Have you always wanted to find out and go into the kitchens of celebrity chef restaurants? For most of us, we only see it on television, where we see how they cook and sometimes 'shout and scold' in the kitchens.
Well, if you have been following Part I and Part II of my adventures on the Marina Bay Sands Hotel's Asia's Dining Destination package, do you know the package includes a Celebrity Chef Restaurant Kitchen Tour?
Here's a preview of what the kitchen tour is like. The group of us went to 3 celebrity chef restaurants. Guy Savoy, Waku Ghin and Santi. If you behave yourselves and be nice to them, the chefs might be nice to you too and prepare some snacks for you!
Guy Savoy - Celebrity Chef Restaurant Kitchen Tour @ Marina Bay Sands
I have yet to dine at Guy Savoy, so I was quite excited to visit their kitchen.
One of these days, KopiKosongGirl and I want to visit the original Paris restaurant. I can imagine KKG saying, ya, when when? Say say only....
They have a lounge area near the entrance where the champagne bar is located. Guy Savoy has the "Bites and Bubbles" menu where you can enjoy small portions of their famous dishes. Thanks to MBS who hosted us, they arranged for us to have the Bites and Bubbles on one of the nights. We had it sitting at the lounge area.
For those who want the full serving size of food and sit at proper tables, enjoy them at the main dining area. This leg of the coveted Joselito Jamon Iberico greets you when you enter the elegant modernist dining room.
I like the design of their dining chairs! This is part of their dining room.
This dining room is where you dine to see and also to be seen.
This is Chef Charles-Benoit Lacour, Chef de Cuisine chez Guy Savoy.
He was previously at Guy Savoy Paris before deciding to come to Singapore.
Our first impression of him is he is such a nice person! So happy all the time as well. Oh this French man speaks very good English. He was very proud to show us his kitchen.
Kitchen design is not what I do for my day time job, so I don't know how to comment. All KKG and I can think of is, if only we have such space for our own kitchen!
Chef and the restaurant manager was explaining to us that everything is prepared fresh in this kitchen. The ingredients come from all over, mostly from France or Europe, but cooking is done here to make sure it's the best that you can get.
I said we behave ourselves, we will be rewarded ya?
On the corner of our eye, we spotted a junior chef preparing something for us!
It's Guy Savoy's famous Artichoke Soup with Black Truffles. The Brittany artichokes base soup was so good. I have not cook artichokes before, but this was sensational. The artichokes that I had for meals when I saw studying overseas was nothing compared to this.
The soup was served with a warm flaky toasted mushroom brioche. Such delicious brioche! Can you see the layers on it? We did not have the coveted black truffle butter, we were too shy to ask.
(Some funnies: The other day when I was at the supermarket with my cousin, I showed her what an artichoke is and guess what she said? 9 hours to plant on Smurfs game!)
We got to try their desserts too. The macarons are made freshly in Singapore from imported ingredients. We asked. ;-)
The teaspoon of the soft foam like quite a delight to the tongue. Whole spoon in the mouth was the instructions on how to eat it. I got to learn how to make these stuff at home!
Someone took a bit of the chocolate, it was so good, she like Oliver Twist, asked for more.
Unlike Oliver Twist, who got no seconds, we got more! A slate of it was brought out for us.
For those who have prefer privacy or business meetings, they have a private room too.
Hint to your bosses! Christmas, New Year or Chinese New Year meals can be held here.
I said from the beginning, this group of people working in this kitchen was a happy lot! See, when we left and looked into the little window outside the restaurant (that can see into the kitchen), the chefs inside waved bye bye!
Waku Ghin - Celebrity Chef Restaurant Kitchen Tour @ Marina Bay Sands
KKG and I have dined at Waku Ghin before. So both of us were excited to see how their kitchen looked like. Compared to the Guy Savoy's kitchen, it's relatively cool in this kitchen. It's an electric kitchen! They use induction cookers here! No open fire, less heat.
