Please drop by http://rollingwrites.blogspot.sg/2012/12/straits-kitchen-hyatt.html for pictures!

Straits Kitchen is pretty much like a high class hawker centre. Here are certain interesting aspects of this place. Firstly, the food is halal. Secondly, I like how they have different kinds of plates for different kinds of food, instead of your old, boring white plate. Thirdly, they have big trays for you to put your little plates in them- so considerate! Fourthly, every station is manned.

I zoomed in right to the Indian food. The tandoori chicken was delicious- Charred, bursting with flavour and very juicy too! The roti prata was not greasy yet not cardboard-dry.

The skin of the popiah was nice and thin, but the vegetables unfortunately lacked flavour and was quite bland.  

I didn't try any of the Malay food because nothing particularly appealed to me. I have to say the smell of the belacan was heavenly when I walked past it! 


The Chinese wok selection comprised of some deep fried food items, fried rice, fried noodles and some egg with tofu thingy. Besides these wok selection, there's also a noodle selection where you can have prawn mee soup, laksa, chicken noodle soup etc. I tried the Hainanese style steamed chicken. They basically cut a small portion of chicken for you and drizzle soya sauce over it, just like what they do at the chicken rice stalls. The chicken was very smooth. 


Although the satay is done on the spot, it didn't take very long for the satay to be ready. The satay is not overcharred and is very sweet. 


Besides these, there was also a station where there is warm dessert. However, the station looked strangely deserted and I didn't get to try the famous goreng pisang. At the same station, there is also ice kacang and chendol.

The ice cream quality is very good. The flavours are very Singaporean and includes coconut, durian and sweet corn ice cream. For sherbet flavours, they have mango and soursop. 

You get free flow of juices as well. There's mango, sour plum, barley, rose flavour drinks.

Food quality's pretty good but I find it a little too expensive, considering that there are not many expensive food items but food that you can easily get in a hawker centre or decent nonya kueh stall. This is a perfect place for those who are looking for halal buffets or want to bring their foreign friends to experience a slice of Singapore in a comfortable environment.

(Note: This review has been cut off because of a 3,000 character limit. For the full review, please visit http://wildchildurbancity.blogspot.sg/2012/11/straits-kitchen-grand-hyatt-singapore.html)

Before getting into the review proper, I will explain the drab-looking pictureless post.

When my friends and I arrived at Straits Kitchen at Grand Hyatt Singapore for their hawker buffet, I began taking photographs of their various stations using my trusty Samsung Galaxy SII. After a few snaps, a waitress suddenly appeared and told me "You're not allowed to take photos in here." My expression must have been "???" because she repeated herself, and said that the exception was that if I, or other people, were in the picture as wellMy friend thought that that was silly, and offered to take pictures of me at every station. As much as I would have loved to have pictures in this post (and also because they remind me of the food I ate and the food that is available), I declined because I did not want to trouble her.

Additionally, although I have a few photographs of the buffet in my phone, I have decided not to upload them out of respect for Straits Kitchen's prohibition.I think that Straits Kitchen's no photo-taking policy is a massive pity though. People want to see in advance what they might get, before they make a decision whether to pay for it. Having a no-photo-taking policy robs a wide audience of the chance to see and get tempted by their spread. I do hope that Straits Kitchen reconsiders its policy.Anyhow, on to the review.It was probably the fifth time I had been to Straits Kitchen. I still remember that the first two lunch buffets beginning in 2005 were with relatives, and the next lunch and dinner buffets were with immediate family. So in addition to reviewing their food at present, I am able to detect any changes in standards.

Seven Stations

The Straits Kitchen buffet can be divided into about seven stations:
(1) grilled food, e.g. ayam bakar, ayam panggang, otah, satay
(2) Malay / Indonesian food, e.g. rendang, sayur lodeh, laksa
(3) Chinese food, e.g. omelette, boy choy, chicken rice, roast duck
(4) Indian food, e.g. prata, murtabak, chicken tikka
(5) other hawker food, e.g. poh piah, rojak
(6) fruit and fruit juice
(7) desserts, e.g ice cream, kueh, goreng pisang, ice kachang.

At every station is a plastic placard with the names and a short description of the food offered. The confusing thing is that the restaurant has always chosen to use one placard with a few food names on it, instead of placing one placard in front of each dish......

This is the best place to bring visitors to Singapore, as it serves all sorts of local food you can possibly think of and most importantly it has aircon!

Very important if your guests to Singapore are afraid of the heat! Unfortunately it is "buffet" concept, so it means that it's pretty disruptive when you are having conversations etc. But what I usually do is, we'll bring the tourist friend a walk round the restaurant first, and share with them what goes into each local dish, e.g. why char siew is red, what goes into the laksa soup, what exactly is our version of carrot cake and why they should avoid popiah if they are allergic to peanuts. Then we will get our tourist friend to sit while we go back to get the dishes that they want to try. I love this place although it can get busy and crowded at times, and it's pretty expensive for "hawker" food. But service is great and the food is not too bad too. It's worth it, but only if you are bringing visitors!