Plusixfive Seafood Feast

Last night, Frangelico, my sister Rice Krispie, her pal JC and I were at the plusixfive supper club again. This was only my second time there, and we looked forward to it with all the excitement of visiting an old friend's home.

The theme this time around was seafood, and the club featured the creations of guest chef Yolanda Augustin. Yolanda is half-Malaysian - of Eurasian descent, she explained, hence the Portuguese surname 'Augustin' - and half-English. She grew up in Malaysia with a maternal grandmother who was one of those amazing-cook-matriarchs that South East Asians will know well. Moving to England for her 'A' Levels, she realised how much she missed the food from home, and she started trying her hand at some dishes. The rest is cooking history. Yolanda, an oncologist by day, is in now the process of setting up her own supper club in London, called Wild Serai, and plusixfive was hosting her first foray into the genre.

We started off with pork belly satay from Goz, chef and founder of plusixfive (day-job: private equity lawyer). If you're in Singapore or Malaysia, you're unlikely to find pork belly satay in a restaurant or hawker centre. Reason being, satay originated in the Malay-Muslim community. Chinese communities in Singapore, however, engineered an alternative that would yield satay as tender and melting as the traditional chicken and lamb. Frangelico described Goz's satay as 'superlative'. I need not say any more, except that the peanut sauce that the satay came dressed in was better than anything I can recall having tried in Singapore: chunky and studded with peanut, limey and aromatic, sweet and sour. If any sommeliers are reading, I challenge you to find a wine pairing for Goz's superlative peanut sauce!

A call from home: the Singapore supper club in London

Last week, I got a call from home. Stumbling around the internet, I came across a Singaporean supper club right here in London. I contacted them immediately, but found out that places were already full for their inaugural dinner. I gave them my number (in case spaces came up), feeling that I just might hear from them again. The Universe works in mysterious ways. As Frangelico and I were having a late brunch on Sunday afternoon, I got a text telling me that they'd moved the furniture around and found spaces for us!

For our international readers, supper clubs have been a popular dining option in London since around 2009. They're basically dinner parties, hosted by dedicated foodies out of their own kitchens. Paying guests attend, with their own drinks, and are seated at shared tables in the host's living room. It can be a great way to have an informal evening out, while discovering new styles of cooking and meeting new people who are also into food.

The +(65)/plusixfive supper club (named after Singapore's international dialling code) features Goz as head chef and Wen, writer of Going with my Gut, at front-of-house (she also made a dish of her own). One of their aims is to show Londoners that there is more to Singaporean food than the 'fictitious dish of Singapore Fried Noodles'. (That's right, people, there is no such thing. The turmeric-covered, thin rice noodles, with prawn or pork or whatever, was invented on this Continent. Probably by Marks & Sparks.)

Before telling you much more about +(65)/plusixfive, I'm going to get straight to the food. We started with one of my favourite Singaporean dishes: kueh pie tee.

Kueh pie tee shells, newly fried and waiting for fillings