refreshing. I like. Next time I'll go for the cold one though.

The soup is full flavored with ginseng goodness, and a very good portion of chicken. It took a few bowls each for the 4 of us to finish the chicken. Nice thing about Togi is chicken soup top up is free. Of course we went for the top up! Their fried rice cake is pretty spicy, and I really liked the chewy rice cakes. It comes fried with a variety of vegetables, some dumplings, some other chewy thing I can't place, and half a hard boiled egg. The dumplings were normal, and pity the Koreans don't do vinegar with their dumplings the way us Chinese do. The bibimbap is a little different from the usual one where you have to pour some sauce over before you mix. Theirs comes with the sauce already in it, so you just have to mix. I like the flavor of their sauce, and the vegetables variety is pretty good. The BBQ pork is served with lettuce. So you pack the pork in a leaf of lettuce, add whatever you want (such as garlic, miso chilli sauce etc), and eat it 'popiah' style.

The six free flow side dishes

Fried rice cakes

Dumplings

Bibimbap. I forgot to take a photo before mixing.

Ginseng chicken soup

I can't comment on the authenticity of the food here, since my experience with real Korean food revolves around the whole week of BBQ food I had when I was there. If kimchi is any indication, I'll say their food is pretty authentic. Do see a fair number of Koreans here, so it's good enough. I'm missing the bibimbap as we speak... Lynn and others, however, had commented that there's another Korean place at West Coast area that's better. But location-wise, Togi gets the hands up from me.

Restaurant Ember

After I discovered my love for foie gras, Lynn said I HAVE to try out Ember's. Their's was the best she ever had. So we arranged for a dinner there last Friday.

I must say the service here was impeccable. I arrived earlier than Lynn, and upon being seated, was asked politely what drink I want - sparkling, still or regular. Considering many lower end places don't serve regular water, I was kind of surprise at the option at a expensive place like that. Their regular water comes with slices of apple skin - I believe leftovers from skinning their apples for the apple pie or something. It did add a touch of freshness to the water, though I would have preferred lemon slices. What the waitress did next completely surprised me. She brought me a magazine to flip while waiting for my friend! How many times have I sat in restaurants waiting for friends, flipping aimlessly through the menu and getting incredibly hungry in the process. I was touched!

Lynn arrived soon after I flipped through a couple of pages. We proceeded to pour over the menu. There was a 4-course set dinner option available. Two appetizers (from two lists of 5 options), one main course, and a dessert for $85++. No sharing of set meal allowed (that's what it said on the menu). We thought it sounded ok, but weren't sure if we could handle 4 appetizers. I did a quick calculation for ordering 2 appetizers and 2 main course off the ala carte menu and found it costs less. The waitress subsequently told us its ok to order just one set meal, provided we order an additional appetizer and main course. I did another quick calculation and found that this will cost the same as 2 appetizers, 2 main course and 1 dessert off the ala carte menu, but we'll get one appetizer more. Sounded ok, and the waitress assured us the French cuisine has very small servings so 3 appetizers between the two of us isn't too much.

So our final decisions were: Pan-roasted foie gras with poached egg and truffle, crab cakes, scallop with Parma ham, 36 hours cooked Duck Confit, Tenderloin with Merlot reduce, and Valrhona chocolate cake with French vanilla ice cream. We munched on two servings delicious crunchy bread while we waited. I was famished cos I had skipped lunch, though not for the dinner, just that I wasn't hungry at lunchtime.

The crab cakes and scallops arrived together. The waitress weren't joking about small servings. The crab cakes were great, full of shreds of crab meat, soft and very yummy. I think one crab cake each was a good idea. More would have been too rich on the palate. The scallop looked undercooked but tastes perfectly fine. Although we both weren't big on Parma ham, and both felt that bacon would have been better. It was still very good though, and the salad that came with them was good too. The foie gras came next. We were instructed to break the poached egg, mixed thoroughly, and eat it with the crispy Parma ham served on the side. We did break the egg, found that it went fantastically with the truffle, but did not mash up the foie gras. Instead, we enjoyed the foie gras bit by bit. Lynn was right about the foie gras here, it was slightly crispy on the outside, but blissfully soft inside, melting in the mouth immediately to release all its goodness. The truffle added a new dimension to it, and the whole experience was simply mind blowing. Pity the serving was quite small. She felt that it was bigger the previous time she came, and I suspected that you get smaller servings with the set meal. The Parma ham, well, let's just say the foie gras stole the limelight.

