Pine Valley

Had a chance to gather around for a meal with the Yebbers on a fine Saturday to commemorate a rather interesting event which i will not go into specifics. Either way, the meal is free and i've always wanted to dine in Laguna Country Club for no apparent reason other then its a country club. So here we are and this is what we had. As i didn't pay for this meal, i'll only give my take on the food quality and service.

Location: 11 Laguna Golf Green

Contact: 62481755

Koi Pond

Pine Valley

Doorway

Interior

Laguna country club hosts a variety of golf tournaments throughout the year, including big name events like the Singapore Masters and the Women's Open nary a year ago. The location is scenic with lush green pastures and an air of luxury that extends beyond the greens and into the eating places housed within. Pine Valley is a relaxed, open and well air conditioned place for the inhabitants and club members and also a good place to reside for a nice chat as its sparsely populated even during the lunch hours.

Shark's Fin Soup with Fish Maw, Chicken and Mushrooms

Serving

Shark's fin soup is one of those dishes that i associate with wedding dinners and extremely wealthy individuals. This will likely fall into the latter category. The soup itself is quite starchy and has a really generous helping of ingredients, shark's fin and fish maw. Taken on its own, there's a sweet taste that emanates from the healthy does of crab and mushrooms in the mix but otherwise, tastes bland as most shark's fin soup tastes. Vinegar and pepper definitely ups the taste and texture department in this case.

Peking Duck

Egg Based and Flour Pancake

Black Pepper Duck

The beauty of the Peking Duck dish is undeniable. Order a whole duck and you'll get to eat it in a variety of ways for the skin and the meat. The only things standing between you and the dish is the knowledge of whether the duck skin is marinated and roasted well. In this case, the skin is quite fatty and crispy enough to warrant a try. The marinate feels non existant and the normal pancake is too dry. The egg version salvaged the situation though. The meat was cooked in black pepper and turned out surprisingly good. It was moist, succulent and sweet. It also helped that the portion size was rather big.

Wasabi Mayonnaise Prawns

Wasabi Mayonnaise prawns, a signature dish of the Tung Lok group, this version turned out too dry for me. The batter and frying process seemed to have been overdone which left the prawns tasting hard and dry instead of crunchy and juicy. No matter, the wasabi mayonnaise was mixed well and provided a small kick in the right direction since it was rather mild and easily acceptable.

Steamed Batang

This fish was huge. Simple steamed fish can be good as long as the fish itself was fresh and the process of cooking was not overdone. Sad to say however, the fish was overcooked and thus caused the meat to loss some of its sweetness which could have made it better. For what its worth, what is good is that the meat is plentiful, fresh and went well with the salty and sourish stock accompanying the dish.

Dried Chili Fried Prawns

Somehow, i don't think the restaurant handles prawns well. This dish was decent but the taste resides only within the portion of the shell. This means that once deshelled, which is a necessary procedure unless you are lazy like me, the prawn itself is rather bland. Otherwise, the spicy and fragrant dried chili is something spice lovers will easily take to.

Beancurd with Spinach

Finally, some greens. The spinach turned out too old and had the "greenish" taste which accompanies greens not cleaned properly. Although a tad salty, the spinach with all its flaws, ultimately tasted better then the beancurd atop it, which came across as being totally tasteless.

Fried Ee Fu Noodles

By the time this dish appeared, we'd pretty much been stuffed like a duck awaiting slaughter. So the taste buds have deteriorated to the point i couldn't taste much. Nonetheless, the noodles were fragrant and had some bacon bits strewn around it. It was also springy and soft enough to be bitten off which is always a good sign.

Almonds, Sea Coconut, Pine Apple and Longan Cocktail

The dessert is rather simple but definitely gets the job done. I like the almond which was very soft and strong (i'm biased because i love almond). Everything else was just detail though. The other good thing was that the sweetness was just right, thus it didn't overwhelm.

Overall Score: 6.5/10

Last Word:
First of all, thank you for the meal boss, i probably couldn't afford having such a huge sumptuous meal all on my lonesome. The view was good, location is quiet, food is decent and the portions were huge. I'd say the place was pretty good but i still don't know how much it cost so thats an open topic. Based on the food alone, i would probably like to have the shark's fin again, Peking duck however, is still better at Hai Tien lo.