The Hainan Story Introduction — Restaurant in Singapore

All Hainanese Toast Set include Soft Boiled Egg, Coffee/Tea (200ml) or cold Beverage Upsize or switching to cold beverage at additional cost. The homemade Gula Melaka Kaya & Butter set includes soft boiled egg and a cold beverage upsize. The homemade Gula Melaka is notable for it is fresh with no preservatives added and has 1 week of shelf life.

Here comes the newspaper Hainanese curry rice set. Not to worry, your meal is not placed on the physical copy of the newspaper but instead a faux newspaper. Each set comes with choice of vegetables: stewed Hainanese Vegetable or heavenly four and choice of egg dish, either fried egg or long bean egg omelette.

Mama Wee Curry Chicken Drumstick Set was served with steamed rice, prawn cracker, Sambal  Tempeh, Sambal Belacan. We have chosen long bean egg omelette with Hainanese Stewed vegetables.  Curry Chicken was flavourful and the style floats my boat. The meat was so tenderly cooked and fall off from its bone easily.

The chicken drumstick was thoroughly coated drenched in the curry gravy and was tantalizing.

It's similar to the previous Hainanese Rice Set but instead of Drumsticks, we have braised pork belly meat and a different selection of vegetables here. However, the Heavenly Four vegetables were kind of oily and not to our liking.

While the braised pork belly was tender and tasted great.

If you are ordering from Uncle Robert's stall, the notable item to go will be its old school's 1980's Hainanese Pork cutlet Coated with Potato Chips Crumbs Served with Corn Kernal Salad and Onion Ring. Diners can choose between the Rojak Yogurt Sauce or White BBQ Sauce.

The exterior texture of Hainanese Pork Cutlet was tougher than I thought. The Pork Cutlet was coated with potato chips crumbs.

This is one of their recommended food if you are looking for the chicken chop. It is served with salted egg fish skin salad and a choice of side dish. The chicken chop was tender and topped with grilled cheese as well as sweet-sour sauce.

Overall, I find that this concept of offering a variety of Hainanese food in the food court is pretty interesting. It gives the diner a fresh experience and a one-stop-shop to...

Today Wed 6 Mar, 11.37 am, I was at Hainan Story Coffee House located at Northpoint City #B1-52 to have my lunch and try out your food.

I spent total $33.70 and ordered the following four items:

Hainam Braised White Bee Hoon $13.80

The plate came with the Taiwan Shinzhu Bee Hoon which is the fine kind. The portion of Bee Hoon served was in such a miserable small portion with four pieces of clams or lala which one of it cannot be opened, hence, likely it was not fresh and did not open up during cooking.

Crispy Lotus Leaf Buns with Hainanese Braised Pork Belly $9.80

The two pieces deep fried buns were oily and the belly pork were slightly salty.

Hanianese Stewed Mixed Vegetable $4.30

It was served in a very small pot with few pieces of Chinese long cabbage and 2 or 3 small pieces of pork skin.

SCS Butter Cake (slice) $2.80

It comes in a small saucer with two small slices of butter cake. From the amount of oil absorbed by the paper napkin, it showed it is really oily. I find the texture mediocre and nothing fantastic to shout about even though it claimed using the SCS butter.

Homemade Lemon Tea $3.00

Taste acceptable only.

Overall, I find the pricing on the high side, served with mostly very small portion for the items ordered. Though the service provided by the staff was good but I will certainly not return to patronise with the kind of prices charged and small portion of food served.

At the next table, I saw a man ordered a cup of beverage to go with a piece of toast. I was wondering why he wants to dine at Hainan Story when he has to fork extra money for both 10% service charge and 9% GST. If I were him, I would rather patronise other popular stalls within the mall like Toast Box, Ya Kun Kaya Toast, Kopitiam Foodcourt, Cantine Foodcourt which I do not have to pay both service charge and GST at all. With the current global inflation and increasing high cost of living, as a discerning diner, I got to be more prudent in selecting restaurants and stalls that provide value for money and tasty meals.

6 Mar 2024...

Allow me to critique this relatively new place which is actually more of a food court with four different vendors. There is no free sitting. Customers are seated by service crew. Orders are via self service kiosk.

i) Ambience - Food court environment. However, if you are seated near the mall entrance/ exit, it feels like a hawker Centre as the heat from outside rushes into the mall with the constant opening of the mall glass doors.  No air curtains.

ii) Prices - Restaurant price.  A Quater Chicken with a bowl of rice cost $9.90 and you don't even get to choose the lower quarter with the drum stick or upper quarter with the scrawny wings and breast meat. Naturally,  you will get the breast.

iii) Taste - One word,  mediocre. Nothing to shout out.

iv) Service Standards - Two words, No Standards. That is to say the worst standards one can expect from this place.  Let me elaborate.  When I arrive with my daughter,  it was off peak period. There were many tables available.  However, the service crew made us wait as the available tables are for 6 pax. I guess she was trying to save those for larger group.  The thing is there was nobody in line except us. Moreover,  it is off peak hours. Eventually, unable to get a table for two, we were seated at a table for 6. Having seated, we were told that the ordering is via self service kiosk and the only mode of payment is via PayNow or NETS only. In fact, it was later that I found out there is a kiosk where cash payment is allowed.  Misinformation. Additionally,  within 15 minutes, there were two cases at two neighbouring tables whereby the orders were wrong.  Both customer had who ordered curry chicken rice, 1 had specifically asked for sunny side up eggs but were serve without eggs. The other had specifically requested for chicken legs (Thighs and drumstick) but was served breast meat with scrawny wings.

Thoroughly disappointed and...