Best thing I ate this week: Cantonese-style chicken rice

'Best thing I ate' is a series where we share the best things we have eaten around Singapore. Read more here.

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What: Chicken rice (from $3.50)
Where: Block 40 Holland Drive

A good plate of chicken rice is when all its five elements come perfectly into play.

And so they do at Sin Kee, where the chicken, the rice, the chilli, the ginger and the dark soy sauce contribute to a delicious delight.

Their chicken is cooked Cantonese-style - a method used by many "Hainanese chicken rice" sellers in fact - in which it is plunged into icy water to stop further cooking (in the Hainanese way, the chicken is soaked in room-temperature water). This makes the skin smoother and results in a glorious jelly-like layer beneath it.

Chopped into bold chunks, the meat was juicy and tender - even the breast was not too dry.

I hate it when the chicken comes with a stingy amount of sauce drizzled on top of it, because the meat is mostly tasteless on its own. Thankfully, Sin Kee is quite generous with the sauce - which tasted really good, too.

My favourite part of the meal was the rice. Compared to the typical rice that you get, this didn't have much ginger and/or pandan taste, but it was overall more savoury than usual, and I loved it. So much so that I ordered a second plate.

huizhen@sph.com.sg

The writer paid for the meal reviewed.