St Marc Cafe Chococro

Saint Marc Cafe opened it's first doors at 1998 at Tokyo Ginza and has gained popularity from it's signature product, Chococro - a short form for Chocolate Croissant. 

The secret in the croissant lies in 3 points:
Chocolate - using the best Ghana and Ecuador beans which has a slight bitter taste
Pastry - Butter and Margarine are mixed and the pastry has more than 20 layers
Kiln - the pastries are carefully baked in a Kiln at 230 degrees 

All pastries are displayed at the self service counter and you can just pick any up and pay at the cashier. 

I ordered the Fresh chou cream croissant set which includes a cup of coffee at JPY390 (SGD 6)

They also carry seasonal items, such as the white chococro - a white chocolate croissant symbolizing the white snow of Christmas. You can also get a box of white and chocolate croissant at JPY790 for 5. 

Besides the seasonal white choco croissant, some of the other seasonal croissant includes: banana, strawberry choco, match and milk tea. All sounds so delicious!

When in Japan, just look out for this orange circle logo for the nearest St Marc chococro cafe!

p.s. you can also get your fix of chococro at Vivocity Unit 01-108/10

http://www.saint-marc-hd.com/cafe (Japanese only)

Hakodate Donburi Yokocho (どんぶり横丁市場)

Hakodate being located at the Southwest of Hokkaido and facing the Tsugaru straits, it is never short of fresh seafood. 

The Donburi Yokocho is a restaurant arcade featuring 20 eateries, mostly selling kaisen don (海鮮丼) which is a rice bowl topped with fresh raw seafood.

One of the most unique kaisen don featured in Donburi Yokocho is the "Ika Odori don" (イカ踊り丼) or directly translating as Squid dancing bowl. 

A live whole squid is put directly on top of the rice bowl and served to you. As you pour the soya sauce over it, watch the squid move (or dance) due to the acidity of the ginger in the soya sauce. 

"Ichika tei"(一花亭) is one of the popular restaurant selling Ika Odori don. The squid practically danced out of the rice bowl!

Each eatery will display photos or food models of their various kaisen don for you to choose your favourite bowl of seafood to dine in. 

 
 
 
  
The prices are really affordable, with a luxurious bowl of kaisen don selling at an average of JPY1500 (SGD20).

We settled for restaurant "Maekawa" as I was attracted by their 5色丼, a seafood bowl consisting of 5 kinds of seafood - uni, ikura, salmon, hotate and ama ebi selling at a promotional price of JPY1500 (usual price JPY2100)

The eateries there are all small establishments, with just about 6 tables and some counter seats. As we went during lunch time, there wasn't much customers in the restaurant as most customers visit during breakfast time. 

My long awaited 5色丼! Look at the freshness and size of the seafood! You can never get this with that kind of price in Singapore.

L ordered 鉄砲汁定食 or what is "cannon soup" set in Japanese. You may be wondering why it is called cannon soup when in actual fact it is crab miso soup, but this is actually how the locals call it in Hokkaido, as when the crab legs pick up the chopsticks look like a stuffed cannon.

I couldn't resist ordering the seafood gratin as well (JPY500) consisting of prawns, squid, crab and scallop cooked in white sauce topped with cheese. Definitely worth ordering for fans of creamy and cheesy stuff. 

The Hakodate Donburi Yokocho is a must visit place for an early morning breakfast or lunch. Definitely value worth for your money for it's freshness and price and variety. Don't worry if you don't speak English. As many tourist visit this place, the restaurants always have a picture menu for you to point at.


Hakodate Donburi Yokocho Ichiba - Restaurant Maekawa

函館市若松町9-15
9-15 Wakamatsu-cho, Hakodate shi
Opening hours: 5:30am - 3pm (closed on Thursday)
Nearest station: 1 min walk from Hakodate JR Train station  
www.donburiyokocho.com (Japanese only)
www.maekawa.hakodate.jp (Japanese only)

Aomori Nokke don (のっけ丼)

Have you ever come across ordering a bowl of sashimi or kaisen seafood don but it comes with some items which are not your favourite? Well you definitely will not have this problem at the Aomori Furukawa Market where the speciality of this market is their Nokke don. 

Nokke don is buying a bowl of rice and various of your favourite toppings to go on top of your rice. By doing so, you would have created your unique bowl of rice or donburi which the Japanese call it.

The Furukawa Market, or more popular known as the Aomori fish and vegetable centre is just 5 minutes walk from JR Aomori station. 

You can also find English instructions on how to make your own Nokke don at the market. 

At the entrance of the market, you will find this information stall where you can purchase your ticket for the Nokke don. 

The ticket comes in either JPY500 or JPY1000 with individual JPY100 tear off coupon. 

To start off "making" your own Nokke don, you have to purchase a rice bowl first from any of the stores which have the orange flag. These are the stores which sell cooked rice. You can either purchase a small bowl rice for JPY100 or a larger portion for JPY200. 
The stores with the blue flag sells raw fish, meat or vegetables for your rice bowl. 

