Visit to Outerspace

N and I rarely travel beyond the West side of Singapore without a good enough reason. You see, it's hard enough to match our personal schedules, and the last thing we want to do when we eventually meet is spend half our time together commuting from place to place. For this reason, we usually make the most of any opportunity where we might be in a "foreign" part of Singapore, usually for the occasional social obligation (e.g. house warming or wedding), to explore the food there.

One of these opportunities came in the form of the fact that we went to Punggol for N's powerlifting coach's house party. N wanted to try the Punggol Nasi Lemak in Upper Serangoon Road, which is touted to be one of the most renowned stalls in the area.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of Singapore's national breakfast dish. There's something about coconut rice that doesn't sit well with me. I haven't been able to identify the exact reason why I abhor it so, but I suspect the smell of the rice/coconut pairing could be the main culprit. I've made many attempts over the years to revisit the dish, praying that the feeling of disgust at the smell of the rice is only a figment of my imagination. However, every attempt has proven to be yet another failure.

We arrived late in the evening to a bustling crowd of hungry locals (and a smattering of tourists) queueing for nasi lemak. The queue moved quickly and N manage to procure a serving of the dish after about a 10 minute wait. Not being a fan of the dish, I can't say I'm too familiar with the usual fix-ins that come with the dish. This version came with the lontong vegetables, otah, fried chicken wing, fried ngoh hiang and ikan bilis with peanuts.

To my surprise, the rice did not trigger my gag reflex and I managed to consume small mouthfuls of it together with the individual accompaniments. All the elements of the dish were fresh and fared well on the flavour front. I felt an acidic element like achar (is this traditionally eaten with nasi lemak?) would have cut through the richness of the oil and grease and balanced out the dish quite nicely. Even the thin sliver of cucumber served nothing more than being a mere decoration.

Also on our agenda that evening was the korean fried chicken, recommended by N's head chef. He said that that there isn't any KFC outside of Korea that is as good as the one next to the Nasi Lemak stall. With such high praises sung of the fried chicken there, N and I looked past the fact that there weren't any Korean chefs cooking (or even serving for that matter) and the fact that the stall was hidden in the shadier part of the coffee shop.

The a la minute chicken took a while to be prepared. It arrived at our table piping hot, crunchy and coated with a thin layer of sweet/spicy glaze. The chicken pieces were meaty and moist, and the portion served was generous. Never again will I waste pennies at commercialised establishments like Four Fingers or even Oven and Fried Chicken for measly pieces of anorexic chicken, coated in more batter than there is chicken, and then glazed with liquified sugar.

With tummies (and hearts) full from our delightful meal, we went home, completely ignoring the fact that we had once again failed to stick to our re-established diet resolutions.