Less than $20 per pax?! One of the CHEAPEST Steamboat Buffet in Toa Payoh

Hello everyone!
It's been 2 months since my last post, but today, I'm bringing something other than my usual event-related entry.
I'm gonna talk about food!

There is a new (considered new because it's less than 2 or 3 months old if I'm not wrong) hotpot buffet in town!
Okay maybe not town town but it's located in central, so it's considered a convenient location I suppose.

*Disclaimer: this is not a sponsored post*

Introducing: Xiao Cao Xiang 小草香

As you can see from the top left side of the banner, it states 'Grand Opening Special', & nothing is over $20 per person (before GST)!

They don't have service charge people!

Actually this banner is the 2nd banner, the first one was even cheaper; I can't remember how much but I saw them changing banner & the price was different than the initial promotional banner.

Probably because they had to charge GST now, because when they started operating, I saw many people queuing up!

Well they state 'Grand Opening Special', my guess is that they will likely to change their pricing after their promotion period, which we don't know when so it's best not to drag your plan!!

The Chinese words at the left side of the banner says: 

老板讲了，我们不赚钱，我们真诚的邀请你来试试

如不满意，原银奉还

Which translate to:

Boss said, we don't earn, we sincerely invite you to come try

If not satisfied, money will be returned with thanks.

Which I feel it's a wacky way of marketing but I think nobody had been unsatisfied considering there's queue during dinner period. 

There are 7 types of soup base to choose from, which is considered a fair amount of choice, with more than 70 kinds of ingredients - spoilt for choices!

This is how the restaurant looks like on the inside.
They served 2 types of pots - for 1 to 2 diners, it's strictly personal pot, as you can see from the picture above.
For 3 or more diners, you can choose between personal pots, or shared pot - & you can choose 3 soup bases.

Now, the ingredient island!

- Seafood isle

The missing ingredient on the bottom left is actually prawns.
Guess many diners attack the prawns first hahah.
Pardon for the unclear photo because of the cold mist is very strong, to keep the ingredients chilled.

• Clams

• Various type of meatballs/seafood balls

• Mussels

• Sotongs

• Cheese Tofu

• Fish Roe Balls,

• Beancurds,

• Hotdogs,

• Luncheon Meat

- Meat isle

• Shangrila (I dunno, it's the name written there) Tender Beef
• Sliced Fish
• Sliced Tender Chicken
• Special Pickled Lamb
• Sliced Beef Belly
• Sliced Pork Shoulder
• Sliced Pork Belly
• Sliced Lamb



- Dipping Sauce Station

There are just too many types & I can't capture all the names so I just let the picture speak itself hahaha.
20 types for you to be your own chef bruh.


- Vegetable isle

Sorry I didn't notice the basket of dry food above this section, so the picture didn't show it.

• 4 types of green veggies
• Corn
• Vermicelli
• Noodles (looks like Ban Mian kind)
• 5 types of mushrooms
• Fried Beancurds
• Uncooked Noodles
• Wood Fungus
• Carrots
• Tofu
• I dunno what that seaweed look-alike is
• Radish
• Lotus Roots
• Fish Maw
• Crab Meats
• Eggs
• .... & more I dunno how to identify them


- Miscellaneous

Appetisers

• Rice
• Fried Mantou with condensed milk

• Watermelons
• Oranges


- Drinks

• Calamansi Juice
• Iced Water
• Iced Lemon Tea
• Hot Water


& their 2nd selling point.... (to me lah hehe)

XIAO LONG BAO!!!!!!!

Oh my gosh, when I see this, I was so fucking thrilled!!!!
But don't get your expectations so high though, this ain't Din Tai Fung or Paradise Dynasty, but the quality ain't that bad either.
I would say Grade B XLB.
But they run out fast though, so better get your hands on them piping hot soup dumplings when they serve it out!!

This is actually my 2nd time here.
The first time I went there, I took a few Insta-stories & some of you ask me where is this place.
So because it's worth going there the 2nd time, I make sure to show you guys what it's like, & also my final thoughts.

