Bugis Junction Food Court

I have not had the chance to visit it after its relocation as I have been dinning out a lot less often.
However, there is only 1 comment I have for the place.

It is a death trap waiting to happen.

I understand the need to relocate it away from the prime area it used to be... basement is where the crowd and the oney is, so, lets make space for cafe and restaurant that can pay more in terms of rent.

However, its present location while looks interesting, does have its element of risk.

The stairs that separate the main seating area from the stalls.

Stairs are never a good idea in an eating establishment.
Why?

Simple, you need to negotiate the stairs while carrying food.
Imagine that if someone did not notice the stair and trip,
Or for that matter, if the stairs are slippery.....

Either way, it makes looking for a seat there during peak hour a real challenge....

I hope that whomever designed the food court or plan to do the interior design of the food court... stairs in a food court, bad idea, stairs with predominantly downward traffic when people are holding trays, a very very bad idea

Hot plate hell

I am fortunate that for the last 1 year or more, I spend most of time either dinning at home or in the office canteen.... Of course, I do venture out of those place ever so often... but there hasn't been a single store that needs me to blog about how bad it is

Until today

I was at Bugis junction in the evening and it is getting a bit late to head home for dinner. I asked around for where the foodcourt has been relocated and was directed to the third floor.

Decided to be a bit adventurous and try out the Tepanyaki. Just after placing the order for a chicken and unagi combo, I regretted as there is a store right opposite that seems to serve noodle and much cheaper as well.

I was taken aback when I noticed how the chicken was prepared. While I was told by my wife that this seems to be the de riguer of barbeque food preparation. I was utterly disappointed when I see the one manning the hot plate, took out a half cooked piece of chicken and diced it into smaller pieces... this does not brood well. The only thing I was grateful was that the chicken was fully cooked and that it is not that pink..... Then came the best part. They serve the chicken and the unagi in the same gravy... Hello.... Unagi is supposed to have it own sauce....

the only reason that I even considered hot plat food is that, it should at least smelled the part.... the aroma of the grill should be there, the oil should sizzle the outer skin to a bit of crispness and that it should have some sort of taste to it. unfortunately, the pre cook treatment took out the aroma, too little time on the hot plat took out the crispness and that the coying sweet sauce masked out the last bit of tast from the chicken.... Nevermind.. there is still the unagi, no?

I like unagi...... in fact, every single time to a japanese restaurant will sure to see me order this delectable dish, nevermind the price. However, nothing prepared me for the eel this time as it has way too much big bones in it, there is no marinating whatsoever, and whatever done to it on the hotplate is only to get it cook so that it is edible without killing anyone... but the taste has left the building..... The only 2 1/2 things done right was the bean sprout, the rice and the egg was overdone on 1 side, I was glad that I asked for extra pepper because without it, I would have thought that I am having some hospital food.....

Bascially, what I feel is that, while the people who tend the store are decent and service is okay... what is lacking in the food is sincerity. It is edible, yes, but the taste and aroma, which is what makes the food worth eating is missing.... Which means that, everything is done autonomously, with just the perfunctory objective of making the food and serving it and hoping that the customer will not die of food poisoning... well, thanks for that......


But seriously, I will not be back in a hurry to visit that store....

What the fish

There are time where a food establishment go forth and conquer new frontier....

But today I found 1 that they should not.

I met my wife for dinner before my first driving lesson.

We decided that we will pay Delifrance in Lot 1 a visit.

I wanted to order the Tuna but it was out of stock....

I got the swordfish instead and my wife felt that its a very bad idea considering that seafood was never their forte.

After some time, this was served



Now, grilled fish is not something that came with spectacular taste or texture. But what came out can only be describe as bland.....mind numbingly bland...That gets me to get the accompanying sauce. I was expecting a spicy laksa sauce but what came through was a light, undistinguished paste which tasted rather weird.

