Address: #01-57 Vivo City, Singapore 098585
Tel: 6376-9555

I was worried. It was the first time that my girlfriend’s parents and my parents were meeting up. I had wanted somewhere upmarket and relatively conducive for the exchange of pleasantries that will take place between both sets of parents.

What I got was a cacophony of noise emanating from tables where throngs of kids were given full licence to create chaos and mayhem. I swear kids nowadays have the lung capacities matching some of the more prominent sopranos..

The result was that we couldn’t really appreciate the nice waterfront view. Anyway, I had a job at hand. To order the dishes that would suit both sets of parents. I think the waitress, sensing my distress and desperation to please, may have taken the opportunity to rattle off various kinds of rather pricey items on the menu. Pushed into an unenviable position where my parents were giving non-committal answers like “anything lar…you make the decisions” and the waitress being rather pushy in introducing more dishes, I accepted most of the recommendations offered.

The next formidable task for me was to induce conversation at the table. The Bah Kwa starters presented a nice opportunity. There was general consensus that the use of the traditional BBQ pork strips made good appertisers.

The Crispy Mini Roast Pork (S$9) is now a regular feature at most mid-end chinese restaurants. The fatty pork combined with the condiment of mustard is quite heavenly. A true blend of east and west flavours.

The Ginseng & Black Chicken Soup (S$76) was something that I thought that the parents would like. Besides being reputed to be good for health, the ginseng is notorious for being a rather expensive piece of root. The soup was clear and went down well.

However, the parents did not really take to the ingredients of the soup The ginseng and black chicken were extracted and put aside to be eaten separately. They stayed uneaten for quite a long time. The good thing was that a round of spirited conversation was started over whether the chicken had black skin or if the cook had coloured it black. I just thought that the chicken probably evolved black skin as a form of protection against being eaten by the biggest predator around - humans. Too bad the chicken did not consider the Chinese people’s willingness to eat anything and everything.

The Foie Gras With Crispy Chicken Skin (S$54) looked delicious. On tasting, the Foie Gras was dry, hard and bland. In fact, if i did not know better, I would have thought I was eating a variant of luncheon meat (or spam). It was a let-down.

Redemption came in the form of the Prawns Fried With Salted Egg (S$30). Huge prawns mixed with the salted egg yolk batter. Good stuff, cannot bluff.

Another good dish was the Beancurd With Wild Fungus (S$27). This brought the parents chorusing with approval of the beancurd.

The meal ended with the Teochew Mee Swa (S$27). This was chosen on account that I felt that the girlfriend’s parents would like to sample a dish belonging to their own dialect group. On deeper reflection, I realised it would be quite similar to feeding fish to fishmongers - it may not be the best of ideas.

And as you can see, the black chicken and ginseng remained untouched.

All in, I would consider the dinner a successful one. The parents hit it off rather nicely. And that is all that matters.