You know, this is one meal at Swee Choon Tim Sum that I will be remembering for a very long time.
Not merely because it was our very first dim sum meal of the 2023 year, but also because I don't think we'd ordered a spread as large as this ever before.
Really, I'm not joking.
Most of the time it's five or six dishes when we're here.
Today it was this.
And it wasn't even all.
Maybe we were feeling particularly hungry this evening or something.
Because aside from our usual favorites of mee sua kueh, char siew chee cheong fun and bean curd skin, we ordered two baskets of xiao long bao, one serving of siew mais, deep fried prawn puffs, fried tofu with pork floss, char siew baos, and Portuguese egg tarts as well.
I don't know how we finished it all.
Actually I don't think we did- if I'm nor wrong, we dabaoed some of the food back for breakfast next day.
Dim sum at Jalan Besar is always a charm for me.
There're many items on the menu that I like, and more often than not, it takes a bit of effort to try not to order them all.
One of the things we always try to order is the mee sua kueh.
I'm not sure if other places have it- they probably do- but I find this a signature dish here at Swee Choon, and I love it, what with its soft, chewy, mee sua centers bordered by crunchy, crispy edges.
The other dish we have come to love is the xiao long baos.
It's interesting; we didn't use to order it before, but then we discovered the joy of having a wee bit of soup early in the meal, and we've ordered it every since.
Anyone who's ever eaten xiao long baos will know the instant gratification one gets upon taking the first bite.
Doesn't matter how you eat it, whether you bite into the firm, chewy skin and slurp the soup out, or whether you pop the whole dumpling into your mouth and let the soup burst out from its skin.
The brave ones choose the latter.
I prefer the former.
It lets me savor the flavors of the soup, the texture of the skin and the rich, meaty taste of the pork that slips out from the dumpling.
I had a great time eating the chee cheong fun, as well as the char siew baos, the tofu with pork floss, and the deep fried prawn puffs.
Different people have different tastes when it comes to chee cheong funs, I realize.
Some people take a fancy to the silky, smooth, paper-thin type.
Others, however, prefer the thicker, chewier type
Swee Choon's chee cheong fun sits somewhere in the center. Their rice rolls aren't as translucent as some of the other thinner cheong funs, but neither are they the super thick and chewy kind that other dim sum places have.
I like their texture.
It's suitable enough for me.
In the same way too I like their tofu with pork floss.
To some diners it's a very simple dish, nothing worth to shout about, not even worth ordering, but I find it light tasting with a contrast of textures and flavors.
At first bite you get the crisp of the very, very thin batter (I think it's batter) on your tongue, but then because it's a small cube, almost immediately you get the soft of the tofu as well.
That isn't all.
There's still the stringy bit of pork floss on top of the tofu which taste wraps itself round your tongue so that you have the flavors of salty, and faintly sweet.
Generally I'm not a strong tofu eater, but I'm happy with this one. :)
When it came to the char siew baos I decided to try eating them with etiquette aka chopsticks, but I gave up halfway and resorted to using my hands instead.
Same thing with the prawn puffs, which, by the way, are very well fried and have a single prawn inside, but you won't have much greasy, oily taste at all.
A couple of Swee Choon's fried offerings do leave you with a hint of the oil over your lips and tongue, like their yam puff, or their bean curd skin rolls, but it doesn't linger and disappears soon enough anyway.
I'm glad for the siew mais, the bean curd skin rolls and the Portuguese egg tarts which we had this evening.
I got to dabao one of each home, plus a char siew bao and a prawn puff which we couldn't finish.
Will we order less next time?
Maybe, maybe not.
If we do, well, we'll keep some for breakfast the next day.
They taste good still after the microwave.