Claimed to be the world's ranked number one porridge (天下第一粥), i have heard of A-One for quite a number of years now although in addition to its fabulously-claimed porridge, there's also a fair share of comments regarding its high pricing.
Mom enjoys porridge, especially when the ingredients are fresh and the porridge is served piping hot! In A-One, the porridge is delivered in a claypot that locks in the hot temperature for a longer period of time. This obviously benefits my mom; however, her son (as in I), has always preferred room-temperature porridge!
Since both mom and younger sister were patrons of A-One before, i left the ordering in their good hands; two types of porridge, deep fried pumpkin and lotus root with creamy egg sauce, spinach with assorted eggs and one hot tea to be shared.
Assorted Dried Fruit Tea (果粒茶) - this was surprisingly invigorating with a refreshing aroma that perked up my tired soul. The sweetness complemented the fruity sourness and its richness surpassed tea-bags that some restaurants love to use for their beverage.
Best of all, you can refill and the waitress would even come forth and ask if you need a refill. Contrast this to the tea we had at Dutch Baby Cafe where refill was absolutely disallowed. I do feel that as a mature adult, i can bloody gauge for myself that a tasteless cup of a tea is a result of too much refill.
Deep Fried Pumpkin and Lotus Roots with Salted Egg (咸蛋奶油金瓜莲藕) - with salted egg sauce being the recent food fad, it just seemed right for us to give this a try.
Thick salted egg sauce encapsulated the crispy batter and this was already a satisfaction before we even dig in! The natural earthly flavour of lotus roots had strangely overpowered the salted egg taste and i didn't get as much enjoyment as i thought i should; good but not as nice as lotus roots chips generously sprinkled with salted egg yolk powder.
Pumpkin was way better with bursts of soft, almost liquefied pumpkin meat that complemented perfectly with the sauce; resulting in a flavour that wasn't overly sweet yet palatable.
Dried Scallop Sliced Fish with Fish Roe Porridge (干贝鱼片鱼子粥) - among all meat, fish counts as my mom's favourite and this was for her.
Cooked in a way similar to Cantonese-style congee, i think it's ingenious to add fish roe to porridge as they provided mini explosions of flavour to the smooth consistency of the porridge. My issue was on the blandness of the porridge after removing fish roe from the picture.
Dried Scallop Porridge with Century Egg and Minced Meat (干贝皮蛋肉碎粥) - same type of porridge as the sliced fish with fish roe with different ingredients.
Compared to sliced fish with fish roe, this was better flavoured, thanks to the century egg. Blame it on my taste buds as they couldn't grasp even a mild whiff of the dried scallops! Personally, this was also quite normal as it can be commonly found in hawker centres at a price of about S$3.50 (with an egg).
Spinach with Assorted Eggs (三蛋苋菜) - Saltiness of salted egg yolk, addictive pungency and taste of century egg and unmistakable flavour of plain eggs; mixed them up in a wok and work up the wok hei!
Result - a great plate of spinach with assorted eggs that in my opinion was very hard to find. Many places either have a too watery version or one that didn't bring out the uniqueness of each type of egg; some were too salty, others could do by just putting in century eggs.
Remember the bland porridge i mentioned earlier? Add in the porridge for that extra oomph as it totally enhanced the flavour!
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Location
1 Harbourfront Walk, #B2-25/25A,
VivoCity, Singapore 098585
Website
Pricing
Assorted Dried Fruit Tea - S$7.90
Deep Fried Pumpkin and Lotus Roots with Salted Egg - S$14.90
Sliced Fish with Fish Roe Porridge - S$13.90
Porridge with Century Egg and Minced Meat - S$10.90
Spinach with Assorted Eggs - S$3.90 (promo price)
(Subject to Service Charge and GST)