House of Steamboat (Tan Quee Lan Street)

Us little people of the lab decided to do a reunion lunch. It also served as a good catch-up time with V, who had since moved on to greener pastures. Since its a CNY reunion, we were aiming for Chinese food. And since Y and X needed to print their posters for a symposium, Bugis area will be ideal as it's near the printshops. So a search for 'Chinese' and 'Bugis' on HungryGoWhere found us a list of steamboat places. Of these, we picked the House of Steamboat based on reviews.

Upon arrival, we were greeted with something we did not expect. The smell. The interior of the restaurant smelled quite funky from all the raw food piled up at the open fridge at the end. But it was too hot to have steamboat outdoors. A little exploration found that one side of the restaurant smelled less badly than the other, for some unknown reasons. We requested seats in that area and were parked under the air conditioner - a plus point because the blasts of cold air helps to blow the stinkiness away.

We were given a good selection of soups to choose from, several of them herbal in nature. Surprising as it wasn't the usual chicken broth and stuff. There was also a pretty good list of thinly sliced fresh meats and seafood we can order from the server free flow. They even have crabs, which we were too lazy to try. Nice to know such foods aren't left on the open fridge exposed to the environment. Other food stuff such as veggies, noodles and processed food such as fish cakes, hotdogs etc are available at the self service open fridge. A few choices of soft drinks were available free flow too. We chose a spicy soup and a herbal chicken soup.

We were then served some cooked food to start off before we start cooking. I personally think it's their way of filling our stomachs before we eat too much of the 'expensive' stuff. These weren't fantastic and we didn't finish them. The chicken wings were too salty, and the buns forgettable.

Fried buns with some kind of glaze

Fried chicken wings

We ordered almost every meat on their menu except for pork and beef for S's benefit. I did order a dish of beef in the end with her permission, and happily finished all of it myself. The rest were too full to help.

Fish and squid

Chicken and mutton

Processed food

A warm reunion

The food was so so, but the company was great. We yakked a good 4 hours there. I believe there was hardly any eating towards the last 2.5 hours, but it wasn't crowded, and we weren't shooed. Somehow, my take home memory of the food is that last dish of thinly sliced beef.... I wonder why... hehehe =)