Haute hawker fare at JustIN

NEW RESTAURANT

JustIN Gastro Cafe Level 4 Tang Plaza 310 Orchard Road Singapore 238864 Tel: 6908-3003 Open daily from 11 am to 11 pm (10:30 am to 11:30 pm from Fri to Sun)

YOU know you’re old when you’re considered a “young senior”, contemplate cataract surgery and hate shopping at FairPrice because the cashier will ask if you have a senior discount card.

But step into Justin Quek’s new concept JustIN at the equally long-in-the-tooth Tangs, and you’ll feel a real blast from the past.

It’s not so much the retro-refurbished feel of the decor. From the people who eat there – the kind who shopped at the Hilton (now voco) and bought its cheesecakes back in the day – to the French apple tart and LKY capellini on JustIN’s menu, and of course the veteran chef himself, this is deja vu repurposed for the new-generation diner.

When you’ve been a chef for 40 years like Quek has – from Les Amis to Sky57 and even the original JustIN where he first served lobster hokkien mee – there’s nothing he hasn’t cooked before. So the menu at his Tangs gastro-cafe is a walk in the park for him, even though there are more items than a Chinese restaurant’s dim sum menu and it’s open all day from brunch to tea-time and dinner.

If you’re looking for a theme, there isn’t one. It’s French bistro meets Hokkien char meets Korean ajumma meets caviar salesman who tries to slip you 30gm of oscietra when you least expect it. Quek is covering all bases and budgets and from the looks of the steady stream of people filing in, he seems to have struck a chord.

Half the battle is won by its location. Right in Orchard Road, with no real Asian food outside of Food Republic or Chatterbox at the old Mandarin (now Hilton). It’s accessible and pleasant looking with its creamy white louvred doors and budget-conscious but nicely pulled-together interiors.

It’s the other half that’s still open to the jury. You’re not in fine-dining territory but strictly casual ground so that’s where the expectations should be. Namely, decent but not shout-out good cooking, although you may grumble fairly loudly about the pricing which is medium to high.

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The menu covers a lot of ground geographically – an all-purpose Asian section stretches from Singapore to Korea with bulgogi, prawn ramen and foie gras xiao long bao in the mix. If you want to add a touch of Gallic, there’s escalope of foie gras or crepinette of pig’s trotters.

We stick to Asian instead, lured by snacks of steamed conch snails (S$13) aka gong gong, and the convenience of not having to pick them out of their shells. It’s the simple pleasure of slippery, rubbery but tender morsels dipped into a spicy Thai dressing. Chicken gizzards (S$10 for two sticks) are spiked with salt and dusty smoky spiced chilli powder – great for mindless fun chewing.

So far so simple. The first real bite comes from deep fried mantou buns filled with slices of iberico pork char siu (S$18 for three pieces) and sliced pickles. Individually they’re fine but together they’re like a reluctant banh mi – an odd combination of bun and pork without the taste of char siu, pickles without the acidity and a sauce that should have been there but didn’t show up.

Lobster hokkien mee (S$35) hits the spot and the wallet, but there’s a hunky specimen in our bowl of stock-fortified rich noodles and sambal on the side to amp it up. But we pay for our enthusiasm later with a slaking thirst that makes you wonder if some secret seasoning hadn’t slipped into the broth like some secret palate assassin.

The much-touted LKY Capellini (S$30) unnecessarily named after Lee Kuan Yew because Quek used to cook it for him is a shadow of what it could have been – a clump of over-oiled, overcooked noodles and overaged crab meat in an awkward combination.

Korean fried rice (S$23) is pricey because the ikan bilis in it has a Korean passport. Again, there seems to be an oil surplus in the kitchen but there’s a good whiff of wok hei and the anchovies are crunchy, and a fried egg always makes things better.

And we do have a sweet ending, in the form of a very nice piping hot, fluffy fresh souffle (S$18) all nice and wobbly and peachy good.

JustIN is a far cry from Quek’s fine-dining days but a cafe like his has a place where it is. Convenient, comfortable and food you don’t think too much about. Less special seasoning would be good, but there’s always the French side to try next.

Rating: 6