Even before the first bite/sip, NOU draws me in.
In the night-scape of Craig Road, an orange beacon beams with smoky allure. Its amber illumination promises “noodles & cocktails.” Oh, what eloquence that literality hides.
Past the floor-to-almost-ceiling glass threshold lies the full extent of those intimations – and the whole, many-splendoured NOU experience. It’s a recent opening by seasoned hands, Petites Ventures, whose co-founders Cheryl Tng and Maxime Dacier have steered wine-forward bastions Foxtail and Juice to that rarefied realm where buzz and esteem are indistinguishable. NOU, the first in the duo’s portfolio to boast a robust food menu, is a collaboration with the guiding force behind Morsels, the formidable Chef Petrina Loh.
In the embrace of warm, mood-perfect lighting, several things become clear and coalesce into a singular and defining truth: This is a place whose constituent elements converge to palpable, whole-transcending effect. This is a place where every detail is in constant and reverential communion with each other, where all the variables in the space-time continuum, bar, kitchen, glassware, playlist, wall art, furnishings, and, of course, people, relate to and enrich each other: NOU is the interface where this happens.
Masego, first, then, Kali Uchis, sing to me from the speakers. Even before my first bite, I want to love this place.
Even before the first bite/sip, NOU draws me in.
Singapore is a bona fide land of plenty – plenty. To make sense of our literal wealth of options, we’ve learnt the metrics of discernment. ‘Elevated’ is used a lot in the business and journalism of food. Because higher is better. And knowing/tasting better means we’re better. We’ve gotten good at being constantly famished for new concepts that titillate as much as they satiate. NOU exists in this high-pressure climate but is absolutely laser-focused on delivering on the totality it promises and not on battling its way through the elite caste system of restaurants here.
A loving approach to familiar flavours that doesn’t exclude a strict emphasis on quality and a progressive philosophy of invention – that’s the going here. Chef Loh’s menu is an homage to the sprawl of Asia and the cultures that shape and connect it. Her idea of soul food is resolutely Asian, which is why, noodles, slow food and fermentation take top billing. In plates small and big, in the kitchen as in the bar, NOU showcases the merits of prioritising tasteful refinement over directionless ‘elevation’ – soul food and drinks made with vast helpings of soul.
Case in point, the Alba Lamb Char Siew. Meat-lovers love meat, but this treat is made to be eloped with. Inspired alike by char siew and wa wa cai, this presentation situates tender, crisp cuts of melt-in-mouth lamb amid a melange of complementary vegetables and spices and a limb-unlocking homemade sweet-salty-tangy sauce and tops the whole with sesame seeds for prolonged impact of taste and texture. How it unlocks a revelatory glint from the familiar surge of flavours is glorious and bewildering – and utterly applause worthy.
This enchanting play of known-and-new continues in the payload of dumplings, whose status as Asian soul food is treated as a revered absolute at NOU. Amid the range to chose from, the head-turner is the Seafood Spinach one, wherein a spinach-green-doused skin houses a peppery thrill of prawns and squid and is bathed in a bespoke white sauce whose secrets are known only to the stewards of the kitchen. Every bite nourishes one’s faith in the sublime power of dumplings and appreciation for the synthesis of disparate elements coming together on a next-level canvas.
All this time, the drinks flow. A point––a strong point––has to made about the drinks. As superlatively as the creations of Cheryl Tng and Head Bartender Bernadine Chan lend themselves as accompaniments to the enjoyment of the food, they are just as much towering as standalone attractions. The same goes for the restaurant’s extensive wine offering, which, presided over by Maxime, privileges the harvest from dedicated independent vinters. Echoing the luminous kitchen-and-bar synchronicity, the cocktails are a marriage of gastronomy and mixology, one which, as per the NOU ethos, expands the lexicon of the classics.
Consider the star players: The Tomato Tomato and The Duck-Tini. Both martini-inspired, the former is gin-based and forged with leftover tomato brine from the house-made hot sauce and the agave-conveying latter is born from residual duck fat from the preparation of the Duck Mee Sua noodle dish. Each is heady and sumptuous and never—ever—makes the pendulum-flight to gimmicky food-cocktail hybrid territory. In both, food is an accessory to the larger message, which is that delightful things can happen when the right things come together in the right ways.
Ditto the noodles. If you have been led to your table by your palate parched for some umami-borne gratification, the noodles will amply deliver with an emphatic flourish, not just because the restaurant is sort-of named after them. The six items in this category are all excellent celebrations of Chef Loh’s vision and are variations on her sincere theme. Served with an accompanying sauce unique to each, these bowls, like the dumplings that pave the path to them, are emblematic of the how NOU brings ‘soul’ to soul food.
If one is used to meat being the the prize, then the Nou Umami Noodle will land as a total shocker. Save for a tea-marinated egg, the dish is meatless, but beckons like bouquet of fragrant savouriness. The interplay of pepperiness and spiciness; the soft coils of noodles; the amplification of everything when the side sauce makes an entrance – this is something that must be experienced. Hearing of/reading about/watching it second hand doesn’t do it justice.
The meat offerings operate the same way: Flavours getting more flavourful in richly inventive ways as various elements enter the mix. An easy one to return to is the Chicken Mazemen, which takes the Japanese tradition of broth-less noodles to a level of refinement worth studying. It’s somehow simple and complex. Chicken, noodles, sauces and garnish. But the end result is groundbreaking.
A restaurant is just a place that serves food that one pays for – until it becomes more.
NOU got there after my first visit. Besides soul, it’s a beacon of culture, of making things that resound positively and meaningfully in a shared space. Man-made forms that testify to humankind’s ability to realise beauty with its bare hands. Whether it’s a bowl of noodles, or some alcohol and sundry ingredients poured in a glass.
Even after the final bite/sip, NOU draws me in.
NOU
45 Craig Road, (S) 089683
Phone: +65 8768 1224
