I was wondering what happened to Morphine Coffee which used to occupy the kiosk currently housing Flash Coffee at PLQ, and then I found @8bar.sg in Singpost Centre, facing that ever popular mala soup eatery. No longer are they confined to serving coffee & pastries, they’ve got stuffed bagels, and they have rice bowls now.⠀
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I initially wanted the Deep Dive bowl, which was seafood on rice. However, they were out of seafood and the beef bowl by evening, so I settled for a Taiwanese classic. Their Braised Pork bowl, a.k.a lu rou fan, costs sixteen bucks, but at least there’s no additional tax or service charge here. A serving of rice is topped with the stew-like sauce that contains all those finely chopped bits of pork belly, two large slices of oyster mushrooms, a still runny braised tea egg, a square of deep fried seaweed, and garnished with a little sprinkle of pickled mustard greens and coriander.⠀
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The lu rou, which is the braised pork, was decidedly delicious. Having been simmered in the soya sauce based braising sauce, it has fully assimilated all the umami of the soy sauce along with the herbs added in, and it has imparted the collagen & fats from itself to thicken & enrich the sauce. The charmingly chewy oyster mushrooms are lightly grilled, while the still runny tea egg has managed to absorb some sapidity from its soy braising sauce. The fried seaweed was inexplicably irresistible though, and each clamorous crunch into the seaweed sparked such joy.⠀
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However, as you might’ve already deduced, the dealbreaker here is the miserly portion of lu rou over the rice. This is the portion size I’d expect of a six dollar lu rou fan, not a sixteen dollar one. Paying ten bucks for this portion size is already eyebrow raising, but sixteen? That’s unforgivable. It’s such a shame too, all the flavours of the elements here are excellent and it’s all let down by a lack of the main element in the bowl.⠀
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Still, I’ll give @8bar.sg the benefit of the doubt since they’ve only been in business for two weeks. I hope they’ll adjust the portion size to reflect the price, because this delicious Braised Pork bowl deserves better.