The Dough Shoppe

This new sandwich joint opened recently, and we saw it when we walked pass to go to another place for lunch. J subsequently told us she had tried it, and the sandwiches were nice, and the set lunch is pretty worth it. So one fine day, JK, FQ and me went to try it out. The set lunch is $10.90 for a sandwich with side salad or chips, a soup of the day, and a drink. Considering some of the sandwiches cost as much as $10, the set meal is definitely a good deal.

JK went for the pulled pork ciabatta. He loved it! The pulled pork was flavourful and juicy (look at the dots of juices that escaped). Their ciabatta was home made, and had the right soft, chewy texture, without the annoying, overwhelming layer of flour that some ciabatta have on their surface (for some unknown reason). He opted to have them with chips. Those were black pepper chips, which I spied from subsequent visits to be Kettle's.

Pulled pork ciabatta

As for me, the beef fan, I went for the corned beef. I have tried their multi-cereal bread before when J bought it for my breakfast once. So I opted to swap the ciabatta (because I haven't tried their ciabatta then and was expecting the powdery ones) for the multi-cereal bread. The sandwich contain a pretty sizeable portion of corned beef, topped with a nicely fried egg. Add all the veggies in, it makes for a juicy and tasty package. Best thing is, the corned beef isn't too salty, which suits my palate to a T. I had this with a side salad that was drizzled lightly with a balsamic vinaigrette.

Corned beef sandwich, with ciabatta changed to multi-cereal bread

View of the beef and egg

We tried their truffle fries. The fries themselves are nice thick cut fries. However, I found the truffle flavor pretty weak, so I would recommend just getting regular fries if you're here.

Truffle fries

FQ, our breakfast king, went for the DIY breakfast platter. No set meal for this, but since he's not exactly a huge beverage drinker, it works fine for him. He chose scrambled eggs and pork sausage for his platter. This platter was served with a bread basket with 3 breads: a multi-cereal, a cranberry walnut bread, and a rainbow colored bread of some sorts that I can't quite figure out. The most interesting thing about the platter is the pork sausage. It came split down the centre, which meant there was more charred surface. FQ usually de-case his sausages, but in this case, the case wasn't so tough that he actually didn't mind it and finished the entire sausage. He loved the eggs (Of course. He love eggs no matter where.). The baked potatoes were nice too! He couldn't actually finish his bread basket, and the staff very kindly gave us a paper bag for him to take away the last piece of bread for his tea break!

DIY breakfast platter with scrambled egg and pork sausage

We've been back a few times since. And J also occasionally buy bread or sandwiches from them for our breakfast. We love their breads and sandwiches. Did I mention they make a decent chocolate cake too? I have yet to try their signature red velvet cake because they rarely have a whole cake available on the days I have sudden needs to buy birthday cakes for the lab.


The Dough Shoppe
61 Kampong Bahru Rd
#01-01 Singapore 169368
Tel:6423 9936
enquiry@thedoughshoppe.com

Pappasan

We spotted this deal from Deals.com, for Pappasan at Dorsett. Since Dorsett is within walking distance from our workplace, we decided its a nice idea to have a good lunch. So after asking around for the total number of interested parties, I bought the deals.

The deal was straightforward: A 4-course set lunch at a discounted price ($19.90) from their usual price ($35++). When we were seated we were served by an annoyingly clueless waitress. Her face was blank when we asked anything at all, and the responses she gave suggests she either wasn't listening, or couldn't understand what I was saying. It took me a while to realise that language seemed to be a barrier and I switched to ordering in Mandarin. It got a little less annoying after that. But, it's after all a hotel, so I expect that staff should be well-versed in English for the international guests, so I daresay I'm pretty disappointed in this aspect.

Menu

The soup of the day was pumpkin soup. It was warm and creamy and actually pretty nice. Pity it was only half a bowl. This was followed by a Caesar salad. With it's slices of parmesan and crusty croutons, it was a pretty standard Caesar salad. Blame my laziness to blog nowadays, I can't remember much about the shrimp in the salad.

Pumpkin soup

Shrimp Caesar salad

We were given 4 options of main course. I opted for the grilled salmon because I was too lazy to deal with a half-chicken, and didn't trust their steak. Crispy skin, flakey meat. Actually very nice salmon. The fried angel hair pasta served with the fish is reminiscent of our local fried bee hoon. That single leave of bok chay didn't help. Somehow the very asian 'fried bee hoon' and bok chay didn't match with the very western grilled fish and tomato sauce. Still, I finished them anyway, although separately so that the clash wasn't quite so obvious.

Grilled Salmon

Many of the others went for the ribeye steak or roast half-chicken. I tried a little of each. The chicken was ok. Not dry, well-seasoned. Not bad at all. The steak was pretty average. It wasn't amazing, yet it wasn't horrible. I was in a way glad I didn't opt for it because I think it would have triggered a craving for very good steak. Both the chicken and steak came with little 'fryer meshes' of fries. So for my table of six (we were split into two tables of six), we had four meshes, and 4 not-so-fries people. So despite my salmon didn't come with fries, I think I polished off almost 2 meshes alone. Thank goodness N was there with us and she LOVE fries, so she help polish off the other two. Few places can make BAD fries so it's usually safe to say they are decent.

Roast half chicken

Ribeye steak

The meal comes with two options for desserts. Fruits, or brownie with ice cream. Ever since I start baking regularly, I tend to eschew desserts that are potentially 'instant-mix'. Set lunch brownies falls under that category so I opted for fruit. Turns out it was a good choice, because the brownie was too sweet for my palate. My own fault probably, since I tend to cut ALOT of sugar in my baking, I was getting used to my low levels of sweetness. But sugar level aside, the brownie was a pretty nice textured, not-quite-instant-mix brownie.

Fruits

Brownie with ice cream

The set came with free-flow coffee and tea, so we were all pretty alert after the meal, with little or no food coma. Haaa. But we probably won't be back, because the original price isn't quite so worth it. And the waitress was really annoyingly stupid. I never felt so much urge to knock a server on the head before. And extremely unhelpful. When I asked her for a spoon, she told me to go to the coffee counter to get it myself. Whatever happened to a 4-star hotel service??