Crystal Jade Dining IN @ Vivocity

Crystal Jade Dining IN (Vivocity #01-112) is a very pretty restaurant, with glass frontage facing a beautiful sea view and a very intriguing walkway (one side was red patterned glass panelling, and the other side was an acquarium) leading into the restaurant.

The cutlery and chinaware were exquisite, and thoughtful (they had 2 pairs of chopsticks for each diner, silver ones and wood ones - presumably for picking off communal dishes and for eating).

I think they must have quite a lot of nice dishes, but as I didn't pay for this dinner, my host did all of the ordering.

We shared a few different soups. The meatball with ginseng soup was flavourful and the ginseng was not too overpowering. The shark cartilage soup was bland, and I didn't like it much. The seafood soup in coconut was the prettiest, arriving in a coconut husk! The coconut flesh was tender and could be scooped out quite easily.

The battered fish with yam was also very pretty. See the medley of colours! Taste-wise, it was not bad, not too salty and quite fresh.

This is the vegetable dish of the night - Spinach with egg. The egg was overcooked, in my opinion and was not really a wobbly custard, more like a pancake. No like.An odd choice for a Chinese restaurant, but interesting nevertheless. Kimchi chicken with thick glass noodles (tung hoon) in a stone bowl. Korean origins, obviously. The pickled cabbage was a bit to spicy and tart for me, but I liked the chicken and the very tasty tung hoon - which clearly has soaked up all the savoury juices. This stone bowl kept everything hot and bubbling away until the very last drop.

We also had a few other dishes (rice with corn and pine nuts, roast platter of pork, duck and char siew), but they were not very memorable. Maybe we should have tried other dishes?

And why is this restaurant called dining IN, with the IN capitalised anyway?