238. Prince Porridge House

There's no lack of food in Bukit Timah area. Along Cheong Chin Nam road, there is a stretch of restaurants. Taiwanese, Teochew, Korean, Hong Kong, Malay, Japanese, Indian food, whatever you want, you can get it there. This scorching afternoon, 4 of us decided to lunch at the Taiwanese porridge restaurant at Cheong Chin Nam road.

On arrival, there was only 2 persons dining in there whereas the other eateries alongside had more people. We went ahead and settle down anyway. The sweet potato porridge. We didn't want to have it because of the sitcom that was aired on Channel 5. Stickier and thick. The sweet potato porridge cost $0.80 per bowl and it's free-flow.

Fried Kang Kong with garlic @$6

It was just like home fried kang kong. Not that it was good but rather I see no difference if I were the chef. I could cook a plate of kang kong like this too.

'Three cups' chicken @$8

'Three cups' (in Chinese : 三杯) is a very common style of cooking in Taiwan. In fact, having been to Taiwan a few times, I noticed on the Taiwanese menus, there are always 'Three cups' style chicken, 'Three cups' style seafood and etc. 'Three cups' was derived from the 3 essential condiments, namely sesame oil, soy sauce and Chinese wine. However, I felt the significant ingredient of this dish lies in the use of fresh basil leaves. Some may find the choking smell of the basil unbearable. This was what happened to me at first but the more I had, the more I grow to like it. Without the taste of the basil leaves, 'Three cups' would not have been 'Three cups'.

The chicken were fried beforehand before they were braised in the 3 essential condiments. If you have noticed, the above dish did not consist of any basil leaves. Because of this, I felt the dish was not so relevant to its name.

Chye-poh egg @$3.50

I doubt the chye-poh egg was appealing at all. The egg was presented almost like charred on the exterior and it seemed like some rotten eggs fried. It was a flop.

Seafood Braised Tofu @$8

The gravy was red due to the chili sauce added. Slight greasy. Tasted of the vinegar from the chili sauce instead the seafood. It was not nice at all. I felt I had an overdose of chili and vinegar though it was not of extreme spiciness.

Our bill chalked up to be $35+ with a serving of their herbal jelly ($3.50) and a ginseng chrysanthemum drink ($3). No GST and service charge. Overall, food was below average. Only the porridge was commendable. If you ask me, I would not visit it again. The dishes were not good enough for a return visit.

Prince Porridge House

9 Cheong Chin Nam Road

Tel: 6467 0289

Opens: 11am - 3pm

5.30pm - 3am Daily

214. New Taiwan Restaurant

We were served two small bowls of braised tofu with fried ikan bilis. Served in place of the usual pickles, achar. It was hot like it was just cooked ready-to-serve. It was a good dish to go with porridge.

And....before we were served of our dishes, a small bowl of greasy gravy was served. The waitress said it was for us to drizzle on our rice. So, it was the braised sauce. I tasted a bit. It tasted of cinammon and star anise. Like the braised sauce used for ducks. The layer of oil put off the idea of having it in our rice.

Stir fried French Beans @$14

Average. No crunch on the french beans. Dried shrimps whole added. Not the pounded hay-bee-hiam.

Pan-Fried Cod Fish @$30

It was delicious. Very crispy on the exterior and yet not oil laden. The sauce was not too salty and of the right density. However, it lacked the wow. I felt the sauce could be further improved. Maybe add a little spice to create the oomph.

Ngoh Hiang @$12

The ngoh hiang was above-average. It wasn't oil-laden. The friendly waitress reminded us that it was piping hot. It was one of the ngoh hiangs which I felt had not had too much fats in them.

Century egg with cold tofu @$6

It was my 1 of my favourite dishes of Taiwanese cuisine. I felt it was a refreshing and healthy dish. New Taiwan Restaurant has had pork floss added to the tofu. The sauce was a little bland. The amount of pork floss was slightly too much. But for that quantity @$6, I felt it was quite cheap. I felt some chopped chili and parsley would have increase the overall taste.

Sweet potato porridge @$0.80

The porridge was slightly watery.

Makansutra 2007 rated it excellent. I felt the food was just decent. Same goes for the price.

Our bill worked out to $91 for 5 pax. No service charge but service was still good. I dare not say it will still be the same on weekdays where business would have been much better with the working crowd. On public holidays, it seems like restaurants in the CBD area have less business.

New Taiwan Restaurant

110 Amoy Street

Tel: 63248310

112. Hua Yuan Coffeeshop

Hua Yuan (华园) Coffeeshop is located at a HDB void deck behind the Hua Nam Dim Sum at Sim Ming Road. You wouldn't have noticed it because it is pretty much like a coffeeshop with nothing much to offer. Well, if you are there for lunch, I guess you will be pretty much amazed by the crowd. I am a frequent patron of Hua Yuan but many times I went there at tea-time but today was during lunch time. There are a few nice food to recommend in this coffeeshop.

Rice rolls(chee cheong fun) @$0.80 per roll

This is the chee cheong fun which I always eat whenever I'm there. Must-try! I'm not sure what is the name of this stall because they hung a red banner over their signboard. But, you can see that they have a smaller signboard which said handmade steamed yam cake and etc. Their chee cheong fun and steamed yam cake are delicious. The sauce they used for their chee cheong fun was a clear sweet sauce as opposed to the black sweet sauce we usually have. The plain rice rolls was good even without fillings. They used the same sauce for their steamed yam cake. Sometimes...simple is good.

Porridge from 华英饭店. Relax. This porridge ain't served from a hotel. It is the name of the porridge stall in the coffeeshop. I was surprised to see a long queue at this stall, from the stall all the way out to the main corridor of the void deck. Wow. What's so nice about it? So we ordered from the porridge stall. See the dishes above? Plus 6 bowls of plain porridge, the total cost was just $18.90. It was very cheap. So, this explains for the long queue. The dishes and porridge were not too bad but not exceptionally good.

Besides these two, the traditional kaya toast and thick toast from the coffee stall are good too. I didn't try them today. Thick toast is only available from 2pm onwards.

Hua Yuan Coffeeshop

Blk 23 Sin Ming Road