Chinese Cuisine at the Airport - Crystal Jade Shanghai Restaurant

I'll never understand why Airports around the world are almost universally expensive - like how McDonald's at KLIA's LCCT (supposed to be a Low Cost Terminal) costs way more than any other McDonald's around Malaysia. One thankful exception to this is Singapore's Changi Airport, which not only has dozens of eateries, restaurants, cafe's and other shopping open to the public, but the prices aren't jacked up at all.

Which, of course, means that it makes perfect sense to travel to the Airport for makan sessions even when you don't have any upcoming flight ... for example, to celebrate Colleague A's birthday and have Colleague B's farewell lunch at Crystal Jade Shanghai Kitchen.


We ordered some dimsum - the xiao long bao was solid but perhaps slightly inferior to more 'dedicated' places like din tai fung.

There was also some random popiah-style items of which I forgot to take down the name :(


Moving on to the bulk of the meal, though, was the four seasons-style dish opening up our nine-course, eight-pax set lunch menu. Go easy on the rice, because the portions are big.


Next up: Chicken Soup, which reminds me a lot of the chicken-based sharks fin soup I had at the Spring Deer Restaurant in Hong Kong a couple of years ago. Hearty and thick, without being too starchy, it was pretty good!


Duo of stuffed bun. The steamed version had some minced meat in them; the deep-fried buns were filled with shredded turnip and carrot. My opinion is that there was too much bun for too little filling.


I'm not so sure about liking the shrimp dish, either. I like that they came pre-peeled, but taste-wise really nothing to shout about.


I found the next dish both amusing and interesting - at it's core, it's flavored crispy roti canai/prata sprinkled with chicken floss. Not too sure how authentic this is with regards to Shanghai cuisine, but it was actually pretty nice to eat.


The crispy fried duck was a mixed bag. On one hand the skin was nice and crispy, and the duck was nicely flavored without too strong a "duck" taste, but on the other hand the dish didn't come with any sauce to compensate for certain cuts (namely the breast areas) that were very dry.


This next pork dish ... I eat it sort of often, but as befitting my awesome "food blogger" credentials, have never found out what the dish is named :P ... it's similar to tong po braised pork but yet different ... ha ha! Let me know in the comments if you know what it is :)


The spinach with beans was a bit of a let down as the spinach was tough and required way too much chewing.


The meal ends with a dessert of red bean paste pancake. I thought that it was pretty well done, with nice and crispy fried pancake filled with hot steamy red bean paste ... but it would be much better if it was lotus paste instead. Due to personal preferences :)


Overall, I thought the food was pretty solid, although there were a few let downs like the steamed/fried buns and the spinach. Can't comment on the value-for-money portion though as a couple of senior colleagues fought over the bill and I couldn't grab hold of it to see how much the lunch cost :(

Crystal Jade Shanghai Restaurant is on the 3rd/4th floors in the public area in Changi Airport Terminal 3. Non halal.