Summer Palace Restaurant The Regent Singapore

July 26, 2010 | 8 Comments

Summer Palace Dim Sum

A couple of weeks ago, the kind folks at Hungrygowhere invited me to join them for a food tasting session, and when I heard that they were going to Summer Palace at The Regent Singapore — I agreed immediately.

Among The Regent Hotel Restaurants, I have always wanted to try the Afternoon high tea at the Tea lounge, Basilico Italian Restaurant, and of course the Cantonese food at Summer Palace Chinese restaurant.

After a quick glance at the menu, we were very excited as there’s a long list of food waiting for us. The Media Degustation menu started us with the Dim Sum platter which included a Baked Chicken Tart with Baby Abalone ($9 per piece), Shrimp dumpling with Bird’s Nest ($8 for 3 pieces), Deep-Fried Yam with Garoupa ($5 for 3 pieces).

Baby abalone and bird’s nest with dim sum? Oh boy, it’s so extravagant!

I’m not sure if it’s just me, but I felt that the baby abalone was rather out of place alongside the baked chicken tart. The savory-savory combination didn’t really work for me, but I like the shrimp dumpling with Bird’s nest. A morsel of the delicate bird’s nest was placed nicely on top the open-shrimp-dumpling, while I couldn’t really taste the fineness of the Chinese delicacy – it’s kind of nice to know that we just had something supposedly good. On the other hand, the Deep-fried yam with garoupa really opened up my mind. While I had Steamed grouper dumpling before, it was my first time having deep-fried yam with garoupa, and to be honest, I’ve never imagined that garoupa could actually be used as the ingredient for deep-fried yam balls.

Bird's Nest Soup

The Braised Superior Bird’s Nest with Lobster and Gold Leaf at $88 per serving was expensive, but it was really worth every cent. I don’t know about you, but gold foil never fails to portray the luxurious feel to me. We could taste every strand of the bird’s nest with the chunky lobster meat, and together with the (literally) superior stock – this was the highlight of our dinner.

Wok Fried Wagyu Beef

It was a shame that the Wok-fried Wagyu Beef ($68) was prepared in huge blocks. It’d definitely be a lot better if the premium beef was sliced thinner to showcase the marbling of the meat.

Deep Fried Spare Ribs

I was confused when the waitress read out the name of the dishes at machine-gun-like speed. Hold on a second, which is the scallop and spare ribs? Both of them looked rather similar to me! You know, deep fried food always appear to be the same.

Okay, so there’s the Crispy Scallop with fresh pear ($36 for the normal portion), and the Deep-Fried Spare Ribs with Shrimp Paste ($22 for normal portion). In case you are wondering, we only had a tasting portion of both dishes. By then, we realized that the Chef likes to play with many different contrasting flavor combined into one dish, and the Crispy scallop with fresh pear was the prime example of that. Broken down into three different components, there was ham on top of the meaty scallop with the pear and there was a surprise layer of powdered dried shrimp enveloped between the two.

On paper, the Deep fried spare ribs was like what the name suggested – something shrimp paste. But it was slightly more than that. The Deep fried spare ribs were coated with a layer of shrimp paste, giving it the luscious and fragrance texture. Inside, it was rewarding with the meat being juicy and so succulent.

Wok Fried Crocodile Meat

I used to have crocodile meat when I was a kid, as it can cure asthma. Even thought Summer Palace’s rendition was wok-fried, the finely sliced crocodile meat tasted somewhat more like shabu-shabu. Have you tried crocodile meat before? Go to Summer Palace restaurant for their Wok-fried crocodile meat with spicy sauce ($40).

Eight Treasure Fried Rice

All of us thoroughly enjoyed the Eight Treasures Fried Rice ($26) that had ingredients like scallop, roasted duck, char siew, olives, brown rice, and dried shrimp.

Summer Palace Mooncake

I know It’s kind of early to have moon-cakes in July when the actual Mid Autumn festival is in September, but the folks at The Regent Hotel gave us a sneak preview of their new moon-cakes for this year. If you are keen to sample some of the mooncakes, they will be available at The Regent Singapore from the 25th August to 22th September.

It was quite hilarious that a few of us actually arranged a date during the dinner, to come back and try their dim sum offerings. We went back for the dim sum last week, most of them was pretty good, but unfortunately my camera was sent for repair and I didn’t manage to get any photos. If you had tried their dim sum before, check out my list of Dim Sum Restaurants in Singapore for other options.

Restaurant Review
Summer Palace Chinese Restaurant
1 Cuscaden Road 3F
The Regent Singapore
Tel: +65 6725 3288

Comments

8 Responses to “Summer Palace Restaurant The Regent Singapore”

lotsofcravings
July 26th, 2010 @ 9:38 am

im not sure whether u would have want sliced wagyu, the delicate meat would have been well done by the time the “wok tossing action” is over.
Joyce
July 26th, 2010 @ 10:33 am

Since you’ve started the “mooncake” theme, Cookie Museum is making mooncakes this year. All snowskin and they make everything from scratch. Their durian is a winner. There’s also one with fig which I like. Interesting texture. The others (like green tea and a couple of others which I can’t remember) are misses. That’s why I can’t remember!
Mei Teng
July 26th, 2010 @ 11:41 am

A sumptous meal

Have never tasted gold leaf before.
ladyironchef - Singapore Food Blog
July 31st, 2010 @ 12:42 pm

lotsofcravings: hahaha trudax! but the thick blocks of wagyu were quite a waste. it didn’t really taste as good

joyce: Cookie museum is jumping into the mooncake wagon too?!? whoa, but it’s so good? how much are they priced at?

Mei Teng: hahah gold leaf actually don’t have any taste, it just makes everything else looks good : )
Joyce
July 31st, 2010 @ 10:45 pm

$60+ for 4 pieces. I’m not surprised they’ve jumped in, just a matter of time. I wish they’d allow a mix of flavours cos buying 4 durian AND 4 fig would just be too much to handle esp if I’m buying others as well.
ladyironchef - Singapore Food Blog
August 6th, 2010 @ 12:43 am

yea, but i probably wont go to the Cookie Museum for mooncakes? lol i still prefer the traditional ones though :p
Steffy
September 17th, 2010 @ 10:22 pm

I received the Durian Baileys mooncakes from a client and was surprised that the taste was fantastic. Very smooth texture and thank god they didnt freeze it like the GOodwood Park ones.

I threw away the goodwood ones cos they were terrible.

Which hotel has the best traditional ones? I am always getting from Da Zhong Guo.
Marie
August 6th, 2011 @ 2:20 am

The Cookie Museum sells only 10 boxes of durian mooncakes a day!
Cant believe it. Went today to order and they asked me to go back tomorrow!!! Coz they reach quota for the day.

any one knows where else sells great durian mooncakes besides the usual goodwood park?????