355. Chef Daniel's Kitchen

Soup of the day - cream of carrot

It didn't look like it was purely carrot because as much as my knowledge in Science tells me, beta-carotene is a strongly coloured red-orange organic compound. It looked like cream of pumpkin. The taste of carrot wasn't very evident, shadowed by the heavier cream taste. The crotons had a nice buttery garlic taste and it did sprung a little surprise.

Black Cod Casino

No description was found on the menu. Weird. The rest of the dishes had description with them. The only word we all could make out of the dish was COD. It is a fish dish. Guess what? The cod was coated with mentaiko. Judging by the appearance, it is akin to having salmon mentaiko sushi where the piece of salmon was coated with mentaiko and fire glazed over the mentaiko to give it the slightly grilled effect. If you are a mentaiko lover like me, you would know what I'm trying to say. It was nice. The saltiness of mentaiko accompanied by the sweetness of clam juice and fresh cod. I see a fusion of Western and Japanese style.

Grilled Ribeye Steak

Didn't remember the full name. The steak comes with a special brown sauce which tasted like wine was added. Friend commented the salad was nice. Quite a normal dish, I would say. I felt it was enough to make a comfort steak meal.

Wok Charred Salmon

This dish won the praises of 3 people, including myself. Behold its beauty. Taste it and you won't deny its reputation of an award winning dish. Pretty similar to how a steak is cooked, the exterior of the salmon was grilled till charred and yet the interior was practically untouched. I tasted a tinge of sweetness on the exterior and I suspect the presence of the artificial agent - sugar. The mashed potato made with soya butter was with garlic fragrance. Rather unique, I thought. The Chinese leeks with roasted pork fighted for some recognition. The leeks and roasted pork protrayed a strong belonging to the Chinese cuisine. The salmon enjoyed both the Western and Chinese's intrusion.

Dessert of the day - brownie with vanilla ice-cream and berries compote

At first, the waitress told us it was creme brulee when we were at the door and then it turned out to be brownie when another waiter took our order. We were fine with brownie. The friend having his steak has yet to finish and then his dessert was served without cue. I thought it wasn't so appropriate because the ice-cream was melting and it was like he was rushed to finish his main.

The celebrity chefs wave, just like the hallyu wave, is becoming more and more signficant with the mutiple inserts of food related shows to the golden hours tv schedule. Chef Daniel is always seen to be very fatherly and I'm pretty surprised with his interest towards fusion style.

The dinner set we had comprised of 1 soup, 1 main and 1 dessert and it cost only $28 nett. I personally think the main alone was worth the money. The dessert could be better though. The lunch set menu is more alluring with the price of just $10.50 if I didn't remember wrongly. We ordered one special order, that is, wok charred salmon without leeks and the garlic but the waiter served the usual. The service staff should be better prepared with the serving procedures.


Chef Daniel's Kitchen

Illuma

201 Victoria Street

#07-02/03

75. Baystreet 21

Soto ayam soup

Nasi Bojari
lemon cake



Claypot curry chicken with roti prata

Beancurd (Dao Huay)

Baystreet 21 basically serves a variety of cuisines. Thai, Chinese, Malay, Indonesian, Western, Nyonya etc. It's a bit like the HongKong street cafe but Baystreet offers more. I ordered the nasi bojari, an indonesian meal. Most of the main courses comes as a set meal, together with dessert, beverage and soup-of-the-day. I was yearning for pasta earlier on but at Baystreet 21, pasta and western cuisines are considered ala-carte. Also, for pasta, there are only 2 choices to choose from. So, it will be more worthwhile to try out those of the set meals.

I have no idea what is nasi bojari besides it's an indonesian cuisine. So, I researched a bit on it. Nasi bojari means coloured rice with 3 side dishes and they are fried chicken, sambal prawns and beef rendang. At Baystreet 21, it comes along with a fried egg. The soup that was served was soto ayam. Well, there were not much ingredients in the soup as compared to my counterpart who was served the chinese white radish soup. The soto ayam was yellowish (due to tumeric?) and a bit oily. Pretty bland as well. I was pretty hungry when I was seated in. It was roughly 8pm. So, when my nasi bojari was served piping hot about 10 minutes later and it looked delicious, I was glad. Haha. The fried chicken and sambal prawn was nice but the beef rendang was not so nice. The beef tasted a bit like mock meat.

My counterpart had claypot curry chicken with roti prata. It's a combination of the chinese and indian cuisine. One good thing about this restaurant was their food was served piping hot. The curry chicken gravy was a little too salty but just the right thickness. I think if it was served with baguette, it will be more appealing.

So, what's for desserts? There were 3 choices, the lemon cake, beancurd and watermelon. So, I chose the cake and my friend, the beancurd. The lemon cake was just those normal butter cakes. Though, it was said to be lemon cake, I could not taste lemon in it. The beancurd on the other hand was pretty good.

Overall, I would say the prices are reasonably cheap for a set meal. The nasi bojari @$14.90. The claypot curry chicken @$13.90.

Baystreet 21

IMM building

2 Jurong East Street 21

#02-30 Singapore 609601

Tel: 65612202