(Our small lil HDB kitchen uses an Induction domino as well! We are more Kiasu, have a Gas domino as well. haha. Who knows there might be no electricity one day! MRT can breakdown too you know!)
This was where they prepare the grilled stuff.
My first impression was so neat! Such nice charcoals too!
If you buy Australian food magazines you would notice Chef Tetsuya's appearing in Electrolux advertisements. His kitchen here in Singapore also uses the same brand. The 'toy' that I want is the blast chiller, but there is no way we can have that in our home. Have always been fascinated by blast chillers when they use it on MasterChef!
This is Sous Chef Cory Soo Thoo. He's Singaporean by the way! He's one of the few chefs that can speak Chinese, so if you bring your parents or grandparents here, they can speak with the chef.
(In the back of our minds, we were wondering, how did he stay so slim? With all the food they prepare, they must have tasted it too! The nosy parker me spotted Tim Tams in their kitchen! They also snack like most of us! Either that Tim Tams and good food has no calories?)
We must have behaved ourselves, because we were going to be served braised lobster with tarragon. (No, we did not behave ourselves, we were asking too many questions! haha..)
KKG and I look at him prepared the food and it brought back memories. Just that the size here was tasting portions. ;-)
Tempting you with more photos of it.
Read our experience at Waku Ghin almost a year ago here.
Santi - Celebrity Chef Restaurant Kitchen Tour @ Marina Bay Sands
Santi is another restaurant in KKG and my list of places to dine. So we were equally excited to take a look at their kitchen.
I like their huge wooden door! Was imagining the huge doors at the Cathedrals in Spain. Not as big as those, but this is big enough.
He's the manager of this place. I forgot his name.
Santi has the biggest glass window to look into their kitchen in all of the Celebrity Chef Kitchen at Marina Bay Sands. You can see the whole kitchen as you walk into the restaurant.
Santi has also cleverly placed their private room away from the rest of the restaurant, but is next to the kitchen. This room has a glass wall, so diners here can look straight into the kitchen through 2 glass walls. This is where you get the best view of the kitchen when you dine at Santi!
Thanks to the folks at MBS, they hosted a dinner for us in this room. Hint to your boss! It's another place to nudge your bosses to visit for Christmas, New Year or Chinese New Year meals.
What a nice and cosy dining room. The brick style wall is to replicate their Spanish origins.
I am such a sucker for the many designs of chairs.
Chairs in their private room. Don't laugh, but I did not get to sit and try these chairs. I should try it out!
Chef de Cuisine, Chef Jose Moncayo. He hails from Barcelona.
Yes, every single mushroom is picked and cut by hand. He better hurry, lots more to go! Now you know why you pay for quality here. Only the best gets to the customer.
The guy in charge of Santi. Chef Daniel Chavez.
A few minutes with him, you feel so at ease. He's so nice to walk us around the whole kitchen. We got to see where they store the meat etc!
He told us, Santi sources for their food locally if possible. If the quality is good enough, they will use local ingredients. Yes, their chickens are from Malaysia. We saw the chickens being hung and dry aged in the special room. I so want to go back one day to try how the aged dry chicken taste like!
They don't waste any parts too. I saw a pig face too! They make delicacies out of it. (You thought only Chinese eat everything right?)
Walking through their kitchen makes you so hungry!
They were so many pots boiling all the various stocks and it smell so good!
We walked to a cooler section of the kitchen and saw someone tempering chocolates!
This section smells so good!
Our reward for good behaviour here, Joselito Jamon Iberico on toasted baguette.
Finally tasted the Joselito Iberico Ham!
Served with the Joselito Jamon Iberico was the Gazpacho Andaluz, one of the nicest chilled tomato I have tried so far. At the bottom of the gazpacho was fish roe. It just goes so nicely.
That's a condensed introduction to the Kitchen Tour. If you like good food and like to see how it is prepared, now you know how you can get to the kitchen tour. More about booking the MBS Asia's Dining Destination package here.
