The Hungry Bunny

It's not often that we eat sinfully indulgent foods like burgers or steak, (u know, coz we now prefer a diet of light soups and salads more conventional of older folks) but every once a veryyy blue moon, we actually crave a good juicy burger. And where else to satisfy that craving but newly opened Three Buns , an offshoot of hipster burger joint Potato Head Folk . I usually stay away from new launches but Potato Head is a well-established purveyor of the best burgers in Singapore. So we figured, can't go wrong!! The menu at Three Buns is a little more adventurous than its Keong Siak parent Potato Head. And a lot more Asian: so expect ingredients such as pork floss, fried shallots and miso-this or dashi-that. We liked it, the unabashed East-West fusion worked. One thing I've noticed about the Potato Head stable of restaurants: service is invariably great. Our servers were, without exception, smiley and cheery. And the clubby hip-hop music just added to that groovy, up

We hardly, if ever, eat at a food court. More often than not, the food is sub-par to whatever you can get at an actual hawker centre. Yes, there's the air-conditioning, which in sooo much more comfortable than the sweltering heat of our tropical "alfrescos"...but I'd rather sweat it out with properly good food at a hawker centre than eat mediocre food , sweat-free, at a food court. That being said... I recently heard that there was excellent wanton mee to be found at a food court in Zhongshan Park (which is surprising coz the mall isn't really renown for its dining options), and so, we just had to check it out. Besides, it's where we like to do our grocery shopping (PSA: the NTUC here is da best!! And while the supermarket is under its 'Finest' brand, prices here are akin to the regular ol' standard NTUC brand...also, parking for the first 2 hours is free on weekends!! #cheaptrillsinlife), so it wasn't too much trouble popping by whilst picki

As u can well tell by now, I love pasta salads, it comes together quickly, and makes the perfect one-dish (healthy!) meal for those busy bee weeknights. And while we get just the one season here in the tropics, this warm pasta salad is perfect for a nippy Fall day. Ingredients (feeds 2-4 pax): 1 cup fusilli pasta 3 cups sausage, diced to 1 inch cubes 2 large zucchini, sliced to 1cm-thick semi-circlets or 3/4cm thick rings 1 large carrot, sliced to matchsticks lengths 3 cloves garlic, minced 3 tbsp olive tapenade 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil 2 tsp maple syrup Directions: 1) Fry sausage in non-stick pan (you don't need oil in this case), until just cooked through, about 5 minutes on medium-high heat. Set aside, leaving the drippings in the pan. 2) With the drippings from the sausage, fry carrots until just wilted, about 1 minute on medium-high heat. 3) Turn heat down to medium, add minced garlic, and maple syrup, stirring through. Salt to taste. 4) Push

Much has been raved of Magic Square , the incubator at Portsdown Road for promising young chefs. But I would beg to defer: in the same way I would prefer not to have my hair cut by a trainee hairdresser, I have to confess I wasn't crazy about Magic Square . It's not to say that the food was bad, but it very much feels like I'm an experiment for said chefs to hone their skills. Also, perhaps the chef was having a bad day, but his sullen demeanor and lifeless intonation didn't exactly inspire enthusiasm for his food. He seemed, at best, reluctant, and at worst, irritably testy, to present his menu. That irritation was most obvious when he stopped, mid-sentence, to glare with pursed lips, at a few diners who failed to pay rapt attention to his dead, monotonous description of some dish. I don't blame that group of talkative diners, the chef appeared so uninterested about his own food, how could he reasonably expect that anyone would be excited by that? And really, thi

Have I already mentioned that I love my foodie friends?? Because oftentimes we get stuck in a rut of only eating at the same few restaurants, it's such a refreshing change-up to have our food-obsessed friends steer us to their family's favourite haunts. In fact, many of our current go-tos started off as recommendations from our friends. Chui Xiang Kitchen is a cze char discovery courtesy of a colleague-turned-friend, who's quickly turning out to be some kind of savant with regards to unknown, underrated gems (he'd previously suggested the fantastic Gu Ma Jia ). It's apparently been around for years, but as with Gu Ma Jia, I'd have never known it was there if he didn't tell me about it. It's located along the same row of shophouse eateries as Casuarina Curry and Ban Leong Wah Hoe Seafood , and in fact, Chui Xiang Kitchen is right next to the latter. Frankly, I'm stumped as to why Ban Leong Wah Hoe appears so much more popular than Chui Xiang Ki

This is one of my favourite comfort-food dishes. And because it's got vegetables, carbs and protein, it makes for a great one-dish meal. While slicing and dicing may take a bit of work, you can easily prep all that beforehand, and get this whipped up in a jiffy on a busy weeknight. Ingredients (feeds 2-4pax): 3 rolls dried vermicelli (rehydrate this by soaking in water for at least 15 minutes) 5 cups lightly packed shredded carrots 1 large head cabbage, sliced into long thin strips (I used Japanese cabbage, it's sweeter) 4 cups lightly packed shitake mushrooms, sliced 500gm kurobuta pork, sliced and marinated in tare 4 cloves large garlic, minced 1/2 cup dashi stock 1 tsp chicken powder 1 tsp oyster sauce 1 tsp light soy salt to taste dash of ground white pepper 1 tbsp canola oil 1 tbsp sesame oil fried shallots for garnishing sesame seeds for garnishing Directions: 1) Fry garlic on medium heat with canola-sesame oil blend until fragrant, about 1 minute

Meta has quickly shaped up as one of our favourite restaurants in Singapore. We've dined at the restaurant thrice now , and their food invariably impresses. Everytime we return at the turn of each season for their new menu, we're always excited. The food's inventive, unexpected and extraordinary, yet manages a grounded unpretentiousness. For sure, Chef de cuisine Sun Kim has long evolved past his training in French-Japanese cuisine, and definitely come into his own. I'd venture, the cuisine at Meta is very loosely, some kind of international fusion. Like, who'd have thought to cook Spanish sweet prawn in Japanese dashi, zing it with Thai kaffir lime, and serve it with Southeast Asian prawn sambal-ed Korean rice. It's just genius how Chef Kim assembles seemingly disparate ingredients and forges a menu that's utterly unique. Ooh, and the chef understands balance like no other (okayyy maybe except for Beni's Benji Yamanaka ), every single dish was exqui