Tanjong Pagar Market Food Center - Herbal Kitchen Preserved Vegetable Chicken Soup

Today, it is back to Tanjong Pagar Market Food Center for lunch. I was thinking of the theme that I should be doing this week. Since I started with Herbal Kitchen yesterday, I thought I might as well do the theme - “Herbal Kitchen Stall”, and sample all the different dishes the stall offers. The food that this stall sells is all very nourishing stuff. The main ingredient is chicken in some sort of Chinese herb.

Browsing through the menu, I found one that does not have herb in it – Preserved Vegetable Chicken ($3.50). It has been a long long time since I last ate preserved vegetables and thought that this dish would be a nice change to the soup I had yesterday. 

From the menu, I thought the dish would be a dry one but was surprised when it turned out really soupy.  

The rice ($0.40) that I add to the soup that came with some braised peanuts and drizzled with sauce.

There were plenty of preserved vegetables surrounding the chicken drumstick. The soup was a little sweet, quite a contrast to the taste I had in mind.  To me, this is a well balanced meal as you get fiber from the vegetable, protein from the meat and carbohydrate from the rice.

First Working Day in 2011

Off to a good start on the first working day of the year by starting it with a sumptuous breakfast from Burger King (BK). Decided to make a detour to BK on the way to office and ordered a breakfast set that I had never ordered before – Turkey Bacon Croissan’wich

My Croissan’wich – Turkey Bacon with Hashbrown ($5.45). Good to see that BK has come up with new initiative such as the sticktogo which acts as a stopper for the takeaway cup.  They could have made it more environmentally friendly by lengthening the stick such that it can double up as a stirrer.

The croissan’wich with the cheese, egg and crispy bacon is simply the best one can have for breakfast to kick start the year! J

For lunch, I really pampered myself by ordering a Ginseng Chicken Soup with Rice ($3.80) from the Herbal Kitchen Stall (unit #02-11) at Tanjong Pagar Market.

Close-up of my rice drizzled with some sauce and braised peanuts.

Close-up of the Ginseng and chicken drum in the soup. The soup was pleasantly light and the flavor of the ginseng was not overpowering. The chicken has been cooked so well that it takes very little effort to break it away from the bones. Yummy J

Best of all, the rain prevented us from returning to our office and we ended the meal with desserts from Dessert Hut!

My Gingko Barley Dessert ($1.50)

Barcelos@Vivocity

This is the 2nd "official" food tasting session with my team..

Running out of ideas, we decided to hit Vivo City and went to Barcelos on the recommendation of a col. As we went before 12, the restaurant was stil quite empty and it was not difficult to find seats for a big group. But if you go any later, finding seats for more than 6 pax may be a bit difficult.

If you are a chicken lover, you will like the healthy grilled chicken offered there. The menu may be a bit limited for pple wanting more variety. After looking at the menu for ages, most of us decided on getting the lunch promo - 1/4 chicken with a side and free drink - which costs S$10.95. Variety for sides includes chicken soup, fries, corn, spicy wedges (need to add $2 ). I opted for the soup which came as a surprise as it was clear soup and not the creamy ones that you would associate with Western Food. It was pleasantly cleansing and sweet and came with lots of chicken and carrot shreds.

The chicken itself was not too bad. The sauces that came with it were pretty special. It reminded me of Nandos that i had in London and Australia. The peri peri sauce were really spicy for me but my cols find it ok. The tangy lemon sauce was not bad too. Think what differentiate this restaurant is the sauce that is being served. Instead of the usual chilly sauce (they have it too), you get mild peri, peri peri, super peri and tangy lemon. You can buy the sauces from the restaurant too if you really like it.


My chicken soup and drink. You can have free flow of drink if you add an additional $1.

My full meal. The plate is not supposed to be this messy. They mixed up my col and my order and we have to do the swop ourselves hence the "dirty" plate. I had asked for mild peri sauce to go with my chicken but they did it as super peri instead which was my col's order.






My col's Grilled chicken burger meal. Forgot if it was part of the lunch promo too.. but price should not exceed 12.