In my so many years eating laksa, I have never come across a light purplish laksa... makes me doubt if this is laksa from France (never heard of) or Mars (Maybe...never tasted it before)

This chef's recommendation has 1 signature characteristics, bland. The sword fish, mashed potato, veggies.....are all bland...I guess the chef ants to recommend this to all the patients out there.....

And I held on to what I put in the suggestion... The chef recommending this to anyone other than a warded patient should be either warded or shot.

Another big no-no which they done was to serve my coffee even before the soup....
I am worried that, as a French -themed establishment, they will really get a very angry Frenchmen giving them a piece of their mind..... Remember, you serve the coffee after the main course, with or after the desert. Not before.

But the redeeming points are that, The lobster Brisque is of acceptable standard and the bread dish which my wife ordered was decent...And from what I heard, the desert is rather acceptable standard as well.

If the have kept to their core business as a Bristro, they are setting the standard there....but as a restaurant, they still have some distance before reaching the standard.

Dump the dumpling

Eventhough I want to restrict myself to talk about bad food which you paid for ready to eat.... however, I did found certain food stuff that I would recommend that you should never pick off the shelf.

In any event, you pass by any of our friendly neighbourhood NTUC and you see a packet of this



Do yourself a favour and leave it on the shelf. do not pick it up.

We first thought that its a great idea to get a packet of this, with some noodle or rice and make a half decent home cook meal.

Nope, that did not have the desired result.....

We had rather decent expectation from it, being from a reputed chain of store and hailed from Korea, we were expecting some rather decent dumpling...The scent raise our hope only for it to be eventually dashed.

A good number of the dumpling disintergrated upon contact with the boiling water.
Those that did survived, do look anaemic at best



Biting into it does feel like biling into skin and air... and the filling thats suppose to be there.. doesn;t seems to fill up too well

Opening up confirm the suspicion that it isn't too well filled up

I guess the korea made chinese dumpling don't have much filling inside.....

We will still try hard not to dump the dumpling for now, but as for those tha thave a choice.... drop the thought and that pack of dumpling.....you will not miss much...

Long John Silver IMM

My wife was so intrigue by the skin on fish promo by Long John Silver that we simply have to go down and try it out.

That we did at IMM and I rest assure you, you can get better.
We ordered a Fish Combo 2 and a grilled fish set for myself.
While the skin stayed on the fish, but thats about the only thing that sticks.

It wasn't thawed properly and that the fish has been pre-prepared instead of being prepared on the spot. The vinegar sauce was also missing. The only saving race was that the fries was still decent.

Not too good if you ask me

The grilled fish for me was plain and noting spectacular........it needs a strong sauce to mask its otherwise bland taste. The rice was hard and despite its look, lacking in taste.

The free clam chowder was served in a styrofoam cup, its only saving grace as it keep the soup warm, I hardly find any shreds of clam inside, which was fine by me as I was told by my doctor to keep away from any seafood with shell.

While we fill our stomach, it wasn't a satisfying experience.

I have only 2 words about the whole experience



This is incase you can't see the written message




For those who wanted to try the skin on.....you better hang on to your wallet..

And in the unlikely event someone from LJS actually read this.....you can have the skin on... in fact, you can have the entire fish cause I won't be bitting anytime soon

Backlogs

No,

I am not shutting this down.
Neither did I had the good fortune not having any bad food during this long hiatus.
The reason was just simply that I was far too distracted to post them here.
well, guess I better clear those backlogs

Ratings

Janet from http://yojanjan.blogspot.com/
had suggested a rating system.

And here I am, putting them into words

It start with those with out cross, which means that I just want to talk about the food and its nowhere near bad...okie.. maybe not perfect, but not bad

Bad


Very bad, you need to be either trained or very hungry to eat them


Terrible, not sure if your dog will eat them, but I will give it a pass


Must be catered for alien if it even gets so bad


This is the ultimate, I guess even aliens will not eat them.