The Orchard Cafe reopens with a Signature Class Buffet of Singaporeans’ Favourites at Orchard Hotel

After a hiatus to renovate the restaurant’s interior and concept, The Orchard Cafe has finally reopened on 19 November 2018 to showcase a creatively-bolstered series of Singaporean food that’s both photo and taste worthy, headed by Executive Chef Bryce Li. The new cafe is beautiful, having elements of handcrafted ingenuity – like the bamboo patterned counters. Its concept is a “Food-Garden”, which explains the greenery-themed interior and food displays.

The Salad Bar boasts a collection of fresh greens in huge cylinders, like in a Green House. And there is also another salad bar, full of creative international salads that are served in small portions.

The chilled Angel Hair Pasta with Crab Meat is a refreshing start to the meal. 

The Kimchi Beef Salad is another addictive cold salad if you want something flavourful, punchy and spicy.

The Korean Octopus Salad gives adequately sliced pieces (not like the too-big or chunky octopuses that you see elsewhere) and it’s got tomatoes and cucumbers. The chilled salad bar definitely whets our appetite for what’s to come – seriously, they’d be fine on their own too!

The Braised Beef Bone Marrow in Spicy Stew is full of strong flavour – you can eat both the beef bits surrounding the bone and the marrow from inside the bone. Having been stewed for many hours, the meat is tender and rich in flavour. What a unique dish! You don’t find bone marrows easily in buffets, that’s for sure.

The Assam Wagyu Prime Rib tastes like a caramelised meat, glazed and roasted with delicious Assam sauce! This is definitely worth going back for seconds.

They serve a wicked bowl of Singaporean Prawn Noodles! It lists under their Signature Class “collection”, which is a highlight in this buffet. There are several other highlights, which change, and consist of Golden favourites, like Braised Pork Belly Bee Hoon in Opah Leaf Pocket, Asian Noodles like Laksa, Thai Boat Noodles, Prawn Mee.

There’s a Rojak station for fans of the dish! Abundant rojak sauces for you to try out too.

The Orchard Cafe prides itself on several of their Char-Grilled dishes. There are the Char-Grilled Vegetables, Spice Chicken, Chorizo, Red Barramundi. They use entire steel counters to chargrill their ingredients, which is different from other “portable” char-grills that other restaurants typically make use of.

Their satays are another cult favourite – apart from the usual beef, mutton, and chicken, they’ve also got exotic-tasting ones, like the Beef Tripe and Duck Heart. The usual satays are smokingly tasty. Unfortunately, we were a bit too faint-hearted to try the exotic ones!

They’ve also got their seafood corner: Prawns, mussels, and scallops. Fresh as the sea, and succulent! We love that they’ve got lots of sauces to match with their seafood, and not just Tabasco Sauce >.< Sushi isn’t lacking from their menu either. Here is the Maki set, as well as the Dashi sushis.

Another specialty of this buffet is their desserts spread! It’s filled with local and international desserts spruced up prettily – and boy are they delicious too!

You can’t leave the Orchard Cafe without trying their Signature Mango Cake dessert, or their Milo Panna Cotta! The Mango cake is fluffy and light, and the mango taste isn’t overpowering. The Milo Panna Cotta was one of our most-liked choices as well – just imagine our childhood favourite drink being put into pudding form! Yummy.

The Gula Melaka Pandan Chiffon was a beauty, but a tad too crumbly for our liking.

The Yam Creme Brulee, too, was a bit too grainy as opposed to smooth. They’re uniquely localised, but probably need some getting used to! Props to the desserts team at this point

The Tiramisu Cake is a special, classic dessert with all the fruits and ladyfinger biscuits lining the cake. Delicious! The Strawberry Tarts were pretty amazing too! I would’ve gone for two if only my stomach could hold up after all that boisterous feasting.

Finally, a ‘sweet’ surprise was the collection of kuehs in the dessert section! As good as the kuehs you grew up with, we must say!

Anyone up for Pandan Kaya Soft Serve? I’ve unbeknownstly decorated it to look like a Christmas tree (Marshmallows as presents, Hundreds and Thousands as ball decorations, and Pink Chocolate Rolls as more decorations)! It tastes exactly like how you’d expect pandan kaya to taste like, except that its served icy cold. What a way to end the local buffet feasting! Merry Christmas!

 

Pricing

Orchard Cafe Singapore

442 Orchard Road Singapore, Singapore 238879

Website: https://www.millenniumhotels.com/en/singapore/orchard-hotel-singapore/orchard-cafe/

 

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Images and write up by @chowbaccas

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