Monday, February 12, 2007

Jumbo Seafood Gallery, Riverwalk, Singapore

There are a few Jumbo Seafood restaurants in Singapore. I'm not sure if they're related to the one in Hong Kong but they seem to specialize in seafood as well.

We started the meal with some crunchy baby squid. This was quite tasty although abit too sweet. There was definitely more sugar than salt in this, but I guess some sugar was required to provide that caramelized finish.

Drunken herbal prawns were up next. They were indeed generous (heavy-handed?) with the amount of Chinese wine in this because after the first taste of the broth, I actually got a little alcohol blast. The prawns were tasted fresh and had that succulent crunchy texture that fresh prawns should.

Stir-fried frog with spring onions and ginger. Frog tastes like a smoother, sweeter version of chicken. Afterall it is known in Chinese as "padi chicken".

Scallops in taro nest were next. Although the scallops were slightly overcooked they still were quite juicy and complemented the crispy taro nests pretty well.

Crabs are supposedly their specialty here. The black pepper crab tasted quite good. The pepper had that spicy kick which freshly cracked pepper should have, but it still did not overpower the taste of the crab. The texture of the crab was abit of a let-down though because it was quite tough and dry. I'm quite certain that was a result of mass-cooking because we ordered two crabs but had five claws in our serve!

The steamed crab with egg-white was a done a lot better and by virtue of the way it's served, it doesn't suffer from mass-cooking that much. The crab flesh was a lot more juicy and tender than the black pepper one.

Stir-fried Chinese vegetables with garlic was the green dish of the night. Just a normal pretty straight-forward dish.


My hosts know I usually need some sort of mammal for dinner, so they were kind enough to order this roasted garlic chicken. Although I think this was fried instead of roasted it was still rather delicious. There weren't any garlic bits about because the flavor was infused into the chicken itself; a nice little twist from the standard Chinese roast chicken. This joint gets pretty crowded on the weekends, so it may be wise to make a booking prior.

D

5 comments:

Lord Dianabol said...

I'm particularly fond of the crab with black pepper, and of late, I've had this dish at a new-found restaurant.

Dishes are looking good anyway ;o)

Eleanor said...

And that is the reason why people like us dream of (and sometimes make it a reality) jumping onto the first aircraft from here to Singapore, and arriving at the restaurant just before 7 pm and feast on double black pepper crabs washed down with bottles of Tiger beer.... sigh....

D said...

lady dianabol: Good black pepper crab down under? Excellent...

eleanor: Interestingly how there are no budget direct flights between Brunei and Singapore. Someone's monopolizing the route...

Unknown said...

D, I will be there for seafood for sure now after reading your review - on a weekday evening which seems more sensible.

Oooh and now that Eleanor mentions Tiger Beer ... sigh ... what memories!

cheeers to u D!

Anonymous said...

presumably you were being ironic in your suggestion that Chicken is a mammal?