Riverside Grilled Fish 江边城外 @ Raffles City



With a moniker like Riverside Grilled Fish 江边城外, I would expect authentic chinese cuisine. At least the name made it sound like some scenic restaurant along West Lake in Hang Zhou except this is in a concrete jungle in a shopping mall. And so I snapped out of the ideals in my head and decided to give this new kid a go. 





With such a legendary dish on their menu and 5.000,000 sold in the last decade, something has to be great about it. At least I thought.


Instead of peanuts or pickles, they offer sunflower seeds with shells ($2) and this reminded me of CNY. It's more hygenic and addictive too cracking these sunflower seeds before food is served (too fast).

The restaurant is decorated like we were in China, from choice of tableware to chairs and even ornaments.


Spinach with Mixed Nuts ($6.80)

I typically would turn my nose up on cold spinach with raisins and chinese almonds. Yet, this worked its charm on me. The briney cold vegetables with occasional bursts of nuttiness and sweetness was actually addictive.


Signature Chinese Sausage Rice ($8.80)

Portions for 2-3, this simple chinese sausage fried rice was considered a signature and I concur! Tastiest of the lot of dishes and best eaten with their fish.


Spicy Pork Chop Noodles ($10.80)

A humongous letdown with soggy noodles and a barely there cardboard tasting pork chop.


Wanton Soup Noodles ($9.80)

I have nothing palatable to say about their noodles. 



Red Sauce Wanton ($5.80)

I've had very good 紅油抄手s else where and these were hardly stellar. The spicy paste was barely biting and those shrimp wantons were pretty ordinary too.



Grilled Patin Fish ($35)

The single dish that was ever present at all tables. There is a choice of type of fish and it sure looked massive with the copious amounts of dried chillies and peppercorns but hardly as legendary as they claim. Well granted it was fish swimming in chilli oil, and thankfully this did not taste stale and that was really just it. Perhaps things may have worked out better with additional toppings but this was hardly wow apart from the presentation.

Once and probably not again since the dishes from noodles to wantons and even spices did not quite appeal, even the one who frequents China more than I cab was not impressed.

Riverside Grilled Fish 江边城外
Raffles City B1-06/07

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