Bistro Soori (Redux)

Round three - and still going well. I love this place.

Another 7 course degustation on the menu this time and still no repeats save for the Butter Lobster in that absolutely lovely tamarind sauce and fennel.

To start us off:  a tuna tataki done just right, lightly coated with a tempura batter, served with flying fish roe, wasabi mayo and cherry tomatoes.



simply done and depending largely on the flavours of the base ingredients, save for the wasabi mayo. i'm not usually a fan of wasabi, but this wasabi mayo i can do. i liked this.

next up: seared foie gras with fig compote



what surprised me about this one was the fig compote. the sweet richness of it actually worked pretty brilliantly with the foie gras, and you could adjust the amount you liked. i personally am not a fan of sweets in general so i didn't actually take that much of the compote, but enough to make it work for me. i really liked this.

next up: the star of the evening for me - the pork belly with yuzu



remember all that i said about sweet stuff? that's all out of the window when it comes to this dish. this is absolutely brilliant. i am in love with it. the pork belly is slowly braised and slathered in a heady concoction of yuzu and i do believe it is honey. slightly sticky, fairly sweet and yet, despite the heavy flavours and the taste of pork, made fresh on the palate by the twist of the yuzu. fave rave!

moving not so swiftly on after the pork (i was given to linger on that one), was the truffle and caviar risotto



good stuff - and also a reminder again why good things come in small packages. i think if this had been in any bigger a portion, i'd have been absolutely destroyed by the end of the evening. the risotto is done just right, al dente with a bit of bite, and it is made rich and flavourful by the truffle and caviar. as risottos come and go, this was good but not the best i've had from them. i think the best is still the uni risotto from my first visit. that was something else altogether.

things slow down again for me in the next course: the butter lobster in tomato tamarind sauce and fennel.



this is a gorgeous dish and it is really the tamarind sauce really makes this work. slightly tangy, rich and almost like a bisque, it makes the lobster (which is already really fresh) stand out even more. happy marriage of tastes this one. my dinner partners have been known to mop up the sauce completely on this one.

and the final main course of the night: beef baby!



medium rare and juicy, topped with some roasted vegetables and a balsamic reduction for the sauce. lovely.

aaand finally: the sweets - the pandan souffle



i've been waiting a while to try this and i must say i really like this, even though i'm not usually that much of a dessert / sweets person. light but with that asian twist, it had us scrapping the bowl clean. i loved it.

so yes. all in all, still probably one of my favourite restaurants this year.

Kathleen's 5, Shanghai

We discovered this lovely place quite by accident while we were trundling past People's Square in downtown Shanghai and stopped mainly because (i) the lunch set was quite reasonable (in SGD terms at least), (ii) the menu looked good, and (iii) it was getting rather chilly on the streets. February in Shanghai is still a bit on the nippy side of winter.

But yes, the price - RMB168 for a two course set lunch or RMB188 for a three course set lunch. Have it with a wine, like we did, and that will set you back another RMB48. That said, I think it was well worth the RMB236 or so (yes, I got the 3 course - reward for cruel and unusual suffering of being dragged through Taobao).

In any case, you get to choose a main and two other courses. The lovely tuna nicoise salad you see below was my pick - and I really enjoyed it. The tuna is done just nicely, as you can see, still a touch of pink in the centre. The dressing is tart, the baby potatoes just on the right side of salty, and the cherry tomatoes very sweet. Really, really good.




My lunch mates had the soup of the day (cauliflower I believe) and the beef caparccio with parmesan cheese and arugula salad. They certainly had no complaints.





Next up - the mains. Definitely not a let down by any means.



The roasted lamb looked too much on the medium side for me (as opposed to rare of course) but that said, it was a mouthwateringly tasty morsel that I had off June's plate.



This was Rae's seared live sea bass with shelled clams, dill, baby carrots, potato mash and clam butter sauce. She cleaned it up totally and she's a bit more of a picky eater than I am. I'll take her word for it that it was good :)



This was my Australian wagyu beef bolognaise with fresh herbs and parmesan. I really liked this actually, although I could be a wee bit biased with my assessment. This bolognaise had just a touch of ginger you see, and I'm absolutely partial to bolognaise with some ginger in it. To me, it adds just that extra dimension to it. My own variation also has bites of ginger in it but one thing it doesn't usually have, I'll grant you, is the buttery melt-in-your-mouth taste of wagyu.


And so, after a deliciously slow main course - and we were savouring it - we rounded it off with our pick of desserts:



the vanilla creme brulee with raspberry jam and creamy coffee ice cream;



the flourless chocolate cake with mixed berry compote and vanilla ice cream; and



the orange pudding and grapefruit with raspberry sauce and lemon sorbet.

Guess which I had?

I'm not a fan of creme brulee nor flourless chocolate cakes in general, but I think both were fairly good. Of all of that, I'd specially mention the coffee ice cream though haha. As to my orange pudding, I was pleasantly surprised at how light it tasted, even though it retained its zing enough to balance our the tartness of the lemon sorbet. The light sweetness of the grapefruit was surprising not overwhelmed by all the rest as well so I'm fairly impressed. I'd recommend this as an alternative to the usual dessert choices.



All in all, it was a great lunch in a really pretty space on the roof top of the Shanghai Art Museum. Set in a glass house like structure which I think would be really nice in spring or autumn (perhaps a little too warm in the summer), was absolutely heaven in the winter. Warm and cosy but yet affording you a view of the busy Nanjing Road down below, gloomy and wet in the winter rain, this was definitely one of the highlights of the lunches we had in Shanghai.

I'd definitely recommend this place, at least for lunch, if you're in the area.


5/F, Shanghai Art Museum,
325 Nanjing Xi Lu,
near Huangpi Bei Lu,
南京西路325号5楼,
近黄陂北路