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Food review: Joyden Canton Kitchen

Singapore — Soya sauce chicken is one of the most basic dishes in the Asian repertoire: Chicken pieces stewed in soya sauce and, depending on the culture, sometimes infused with aromatics such as star anise or cinnamon sticks. At Joyden Canton Kitchen, the whole chicken (S$12) is steeped in a complex blend of superior light soya, herbs and, quite surprisingly, rosewater. The result is a dish of incredibly tender chicken bursting with the depth of soya and gentle floral endnotes.

Singapore — Soya sauce chicken is one of the most basic dishes in the Asian repertoire: Chicken pieces stewed in soya sauce and, depending on the culture, sometimes infused with aromatics such as star anise or cinnamon sticks. At Joyden Canton Kitchen, the whole chicken (S$12) is steeped in a complex blend of superior light soya, herbs and, quite surprisingly, rosewater. The result is a dish of incredibly tender chicken bursting with the depth of soya and gentle floral endnotes.

Dishes like this make the trek to the restaurant’s rather remote location in Hillview Rise worthwhile. Joyden is already well known for its seafood restaurant in West Coast Recreation Centre, while its sophomore establishment draws inspiration from cities such as Shantou, Chaozhou and Guangzhou in Guangdong province.

Its owners say they took six months to conceptualise the menu, which involved field trips to Guangdong to truly understand the region’s culinary nuances. Among the things they discovered was the fact that some Cantonese fare draws from Teochew cuisine, which explains the addition of traditional Hakka salt-poached kampung chicken (S$17) on the menu.

Much like the poached chicken in Hainanese chicken rice, this version provides a more rounded, savoury flavour that is perked up by a ginger sauce that cuts through the saltiness. Because of its strong base flavours, it’s near impossible to skip the rice with this dish (carbo-phobes, you’ve been warned).

But enough about chicken. There are about 60 dishes on the menu, which means it’ll take more than a few visits to scratch the surface. The braised pork in aged mandarin- peel sauce (S$16.80) impresses with fall-off-the-bone meat that has been given a good sear, so that it is burnished and charred on the surface. It is all swathed in a sticky sauce that jumps with the tang of dried orange peel.

Soothing comfort can be found in the rice vermicelli with poached egg white, crabmeat and scallops (S$15.80), where the vermicelli is first wok-fried and then drowned in a thick gravy with all its smoky flavours intact. The textures and flavours are reminiscent of old-school egg-drop soup with crab meat that begs for just a jolt of black vinegar to properly accent its varying layers of taste.

As the weather begins to get hot, this may not be the best time to ask for warming dishes such as the grouper fillet with pine mushrooms and black fungus in a rice wine broth (S$18.80). But if breaking a sweat in the name of gluttony doesn’t faze you, then this dish is richly rewarding. Homespun and restorative, with plenty of ginger and wine, it is the kind of food that will pull you out of a common cold or bad day with delicious ease.

Happily, the prices here are as folksy as the restaurant’s location which, incidentally, boasts little else by way of drawing visitors to this neck of the woods. So once the meal of invariably soulful dishes is over, there is little choice but to get back to the grind or, better yet, to the restful comfort of home. ANNETTE TAN

Joyden Canton Kitchen

Where:

#02-21 HillV2 Shopping Centre

4 Hillview Rise

Telephone:

6465 9988

Opening hours:

Daily 11.30am to 9.30pm

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