Dim-Sum at Golden Peony 金牡丹レストランのヤムチャ（Conrad Centennial Hotel）

At 2 Temasek Boulevard, Conrad Centennial Hotel;Singapore 038982.

If I were asked what’s good about this place, it'd be: I like something here which I have always disliked. And that 'something' is wan-tan dumplings. Wantan or, siew mai, has never been on my yum cha menus; so you can tell I am not a yum-cha enthusiast.

Golden Peony, an award-winning Cantonese restaurant, makes yum cha more than just tucking in tapas. A Japanese interpretation of the Chinese lion on a Narumi porcelain already qualifies as an art piece sur la table:

The teak screens and porcelain display make Chinese meals an elegant and serene affair. It offers superbly crafted Cantonese dim sum specialities which are probably the best in Singapore. But I wonder if the ikasumi ha-kao (squid ink shrimp dumpling) is one of its specialties? I don’t fancy them, as I didn’t find them different from the ordinary fair-skin ha-kao. The ha-kao wrapper is too thin, so the color is just a mask. I give thumbs-up to the scallop steamed in aburage with a superb rich broth with wolf-berries- this is a stellar dish!

Next in the line is the most unlikely candidate for me, the wantan. The skin is chewy, consistent and the filling tasted more ‘shrimpy’ than ‘porky’, thank goodness. The little mound of ground ginger and green spring onions (negi) that crowned it imparts a wonderful melodious note to it – and it’s neither too soft or tough…scrumptious.

We also ordered fried beancurd skin wrapped with shrimps, a common dim sum which happened to turn out ordinary as well, but the daikon cakes were light and delicious. Another usually oily snack made less oily and more delightful here is the deep-fried balls with vegetable-mushroom filling. It’s something not to be missed.

Each dish is from SGD4.80 to SGD 6.00. I will yum cha here again!

Dim Sum at Mouth Restaurant シンガポールのヤムチャ （6534-4233）

April 29, 2007 (Sunday): It seems ages since I last had dim sum at Dragon City on January 1 this year. The restaurant is located in Corpthorne Orchid Inn (ex-Novotel Orchid Inn). Since then, I really thought I would not eat anymore Chinese food out of my home. Dragon City used to be one of my favourites a decade ago, but its standard has plunged so much that I think chefs working there must be paid peanuts. I had deep-fried seafood rolls (frozen Southern Vietnamese seafood rolls)- the most horrendous combination of some jackfruit mayo sauce mixed with oil, its nightmarish stirfried fuyi noodles, and its steamed tofu dish all tasted like substandard hawker fare.

This time, after browsing through UOB's brochure on one-for-one deals, I've decided to check out this restaurant where one of my nephews had his birthday bash. There was no good deal I could get from my UOB card, though, having not gone there with a group of four.

When I reached there at 3:00 pm, the restaurant was still packed. There wasn't much of an ambience to talk about -- just a rather clean-looking place with pacquet floor, some timber works, two huge pillars diagonally positioned probably for good fengshui. I have always wondered why this place was named so uncreatively, upon seeing its Chinese name 地茂馆（lit. 'land prosper restaurant/place'), I sensed some humor in it. The Chinese name phonetically reminds one of the way a Chinese would attempt to pronounce 'the mouth' in English for the first time -- it is rather ingeneous!

The menu is expansive; one features the deep-fried stuff, the other the steamed dishes. Then there are lunch and promotion sets. Prices range from SGD 3.80-4.90 a dish. I only picked the steamed stuff because I didn't think oily food would work well with my stomach. Finally, after being told that 80 percent of the steamed menu were no longer available for that day, I'd not much choice left. What I ended up ordering were: siew mai with crab roe, Beijing jiaozi , yam cake, special har gao (shrimp dimplings), and bamboo shoot in beancurd skin rolls. I couldn't have more because they forgot my steamed carrot cake. The total bill added up to SGD 25.28 ( a little discount on service for UOB cardholders).

My overall rating: food: 4.0 out of 5.0 points; service: 2.5 - 3.0 points; ambience: 2.5 - 3 points. I wouldn't mind making another trip there at the end of the year.

Address　場所: 133 Chinatown Point #02-01；New Bridge Rd 059413.