Place I have been - Crave Singapore 2010 - Sizzling Kelong

As part of a series of event organise for some of the F1 delegates and those related to the event, Chef Tan Yong Hua from Pearl River Restaurant was invited to cooke up a buffet style feast for over 20 delegates, event organisers from SPOC and the rest of us from the Kelong.

The preparation started at 2pm and delegates started arriving from 4pm. Chef Tan and his assistant - a first year student Benson(I hope I get his name right!) from ITE started preparing from 5pm till about 6pm.

I am not a fine dining person. I am a Kopitiam (coffee shop) and make sure my coffee and tea stay within 80cents (lower end of price for Kopitiam to foreign visitors reading this blog) kind of person. In my first up close experience with a world famous chef (people who watch TV will know he is one of the Chef in 《名厨出走记》), I discover Chef Tan is as humble as approachable as friendly as anyone can be. I feel comfortable talking to him...relaxing even. I hope that we can have more opportunity working together next time.

The delegates are put to task in fishing for the ingredients for chef Tan to cook from the Kelong fish farm. Chef Tan exercise his professional judgement in selecting the correct size Groupa, delegates have to re-fish if the fishes being netted failed to pass his stringent requirement!

Apart from sashimi, grill fish, prawns, mussels, Rose Mary (Kelong owner) also provide rice, mee goreng, bee hoon to ensure that the buffet will be a great success!

During the event, representative from the Fourth Estate also explain how wine can compliment seafood to make it taste better! Example, white wine can bring out the taste of sweetness in Seafood. I am not an expert in this area so if there are any opinions about this, feel free to write in the comments.

This write-up will be categorised under Places I have been.