南华昌 (阿秋) Nam Hwa Chong (Ah Chew) Fish Head Steamboat

This restaurant located opposite the Textile Centre, Jalan Sultan serves good fish head steamboat. This is the traditional charcoal-boiled fish head steamboat. The wall boasts of their accolades and they have been in business since 1927. Their steamboat is served with fresh sliced Garoupa fish, lots of cabbages, tang-o vegetables, seaweed, dried fish and fried yam. This one is the traditional teochew style fish soup that relies on the freshness of the fish. The soup tastes of charcoal boiled, is sweet even without the Chinese herbs like danggui which are common in some steamboat fish soup. Real natural goodness.

I also patronize Whampoa Keng fish head steamboat which is also very famous locally. (See June 2009 blogpost) Both costs about the same; $35 for Nam Hwa Chong and $30 for Whampoa Keng (but need to add $6 for serving of tang-o vegetable). By comparison, my verdict is the fish slice is big and fresher at Nam Hwa Chong while the soup is tastier at Whampoa Keng! Guess we can't have best of both world! See my delicious dinner below! Do also note that the shop serves delectable Tze-Char dishes (such as oyster omelette, fried pork chop etc) at reasonable prices to supplement your meal too!

Nam Hwa Chong (Ah Chew) Fish-head Steamboat Corner is at 814/816 North Bridge Road, Singapore 198779 Tel: 62979319 (opens daily).

Food for Thought

Found this lovely eatery around busy Bras Basah Road while downtown. This place was started by a group of friends as another of their attempt at a social enterprise and boasts of serving some great comfort food to make people happy with a good cause of devoting 10% of their profit towards their noble areas of interest:

1. Support Clean Water
2. Feed Good Food
3. Help End Poverty
4. Educate the People and
5. Encourage Good Acts.

Very nice people or so and we thought they deserve a visit ....

In we went. Ted and me. This was our first visit. Not knowing what to order. We browsed the menu that was placed on the table. We understand later that we had to place our orders at the counter. The chef specials and other recommended items/set specials were written on the chalkboards hung on the walls behind the order counter.  Free clean water was served at the counter (DIY) but a small donation would be nice to be placed into the piggy bank there with this proceed to be contributed towards the Support Clean Water Funds. Not very sure how the funds gets there though.

We stood at the counter for a while comtemplating what to order. Finally I decided upon the combo sets which were like "half-and-half" sets comprising of a sandwich served in half its normal size, add on with another side order of either your choice of the salad or soup. There are 3 sandwich categories: the House, Special or Premium which consists of different types of sandwiches under each category. Details of their menu can be found at their website. The House seems the likes of the usual roasted chicken breast, pork sausages or vegetarian sandwiches. The Special Sandwiches seem inclined towards the local flavour - which are the roasted pulled pork, spicy braised pork (something like the local "kong bak pao" - braised pork buns in Hokkien) and roasted beef striploin flavours. The Premium ones definitely have to be the best and consists of cuban ham and pulled pork.

My Slow Roasted Pulled Pork Special Combo Set served with

Bacon, Potato and Baked Onion Salad

I found the Special Sandwiches really something pretty local and interesting so I went for the slow roasted pulled pork special combo set (at S$11.90) with sweet potatoes. I also got to choose the Soup or a Salad similarly under the Special categories. I took the Bacon, Potato and Baked Onion Special Salad to complete my set order. It came wonderful and did not disappoint.  (See above photo) I especially liked the bread which was soft and warm. The pulled pork slices were just nicely pulled to fit every mouthful you take and the flavour is quite local as I expected it be but blended with a nice mix of western bread.  Lovely. The salad was peppered black vinegar and there were roasted potatoes with bacon and nicely baked soft onion slices. Nice.

Ted's Delicious Shiitake Mushroom Pasta

Ted found his favourite Shiitake Mushroom Pasta (at S$13.90) and wasted no time digging in the minute it was served. A heavenly creation too. Look at what we had above.

We were two very satisfied person though Ted thought he still has stomach for more. I thought it was a good hearty meal for me. We did not burn any holes in our pockets at about S$25.80 plus 7% GST totalling to about S$28 for 2 person. We were sure we will be back for some nice bread and pasta there again. Good food for a good cause. Definitely.

Food for Thought we visited was located at 420 North Bridge Road, North Bridge Centre #01-06, Singapore. Tel: 6338 8724. They have another outlet at 8 Queen Street, Singapore.