Forget about eating with forks and knives. Roll up your sleeves, get down and dirty with sweet-tasting baby lobsters (also known as crawfish). From 15 October to 31 December 2015, Si Chuan Dou Hua at PARKROYAL on Beach Road is launching their first ever Baby Lobster Feast.

These top quality baby lobsters grow in fresh running water from mountain and organic feed, hence the meat is fresh and tender, tasting soft and crisp.

The à la carte menu offers fresh baby lobsters (1st KG $48; 2nd KG $38; 3rd KG $28, UOB card members receive additional 500g of crawfish with a minimum order of 3kg per bill) cooked in seven different ways. Besides the à la carte menu, there are also two set menus at $58 or $68 per pax (minimum 2 pax), that pair the baby lobsters with appetisers, mains and desserts.

Now brace yourself for some serious heartburn!

So what can we do with baby lobsters? Executive Chef Zeng Feng, who has helmed the Si Chuan Dou Hua kitchens since its inception in 1996, seems invigorated by the challenge.

Stir-Fried Fresh Baby Lobster with Diced Yam in Garlic and Chilli Sauce (蒜香芋粒小龙虾) offers many tastes in one bite with yam cubes, garlic and spring onions. It’s savoury and bright, making it my favourite dish in the menu.

You probably have eaten kung pao chicken (gong bao ji ding), but have you tried kung pao baby lobsters before? Stir-fried Fresh Baby Lobster and Crispy Rice Bubble with Dried Chilli (糊辣锅粑小龙虾) is midly spicy but has a good aroma. The brownish sauce carries a little sweetness. With its trifecta of cubed chicken, crispy rice bubbles and ruddy red chillies, this plate of stir-fry is beautiful and delicious thanks to a light sweet-and-sour sauce pumped up with chillies.

It is not easy to use one ingredient (baby lobster) to create so many dishes with different taste profiles. But Chef Zeng Feng has done it very well. Look at this sexy red Stir-fried Fresh Baby Lobster in Thai Spicy Sauce (泰式辣味龙虾). Do not be deceived by its look and think that it is fiery hot. In actual fact, the Thai spicy sauce is just mildy spicy with a hint of sweetness. I thought it tastes similar to our local version of the chilli crab. Served with deep-fried buns, I cannot help but reach for the buns to mop up all that luscious sauce.

You either love the Stir-Fried Fresh Baby Lobster with Fresh Ginger and Onions (孜然红袍小龙虾), or you don’t. The scent of toasted cumin wafts over my palate and thrums through every bite. What flavour dominates in this dish? Baby Lobster? Cumin? The baby lobster is stir fried till it is almost dry on the exterior, yet still houses a juicy core. The aroma had the distinct musky scent of cumin, but was bound together with ginger and onion, which leads to more complex flavours.

While the baby lobster is the star of the show, it needs some supporting actors too! This claypot is brimming with Stir-fried Fresh Baby Lobster and ‘Live’ Frog with Sichuan Bean Paste and Peppercorn (干锅美蛙小龙虾). The frog meat is well marinated and juicy, giving a texture that contrasts well with the baby lobsters.

The other favourite dish of mine is the Stir-fried Fresh Baby Lobster with Black Bean Paste and Spicy Chilli Sauce (豆豉双椒串串小龙虾). Black bean sauce is intense and bold, which goes really well with a bowl of rice.

Every individual handles spicy food differently. The term “a lot” has a unique meaning to each individual when referring to the size of a meal, and the term “spicy” has a unique meaning to every individual too.

My idea of “spicy” is covering something with sambal belachan. If you serve me a dish containing Sichuan peppers or anything spicier, I will need a big glass of iced water to help recover from the burning sensation afterwards.

After the six dishes that belong to “NO KICK” in my category, we were presented with the real deal – Stir-Fried Fresh Baby Lobster and Diced Chicken Thigh with Chilli and Pepper Sauce (香辣鸡丁小龙虾) (Spiciness Level: 1). How does this dish fare? Nothing happens when I first pop a piece of meat into my mouth. But after a few seconds, the tongue-numbing sensation begins. And some sweating occurs. It’s a level of sweating that’s somewhat on par with being in the gym doing weights. But don’t worry, the heat slowly subsides. Mind you, this is only level 1. Oh my, THIS IS SO SHIOK!

To wash down the heat and spice, the restaurant is also offering Bavaria beer at a special price of $50 for five bottles or $38 for a jug.

SCDH Spicy Warrior Challenge 吃辣比赛

Two Saturdays ago, we held a SCDH Spicy Warrior Challenge 吃辣比赛 where participants were treated to a deliciously spicy menu made up of fiery-hot baby lobsters!

Participants pushed their taste buds to the limits with some of Si Chuan Dou Hua’s signature dishes and baby lobsters! Most of the participants were able to finish all the classic Sichuan dishes easily, but the challenge came when they had to eat the spicy baby lobsters within a short time frame.

You get the sweat but you also get the flavour! Chef Zeng Feng added A LOT of chillies into each dish. Even so, the baby lobsters looked beautiful and tasted so good. That’s the fun of this competition – we served deliciously spicy food that is also finger lickin’ good!

Participants truly ate their hearts out, sucking the juices from the baby lobsters and plunging into fiery-hot madness.

And the one-night stay in PARKROYAL on Beach Road’s newly refurbished Premier Room goes to…. Steffi Tan! Thank you everyone for taking part in the SCDH Spicy Warrior Challenge!

Si Chuan Dou Hua Restaurant

Address: PARKROYAL on Beach Road, 7500 Beach Road, Singapore 199591
Tel: +65 6505 5722
Website: http://www.sichuandouhua.com