Jaan

Jaan (derived from ancient Sanskrit for bowl) was formerly known as Jaan par André and was included on the San Pellegrino Top 50 restaurants list for 2010 in that guise. In the meantime, head chef André Chiang has left to run his eponymous Restaurant André with the resulting shortening of Jaan’s name. The kitchen is now headed by Julien Royer and the food’s emphasis is on French cooking reflecting the chef’s roots in Cantal, Auvergne.

One immediate reason for the first-time traveller to Singapore to visit Jaan is for the setting. The Swissotel Stamford, one block over from Raffles, is a single tower block surrounded by low buildings. Jaan is located on the 70th floor of the hotel and the best tables are those by the tall windows that give fantastic views out into Singapore Strait. Closer to the hotel, my table looked directly out to the spectacular Marina Bay Sands hotel, Gardens by the Bay, the Singapore Flyer wheel and the container ships queuing to visit Singapore docks. The German maitre d’ patiently talked me through the view pointing out the vague shadows of Malaysia and Indonesia in the distance and then focusing on the rehearsals at the amphitheatre by the marina for National Day celebrations on August 9th. There was a firework display planned for the riverfront area the evening of my visit but other plans meant that I couldn’t be there. It was definitely one of those instances where I’d loved to have been able to be two places at once.

The menu had two options; a three-course lunch with three options for appetiser, main and dessert or the five-course seasonal lunch menu (with optional cheese course) or the 7-course artisanal lunch. I never actually noticed the 7-course option at the time so went for the 5-course menu.

Almost as soon as the order was placed the amuse bouches arrived at the table. First up a trio of small bites, comprising a sesame crusted cheese and potato croquette, crispy chicken skin and smoked eel with pickled apple jelly. The star of the three was the smoked eel. The strong smoked fish was supplemented nicely by the refreshing burst of apple. The crispy chicken skin was simple but wonderfully tasty. The cheesy croquette, topped with a tarragon leaf,  was a lovely mouthful, it just didn’t match the other tasters.  

Hot on the heels of the amuses bouches, an additional taster of in-house made hummus with rye crackers turned up. The kitchen gave the hummus a French slant by including lentils and chestnut.  This went nicely with the rye crackers but I found the caraway seeds on the crackers too intrusive. However, one of the bread choices was a mini baguette that combined perfectly with it so the chestnut soared out of the mix of flavours. The other bread was a brioche with black truffle that was gloriously light and didn’t need any accompaniment.

All of these were preliminaries to the star of the tasters. Involving a bit of by the table theatre, the cep mushroom sabayon topped with toasted buckwheat came prepared in a small glass bowl. Accompanying it on the tray was a cafetiére with mushroom tea that was poured into the sabayon at the table. A lot of work for a very small portion but it was so worth it. The combination of egg and mushroom was incredibly intense with the buckwheat adding a nutty crunch that rounded out the dish perfectly. This was a really lovely dish.

First course proper was ballotine of quail and foie gras. The quail came with a toasted hazelnut crust, with date paste merged into the ballotine. The plate also included orange dots of apricot purée, dandelion leaves and a maple reduction. The sweet and fruity contrasts were great combinations with the gamey meat. This got the tasting menu off to a robust start.

Next course was the one I was looking forward to the most and was billed as one of Jaan’s signature dishes. The rosemary smoked egg was cooked at 64 °C for 55 minutes before smoking over rosemary. The other components of the dish; mushrooms, peas and Bellotta ham were delivered in a glass bowl and the egg, shrouded in dry ice, was poured onto the other items at the table. This played into the basic egg and bacon approach but fell short to other examples at Jungsik & Pollen Street Social for me. The ham was a strident counterpart and the mushrooms were perfect with the egg. The peas did not work for me.

The next course stepped things up a gear and was, quite simply, wonderful. The sixty second saba (mackerel) fillet was served with sautéed young squid, baby bok choi, smoked ratté potato and a red wine vinegar reduction. The mackerel was garnished with fennel fronds and spring onion. Strong flavours throughout with the succulent mackerel more than capable of standing up to any of them. The combination of smoked potato, whether mashed or sautéed slice, with the mackerel was really excellent. This shouldn’t ignore the lightly breaded squid because they were also a crucial part of the dish, adding texture and a milder but integral flavour to the whole. A superb dish.

The main course was Kurobata pork in 4 preparations. What this meant was that the plate featured four different cuts of pork, belly, trotter, cheek & rib, to show the versatility of the pig. The pork belly topped with grilled shallots was the nicest of the four cuts where the crunch of the shallot contrasted well with the rich, soft meat. The fatty layer of the belly melted away in the mouth. Almost as good was the cheek that I assume had been braised for a long time so it was very tender but with a deep, rich taste.  Minced trotter was presented as a croquette that combined nicely with the pickled onion. Least successful of the four cuts was the rib meat partly because it was overly salty and the meat wasn’t sufficiently strong to overcome it. Other vegetables on the dish included wild Chantenay carrots and Hipsy cabbage. With the exception of the small cube of rib meat, this was another very nice course. 

Pre-dessert was lemon pannacotta topped with basil sorbet and thyme espuma. This wa garnished with basil leaves. Despite my suspicion of herbs in desserts, this was nicely refreshing. The herb flavours were not intense so the thick lemon pannacotta actually dominated the dish. 

The actual dessert was billed as Choconuts 3.0 as it seems to have gone through a number of iterations before this version.  The dish included a mousse based on tanariva chocolate so it had a rich milk chocolate flavour. The salted peanut butter component was  quite a firm paste.  Tonka bean ice cream provided light dairy relief with chopped macadamias, pecns & walnut snow also added. This was reasonably good dessert although I tend to go for lighter, fruit-based desserts when given a choice.

Petit fours were brought to the table at the end of the meal including a smoked rosemary loliipop delivered to the table in a cloud of dry ice, a spearmint sorbet topped with pop rocks, a banana and passionfruit marshmallow where the passionfruit dominated, a lovely, light lemony Madeline and a very rich chocolate lavender log. This was a good end to a meal that exceeded my modest expectations.

Overall verdict.
Things got off to a great start as you walked into the dining room and took in the glorious view. However, the food was the equal to its setting and delivered a great meal that proved to be a great way to start off a trip to a new city. It seems strange travelling to Asia to eat French food but Jaan definitely justified the detour.

Would I revisit Jaan?
Definitely. Food was good (great in places), service was good and the overall experience was very positive.


Overall Rating - 4/5