Orh Nee Butter Toast, Purple Sweet Potato Butter Toast and Red Bean Coconut Cream Toast by Suu Kee Coffee

Kaya butter toasts are a classic treat in Singapore widely enjoyed by everyone, so I was excited to see a local Nanyang coffee specialist that had all kinds of toast fillings on their menu. I tried 3 that I thought would be nice - the trending orh nee butter toast, an unusual purple sweet potato butter toast and a Singapore National Day special seasonal item, the red bean coconut cream toast.

Orh Nee Butter Toast, Purple Sweet Potato Butter Toast and Red Bean Coconut Cream Toast by Suu Kee Coffee

First, a quick comment on the quality of the toasts. They were all perfectly and slightly charred along the griddle lines, which produced a very inviting aroma of grilled toast that permeated the air around the shop. A very nostalgic breakfast smell that was super comforting, much like how perfectly roasted coffee aromas in some cafes enrich the entire meal experience. This was something that I haven't noticed as prominently in other local coffee shops such as Killiney, Heavenly Wang or Yakun. Taste-wise, the slight burned taste also adds SO much more to the gourmet experience, much like wok hey, barbequed charcoal taste in grilled items or burned rice in claypot dishes so richly enhances taste.

Second, I loved how generous their slab of butter was. Just look at the pretty pictures. The only point to note, as I mention below, is that it may taste better if you spread the butter evenly throughout the toast to complement the other spreads.

Orh Nee Butter Toast

The orh nee had a nice earthy yam taste with creamy nutty coconut notes, and it paired perfectly with the salted rich milky butter. The orh nee paste was a tad sweet, but it was well balanced with the butter's salt. 

Orh Nee Butter Toast by Suu Kee Coffee

However, the parts without the butter weren't that nice to eat as a result, without the butter to balance it out. Furthermore, the orh nee paste taste was mild and barely discernible over the butter when eaten together. It was creamy and slightly drippy in texture (like melted milk chocolate), so it was a bit more like an orh nee dessert paste with a tad too much starch and water added. I think it would have been nicer if they had made it thicker with more taste and less viscosity.

Nonetheless, I'm probably being picky - just spread your butter throughout the toast and this would be a lovely treat.

Purple Sweet Potato Butter Toast

This was my favourite of the lot. The sweet potato paste was very intensely flavoured, like pure authentic Japanese purple sweet potato dessert paste. It had a very strong sweet floral root aroma, slightly overlapping with the fragrant taro varieties. It was clearly purple sweet potato in flavour because of that, in contrast to the yellow sweet potato taste which leans more towards honey. 

And check out the lovely rich lilac and yellow colour combination!

Purple Sweet Potato Butter Toast by Suu Kee Coffee

The sweet potato flavour was so intense that it was clearly distinguishable over the generous chunk of butter.

The salty butter provided a great balance, and the creaminess of the butter complemented the smoothness and sweet floral fragrance of the sweet potato paste very well.

Furthermore, you can see that the sweet potato paste was more of a paste than a spread, and from the picture it is clear that it is drier in texture and not drippy at all unlike the orh nee spread. It can hold its own shape. But when combined with the melted butter, it came across as creamy and not dry at all, compared to the overly drippy orh nee version, so I felt that this flavour was better.

This is the most unique item on the list and what I would highly recommend to get, especially if you only got stomach space for 1 item.

Red Bean Coconut Cream Toast

This was the least favourite of mine. I took a bite and couldn't eat the rest.

Red Bean Coconut Cream Toast by Suu Kee Coffee

The red bean was the Japanese adzuki version, which tends to be lumpy, overly sweet and without the dark woody nuttiness from the Chinese version. Furthermore, this version was very slightly wet, like the type in iced desserts or clear red bean soups. (You can kind of see the glistening effect of the wetness in the photo.) 

Furthermore, the coconut cream didn't mix well at all, and there were kind of chunks of semi-solid pasty cream in between the beans, as you can see in the picture. 

There wasn't salt in the coconut cream either, so unlike the butter, it didn't balance the taste. Even the plain bread was more savoury than the filling. As a result, it was just plain sweet, creamy and mellow - quite poorly balanced as a result. 

Overall, don't touch this item. Maybe if you really want to try it, get the version with butter instead of coconut cream. But I think they should really have used the Chinese version of red bean paste that is dark brown. I think there's a good reason why that version is used in the local pancakes (or min jiang kueh) and mooncakes.

Discover other toast, Asian filling or butter treats

Comments

Post a Comment