save water drink beer.
there’s something about chef willin low, courtesy of wild rocket/relish. he seems to have mastered the art of singaporean-western fusion, combination local flavors and delicacies seamlessly and splendidly together to form interesting and inspired dishes.
relish by wild rocket, is a scaled version, burger-cafe version of the more atas wild rocket restaurant @ mount sophia. but the chef’s signature dishes and philosophy of asian-western fusion dishes is still very present. sited at myvillage @ serangoon gardens, it is quite the hidden find, but judging by the crowds during lunchtime, it might be quite the open secret.
ambience wise, i like relish’s pared down, simple cafe design — with sleek metal furniture, full length glass windows, white brick walls. cutesy drawings on blackboards break the monotony of the minimalist design, and imbues a certain sense of playful warmth to the surroundings. i suspect servers are also judiciously chosen, being all of young, cute gals that are amicable, friendly and very presentable. top marks for branding yet again.
let’s talk about food.
set meal mushroom soup. (set meal costs $12.90 and comes with soup, along with discounted prices for desserts)
simple mushroom soup with a dash of truffle oil that really elevates the smell of the dish. sadly, i couldn’t really taste much of the truffle oil when drinking the soup. pretty decent stuff tough, not like the watered-down sort you get at common western chains like swensens (and think about it.. the set meal price is pretty reasonable if you consider that swensens pretty much charges at the same rate).
aglio oilio with crabmeat (pasta of the day – one possible selection for the set menu)
mom ordered the pasta of the day. looks pretty good. but p’haps tad small a serving.
wild rocket beef burger – arugula, sarawak pepper cream, sun dried tomato relish together with a nicely charred, medium rare patty ($12.90)
this doesn’t come with a set meal sadly. supposedly there signature dish, this is the beef burger done artfully, the patty being juicy and yet crisp at the edges. the sarawak pepper cream added a certain spiciness to the dish which distinguished it for common burgers out there. i noted that they called arugula arugula instead of rocket which is kinda wierd since the burger is known as wild rocket beef burger. ah wells.. i notice wierd things.
for sides, i got the onion rings (+2.50), which were not your ordinary run-of-the-mill rings, but nicely battered and crispy. yummy.
pandan-infused panna cotta in a pool of gula melaka ($3.00 with the set meal)
the set meal makes things really quite affordable. this interesting local variant of the panna cotta was refreshing, and the sweetness gula melaka went well with the light frothiness of the pandan panna cotta.
deconstructed strawberry cheesecake, ($3.50 with set meal)
i think i finally understand the point of deconstructed desserts. it allows you to be the masterchef to combine ingredients by yourself and essentially recreate the entire flavor of the familiar dessert within your mouth. of course, each deconstructed piece has to be delicious and well made – such as in the case of this strawberry cheescake, with a delicious walnut crumble, cream cheese, ice cream and strawberries in syrup. you take a sample of each portion in your spoon and eat the entire spoonful in one shot, hence essentially recreating the flavors of the strawberry cheesecake instantly. to me, such a way of eating actually enhanced the flavors of the dessert, since you could taste every single ingredient on its own and also the overall impression of the dessert.
overall, definitely come here for the set lunch — for the same price that you would pay at many local establishments that push out pretty mundane, uninspired dishes, you get interesting satisfying flavors in a really chillax environment. i like. i would also want to come back and try the various different burgers with local twists, from chilli soft shell crab burger, to blue cheese and pear burger. mmm. 7.5/10
relish (serangoon gardens) | 1 Maju Ave, #02-07/09 myVillage at Serangoon Garden | burgers, desserts, chill out
