Tuckshop

C says:

I think we’ve found the perfect steak sandwich. A’s friends R and T suggested dinner here with the gang on Tuesday night, for a joint birthday celebration. Tuckshop is barely a couple of months old, and is located along Tanjong Pagar Road, next to Oso restaurant. Since a couple of the guys work right upstairs from here, they’ve already been here a few times and raved about the steak sandwich.

They certainly weren’t exaggerating. This is nothing like the roast beef sandwiches or Philly cheese steak sandwiches that you can get at high-end sandwich shops or delis, that pile on the vegetables and skimp on the meat, and where the meat itself tastes like corned beef at best, or strips of leather at worst. No, this is a no holds barred, proper steak sandwich without any frills or trappings. It consists of the simplest ingredients – a good-sized piece of steak, fairly thick and done medium rare/medium, topped with a Portobello mushroom and caramelized onions, sandwiched between ciabatta bread.

It’s classic proof that simple is best. No wagyu or foie gras or aioli or any other fancy schmancy ingredients. They just rely on a good cut of steak. For $12, you get the steak sandwich with fries and coleslaw (both of which are pretty good too). M told us that we can switch the fries to a salad, so we ordered one with fries, and another with a caesar salad.


The sandwich is pretty amazing, and good value if you factor in the quality of steak that you get. It’s juicy, not too greasy, and the Portobello mushroom gives it even more of an earthy, meaty taste. The caeser salad is very good too – they make their own salad dressing, and serve it with proper bacon bits.


We tried the calamari as well, which was another winner. The squid was tender, the batter light and crispy, and it came with a really good tartar sauce. The salami and basil pesto pizza fared less well, though. I guess it’s not that bad per se, but the steak sandwich and calamari rings are a pretty hard act to follow. Maybe if they had called this salami foccacia or something along those lines, it would’ve been ok; it just wasn’t really a pizza.

Another of our friends ordered the ale-battered Fish and Chips, which looked good too. We swiped some of the batter (in our defence, she wasn’t eating the batter anyway…we’re not such shameless freeloaders…) and it was very tasty. Definitely another promising dish, although as M puts it, anything else on the menu, while good, just isn’t the steak sandwich.

This place is literally down the road from A’s office, so I can foresee him coming here for lunch pretty often. He’s already eyeing the smoked salmon sandwich…

A says:

Food RAWKED! This place is pretty cool and I’ll keep going until it gets crowded. The alcohol isn’t watered down (from what I hear), but I think they should add coffee to the drink selections.

Tuckshop
21 Tanjong Pagar Road, #01-05
(Between Play Bar and Oso Restaurant)
Tel: 6534-9287
Opening hours
Mon to Thurs: 11.30 am to 2.30 pm; 5.30 pm to midnight
Friday: 11.30 am to 2.30 pm, 5.30 pm to 3 am
Saturday: 5.30 pm to 4 am
Closed Sundays.
Happy Hour
Mon & Tues: 5.30 pm to 10 pm.
Wed to Fri: 5.30 pm to 8.30 pm