Charly T's @ 112 Katong

I was invited to a food tasting session at Charly T's at 112 Katong to try out Charly T's new Weekend Free Flow Sliders & Beer promo.  I also brought my friend, Sam along for the tasting session.  Other than the sliders, we also got to try Charly T's Original Recipe 'Best Chicken in the City' which was served with 2 side dishes - Macaroni & Cheese and German Potato and some of their desserts.  Other sides that you can order are Steamed Fresh Vegetables and Butter Garlic Rice.

The Macaroni and Cheese is different from what is normally served in other places.  It uses a recipe from award-winning Chef Rozanne Gold’s “Eat Fresh Food” cookbook - it contains less cheese and includes fresh cauliflower.  Charly T's has received Rozanne's authorization to use her recipe in the restaurant. What's unique about this recipe is that it was created with the help of her Sous chefs, all aged between 9 to 19 and under the guidance of nutritionist Helen Kimmel, who has worked with Rozanne on all her books.  Their goal was to create recipes that were delicious, real and healthy.  

The signature "Best Chicken in the City" (Half chicken with 2 sides at $24.00+) didn't fail us.  It was indeed one of the best roasted chicken that I ever had.  The meat was succulent and tender.  Charly T’s Original Recipe, free-range chickens are marinated for over 13 hours before being slow-cooked rotisserie style to achieve its tender and juicy texture.  It was served with 3 types of sauces - BBQ sauce, hot sauce and sesame sauce  Highly recommended!

 This is the new weekend promotion, offering free-flow sliders that comes in a choice of Juicy Beef or Schnitzel-style Chicken, fries and bottled Budweiser beer at $38+ from 12 to 3pm. 

 We were served with a set of sliders and some fries first.  As Sam doesn't take beef, I tried the beef slider first.

 The well-marinated beef patty from the beef slider was thick and very juicy. 

We ordered another 2 chicken sliders  (Remember, it is a buffet!!!) after that and I also got to try the chicken slider.  The 3 pieces of thin crispy Schnitzel-style Chicken sandwiched between the buns were very tasty and fragrant.  It was really a delight to have.  

 Other than beer, we also ordered fruit juices from their CT's Odyssey juices selection.  ($7+ each). Sam had the Green Flash, a concoction of green apple, orange and pineapple juices and I had the Red Tang, containing strawberry, cranberry and lychee, with a very sweet presentation and was refreshing.

 After we were quite done with the mains, we moved on to order the desserts.  I decided to be a bit more adventurous by ordering something that we had not tried before - Kaiserchmarrn ($16+).  It is a light, caramelized pancake made from a sweet batter using flour, eggs, sugar, salt, and milk, baked in butter.  At Charly T's, raisins are added to the pancakes and also served with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream.  We had requested for reduced portion for the tasting session.  The actual portion is meant to be shared between 2 pax.  The pancakes were quite fluffy but be warned that this dish is quite filling to end off as a dessert!

 Molten Cake ($10+) was served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. The cake was very dense and flavourful although it the chocolate didn't flow out as we cut it.

Homemade Ice Cream Sandwich ($8+), Vanilla ice cream sandwiched in between two huge cookies. The cookies were quite hard and difficult to cut through.  After a while, when we were sampling the other desserts, we realized the the ice-cream had melted.  The cookies were soaked with the molten ice-cream and it was easier to eat the softened cookies.  Not too bad.

    We continued our makan feast until 3pm when most of the patrons had left.  Afterwhich, we took a few photos of the restaurant's setting.

 The restaurant is a family friendly place whereby there is a colourful and vibrant corner for the kids to have fun or watch video.  The cartoon movie "Up" was screened during the time when we were there for our lunch.

   Open-concept kitchen where you can find the chefs preparing the food and also see Charly T’s rotisserie‐style “Best Chicken in the City” during their roasting process.

  
 

Overall, we were very satisfied with the quality of food served at Charly T's.  Thanks Charly T's and Foodnews for this invitation. 

Celebrate National Day with Charly T's

1) Charly T's Chicken Rice

Salute the nation's 49th Birthday with the newly-launched Charly T's Chicken Rice, their mouth-watering rendition of the local iconic dish featuring our signature free-range "Best Chicken in the City", served with authentic fragrant rice, mom's chicken soup (A homemade broth prepared from a secret recipe from Charly's mother) and popular chicken rice condiments.

Credit:  Charly T's facebook

Available all-day at both Charly T's 112 Katong and PasarBella from now till 31 August at $9.90 per portion.

2)  Charly T's National Day Photo Contest

From 1 to 31 Aug, express your love for Singapore this National Day by taking part in the Charly T's National Day Photo Contest and stand to win $500 cash and $200 worth of dining vouchers! To participate, simply post a photo of one's heartfelt wishes and share the contest to rally votes from your friends.  For more details, please visit Charly T's facebook here.  :)

Charly T's
112 East Coast Road, #03-15
112 Katong, Singapore 428802
Tel: (65) 6636 4701
Opening hours: 11am to 10pm on Mondays - Fridays,
                        9am to 10pm on Saturdays and Sundays

OpenRice Food Tasting @ Brewbaker's Kitchen & Bar, Anchorvale CC

I attended my first OpenRice Food Tasting session at Brewbaker's Kitchen & Bar (managed by JP Pepperdine), together with my friend, Sam.  Brewbaker's Kitchen & Bar had just revamped their whole menu, incorporating both Western and Japanese dishes.  Residents nearby can now get to enjoy Japanese cuisine at this location, away from the hustle and bustle of the city.  

How to get here by public transport?  Recommended Route:

- From Sengkang MRT Station, transfer to Sengkang LRT Line.

- Board the Sengkang West Loop LRT and alight at Farmway Station.