Our mains come up next. The duck confit was incredible! The 36 hour cooking process had resulted in incredibly tender meat, and I don't know what the last part of the process was, but the skin was crispy and oh-so-yummy! The fats under the skin was soft, and melts in the mouth. I never knew that duck fats can taste so good, the same way the fats in a ribeye steak does! I definitely do not enjoy the fats of regular kopitiam roasted duck... haha... The potatoes served under it was soft and delicious. The tenderloin was quite small, served with mashed sweet potato and surprise surprise - truffle salt. The salt turned out to be the highlight of the evening. We were rationing it out so as to have enough for the two mains. The tenderloin was so-so. I mean, if you compare it to the chain steakhouses, it was a good piece of meat. Yet, if you compare it to the steakhouses boasting high quality cuts such as The Steakhouse or Morton's or Les Bouschons, it paled miserably in comparison. The reduced Merlot it was served in somehow reminded me of chicken essence. Too much of it and I found it quite sickening... Thankfully the steak wasn't too big. First time we went for a steak dinner and found the non-steak main much better. Oh well, of all the choices we made, this was the only one the waitress actually didn't make a recommendation. I guess high class French cuisine's focus is not on the steaks. The truffle salt however, was heavenly. I think I'm gonna hunt down where to buy some, and maybe throw a dash of it in whatever I cook in future. It was sooooo aromatic and flavorful! The mashed sweet potato tasted like yam paste, much to our amusement. Lol...

We were served coffee/tea as part of the set dinner. We assumed that since we only ordered one set, we were entitled to only one. I was actually given a good selection of teas, not just the usual English breakfast. I chose Earl Grey, but was somehow given Chamomile, which was also okay with me. Tea was served in a tea pot, with a strainer at the side, warm milk and a cute little dish of sugar. I thought it was weird to have chamomile with milk but I gave it a chance and tried a little tea with milk on a spoon. Tasted really weird. So no milk in my cup. The pot had enough for more than a cup. So Lynn had the second cup. Good thing we only ordered one. We were then served hibiscus juice, two cute bottles of them. I was again surprised, since we only had one set meal, it was nice of them to give us two servings of that. Finally came our chocolate cake. Hot molten chocolate oozed out of it when we sink our forks into it. Thankfully not salty like Brawn's. The small single serving was good for both of us to enjoy but not overly cloying.

Crusty bread with butter

Scallop with Parma ham

Crab cakes

Zoom in of the crab cake. That piece at the side is a piece of bread.

Foie gras with the Parma ham served on the side

Soft foie gras, runny poached egg and heavenly truffles.

36 hours cooked duck confit served on potatoes and mushrooms

Tenderloin with truffle salt (that little hill on the left) and mashed sweet potato (the mustard-like thing on the right)

Prettily served Chamomile tea

Hibiscus juice

Valrhona chocolate cake

This was also the first time we actually did not overeat. The portions were comfortable and we weren't stuffed to the brim when we're done. Guess for French cuisine the focus is not on the portion but on the work that goes into each dish. The sauces were rich and well prepared, and we could appreciate how each dish is the result of a lot of effort. However, I would definitely love to have a bigger portion of foie gras. That was too little for 2 persons! (ok, it was meant for one... we're being stingy here...) And we actually like eating our appetizers alongside our mains, so the French style of serving a course at the time was a little slow for us... haha...

We will come back some day, I'm sure, when the craving for good foie gras and truffle-goodness hits us. We learn not to order the steak though. This meal was great for the truffle overload - we both found a new favorite, on top of our already long list of favorites. It did fail, however, to satisfy both our steak cravings...