Food Review: The Botanist

The Botanist Café is yet another new entrant to the cluster of cafes at the Outram Park/Tanjong Pagar area. Having opened late last year, this café has managed to attract some attention on social media, both for the food and for the aesthetics of the place.

With the main entrance at the side of the corner shophouse unit, this café has two sections – indoor and semi-outdoor seating areas. The indoor seats are limited, and while it’s air-conditioned, it’s located just beside the kitchen, hence you risk smelling like what you ate after stepping out of the café. The outdoor dining area is furnished with communal tables, and true to the café’s garden theme, the walls are decorated with vertical plants to give a relaxing and tranquil atmosphere, as if truly dining amidst lush greenery.

Moving on to the food and drinks, the menu offers a couple of side dishes and mostly Melbourne-inspired brunch and main dishes. The Iced White Coffee ($5.50) was smooth and not too acidic, with the coffee beans sourced from their co-owned Knockhouse Supply Co., located on the second storey of the same shophouse.

Carbonara Tagliatelle ($18)

One of the two pasta dishes on the menu is the Carbonara Tagliatelle ($18), cooked in cream with bacon and mushroom, and topped with a sous-vide egg and parmesan shavings. Mix them all up and you get a concoction of flavours – the salty bacon cutting through the richness of the cream, and the sautéed mushrooms giving that earthy tones to balance out the dish. Perhaps if we could nitpick, it would be that the deep-dish bowl it came served in was a little hard to eat. Otherwise this was a pretty well executed pasta.

Brioche French Toast ($18)

 

If you’d like to start your day on a sweet note, then the French Toast ($18) is the one for you. Two triangular pieces of fried brioche, each sandwiched with rhubarb marmalade jam, are beautifully plated with an assortment of fresh berries, almond flakes, poached pear and vanilla ice cream. The brioche retained its fluffiness after being pan-fried, and the generous amount of berries provided that slightly sourish tang amidst the sweetness of the jam and vanilla ice cream. This is a dish that tastes as good as it looks.

The Botanist café sure knows how to capture the hearts of café-goers here as it scores on its pleasant and charming space, and delicious, Instagram-worthy food. With no GST and service charge, the prices here are reasonable. If only they could introduce a few dessert offerings, then that would make it the perfect place to chill and while the afternoon away. 

The Botanist
74 Neil Road
Singapore 088839
Tues - Sun 0800 - 1800
Closed on Mondays
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