- Take a 5 minutes’ walk over to Anchorvale Community Club

We walked down a flight of steep staircase to the basement, nearer to the sports complex side, and saw the restaurant at the end corner.

Exterior of the restaurant.

You may dine alfresco or in their main dining room indoor.  For us, we tried both!  Read on to find out more!  :)

We were seated near to the entrance of the restaurant and on our table:  The OpenRice signature smiley fan, a notepad, tissue pack, pen and a feedback form.

We introduced ourselves and this was our host - Calvin (on far right), from OpenRice doing some introduction and standing next to him, is the chef for the restaurant.

Sashimi Caesar Salad 

($12.80)

Tossed assorted lettuce with caesar dressing, topped with garlic-herb croutons and raw fish.  Wasabi sauce was served in a small dipping bowl and you pour the amount of sauce according to your liking.  This was quite a refreshing appetizer with all the crunchy lettuce, blended with the raw fish cubes and wasabi sauce.  

Atsuage Tofu

($5.50) 

Grilled Japanese home-made Tofu topped with fish flakes. The tofu could taste quite bland when eaten on its own. The chef recommended us to dip it with soya sauce and sprinkled some chili flakes on it to give it more flavour.

Carbonara Udon 

($12.60)

The chef explained to us that this was a fusion dish.  The home-made udon was also very different from the thick ones that we normally have.  Their vesion of udon was long and much thinner, but still maintained the springy texture.  Served in a rich creamy sauce with crispy ham bits and an onsen egg, this was really "oishii"!

Kinoko Pizza

Japanese Styled Mushroom Pizza

($12.60)

The pizza texture was like that of soft bread. Eating this pizza, was like eating a piece of bread topped with mushroom, mayo and fish flakes. Would give this a miss the next time.

Unagi Roll 

(3 pieces for $12.80)

My friend, Sam requested for unagi roll as during the tasting session, there were a number of beef dishes she couldn't take.  I didn't try this but Sam said it was very good.  Could tell from the presentation, it looked quite tasty with thick slice of unagi wrapped over avocado/ crabstick and omelette sushi.

N.Z Beef Rib

($21.00)

I think this dish should be meant for those with huge appetite.  The beef rib was huge and I took a small slice, it was quite tender but the taste was a bit overwhelmed by the sweet BBQ sauce.

Beef Shabu Shabu (2 paxs) 

($28.60)

This was one of my favourite dishes for the night.  I love to swish the meat back and forth in the boiling broth.  Do not throw the meat inside the soup for too long otherwise it would become tough and spoil the taste.  I took 2 pieces of the sliced beef and cooked them just right, very juicy!

Matsu Sushi Moriawase

6 types of sushi ($31)

I tried a salmon roe sushi and a sweet shrimp sushi. The sushi were fresh.

After we were done with the above main courses, we proceeded to the outdoor seating for Yakiniku!  Why outdoor?  The main reason was to prevent the restaurant interior from having the smokey smell and also, to enjoy better ambience doing our grilling outside.  We all had fun "BBQ"ing alfesco in the cooling weather.

Pork Belly Yakiniku - Pork belly on Charcoal grill 

($12.80 for 1 pax)

Our table got a plate of sliced pork belly.  They were thinly sliced and would get overcooked quite easily.  I took a few slices of the pork belly and they were rather tough.  We were worried that the pork slices were not cooked totally and grilled them for too long and sometimes, we were busy taking photos and forgot to flip them over. 

Ribeye Yakiniku (BBQ) ($32.80)

The other table had a plate of beef slices and I took one cooked slice from them to try. It was quite a thick slice but the meat was tender and juicy. I would recommend this!

Marble Cheesecake in a chocolate cup - Served with mixed fresh fruits and chocolate sauce 

($6.50)

The cheesecake was uniquely presented inside a chocolate cup and it was wiped off by the four of us very fast.  The texture of the cheesecake was soft and not too dense.  I tried to break the chocolate cup with my fork and spoon but failed.  It was very hard and thus, we didn't eat the chocolate cup.  I suppose it was meant to just hold the cheesecake inside nicely.

Thank you OpenRice for the invitation and looking forward to more food tasting sessions with them in future!

Brewbaker's Kitchen & Bar
Address: Anchorvale Community Club,

59 Anchorvale Road #01-06
Phone: 6886 1811

Website:  http://brewbakers.com.sg/

Opening Hours:
Mon to Thu: 1100 - 1530, 1730 - 2230
Fri - Sat & eve of PH: 1100 - 0000
Sun & PH: 0730 - 2200

Jones the Grocer @ Mandarin Gallery

**  All photos here were taken with my new iPhone 5 :)

I had been to Mandarin Gallery twice for Art Jamming at Artestiq but this was the first time that I came here for food.  The occasion this time was to celebrate one of our buddies' belated birthday at Jones the Grocer, which is located at a quiet cosy corner on the 4th level of Mandarin Gallery.

The colour theme for the restaurant was "Blue and White".

I ordered a pot of forest-berries tea.  Most of their white cups were quite badly stained.

A good location for a laid-back afternoon.  I like the fact that the whole place is rather spacious and the tables are not too close to one another.  This gives us more freedom to engage in our conversation without worrying that the people seated adjacent to our tables can hear our small talks.

At 3pm on a weekend, the choice of food was rather limited.  The breakfast, lunch and ala-carte menu was not available at this timing and we could only choose from the brunch menu and bakeries.  The birthday mummy and I both ordered the Jones' Club sandwiches and we were quite happy with the food.  The only disappointment was that they ran out of avocado and replaced it with tomato.

Time flies.... the next time when we meet will be to celebrate my birthday!!  Looking forward to our next gathering!!  :) :)