LAB MADE SINGAPORE
The Hong Kong nitrogen ice cream chain Lab Made has opened its first overseas outlet here.
The four-year-old brand has a repertoire of about 150 flavours, but its 450 sq ft takeaway kiosk here offers only four flavours at one time. The flavours rotate every two months.
For starters, there are Hong Kong-style flavours ($6.90 a cup) such as salted egg yolk custard, Hong Kong French Toast, soya beancurd and crunchy sea salt caramel that is garnished with cereal and caramel sauce.
The ice cream is made upon order - with the ice-cream paste being flash-frozen with liquid nitrogen. The paste is shipped from Hong Kong weekly. To create a smoke-like effect, the ice cream is served in a double-layered cup lined with dry ice. Other ice-cream flavours in the works include mango sticky rice, pandan, chilli crab and kaya toast.
Where: 02-K3 Westgate, 3 Gateway Drive
Open: 11am to 9.30pm daily
Info: www.labmade.sg
K TOWER
The Korean-style seafood tower of cooking food in stacked steamers caught on last year and it looks like the trend is just picking up steam.
The latest addition is K Tower in Amoy Street, where one can have up to nine tiers of fresh seafood. Prices start at $58 (two to three people) for a three-tier tower with prawns, scallops, shellfish and soup base. For nine tiers ($388, eight to 10 people), you get abalone, lobster, crab, oysters, fish, prawns, scallops, sea cucumber, shellfish and soup base.
Soup options include seafood soup (complimentary), kimchi soup (add $10), army stew (add $10) and ginseng soup (add $20).
A la carte items include ginseng chicken soup ($17.90); army stew ($26.90) with luncheon meat, tteokbokki (rice cake), tofu, baked beans, a medley of vegetables, mushrooms and instant noodles; and Shake Shake Rice Box ($9.90), a take on childhood lunch boxes in South Korea.
Where: 74 Amoy Street
Open: 11.30am to 2.30pm, 5.30 to 10pm daily
Info: Call 6221-9928 or go to www.facebook.com/KTowerSG
MORSELS AT DEMPSEY
After four years in Mayo Street in Little India, Morsels now has a new 1,000 sq ft home at Dempsey Hill.
The menu features new dishes such as kasu-cured Hiramasa kingfish ($22), with rhubarb aioli, pickled grapes, pistachio praline and ikura; grilled wild Sri Lankan tiger prawns ($24), with sakura ebi daikon cake (an ode to the local savoury "carrot cake"), burnt okra, tamarind miso sauce and housemade calamansi furikake; and Burnt Somen ($18), with Japanese wheat noodles flavoured with monkey head mushroom dashi and mixed with charred corn, sugar snap peas and pickled woodear fungus.
Signatures from Morsels' chef-owner Petrina Loh include steamed venus clams ($24); charred house-poached octopus ($26); Firecracker Duroc pulled pork with shell pasta ($24); and ume-sake braised black angus beef short rib ($30 or $38).
On weekdays, the lunch menu highlights noodle options (set lunch from $25++) such as Morsels' beef noodles with grilled 1824 beef flank, beef balls in a beef broth with rice vermicelli; oyster mee sua with slow-cooked shredded Sakura chicken in a Chinkiang chicken dashi with somen; and assam laksa with Norwegian mackerel done two ways (pickled and deep-fried), fermented pineapple and glass vermicelli.
Come April, a Chef's Table for four diners will be launched.
Where: 01-04, 25 Dempsey Road
Open: Noon to 3pm (Tuesdays to Sundays), 6 to 10pm (Tuesdays to Thursdays), 6 to 10.30pm (Fridays and Saturdays), closed on Monday s
Info: Call 6266-3822 or go to www.morsels.com.sg
•Opening a restaurant? Send the details to stlife@sph.com.sg
Eunice Quek & Kenneth Goh