The pot looks empty because I forgot to take a picture when we start.
Aiyah you only need to know how the pot looks like right?
We got Herbal soup, Mala soup & Tomato soup.
Only Jake wants the Mala soup so he got the smaller size in the middle.

Jake made the same combination of dipping sauce he was here the first time, so if you wanna try his combi, it's chilli, garlic and spring onion, loads of chilli, like LOAADDSSS, & soya sauce.

There were 4 of us, still less than $20!

My final thoughts:

I prefer the tomato soup to the herbal soup, because it is richer in my opinion.
The meat were generally tasty, choices say not less, not much.
Dunno why so many people take the prawns because twice my visits, the prawns hasn't been very fresh. I'm just glad there are mussels & clams.
Man Le Hotpot serve better fried Mantou with condensed milk - their buns remain warm, crispy on the outside & soft on the inside. The condensed milk is also pre-drizzled on top, so I guess it has that crème brûlée kinda taste (due to heat from the top, does it make sense?)
I recommend eating the Xiao Long Baos immediately after you picked them up.
Once you leave it on your plate for too long, it get's to room temperature so it doesn't taste as nice.

The vegetables are quite reasonable, I always attack the 油麦菜 in any hotpot buffet place that serve it because it's my favourite ingredient.

I wish there were more choices of drinks, perhaps add in the generic Coke or green tea?
My younger brother says the watermelon isn't fresh, the texture is kinda 'mushy'.
They lack dessert area - would be wonderful to serve ice cream or pudding or some sort!

But of course, 一分钱  一分货, you get what you pay for.
For less than $20 ($18 to be exact), I feel that I'm getting a lot more.
Food's not that bad too, that's why I went back again.
I suggest going during lunch period because it is cheaper than dinner rate + fewer diners.
Their service is acceptable too.

But be warned, they charge $5 for every 100g of food you waste, including food in the pot. They will donated the 'fines' to the Singapore Lions Club to help the elderly.
Turns your bad habit to a good cause 👍

Overall: 7.6/10

- Xiao Cao Xiang 小草香 -
Block 470 Toa Payoh Lor 6 #01-72 S(310470)
Tel: 62737488

Only 5 minutes walk from Toa Payoh MRT Station, it is just beside HDB Building.

Why do I love food so much?

I be freakin' and fleekin'
I just do what I wanna

It's the tail of April & 1/3 of 2017 is just like that - gone.
(Omgosh do I sound like the typical girl who says cliche words like that)
This is gonna be a very short post, I probably should write at the end of April because I have events on the last few days of April.
Oh well, let's go!

08 April 2017: KBBQ because why not?

My clique went to Tanjong Pagar for KBBQ because that area is where many Korean restaurant resides.
Previously I have blogged about a Korean restaurant we went. The KBBQ is apparently under the same company.
Cong said it is affordable for KBBQ so why not?

It looks very similar to the one I had in Korea...
The meat is good! Well-marinated I'd say. The tteokbokki is just.. chewy. Chewy is a good thing but I prefer the ones in Korea. The seaweed soup is not too salty & there's abundant seaweed inside.
We ordered 2 flavoured Soju because what's KBBQ without Soju am I right??
Actually we (Cong) sneaked in his own Sojus because it's expensive in restaurant (or in Singapore in general).
He brought 3 bottles but we drank 2. My goodness IT'S SOOOOO GOOOODDD!!!
I can't remember what flavour he brought but I swear flavoured Soju might just be my thing.

LJB

Another example of LJB

Restaurant: 2D1N Soju Bang (Ssikkek)
Address: 46 Tanjong Pagar Rd, Singapore 088467
Tel: 6227 6033

Because Batman over here is Vegetarian, so he went over to a vegetarian restaurant nearby that sells soya noodles (???).
Vegetarian cuisine are so expensive! But the ambience is great! Very like Chinese style.
The restaurant also have games to play!!

