Chinese New Year's sweets and goodies Time!!!
A blind taste test on perennial Chinese New Year goodies. Which are the testers' favourites ?
The Lowdown:
Chinese
New Year is the time to feast and binge on all the sweet goodies
and forget about the fat and flab. This is also the time when
many aunties will be selling home baked cookies from their
kitchens--all made according to traditional recipes. Makansutra
must agree that the best Chinese New Year cookies are made
by all these aunties but we can't reveal their contacts because
they are not licensed shops, you can only know about them
by word of mouth. So, for those who don't have a clue on where
to buy these home baked cookies, Makansutra scoured the shops
to shortlist a few reasonably good ones and made nine makanmatas
and makankakis spent a Saturday afternoon tasting and grading
the goodies for you.
Pineapple Tarts:
| From | Price | |
| Swensen's | $16.80 | |
| Bengawan Solo | $8.80 | |
| Smiling Orchid | (closed-faced) | $13 |
| (open-faced) | $15 | |
| Bakery Depot | $23 | |
| Seasons | $10.80 | |
| De Cooking House | $15 | |
| Kimzara | $12.80 | |
| Glory | $10 | |
| Sin Tiong Wah | $12 | |
Glory and Helen's Deli came out tops with a 2.5- chopsticks
grading. The one from Glory has a generous filling and is
a little sweet while the pastry has a biscuit texture. Helen's
Deli has a softer and lighter pastry that wraps around a small
chunk of pineapple filling that tastes pretty sweet too. Smiling
Orchid's closed-faced tarts clinched a 2-chopsticks rating
with a good balance of filling and pastry. If you don't like
melt-in-your mouth type of pineapple tarts, Sin Tiong Wah's
should be your preference. The pastry is a little hard like
a cookie texture with generous fillings. The priciest tarts
from Bakery Depot (about $1 each) are huge and have excellent
pineapple filling. But, the pastry is too soft that you can't
even hold the tart in your hands--it just crumbles.
 |
Glory
139 East Coast Road Tel: 344 1749 |
|
|
Helen's
Deli Block 39A Commonwealth Ave #01-344 Tel: 474 4168 |
 |
Smiling
Orchid 29 Boon Tat Street Tel: 220 7660 |
 |
Sin
Tiong Wah Eating House #89-00509 East Coast Road |
Love
letters
| From | Price | |
| Swensen's | $11.80 | |
| Bengawan Solo | $16 | |
| Smiling Orchid | $15 | |
| Seasons | $9.49 | |
| De Cooking House | $12 | |
| Helen's Deli | $16.50 | |
Helen's Deli is a hot favourite with a 2.5-chopstick rating. The bite is shiok (satisfying) as it's crispy and fragrant and you could taste the egg and coconut in it. The texture is light though not too thin. Bengawan Solo is good too, with a 2-chopsticks rating. It's light and crispy though not as fragrant as Helen's Deli and the texture is thinner. The one at De Cooking House is light and sprinkled with sesame seeds for an added taste.
|
|
Helen's Deli Block 39A Commonwealth Ave #01-344 Tel: 474 4168 |
|
Bengawan Solo Outlets all over Singapore Tel: 756 9088 |
Sugee cookies
| From | Price | |
| Swensen's | $10.80 | |
| Bengawan Solo | $10.80 | |
| De Cooking House | $15 | |
The Cooking House has the best rating of 1.5-chopsticks while the other two have a 1-chopstick rating. The cookies from De Cooking House are fragrant, soft and moist. The best sugee cookie would be one that combines the taste of De Cooking House with the texture of Swensen's.
 |
De Cooking
House 137 Amoy Street #01-04 Far East Square Tel :538 2168 |
Barbecued Pork (Bak Kwa)
From
Tung
Lok
Bee Hock Guan
Bee Cheng Hiang
Sang Hock Guan
Kim Hock Guan
Kim Hwa Guan
Kim Peng Hiang
(Prices are all between $33 to $36 per kilogram, except Ting Lok's which costs $22 per 500g.)
Notice that almost every bak kwa store has either Kim or Guan in its name? We wonder why? Anyway, we queued at Lim Hock Guan (supposedly selling the best bak kwa in Singapore), and had to give up after one and a half hours as the queue hardly moved. But the other bak kwa stalls are pretty good too. Sang Hock Guan, Kim Hock Guan and Kim Peng Hiang are the favourites with 2-chopsticks rating. They are tender, nicely grilled and not too sweet.
Goodies from the hotels
Hotels offer more sophisticated goodies for this season and all the goodies come beautifully packaged. Our top favourite is Shangri-La Hotel's Chinese New Year goodies box from Shang Palace. All the pastries look delicate and are so attractively laid out in the box that you just want to admire and not eat them. We like the ones with the pine nuts, lotus paste and ginger fillings.
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|
Glory
139 East Coast Road Tel: 344 1749 |
|
|
Helen's
Deli Block 39A Commonwealth Ave #01-344 Tel: 474 4168 |
|
Sang Hock Guan Blk 163 Ang Mo Kio Ave 4 #01-446 Tel: 458 7374 |
|
Sin
Tiong Wah Eating House #89-00509 East Coast Road |
|
Kim
Peng Hiang 465 Changi Road (near Kembangan MRT station) Tel: 747 6853 |
