Friday, February 18, 2011

Iggy's @ Hilton Hotel

Well, as promised here is the new review of Iggy's at its current location in Hilton Hotel.

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Even though it was during an "off-peak" month, but reservations were still almost 80% full on weekends. So this is a place where you want to reserve first before coming.

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Guests who arrive early will be ushered to this colourful corner called the "red room" because most of the furniture in this corner is red.

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Owner of Iggy's, Mr Ignatius Chan, was there at the restaurant when we were there. He is a pretty hands on guy, who has to try out all the new improved creations the chefs created before giving his stamp of approval to be served.

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Even though we managed to get a table in the main dining hall, but when we decided to check out the kitchen bar where we can see all the actions from the kitchen.

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Iggy's has spent a huge sum of money on the ventilation in the kitchen to ensure that it is free from all smells, oil and dirt. And we can confirm that we didn't smell like any of their food because we decided to sit along the kitchen counter to see first hand their chefs at work.

For our dinner, we had the Gastronomic Menu - S$250++

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First up was Iggy's Pinot Noir (S$30), a house wine of Iggy's.

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Our first Amuse Bouche was the Butternut ice cream with sweet potato. Sweet, cold and delicious.

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Next, we had the creamy Foei Gras lollipop which had a light crisp crust on the outside.

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Plus the super sweet and fresh Squid with uni and dashi tea (Japanese seaweed stock)

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The bigger appetizers we had was this Kohada fish with Tomato, Clementine, Mango, puffed Quinoa and beef. This reminds diners that spring is near.

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Bread rolls with butter and shaved cheese.

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I was surprised by the Hokkaido Scallop with celery, bacon foam, granny smith apple. Especially the bacon foam. Even though you can "eat" foam, but you can still taste a strong bacon taste in it.

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The service staff lay down a Fish knife and fork. And you know the next dish is a fish dish.

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Indeed, the fish dish we had was the Lightly cured Himi Kan-Buri (winter amberjack from Himi, Japan) with baby leek, pepper and wasabi powder. Initially, I was not sure how strong the wasabi powder was, but to my surprise, the wasabi powder was very light, in fact almost non-existence.

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This beautiful "dumpling" was the Raviolo of duck, egg and yam and dehydrated vegetables. The duck was inside the Raviolo and mashed yam underneath it.

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We were given a small cup of Duck consommé, cooked from the duck meat.

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The mains for the beef dish was the Wagyu with Nanohana flower, heirloom carrot and rosemary. Beef was tender and juicy.

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The only dish we didn't like that much was this Vacherin Mont D'or - mashed Yukon gold potato, mache and Alba black truffle. It sounded good, but perhaps it became a bit too rich. Especially when it came towards the end of the meal.

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To lighten things up, we ordered a glass of Torbreck Bothie (S$15)

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Our pre-dessert was this beautiful Gorgonzola cheese in disc

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plus the Strawberry with vin cotto sphere. The vin cotto was injected into the delicate crisp sphere and when you bite into it, the liquid flows out. Yummy.

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The chef preparing our next main dessert.

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"Winter" - Chestnut, coconut powder, coffee and lemon. Looks can be decieving. This ordinary dessert actually tasted pretty good.

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The best best part of the meal, was when the dessert chef brought out this dessert bento box. Petit fours selection offered in bento box and diners choose anything they want, or in case you cannot make up you mind, how about one of each.

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We did that! Everything was deliclious. You can even have more if you really want.

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To wash down all the yummy food, we had a Pot of tea (S$10)

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and decaffeinated coffee (S$6)

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Iggy's was one of the highlights for our 2011 even though it is still early in the year. And with such standards, I think it is not difficult for Iggy's to squeeze in to the Miele's Guide once again for 2011.


Iggy's
581 Orchard Road
Level 3
Hilton Hotel Singapore

5 comments:

  1. I was at Iggy's a few weeks ago and was totally disappointed. My evening was a disaster from the very second i stepped into the restaurant. I was made to wait for 10 minutes before i was seated despite having a reservation and that the restaurant was pretty empty - this was at 8pm. I was then seated by the hostess (who was not a local) at the counter - again there was no customer aside from my wife and myself. Somehow i cant understand why we were made to wait - perhaps i was a local and not of foreign descent.

    As for the food, it was nothing to shout about and none of the courses stood out unlike Andre, Wakughin, Les Amis and Santi.

    At $250 a head, i rather pay $30 more and head to Andre. There i know i dont have to wait 10 minutes to be seated and given the feeling that foreigners (other than Chinese) are treated better. At 9pm a French couple was also seated on the counter and the service level they received (from the waiters and chef) was truly an insult to us, Chinese.

    Apart from the French couple and a small group occupying the room, the restaurant was extremely quiet for a Thursday evening.

    In my opinion, Iggy's has to buck up or buck out. With such level of service and average food, i truly wish Ignatius and his crew the best.

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  2. Oh boy....you should seriously consider feedback to the management or Ignatius himself. I believe this is quite an usual lapse of service. My experience there was quite pleasant though. No matter what the reason maybe, Iggy is a brand name that should ensure high service quality standard in a consistent way.

    I ever had similarly horrible experience at Hsin Yeh when it first opened. The two sour faced and totally arrogant door b**** with unfriendly voice told us "full house, have to wait at least 1 hour hor.....can wait or not, cannot wait dun wait".... Totally pissed, we feedback to the management, and few weeks later, the 2 b**** were nowhere in sight, replaced by friendly service staff with big smile.

    Another total disasters were at Royal China@Raffles Hotel and Chinois@RWS, which the damage was simply to big to mend. It is a forbidden place for us since then. Never ever stepped in again.

    So Forbes Travel was correct after all, to not giving any hotel in Singapore 5 Star rating with the reasons of inconsistent service quality standard. I totally agree.

    So my friend, if you still have faith in the restaurant, pls feedback to its management and hope it will improve. If not, just give up on it. Plenty of choices out there.

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  3. I had the same experience as you at Royal China though the service at Chinois was good the food was a let down.

    Back to Iggy's, i did give Ignatius feedback when i was leaving but it was not well received by him for some reason - perhaps i was not harsh enough as i should be.

    Was at L'atelier Joel Robuchon @RWS on Tuesday night and the service was excellent. The Chef, Lorenz, explained the menu and both the assigned waiter and restaurant manager, Diego, was most friendly. The food was good but still a notch below that if their Hong Kong branch, which i believe has a Michelin star.

    Do keep up the good work you are doing here (notwithstanding my experience at Iggy's) - I have your site down as a favourite.

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  4. We were at Iggy's last week for lunch. We loved it. We'll definitely go back for the full dinner experience next time we are in Singapore. Hopefully we'll get the petit-fours bento, which looks fab! I'm going to be posting my review in the next couple of days as I have just started my blog: www.hungryhoss.com

    I love yours. please let me know what you think of mine. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks.

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  5. Anonymous : love L'aterlier Joel Robuchon in Hong Kong. And will visit RWS outlet soon. Tried to go on 2 occasions, but was told fully booked .. :-(

    Hungry Hoss : thanks for visiting our blog! And I will drop by your blog every now and then, too! Do come to Singapore more often, ok? Cheers!

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