藝 yì by Jereme Leung - Beautiful new Chinese restaurant in Raffles Hotel Singapore

藝 yì by Jereme Leung is the new Chinese restaurant at the recently re-opened Raffles Hotel, Singapore. It occupies the same space on Level 3 as the previous Chinese restaurant Royal China and before that, the Empress Room. This time round, it has been transformed into an even more attractive place. Yì by Jereme Leung is one of the most beautiful Chinese restaurants in Singapore.

A whimiscal entrance decorated with white paper foliage welcomes visitors into 藝 yì by Jereme Leung. The main dining room is spacious and tastefully furnished, as are the private dining rooms. Another paper art installation makes an appearance, this time as decorations on the ceiling.

The 藝 yì by Jereme Leung menu

Here are pictures of a page from the wine list and some pages from the food menu. We had a simple lunch of mostly dim sum items.

yì by Jereme Leung Raffles Hotel Wine List

The Food

Our lunch started with an appetiser with a long description – Shanghai style purple rice stuffed lotus root with osmanthus syrup ($16). Pieces of lotus root with rice stuffed into the hollow parts of the root. It was a good dish, except for one thing. The very sweet osmanthus syrup dominated the taste of the dish, making it more suitable as a dessert than a starter. We are happy to order this again on a future visit but will save it till the end of the meal.

The barbequed Kurobuta pork char siew ($28) was thoughtfully presented on a grill heated by hot stones. The pork was tender and tasty. If only there were less fatty bits, it would be even better.

The rest of our meal was made up of dim sum items. The steamed dumplings with porcini mushrooms and pok choy (picture above) were delicately made items. In particular, we liked the thin translucent skin.

The best dim sum item was the dried scallops, shrimp and chive pancakes. These were as good as we expected them to be. Very well flavoured fillings. The skins fried till golden and crisp and no more. They were served on a warm stone platter.

Purple sweet potatoes stuffed with salted egg yolk was an unusual dim sum dish. Its taste and texture made me think of mooncakes.

Our final dish was the most literal and unexpected dish. When we saw “fluffy curry puffs stuffed with chicken, potatoes and onions” on the menu we had expected the chef to surprise us with a Raffles Hotel interpretation of our common curry puff. It was truly a surprise when the curry puffs turned out to be exactly like the ones that we are used to. The only difference was that they were presented beautifully.

We had some hits and misses with the food, but the lunch on the whole was a tranquil and enjoyable occasion. The friendly staff and the beautiful and varied food plating made the experience more enjoyable than usual.