Sunday, October 18, 2009

Attractive Patisserie from Carousel

I first saw the nice box picture in facebook. Next in the album was a very nice piece of cake, a few more pictures showed me pictures of more cakes, all done in a delicate manner. All these cakes are from Gourmet Carousel, the bakery from Royal Plaza on Scotts.



Faced with such beautiful cakes, I made a trip down to the hotel and look at the cakes and to try them, however I bought the cakes back home as they only serve the cakes in their lounge which is very dark. Their lounge is a place to drink some beer and chill so there are not much lights.

The cakes were decorated with some fine details that it has become an eye candy, to look at rather than to eat it. Each of the cakes comes in either the small size, which is just enough for 1 person, or the bigger size which can be shared by a party of 4 or 5 person.





Patisserie Naranja (S$7.00)





Presentation:
Naranja is a layered cake with blood orange and pitted orange with Manjari chocolate 64%. The bottom layer is the dacquoise, topped with the Manjari chocolate, followed by the orange mousse. Compared to the other cakes, this cake is much simpler.

Taste:
The first bite into the cake gives me a fragrant pistachio nuts and blood orange flavour. The chocolate adds a slight thickness to the cake, while not overpowering the core flavour. If the description is not known, the cake can easily be passed off as an apricot cake layered with pistachio nuts. I am not really a fan of orange cakes so I would not recommend this one.

Not Recommended Cake


Ispahan (A La Pierre Herme) (S$7.00)






Presentation:
Ispahan is a patisserie that comes with bisquit macaroon a la rose, crème au beurre a la rose lychee and fresh raspberries

Taste:
This cake is a very refreshing and light cake, though slightly on the sweet side because of the macaroon, which is notoriously known for being sweet. The lychee creme comes packed with the rose fragrance and it hits on you the moment it enters your mouth. The 2 flavours are gives a very comfortable feeling especially after you had taken 1 or 2 chocolaty cakes. It gives the palate a break.

Recommended Cake


Sunset (S$7.00)




Presentation:
Sunset is Gourmet Carousel's signature cake. It is a dark chocolate mousse with a orange crème Brule, a nougatine of sesame, chocolate sponge.

Taste:
This is a heavy chocolate cake. The best description would be so chocolaty till your drop. The choc mousse is very rich however once you hit the center of the cake, it contains a different type of filling, which is the sesame nougatine. Nougatine is usually in the hard solid form however this one is different in that it like just like creme. This nougatine has a relatively smooth texture. This sesame creme in the middle gives an unique twist to the chocolate taste and both goes well togehter. No wonder it is their signature cake.
Though overall the cake is very nice, it is a heavy and relatively sinful cake, though not the most sinful one that i had tried elsewhere.

Recommended Cake


Tart Praline (S$7.00)





Presentation:
This is a tartlet that consist of pecan nut and almonds, with a custard of hazelnut praline. There is a chocolate ball that is supporting the layer of nut based 'plate'.

Taste:
The crust of the tart is very nice, though it is not soft. The praline inside is the core that is holding the crust together. In fact the praline is so hard that it takes quite some strength to chip off a part of the tart. The praline uses thick caramel to hold the almonds and peacons together, and is full of the almond and peacon taste. With the thick caramel and the nuts, it is very easy for them to stick into the teeth gap and i hate this type of feeling.

Not Recommended Cake


Royal Jasmine (S$7.00)




Presentation:
Royal Jasmine, a beautifully designed cake, is one that contains infuse Jasmine chocolate cream with hazelnut rice krispie and chocolate almond sponge with manjari chocolate mousse. Flanked on the sides by the white jasmine macarons, this piece of cake gave a very balanced look.

Taste:
Royal Jasmine is more of a chocolate cake. The chocolate mousse is very rich. There is only a slight tinge of jasmine flavour, and that only happens in the jasmine macarons. The cake itself taste only of the chocolate. Deep inside the center of the cake are the hazelnut rice krispie. These krispie goes well with the chocolate. The white macarons though sweet gives out a fragrant jasmine flavour when melted.

Recommended Cake

Ratings
Presentation: 4.5/5
Taste: 4/5
Value for money: 3.5/5
The cakes are very nice and while some of them i do not like the them, its a matter of preferences. The cakes are full of flavour and since i am a dessert kind of person, i will be back to grab more of the cakes. I do wish that their lounge can be brighter so that i know what i am eating.

Recommended

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

A nice piece of Crystal or is it Jade?

Crystal Jade, a group of restaurants, that has established its pressence in most of the Asia countries, was established in Singapore and has grown to be one of Singapore's leading F&B company.

It has been one of my family's favourite eating outlet for the past few years and I believe that this chain of restaurants needs no further introduction. The branch that we visited this time was the one at Suntec.

Food
Smoked Sliced Goose with Lemon and Mango



Presentation:
Six slices of goose meat were placed in a star shape on top of the mango slices and had lemon poured over sauces. The sauce is slightly thick, which I believe is cooked with corn-starch flour before pouring over the dish.

Taste
The texture of the goose meat is tender and the meat goes very well with the mango and the sauce. Though it is lemon sauce, it is not too sour. In fact it brings a little sweetness to the dish too and it goes well with the mango.
This dish should be tried by stacking the goose meat on top of the mango, the taste is simply marvellous. The taste becomes rather complex, having the smoky taste while the mango provides sweetness and the sauce gives its a little sourish flavour. Some of the more traditional chinese food lovers may only like taking the goose meat slice alone.
No matter how this dish is taken, the dish will definitely receive another order from me again.

Recommended Dish


Double Boiled Traditional Chicken Roots with Ginger and Chinese Herbs




Presentation
As with many chinese soups, they come in a big bowl which is sufficient for many people around the table to share. The soup contains a lot of chinese herbs, from red dates(紅棗) to 淮山 and 枸杞子, chicken and ginger. Most of the chinese herbs were relatively common and can be found in those traditional chinese medical hall. The soup looks rather thick but is in fact not so. However one thing was that the chicken pieces was not a lot.

Taste
The essence of all the herbs and chinese are in the soup. The soup is very tasty and the soup i believe would have been boiled for at least 4 hours in order to reach this taste. Due to the many herbs and long hours in simmering the soup, the taste has been made very complex. The ginger gave the soup a little spicy taste, but this is very welcomed. Chinese believed that ginger soup is good for warming the body especially during the winter times.

Recommended Dish


Crystal Jade's Service Attitude
The service is strictly Welcome, order, deliver, billing and goodbye. It can be said that there is nothing special in the service they deliver. However the captains that takes the order do give some recommendation and also tells us if there are any promotion to any items. As we had been to this restaurant a few times, some of the captains do recognise us and do chat to us when our meal is over, but this is not apparent to the other customers.
Service to top up water, clear table and replace cutleries are very quick, even the dishes comes out very quickly.

Crystal Jade's Cleanliness
Good cleanliness. Nothing less, as expected of a restaurant.

Rating
Food Presentation: 3/5
Food Taste: 4/5
Service attitude: 3.5/5
Cleanliness: 4/5
Value for Money: 3.5/5
This is a restaurant chain that we had went back a number of times because of the food. If you are hungry, just go in and order the food. Once the 1st dish comes to you, the rest will follow suit very quickly. Fast service too but it is definitely not the place where you can sit and talk after the meal. Strictly for meals only.

Recommended
 
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