Met up with my ex-colleagues today as they treated me to an early birthday lunch! Jen suggested Stellar @ 1-Altitude and the menu looked really fantastic from the website.

I was all psyched up to go and try out the food at this restaurant since it's supposed to be fine dining AND it has a view to boast.

First impressions: nice bright decor and it was surprisingly crowded.  There was quite a number of wait staff but the whole restaurant was noisy and felt a bit messy.  Very different ambiance from the Michelin-starred and Award-winning restaurants I've been to.

Onto the food.  All 3 of us chose the set lunch, which was totally different from the one posted on their website.  Note to the webmaster - please update said site. Jen & I chose 3 courses while Irene only chose 2 (she said that all the starters looked boring).

Below is my starter of tuna tartare with toast and grapefruit.  It was really nice but the funny part was I had dropped my knife and although the waiter said that he would come with another one, it never came. I had no choice but to eat the whole starter with a single fork.  Doable till the very last bit...didn't have anything to push the last morsel onto my fork. Ah well...it went back to the kitchen.  At least the slate plate was clean (relatively).


 Jen ordered the sushi, sashimi starter and she had to add $8 for this.  Result was...so-so.  Nothing wow yet.  Funnily enough, it was only AFTER we finished our starter did a waitress place butter, olive oil & vinegar and bread on our table.  Isn't this the FIRST thing you put on a table? Moreover, we didn't find out that there's a choice between white and walnut bread till the captain came out serving us more bread. Ok...really starting to question their 'fine-dining' status now, although I must say that the breads were GOOD.

 My main course - roasted chicken with rice cooked with foie gras and poulet jus.  I laughed out loud when Irene commented, "Isn't this just chicken rice?" Honestly, a plate of Boon Tong Kee chicken rice would've been more satisfying.  The breast meat was dry and the drumstick was bordering on dry too.  The rice wasn't totally cooked and the bit of foie gras that I saw was 1mm x 3mm. Both of us didn't finish it.  Jen didn't finish her main course of threadfin fillet either.

Onto the dessert part. Jen and I ordered the coconut dessert which is coconut mousse on top of shredded coconut and served with pineapple sorbet, crumble and jelly.  In other words, this was a deconstructed pina colada.  You have to eat the sorbet with the mousse although Jen didn't like the mousse and only ate up the sorbet.  She said that she didn't like the texture of the mousse which reminded me of Japanese soft cheesecake and marshmallows.  The jelly was so extra. Hmm...

 Now...I should've ordered the Tiramisu with stout ice cream. There was enough kick from the coffee and a touch of liquor although I couldn't taste the stout in the ice cream (thank goodness?).

The View.  This is why people will pay $38++ for a 3 course/ $32++ for a 2 course set lunch at Stellar.  The food is so-so and the service was not up to standard although you can't fault them on their friendliness.  They really need to keep their patisserie, get another executive chef or re-work their menu because this is NOT the standard one expects from a fine dining restaurant.  Food from celebrated restaurants sing to your palate and not make you want to sing your woes.

That said, it was still an interesting experience as I've always wanted to go to 1-Altitude at least once.  I still haven't gone to the popular bar but at least I now know to skip the restaurant and just head onto the bar ;)

Stellar @ 1-Altitude
One Raffles Place
62F
website: http://www.1-altitude.com/#stellar