Fire & Ice and Everything Nice
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I was at Alexandra Road for a meeting and as I wandered around, I spotted a large hawker centre with quite a lot of stalls still open even though it was 4.30pm. I wasn’t particularly hungry so I decided to try some of the local desserts. The stall I patronised was obviously a franchise. Anytime you see the words “House of …,” it’s a franchise.
Despite my misgivings, I decided to give it a try by virtue of the fact they had a rather intriguing sounding dessert – Pear with Fungal. Er … really? Suppressing a gulp (and a little bit of nausea), I decided to investigate.
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As it was such a hot and muggy day, I decided to purchase some to test the combination of sweet, crisp pear with mushy, slippery white cloud fungus – a sure-fire cure for over-heated systems as these two are cooling foods. I was not too convinced that it would be a tasty marriage but perhaps I was just slightly biased as I am not a keen fan of cloud fungus. Still, the food adventurer in me decided to give it a go.
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The icy cold, cooling and mushy Pear and White Cloud Fungus soup flirted with its complete opposite, the hot, spicy ginger soup with the chewy and glossy tang yuan aka glutinous rice balls filled with black sesame and peanut pastes. Even the colours were contrastingly vivid!
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I quickly moved on to the black sesame-filled glutinous rice. Much, much better. The black sesame paste was smokey and nutty yet sweet enough to temper it. The slightly gritty texture highlighted the moist, chewy and slippery glutinous shell and it was altogether rather nice, even if it is still not my favourite dessert.
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Thankfully the ginger soup was generous and slightly thick, which makes me wonder why the House of Desserts is so partial to starch in their sweet dessert soups. I find the addition quite unpleasant.
As I left the stall, I pondered on the fact that the stall advertised itself as a vegetarian dessert stall. Surely all desserts are vegetarian? What desserts are meat-based??? Perhaps they meant vegetarian as in using no animal by-product? Hmmm …
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Well, that was fun … now where’s the Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food?
7 Comments:
Dear MM...it's my dream to "happen" upon a dish named "Pear with Fungal" while walking down the street! Why can't I find it in NYC? Genius...HT
Hey Harriet! Thanks so much. Singapore is a vertiable haven of food. You truly cannot walk 10 paces without hitting upon a food stall or other. I think I could spend years wandering all the streets and still not manage to discover and try all the food stalls, despite the tiny land mass of this small island.
hmmm....looks like a good place to makan
your images you use with your posts are great.
Hi MM, Havent seen yr posts in a (long) while. Everything ok? Me a regular visitor..I love the way u write & keep coming back for yr (mostly) funny & (sometimes) thought-provoking narratives :-) Pls pls post something soon!
Immensely entertaining blog. I quite like the way your mind works.
Foodcrazee - wouldn't know as I have not had a chance to go back there but hopefully, one day I will have time to do so!
Evan - thanks so much & thanks for visiting! I love your work - you have talent, mate!
Shvetha - thanks for being such a faithful reader and coming out of lurkdom to wish me well! I really appreciate it. :)
Anonymous - thanks and my sympathies! LOL.
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