Bobby's

We had wanted to check out the new restaurants at Cuppage Terrace and found ourselves in Bobby's. There is quite a story behind Bobby's as we later found out from the Manager, Desmond, who turned out to be quite a character. (If you do make a trip there, be sure to steal a conversation with him. You wil be thoroughly entertained)

Well, rumour has it that Bobby's was originally known as Bobby Rubino's, the restaurant at Chijmes. It was set up and owned by a Canadian couple who got into trouble with the law and sold the business off to an enterprising lady in the finance industry named Susan. She chose a new name for a restaurant, hired a new team, launched a new menu and Wala! Bobby's was born.

Yeap. I hear you. AS IF it were that easy right? Well, seems easy enough that Bobby's just set up its second branch at Cuppage Terrace.

The first thing that struck Sheryl and I when we entered the restaurant was how discordant everything seemed to be. From the zebra-print couches, to the plasma TV showing ESPN to the piped-in hip hop music, everything about the restaurant screamed incongruous. "Think of this restaurant as an American restaurant with an African beat" was what we were told by Desmond.

Uhm, ok Desmond, whatever floats your boat. I guess sometimes incongruity can be lost by novelty-seekers? Perhaps others would like the feel of this retaurant. But us? not so much. Give me either Africa or America. I don't understand the concept of an African-America. Or an American-Africa for that matter.

Moving on to serious business, the menu. Don't expect any surprises here. Yes, the menu is rather extensive. Yes, some of the food do sound appetising. But if its eye-catching, attention-grabbing, EAT-ME-NOW kind of food you're after, Bobby's is not the place for you. Bobby's offers standard American fare. We're talking Pizza, Pasta, Burgers and Grills here.

Bobby's is having a discount for lunch-goers. Order a main course between 12noon - 3pm and get a Caesar salad and dessert on the house! We had 2 of their signature dishes; ribs and the beef burger. Unfortunately, the beef burger did not qualify as a main and did not come with the promotion. This, as we later found out, was to be a good thing. Be warned that the servings here are huge. For a moment there, I felt like Gulliver in Brobdingnag.

The Caesar Salad, pressumably. I don't know about you but this did not look like a Caesar Salad to us. It was more like a garden salad served with some random tasting dressing that they tried to pass off as Caesar. Oh not that it was bad or anything. It was passable. Just definitely not Casesar dressing. So more like a Garden Salad served with a dressing that tasted remotely like Caesar. Need I say more about the incongruity of this place?Next up, the ribs. Mind you, this is the smallest order of ribs they offer. The menu reads "the lighter appetite". I'm not sure I want to know how big "the steel city rack" would be. These ribs were succulent and finger-licking good. I appreciated that the BBQ sauce wasn't too overbearing that it took away from the taste of the ribs. That said, I've had better and I felt that the ribs were a bit tough and did not fall off the bone. The coleslaw served with the ribs was forgettable too. The cabbage was limp and lifeless, as if it had been soaking in the slaw dressing for far too long. I've had better- at KFC.

Sheryl had the beef burger. We had asked for it to be medium-rare but it came more like well-done. No blood! No sweet blood! Nonetheless, the patty was juicy and flavourful. It was rather decent. It was supposed to come with Swiss Cheese but came with a disappointing thin slice of Kraft Cheddar Cheese look-a-like, taste-a-like. It wasn't even melted properly and it lacked that glorious cheese-in-every-nook-and-cranny, stretchy, gooey, wonderful cheesy thing. In fact, I thought that the amount of cheese was too pathetic and was completely lost in that gigantic patty.

The apple pie was great. The apples were not cooked till they were mushy but instead retained that firmness and crunch. It was not sickeningly sweet either and was in fact all rather tart. It looked more like a mini-chicken-pie, the size of a tart, that you can get at Delifrance. In fact, it tastes like that too. The pastry was commendable. Very buttery and nicely browned. I'm just not sure I would come back to Bobby's just for it.

Bobby's. Definitely a place to go if you're into food sharing. Or if you have one helluva appetite. But, with the myraid of options diners have at the revamped Cuppage Terrace, its easy to overlook this restaurant in favor of the other, more unique, ones.

P.S We didn't take many photos this round as we got stopped by Desmond who told us that they had a 'no food photography' policy lest other restaurants follow their recipes, presentation etc. This I don't understand. How can you copy a recipe from a photo? And seriously now, how many different ways are there to plate a burger or ribs?

relish-mania

it was the third time going to relish today and instead of going for the normal wildrocket burger (which is sublime by the way), we opted for the spicy crabmeat linguine with tomato cream and the much raved about charsiew burger.

now, this would be the third time giving the linguine a chance. The first time we had it was ok but nothing to rave about. In fact, we didn't have it. Y had it and she doesn't even take spicy food. We just tried a mouthful. It was aight, but not whoa-gimme-some-of that. After reading so much about how absolutely scrumptious it was, we decided to give it a second shot at Wild Rocket. Sadly, we weren't too impressed by it then and P was adamant that the chilli tomato crabmeat linguine with pinenuts at Marmalade Pantry would beat the version at Wild Rocket hands down.

So it was with apprehension that we ordered that instead of the wild rocket burger. And it was whoa tonight. Like really, whoa. Wild Rocket has always been known to serve good pasta, their pasta is always perfectly al dente and this was no exception. But even more than that, today's pasta really created a symbiosis with the tomato cream, a perfect amalgation. It was also a lot spicier than the last time which was really good. True, they weren't crazy generous about the crabmeat, but there was always a sufficient amount in every mouthful. The best part about it was that the crabmeat had actually 'fused' with the pasta so that they are one and the same. You know how you always end up with a lot of crabmeat after downing the pasta because the crabmeat doesn't 'stick' to the pasta so you don't end up eating much crabmeat during your meal and find a whole lump of it after you have finished all your pasta? Well, no worries about that today. Every mouthful was blessed with a chockful of crabmeat and equally coated in that delicious cream, so that you really do eat crabmeat linguine instead of crabmeat and linguine. Kudo to Relish for that!

Now, for the star of the meal. The charsiew burger. FWAH. It was so good. It was sweet and savoury the way charsiew should be. Although it didn't really taste like charsiew. It was more of a cross between charsiew and the sauce for kongbak bao. And I have to admit that when it was served, it looked like a lump of black substance above toasted bread. Very not appetising indeed. But boy was it good. From the first bite, I was stunned for a while because the taste was so unexpected. The meat was tender (apparently quite fatty but we took the fat off) and so so well-marinated. I'm not a fan for pork and apparently, it is poison for all blood types (I've been reading up on the blood type diet) but this is one poison I would die for. The bread, well, nothing to shout about, but hey, they're not a bakery so I'm less fastidious about that.

Interestingly enough, this burger was not slated to be a hit at all. They had only included the burger because they wanted more variety. Since we have beef, chicken lamb, seafood, hey let's throw in some pork kinda thing. And it was charsiew so Wilin and Sam (boss and manager respectively) did not expect the burger to be such the success it is. And according to Sam, it is his favourite burger. Fantastic.

Dinner was extremely enjoyable. I just love Relish for its gorgeous ambience, the high ceilings and understated chicness. It's like casual for the high-living man. And Sam, who we thought would to be reserved initially, turned out to be quite a lively character, sitting and joking with us a good portion of the meal. From pretty but dao girls at Island Creamery to Wilin as Cleo's top 50 EB to even Daiso and 1.99 shop, maybe next time he will direct sit down and eat with us.Maybe we will really be part of the Wilin Empire in future!

We set up an appointment for Friday lunch, my favourite burger place with (one of) my favourite people. :)