Savour 2012 : Overwhelmed by Food

30th March 2012. Written by Xin Li.
Savour is a gathering for foodies….imagine all the Restaurant Week restaurants, all your favourite grocery stalls and all free cooking lessons gathered in one place. 44 SGD (of which 21-24 is your pocket money) is ridiculously cheap if you want to have a wholesome epicurean journey but don’t have the luxury of wealth and time to sample all the restaurants within one week.

Furthermore, some of the restaurants they brought in are Michelin-starred (not that it mattered to me) and are rather well-known abroad such as Bo Innovation.

Initially, I was skeptical about Savour 2012…..but after attending today’s afternoon session, I am convinced it was all worth it. I managed to get the ticket at 40 bucks (early bird price) with 24 dollars Savour Dollars (SD) included as part of Visa promotion. The day started off on a rather depressing note as there was a heavy downpour but that didn’t seem to stop the crowd from enjoying the national passion for food.

Instead of munching away at the Gourmet Village, we headed for the Gourmet Market. The selection was impressive with a variety of vendors selling wines, spirits, cheeses, cold cuts, macarons to exotic teas and oils. It is the foodie’s wet dream.

They even have a full-fledged ThreeSixty Marketplace (under Cold Storage) set up but unlike the real one at ION this one offers you to taste their wide selection of cheese.

Australian grass-fed beef from Diamantina.

Or Five Star Lamb from Australia. Really tender lamb loin and the game flavour wasn’t too strong.

Or indulge in some caviar if you have the money. They offered tastings of a selection of roe too.

If haven’t tried Iberico ham, you get to taste it here, the Italian prosciutto is just next door.

There is also a sashimi station, they looked really good. As you can see from the price tags, unlike the other vendors at the event, the ThreeSixty Marketplace accepts cash.

Oriole Coffee, helmed by some of Singapore’s top baristas have a stall here too offering coffee for 3-6 SD (Savour Dollars), their coffee beans are being sold for 18 SD here and they also offer some discounts for their Bodum coffeeware.

Macarons by de la Crème looks yummy but we didn’t get to try.

Windowsill Pies offers balanced and addictive Pecan Pies among other pies such as the Pumpkin Pie & Bourbon Whip.

Foodpath Pte Ltd, under the tagline New Zealand's Finest, is the distributor for a myriad of New Zealand products including artistic preserves by the Maison Therese. Their relish and avocado oil is a must buy at the gourmet market. We enjoyed the Beetroot, Tomato and Capsicum relish very much. It goes well with crackers, bread, rice and salads.

If you are into teas, look out for the elegant looking tea bags by Tea Forte. Beautifully crafted pyramid tea bags come in all sorts of flavours such as Lemongrass Ginger, Citron Chamomile and classics like Earl Grey.

Aequitas Gourmet introduced Le Chateau Blanc macarons during the French Festival 2011 wowed us with a curry flavoured cheese.

Food toys from Japan brought in by Candy Play can be found here too.

Here is video on how it works.

ThreeSixty Marketplace also sells clotted cream!

There are many more stalls to explore at the Gourmet Market but now we head for a meal at the Gourmet Village.

The various stalls of the Gourmet Village representing their restaurants offer 3-4 samples of their signature dishes. Firstly, we visited Saint Pierre that we have long heard about but yet to try. Headed by Emmanuel Stroobant (the chef himself was present too!), it’s a pity the Grandma Stroobant’s Flourless Belgian Chocolate Cake was not on the menu.

I had the Beef Rossini (12 SD), 72-hour braised U.S prime beef short rib tartare with iced foie gras meringue and black truffle tuile and black olive scented split jus. The meringue was rather mild and has a creamy texture that sort of gel on to the tender pieces of beef. The end result was like a really good ‘mayo’ with beef. I like that the cream was light and complements the beef in terms of texture to add the smooth finish to it (although it was a tad oily).

My friend who had the Menage-A-Trois (12 SD), Scallop mousse, green tea smoked salmon and soy mirin marinated ikura; sous-vide ocean trout, steamed bulot, micro basil and rouille dressing; sushi rice croquette, spanner crab, salmon sashimi and edamane puree was slightly disappointed. She felt that the whole dish was rather ordinary, overpowered by the salmon and only the sous-vide ocean trout, steamed bulot, micro basil and rouille dressing stood out with its familiar yet exotic flavours.

After Saint Pierre, we headed over to Xu Restaurant for some modern Vietnamese cuisine by Chef Bien Nguyen from Vietnam. James had the Coconut Braised Pork Belly (12 SD), with pickled red cabbage and caramelized daikon. I enjoyed the tenderness of the braised pork belly, it was good but not spectacular.

We were wondering what is the Fine Apple Tart “a la dragees” (9 SD) from Gunther. This turned out to be the most disappointing item for the day. The apple tart was tough, limp and ordinary at best. Priced at 20++ SGD at the restaurant itself (with the Havana rum raisin ice cream), I don’t think I will fork out for such miserable looking apple tart.

The saviour for the afternoon is none other than Bo Innovation helmed by Alvin Leung. For a 2-Michelin starred booth, it offered some of the cheaper items around here from 6-9 SD only. I have read quite a bit about Bo Innovation. For a glimpse of a meal at its Hong Kong restaurant, here is a good post about it.

The first item that I tried is the Molecular Xiao Long Bao (6 SD), some of the patrons were taunting their fellow patrons who purchased this small little orb for 6 SD. But….after consuming this, this is one appetizer I gladly pay for. Within this slightly bouncy, thin yet firm skin is the “essence” of the xiao long bao, I could recognize the flavours and the familiar sensation of the soup gushing out of a normal xiaolongbao but this is different not only because of the absence of meat, but the flavours has more depth? In short, it was great.

The next item is the perfect aglio olio of the Far East. The Har Mei Lo Mein (9 SD), with har mei oil and powder is a very well executed pasta dish packed with the right amount of spiciness, oliness and crunchiness from the generous amount of roe and spring onions. This is simply addictive, I am already missing this dish!

In Hong Kong, these dishes are part of the set menus so at Savour 2012, it is an opportunity for you to try them without paying for the whole meal. However, the problem (as well as when trying other stalls) is that these items are taken out of context unless you try all the 3 items from appetizer to dessert in order. We didn’t try the Egg Waffle (9 SD) as they have ran out of ice cream due to the popular demand.

Lastly, we finish off with a Shiratama Maccha Ice Zenzai (6 SD) Red bean soup with rice flour dumplings (mochi) and maccha ice cream, a perfect dessert by Enmaru for under the burning hot weather (after a heavy rain!). This dessert managed to transport me back to Uji, Japan. It reminded me of my first encounter with the matcha ice cream and red bean.

EVENTS
As we are exploring the Gourmet Market and Gourmet Village, workshops, speeches, demonstrations and lessons are going on all the time, it is hard to get idle with so many activities to take part (and it is free).

The most worthwhile activity is none other than learning how to prepare your own meals at the Speciality Kitchen. James learnt how to prepare a 3-course meal in 30 minutes with Chef Claudio Sandri featuring Escargot, Chicken Risotto and Baked Alaska! Amazing!

Top: Escargot dish, Above, Chicken Risotto and bottom, Baked Alaska.

Savour is still on this weekend, and tickets go for 44 SGD for the afternoon session and 66 SGD for the evening session, catch it while you still can. For more information, do visit their website below.

Savour 2012 (Official Website)