Celebrity Chefs and non-celebrity Dim Sum

The Marina Bay Sands complex officially opens this week, with its impressive Skypark, casino, shopping mall and celebrity chef restaurants, I headed down there a few days ago to check out progress.

Obviously what intrigued me most was the celebrity chef restaurants – there’s been a lot of excitement in the Greedy Glutton house about the arrival of world-famous names such as Santi Santamaria, Guy Savoy, Wolfgang Puck and Tetsuya Wakuda. Such is their status, they have been awarded their own ‘wing’ within Marina Bay Sands, reached by dedicated lifts.

It’s an impressive setting when you emerge from the lift – an enormous atrium, with views down over the entire casino, so you can watch the old ladies lining up their chips on the roulette tables.

Out of the celebrity chef restaurants, only Santi and Guy Savoy are currently open, although both were closed for lunch. There was no menu displayed outside Santi, but we did spend a few moments marvelling at their wine collection displayed in the window. Guy Savoy’s peepy-hole windows provided another entertaining diversion, as did the menu – or the prices displayed on it to be more precise. Crispy Sea Bass main course? $120.00++. Five course degustation menu? $340.00++ (without drink). Not for a cheap night out then.

Also sharing the celebrity chef wing is a new branch of home-grown favourite Imperial Treasure – Imperial Treasure Fine Chinese Cuisine. Realising that this was rather more within our budget, we took a table for lunch.

The restaurant’s décor is modern and opulent, with its deep-sofa booths and contemporary floral centrepieces, and befitting of its glam surroundings. Its high-end aspirations are evident as soon as you cross the threshold, when you are greeted with wafts of truffle – which is liberally applied throughout the menu.

We, however, opted for rather more humble selection of dim sum, including Barbecue Pork in Honey Sauce, Baked Char Siu Bao, Har Kau, Crispy Beancurd Roll with Shrimp and Custard Buns with Salted Egg Yolk. All of it was delicious – fresh, hot and tasty – and even served with a smile.



The chefs at Imperial Treasure may not enjoy the international stardom of their next-door neighbours, but the food they produced today for our lunch certainly kept this Greedy Glutton more than happy… and perhaps more importantly – it was affordable!

You can read more about Marina Bay Sands opening on my NileGuide blog here.

Imperial Treasure Fine Chinese Cuisine - http://www.marinabaysands.com/Restaurants/Imperial_Treasure_Fine_Chinese_Cuisine.aspx

Celebratory Steaks

It was my Birthday Eve and Mr Greedy Glutton had arranged to take me out for a slap-up carnivorous meal at famous steakhouse, Morton’s, The Steakhoue at the Mandarin Oriental, what a lovely surprise!

I started off with a ridiculously-priced Pomegranate Martini in the bar, which certainly looked impressive and, once I’d managed to suck through the thick layer of froth, packed a powerful punch.

We then headed through to the restaurant itself. This has a very different atmosphere from the outset from most other restaurants we’ve been to in Singapore. The windowless room with, low ceilings, comfy seating and walls adorned with photos of past patrons gives a definite flavour of North America, which is of course the home to the original Morton’s.

The service too is more akin to a North American restaurant than to your typical Singaporean one. As we all know, Singaporean waiters can be somewhat lacking in attentiveness, and often friendliness – but here we were welcomed like long-lost friends and made a thorough fuss of the whole meal… even if it hadn’t have been my birthday, I should certainly have felt like it was.

As soon as we were seated a waiter appeared with some bread. However, this was no small bread roll to nibble on while we perused the menu –oh no at Morton’s they serve you an entire loaf of freshly baked bread!

We were even warned by the Maitre D’ not to eat to much or risk ruining our steak appetites… so they obligingly parcelled it up so we could enjoy for breakfast the next day!

The fun really began when our waiter arrived to explain the various cuts of steak. He carried with him a tray filled with lifesize (Read: enormous) versions of these hunks of meat to illustrate his banter – which was quite theatrical in delivery as he talked us through how he envisaged each being prepared and cooked.

All theatrics out of the way, we were finally allowed a peek at the menu, although the Sommelier wouldn’t assist with the wine choice until we had chosen our steak, as obviously each different cut merits a different accompanying wine! So obviously we made a quick decision so as to get our hands on a bottle of red quickly! Although the wine list was long and comprehensive, with the majority being in the very expensive range, I am pleased to say that the Sommelier was more than happy to help us choose a suitable wine to fit our still-expensive-but-not-ridiculously-so budget.

So, to the food… as we were obviously going for fully carnivorous main courses, we looked to the ocean for our starters, with me opting for the Colossal Shrimp Cocktail and Mr Greedy Glutton choosing the Lobster Bisque. The Lobster Bisque was very tasty – rich and creamy and garnished with large lumps of lobster tail.

I was a teensy bit disappointed with my Shrimp Cocktail – mainly because the dipping sauce was loaded with Horseradish, which happens to be a bit of an aversion of mine – and without the dip the Shrimp was left a little lost.

