The Malaysian Insider :: Food
The Malaysian Insider :: Food |
| French restaurant in Singapore tapped as ‘The One to Watch’ Posted: 21 Feb 2013 06:31 PM PST SINGAPORE, Feb 22 — A small, modern French restaurant on the 70th floor of the Swissôtel in Singapore helmed by a young chef from central France has been tapped as "The One To Watch" by Asia's 50 Best Restaurants.  File photo of the JAAN at Swissôtel The Stamford. — Picture courtesy of Swissotel Helming the sky-high eatery is French-born chef Julien Royer, who filled the vacuum left by chef André Chiang in 2011. Before taking over the kitchens of JAAN, which is derived from the ancient Sanskrit word for "bowl", Royer cooked under triple Michelin-starred French chef Michel Bras, at Bras in Laguiole, France, and Bernard Andrieux, both of whom he credits for influencing his current cooking philosophy which emphasises the importance of quality, organic ingredients and maintaining the purity of flavour in dishes. Dishes on his à la carte menu include Confit Arctic Char with hazelnuts, and Oscietra caviar from Russia and Romanesco, also known as Roman cauliflower, or Bresse pigeon, a hay-roasted breast with confit legs, beet roots and jus d'abats (or jus of offal). Royer has also worked in the French Indies, in the kitchens of Jean Georges Vongerichten restaurants, at Greenhouse Restaurant in London, and Brasserie Les Saveurs at the St Regis, Singapore. The inaugural Asia's 50 Best Restaurants awards will be held at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore. — AFP-Relaxnews |
| A Chinese New Year reunion dinner in Paris Posted: 21 Feb 2013 04:25 PM PST  Eiffel Tower at night (left); the Parisian Chinatown (right). – Pictures by CK Lim Welcome to Chinatown in Paris. A troupe of young lion dancers (a mix of mostly Asian teens and a couple of blond-haired French apprentices) nearly run into us as they hurry by with a fire-truck-red pedestal. There are the usual Chinese hair salons found in every decent-sized Chinatown in the world. (I've learned the hard way that European hairdressers tend to mangle our more delicate hair, being used to feistier Caucasian curls.)  Traditional steamed fish in soy sauce. While it's already dark, our watches confirm it's only six in the evening. We're having dinner very early by Parisian standards, where some restaurants don't begin seating diners till after eight. Our venue tonight is Li Ka Fo, an old Cantonese stalwart in Avenue de Choisy, the main road cutting through this French Chinatown. From the outside we observe a few occupied tables with the patrons happily digging in already. This may be Paris but the Chinese can be trusted to have a meal at any time of the day. There's never a bad time. Early to eat, early to reap (wealth, one assumes). We are greeted at the entrance by the fragrant salute of fried duck tongues with spices and braised beef tripe. It may be bad manners to stare at what others are having but fortunately no one bats an eye here. We are all here for good food; this everyone understands.  Mixed vegetables (left); roast duck (right). The menus are in Chinese, French and English; the last a nod to those among us who are nominally Chinese but can't read a single Chinese character to save our lives. Even "bananas" have to eat, and eat well given it's the eve of the Lunar New Year. It is fun to read our favourite dishes in French; the tongue-twisting encornet sautées poivres turns out to be salt and pepper squid while the demonic-sounding gambas ailées à la vapeur are merely harmless king prawns steamed with garlic. Given how poorly the English translations fared in the menu, we wonder how accurate the French versions are. The proprietors are Cantonese — we guess this from the instructions the silver-haired maître d' gives to his son who takes most of the orders. Our server for the evening is from mainland China, probably the northern part given her accent. While she is warm and polite with us, she soon showed that she wasn't to be messed around with when another table reservation for six pax dared to turn up late and with only two diners at that. Let's just say the cacophonous din had another voice raised several decibels above it in righteous admonishment.  Vermicelli and crabmeat soup (left); scallops with pine nuts (right). There is also vermicelli and crabmeat soup, aromatic with sesame oil. Soup is a must for the Cantonese and we are all Cantonese at this table, born or "honorary", shall we say. It's a safety blanket for when the world around is so uncertain. We have vegetables for fibre and a full year; scallops and pine nuts for bite. Lastly roast duck with dripping, succulent fat. Decadent and probably not healthy, but this is a time to indulge. There is no loh sang. We have already done our fair share of that courtesy of brisk pre-Chinese New Year celebration business in every restaurant back home. To be honest, I've had my fill of yee sang and this seasonal, semi-artificial salad only feels appropriate in Southeast Asia for some reason. There is part of me which longs to be part of the greater Chinese diaspora and to experience what they experience. I tell Patrick, our sole non-Chinese family member (he's from Ireland), that there wasn't a Chinatown in Munich when I was studying there more than a decade ago. All we had was a tiny street with an Asian food store which carried ancient-looking durians at astronomical prices and a Hong Kong-style restaurant.  Hungry patrons waiting outside Li Ka Fo on Chinese New Year's Eve. They watched as I ordered the dishes in German and asked me why I didn't use Chinese instead. My reply: "The waiter wouldn't understand because he's from Hanoi and I don't speak any Vietnamese." Patrick laughs at this anecdote so I tell him it's an old one I reserve for occasions like this. When family from afar gather and have a good meal in each other's company. It's like Thanksgiving or Hanukkah, except with Chinese matrons replacing the Jewish mamas. We raise our glasses (made from shock-proof Perspex; no decent Chinatown restaurant would use real glass) and toast the Year of the Snake with hot tea. A fresh year and precious time with those we call our family — these may be all the wealth we need to reap. Li Ka Fo, 39 Avenue de Choisy, 75013 Paris, France (Tél: +33 145 842 045). Métro: Porte de Choisy * Kenny prays every family is united this new year. Read more stories at http://lifeforbeginners.com/ |
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