meat n' chill, bukit timah.
R is a steak person, so i was poking around looking for steak places for dinner when i remembered meat n' chill, which i've wanted to try for a while. everyone was okay with the menu, so i made reservations for a saturday dinner.
having the downtown line makes getting to bukit timah road without a car so much easier! the place was just a couple of minutes' walk from sixth avenue station- really quite accessible now.
i was extremely torn about whether to get the steak or the ribs (they had one glazed with a combination of guinness stout, marmite and molasses) but went with the red neck soo-veed ribeye ($27) in the end. every main came with a choice of two sides. i went for the mashed potatoes and sweet pickled apples n' onions. R, of course, went for the 500g soo-veed strip steak ($27), but strangely enough there was no option to choose sides- it automatically came with a double portion of fries.
C's hickory ribs ($19) came first. it was quite a formidable amount of ribs, and C, having a bird-like stomach as she does, donated quite a bit of it to me (yay!). i quite liked the ribs- the meat was tender and it was easy to remove it off the bone. the ribs were quite meaty as well. i'd probably want to come back to try their more exotic flavours.
happily enough our food came in quick succession. R's steak was massive, and fries filled up the rest of the plate. i tried a bit of hers, too, and while it was good, i much preferred my ribeye.
our steaks were both perfectly medium rare, just as requested, but mine, being ribeye, was definitely fattier and juicier. the accompanying red wine sauce went well, too. the sides were also prepared with care- the star was definitely the mashed potatoes. all of us finished our individual portions of mashed potatoes, and L commented that she could do with another. i loved that it was creamy and buttery, and that it wasn't completely smooth- there were lumps of potato to add texture. the pickled apples n' onions (really just pickled apples) was refreshingly tart, providing a great balance to the creaminess of the mash.
L got the crispy skin grilled salmon ($19). being just 160g, its size looked minuscule compared to ours. it came with tobiko cream sauce, and since L cleaned her plate, i'm assuming it was good.
the mains were simple, nothing fancy, but i love it when simple things are done well. food was reasonably priced as well. the thing that was lacking, however, was probably service. service was brusque, but i would've overlooked it if they were efficient (they weren't). we finished our mains and had ordered dessert, but they didn't clear our plates until they had to serve the dessert, and found that there wasn't space on the table. even then, only half of the table was cleared, and we were left looking at each other, wondering if they were going to come back to clear the other half. (they eventually did, probably five minutes later.) they also didn't serve us water until halfway through the meal, and never did come back to top up our water (the glass was pretty small).
ridiculously enough we waited for more than half an hour for our waffle. we were half suspecting that they'd forgotten our orders and sent L to go and check- apparently they'd accidentally put chocolate sauce on ours (we ordered it sans sauce) so they had to remake it. but really? more than half an hour? and no one even came to offer us an explanation until we went looking for it. when the waffle with vanilla ice-cream ($7) finally arrived, we heaved a sigh of relief.
oddly enough it comes as a stack of three (don't waffles usually come served as an even number?) but C was too full to have any, so it worked out fine. the waffle was the biscuity, crisp type which i grew to like after a few bites. for $7 including ice-cream, not too bad. the wait was horrendous, though.
food was good, and i can see myself coming back when i have a meat craving. they do have to improve on service, though.
meat n' chill
805 bukit timah road
#01-04
https://www.facebook.com/meatnchill/