The variety of toppings available are huge! As the market is not very big, you can actually tour one round of the market to pinpoint your favourite stalls or toppings before starting to make your own rice bowl. 

Besides raw food, there are also a variety of fried foods for your selection. 

Our one and only unique bowl of nokke don!

As we still had some coupons left, we bought some fried stuff and also chu-toro. 

Don't worry about finding a place to sit in the wet market. They have designated areas with tables and chairs, and even packet soya sauce, wasabi, chopsticks and even hot green tea for you to enjoy your nokke don. And as usual, as this is Japan, the place is kept very clean even though it is located inside the wet market. 

Locals also come to buy their daily fresh fish and seafood. 

As Aomori is surrounded by both the Sea of Japan and the Pacific Ocean, you can get fresh and cheap seafood here. These fresh scallops are huge! They are meant for sashimi use, so you can actually eat it just like this. And a plate of 7-8 scallops only cost you JPY1000 (approx SGD15) which is certainly very cheap!

Fresh abalone is also sold here. Although there is no price tag to it, I believe it should be quite affordable as well. 


Furukawa Market Nokke don

青森魚菜センター, 青森市古川1-11-16Aomori Fresh Fish and Vegetable center
1-11-16 Furukawa, Aomori shi, Aomori
Opening hours: 7am-5pm (individual stores may have different operating hours) 
Closed on Tuesday
5 mins walk from JR Aomori station

www.aomori-ichiba.com (Japanese only)

Hatched, Holland Village

Hatched opens in Holland Village! I've always heard about Hatched at Evans lodge, but didn't have the chance to try their highly popular egg menu. Since we were having a brunch gathering and pondering where to go, Ms A suggested trying Hatched at Holland Village, so we were all thumbs up for the suggestion. 

When we arrived the cafe, there were actually very limited tables in the cafe. When informing the staff that we made a reservation, we then found out that they also had a 2nd floor as well. But 2nd floor's air conditioning wasn't working very well, hence they switched on the ceiling fans for better ventilation. But it made the surrounding very cold and distracting with air constantly blowing on your face and food.

The menu looks interesting, with colourful cartoon characters. However, the laminate had came off from most of the menus, so it made them look quite old. 

90 percent of the menu consists of eggs, hence the name of the cafe "Hatched". As per their website says: baked, boiled, fried, poached and scrambled, we have them all and more... 


We ordered a few of the popular items on the menu: 

Sir Benedict - half an English muffin topped with smoked ham streaky bacon, poached egg and hollandaise sauce, topped with homemade mash. I liked the homemade mash, as it was covered in a mushroom sauce, something like your mushroom soup, only in a thicker consistency.

The poached eggs were a tad too overcooked - no egg yolk flowing out here when cut into it. 

Another recommended item from the staff - beef pot pie topped with scrambled eggs. It was not exactly like the normal oven toasted pies. They actually pour cooked beef slices over a soft bread. But soft bread actually goes well with the scrambled eggs and sliced beef. A normal oven toasted pie crust would be too dry to match the eggs. 

We also ordered the caesar salad, and of course topped with another poached egg. The poached egg was also too overdone, like the eggs benedict. 

The sausage platter looked interesting, so we ordered for sharing. They had some chicken, pork and beef sausage.

And this super red sausage is their beef and pork sausage. It's not exactly something I would order again... a tad too dry and at the salty side. I had to put alot of mustard on it and to eat with lettuce and bread together. 

We also ordered a ciabatta and sauteed mushrooms on the side. 

I spotted a blueberry bircher muesli on the menu, and had to order it to try. The staff told me that there were no raisins in it, only blueberries (as I am not a raisin fan), but it still contained raisins afterall. I still prefer the Sheraton Ho Chi Minh version where it has a thicker consistency. 

After a full meal, we just had to try their sweet items, so we ordered a waffle with strawberry sauce. To our utter dissapointment, the waffle was very hard and I couldn't even cut it up with a knife. Our culinary expert - Ms S commented that they must have made the waffle beforehand, maybe kept in the fridge and reheated it when we ordered it. Otherwise I couldn't believe how anybody can make/serve such a hard waffle to the table. After informing the staff, they made another waffle for us, this time much better, but it's not something I would order in their menu again. 

Lastly, how can brunch be called brunch without my cuppa latte... 


Overall, Hatched has a reasonable menu, with affordable prices. The staff who served us was also very helpful and knowledgeable, except for one who banged the plates on the table when we asked for a change in plates for dessert. Not exactly the best of the whole lot of places serving all day breakfast, and I still prefer jones the grocer for their higher quality food.

Maybe I should try their Evans lodge branch someday for comparison.


Hatched at Holland Village

267 Holland Avenue
(located along the same stretch as Starbucks and Swensons)

open Tuesday to Sunday: 8am - 10pm
reservations are encouraged to secure a table: 6463 0012