Never mind, onwards we went to the main reason for being here – the Steak. Having taken note of the ridiculous size of the cuts of meat on our waiter’s tray, we both opted for the “Slightly Smaller Steaks” – a New York Strip Steak for Mr Greedy Glutton, served with a Peppercorn Sauce (yes, this really is a ‘Slightly Smaller Steak’ despite the fact that it takes up the entire plate!)

And I opted for the Filet Diane- a filet mignon with a mushroom, cognac and mustard sauce. It was delicious… and cooked exactly how I like it. Whilst I normally order my steak rare, the waiter warned me that it would still be cold in the middle, so I upped my order to medium-rare, and it was perfect.

We threw in a side order of fries and some garlic sautéed green beans to pretend we were being healthy and we had ourselves one ginormous feast.

We were completely and utterly full to the brim by the end of the steak course… but it was a special occasion, and everybody knows that special occasions merit desserts… What did look particularly special was the soufflés that were being carried to other people’s tables – but these need to be ordered at the same time as the main courses, and we wouldn’t have had enough room anyway… so we shared a Crème Brulee instead.

Well those lovely waiting staff only went and stuck a candle in the dessert and accompanied it en masse to our table where they all sang Happy Birthday to me (in harmony, no less!) – they then took our photo and turned it into a dated birthday card signed by all the team…

So yes the food, and in particular the steaks, was delicious… but what really made the evening was the enthusiasm and energy of the waiting staff… who made me feel like a very special birthday girl indeed…

Morton’s - http://www.mandarinoriental.com/hotel/509000168.asp

The Gluttons back at Gluttons Bay

We had a friend staying with us, who was straight off the plane from the UK and wanting some local Singaporean food – and fast, before she succumbed to the inevitable jet-lag induced early-to-bed syndrome. We met Mr Greedy Glutton from work on Boat Quay and took a sight-filled stroll across the bridge to the Esplanade, and Gluttons Bay.

The last time we came here, we left sorely disappointed, as the food just wasn’t up to its usual standards… today, however, I’m happy to say it was back on form. We ordered up a selection of ‘local’ nibbles to give our friend a flavour of Singapore and give ourselves a tasty feed:

The ever delicious smoky chicken wings from Huat Huat Chicken Wings/Carrot Cake at Stall F

The equal-favourite scrumptious, sticky Mixed Satays from Alhambra Padang Satay at Stall C

Popiah (from memory and deduction this came from Stall G, but I’m not sure what it’s called) – it was slightly too shrimp pastey for me, but that’s just me not being a big fan of shrimp paste, our guest seemed to enjoy it, and that’s the most important thing.

The fabby Char Kway Teow from Hup Kee at Stall L – you can tell it’s good as there’s always a queue here... and of course some veggies, which I believe we got from Boon Tat BBQ Seafood at Stall J.

Once again, an enjoyable feast… and our friend was awake at 4am with jetlag, dreaming of the food we’d just had… so it was obviously a success…

Makansutra Gluttons Bay - http://www.makansutra.com/eateries.html

Christmas Lunch

Christmas lunch, and as we were in Singapore and away from the family, we joined a group of friends at the Mandarin Oriental's Melt restaurant for a champagne-fuelled buffet, in place of the usual Roast Turkey and all the trimmings.

It's hard not to enjoy a meal that is accompanied by as much champagne as you can drink, but I have to say we were slightly disappointed with Melt's buffet selection. We've stayed at this hotel before when we've been in Singapore on holiday and their breakfast buffet is among the best I’ve ever had, anywhere in the World, so we were expecting great things. I’m afraid to say that it just didn’t live up to expectations, and their champagne brunch just wasn’t as good as the others we have tried at the Fullerton or at the Sentosa Resort.

They had a decent seafood and sushi selection, but there was nothing there that begged me to return for seconds, as has happened at other buffets, and I was told that the Indian selection was fantastic although I didn’t try any myself.

Being Christmas Day, we were keen to track down the Roasts and they had a choice of Beef, Ham and Turkey, all of which looked amazing and had been cooked perfectly. But the biggest disappointment of the day was the accompaniments – the main one being that there were no roast potatoes! No roast potatoes to go with the turkey on Christmas Day? How could they do this to me? I mean, seriously, that’s like having a burger without a bun… or fries without ketchup… to say we were heartbroken is an understatement. In fact I still don’t think I’ve recovered yet…

Anyway, onwards and upwards… We finished off with some nice cheeses (again a smaller selection than previous brunches we’ve sampled)

and desserts (again…) and did find solace in some scrumptious little chocolates reminiscent of Jaffa Cakes.

Next year, I’ll be back in the UK for Christmas, and my mouth is salivating at the prospect of Turkey with all the trimmings already… yes, including roast potatoes…

Melt, The Mandarin Oriental - http://www.mandarinoriental.com/hotel/509000167.asp