It has been years since I stepped into CHIJMES.
Somehow, I felt weird that a church (House of God) and a school (Insituition of Learning)were being turned into a "market place". Anyhow, it's only my 2nd time dining at CHIJMES after more than 10years.

Anyway, back to food @ Capella.

Complimentary Foccacia - Soft texture like old school coffeeshop white bread. It looked lovely (orange in colour), yet lacks the aroma of whatever herbs that was being used. Below average.

Duck Liver ($32) - Steal a bite. It was lovely. It melted in my mouth. But it's "a sinful" dish (the animal welfare thing), I would not order it but can't resist stealing a bite if someone else does. The portion is decent for $32. Worth it.

Caprese ($20) - Mine. The tomatoes were juicy, fleshy and sweet. Stacked up in a lovely tower. It's Pink Beef Tomatoes that were being used.

Insalata Romana ($16) - Expensive. It's bascially Caesar Salad minus the bacons, minus the egg. Bascially, just leaves, dressings, crotons and some toppings of parmesan cheese. There was a "naked / incomplete" feel to it.

Spaghetti Aglio Olio with Rocket ($26) - Though it tasted good & fragant, for a simple pasta dish like this, it is way overpriced.

Risotto with assortment of Mushrooms ($28)- Steal a few bites. Tasted average. But I guessed it's pricy only because of a small piece of black truffle garnishing this rice dish.

Tiramisu ($14) - Below average. Served in the usual but small squarish shape, the sponge was rather dry - there was 2 layers of it. There were insufficient mascapone cheese and one can hardly taste any liquore in it.

Ice-Cream ($12) - A scoope of ice-cream served on an almond "waffle like" basket with miserable pieces of fruits (1 small gooseberry,1 small raspberry, 2 or 3 blueberries) . For $12, I wish to have real almond nuts / flakes on the ice-cream and a more generous serving of berries / fruits would be helpful. The ice-cream was of good quality though. Smooth and creamy.

At the end of the dinner, the feeling was that it's just a place for tourists to dine at tourists' prices. There are indeed many tourists or maybe local foreigners.

May only go back to CHIJMES for an evening walk and chat over tea with friends. Better food at the right prices are found at Raffles City and even Raffles Hotel.

I went here with three friends for a "ladies who lunch" outing on a Wednesday.

Capella is a nice restaurant with white tablecloths and the bit, but it wasn't pretentious at all. We ate outside under a covered walkway cooled by a fan.

We all ordered the set lunch for S$27 which includes a starter, a pasta main (meat or fish for S$34) dessert and coffee or tea.

The food was very good. Ingredients were fresh and the dishes didn't have too much oil. Plus the portions were quite healthy.

I had the rocket salad to start followed by a large portion of eggplant, tomato, basil and mozzarella spaghetti. Very nice. The eggplant melted in my mouth. The dessert wasn't large, but it was a perfect refreshing touch - a ricotta pudding with some fresh fruit. Another diner had the grilled seabass and another had the linguini with smoked salmon.

We all agreed that the food exceeded our expectations.

The setting was so lovely we lingered there for over 2 hours and never once felt rushed by the wait staff.

“A crust eaten in peace is better than a banquet eaten in anxiety.” So said Aesop, and Capella would do well to listen to this advice.

Maybe it was because we sat inside (where the ambience is a bit more corporate than the terrace) but the atmosphere was quite tense with the feeling of trying too hard. It came across in the food (think immaculately presented - if small - works of art) and even more so in the service, which was downright irritating at times.

Good service to me is attentive but not overbearing – the kind of service that is so seamless you don’t even notice it. No chance of that here - the waiters scuttled around our table like an army of ants, clearing dishes as the last mouthful was being taken. My empty wine glass didn’t even touch the table cloth before it had been swooped up by a helpful hand.

Now I know that the waiter probably thinks he’s being super efficient and doing a great job, but a word of advice – it’s really hard to enjoy your meal when I can constantly see you hovering in the background, poised to leap in and clear the table. It makes us feel like you’re trying to rush us out of the place – so please, just leave the empty plates for a few minutes - or seconds, at least.

Okay – rant over. The food here is actually quite good. We had monkfish wrapped in parma ham ($36++), which was perfectly cooked. The veal cheek ($38++) was tasty but a bit lacking in accompaniments. I can’t comment on the carbonara ($24++), except to say that it looked good, and the salads (caprese – tomato & mozarella (18++) and garden mixed salad ($16++)) all got the thumbs up.

The biggest gripe with the main courses is that they were all, without exception, very small portions. Exquisitely presented as they were (with artistically arranged blobs of sauce, a couple of bits of asparagus and a tiny dollop of mash) I longed to scream “just shove a bit more on my plate – I don’t care what it looks like!”

Onto desserts and the tiramisu ($12++) was perfect – soft sponge, creamy texture and just the right flavour hit. The cheese platter ($12++) is excellent value – you get to choose four cheeses from the list and it’s a generous plateful, so much so that I couldn’t finish it. In fact, it would be perfectly feasible to skip the main course and just go for a starter (I recommend the bruschetta $10) or salad then a dessert.

But before I think about a return visit, a plea to the staff at Capella – The food is great, but don’t take life so seriously. Relax a little…smile…enjoy…and your customers will too.

One of the many eating places at Chijmes, while the food is just slightly above average, the service is good.

That time when I went, I ordered a set dinner which came with soup, dessert etc while my better half ordered the main course. The staff did a v sweet thing that was nv heard of elsewhere, they offered to split the soup/dessert portion into 2.

The venison I ordered was nice but the serving was abit small though.

Suitable for al fresco dining.