It's pretty thrilling!!! We get all worked up from the suspense because it does that to you!!
They were all pussy when it is their turn to take the bone. & it's not just any bone; you take a card & have to take whatever is said on the card.
E.g. 2 green bones or 3 blue bones.
Love this game!! Lucky we were the only customers in the restaurant because then no one (except the staff) can hear our screams.

13 April 2017: 1 tier? 2 tier? 3 tier? Nope, 4 tiered buffet!!!

Are you confused by the title?
Let me show you what I meant:

4-tiered buffet!! 
Base there is the soup (or can be used as steamboat), then moving up to BBQ, above it is cheese (you can choose between cheese or salted egg) & finally the top it is steaming pot!!!
Furthermore you can have 2 soup bases!
BEST OF ALL WORLDS!!!!!!
Jake said he's bringing me to a place I've been wanting to try but refuse to let me know where because, 'surprise'. 😝
When he said 'we're here', I was like 'HOOOO MYYY GOOOAATTTT'
I WAS OVERJOYED WHEN I SAW WHAT'S IN FRONT OF ME HAHAHAHAH
The ingredients were free flow (duh) & I'd say the selections aren't little neither are they huge.
There were the 3 main meat choices - chicken, beef & pork. Each has the same marinated sauce.
Seafood like mussels (I loveeeee mussels), prawns, sotong, etc.
Other soft food like cheese hotdog, tofu, seafood balls, etc.
It's pretty affordable, I think it's less than $25 per adult for dinner!
Considering you have steamboat, BBQ, cheese/salted egg sauce AND steaming pot PLUS FREE FLOW OF ICE CREAM & DRINKS?!?!?! 
I say it's fucken worth it.

The restaurant: iSteamboat By Shi Fu Ge
Address: 6 Raffles Boulevard #04-102A Marina Square Shopping Mall Singapore 039594 (It's beside the foodcourt)
For the soup base you can choose 2 from Chicken, Fish, Kimchi, Ma la, Herbal, Hot and spicy or Vegetarian.
We got chicken & Tomyam (don't know why it isn't stated there) & the Tomyam soup is good!
I highly recommend this place!!
You're welcome guys 😉

23 April 2017: It's Thai(m) to have some Thai food

I had a catch up session with a friend I haven't seen in a long time!
He brought to me Golden Mile to have some Thai food, a stall he frequents that he's a regular customer & he knows the owner.
It's very family-oriented! The owner is very 亲切! Having small talks with the owner who is all smiles 😃

The stall is Porn Thaifood

There's Mookata here at Golden Mile as well (figures).

I call him Gentle Giant because he's really soft & sweet to me!
Caring & definitely not the fuckboy type.
He ordered Pineapple Fried Rice, I ordered Green Curry & he bought us Thai Iced Milk Tea 😀.
The Green Curry is a little spicy at first, when it's hot. But when it cooled down it's more of a sweet gravy. I liked it!
His pineapple fried rice taste well, like that loh.
Thai Milk Tea is very sweet, so it's not to my liking... Too sweet!! I'm already very sweet & now that I drank that, what's make of me?

He said 'so am I gonna be in your blog???'
Well, ask & you shall receive 😂.

The reason why it looks super grainy because I had to up the exposure & contrast because his face is covered by shadows.
After knowing each other for so long & going out several times, this is the first time we took pictures together 😂
Meet up soon Gentle Giant! I want my Tomyam Maggie Mee hahahaa

Miscellaneous

19 April - Met up with Partner for this Halal Korean restaurant (Korean cuisine again) called Muk-Bang Korean Restaurant because the photos look so good online. We ordered their Budae Jjigae (Army Stew) but it was just meh~
The drink she ordered isn't very nice; she had like 2 sips then she didn't like it & had to pay 30¢ for it.
It's pricey for what we ordered. Never gonna visit again.
I googled the place after we went there, & it's 3.3 stars for a reason hahaha.

My artwork was posted to body art Twitter account (at)BeMyCanvas & to me, to have reached that number of audience, is a small achievement to me!
I feel so driven to do so much for my passion 😊

A selfie to end the post hehe.