Chinese/ Zi Char

Aside from the wantan mee and claypot rice, there are many other dishes available. Luffa has always been my go-to vegetable dish and this was satisfying. This came with fragrant chunky minced meat, soft luffa and very tasty beancurd that stole the show.

Most people are familiar with ENG’s for their wanton mee but in this East Village outlet, you get to enjoy traditional claypot rice too!

While it’s quite a long wait if you don’t call ahead, it’s still pretty worth it. Granted, I haven’t been eating a lot of claypot rice but I think this might be the best claypot rice I’ve had in awhile😬.

Usual suspects of vegetables, lapcheong, salted fish; and the chicken was incredibly tender. I loved the generous addition of salted fish for that burst of flavour and the sauce is added in moderation without being too salty.

The grains had a nice bite and the contrasting crisp texture of socarrat from scraping the pot is pretty addictive.

Prices are quite reasonable for this hearty dish!

What really surprised me was the Sautéed Otah - wasn’t sure what to expect for Otah at $17.80. It was a huge portion, with chunks of fish/ sotong/ crabmeat in the otah paste, with distinct lemongrass fragrance and a surprising addition of coconut. Flavours were addictively good but i wished it was a little less crumbly.

We had expected a stronger hint of brandy in the Brandy White Fish Soup ($11.80, good for 2) but there wasn’t - nonetheless it was still a comforting bowl of soup, no milk added, with sweetness from wolfberries at a reasonable price with a good portion of sliced fish.

The beehoon was springy, flavourful and the trotters was melt-in-the-mouth tender!

Available for BurppleBeyond 1-for-1

Liked how creamy the meekia was after mixing in the truffle sous vide egg with their secret recipe sauce. There were decent amount of crab meat but the pork cheek, while succulent was a tad too fatty for me (I used to really like them but I guess I’ve changed so it’s not them it’s me).

PS. Pretty good deal here cos we utilized our BurppleBeyond 1-for-1 main dish!

Also enjoyed the beancurd dish. Soft and smooth, appetisingly tasty gravy that will make you finish your rice in no time.

Really liked this! The eggplants and ladyfingers wasn’t too mushy and had a lovely subtle hint of spice fragrance (probably from curry leaves?).

Mildly spicy and very fragrant! The leaves were perfectly cooked, soft but still with a good bite to it.

May not look like much but this sambal fried fish is darn addictive! Fried till golden brown, it’s so crispy it almost feels like you can easily eat the smaller bones.

Fish is fresh and firm but that aside, the sambal was more like haebeehiam, with a crunch to it and a good balance of sweet / mild spiciness. I could easily finish my rice with it. I loved it so much I went back twice within 3 days haha.

With 4 different bases - signature tomato soup, beef bone soup, mushroom sauce and stone pot rice to choose from.

The signature tomato based soup was so good and well-balanced with just the right amount of sweetness to it! I could easily finish the soup and noodles by itself. Noodles were also perfectly cooked and you get to pick the type of noodles (thin/ normal/ thick/ small flat/ flat). We had the Wagyu beef, which was very tender.

Will definitely be back - especially since it’s also on Burpple Beyond!

I liked that ingredients were plentiful for its price - bits of salted fish, lup cheong and tender chicken.

Add the dark sauce as you like it, which I found it not too salty. Rice at the bottom turned out nicely crisp and not too charred! Wished there were mushrooms though.

We also had other dishes like the San Lou Beehoon (paler than expected but the springy beehoon was nubbad), super crisp Hakka Crispy Pork (not pictured), fragrant Garlic Fried Chicken (daunted by the cloves of garlic but the chicken was quite crisp and succulent), crunchy fresh Qing long cai, salted egg sotong and lala.