Connect 71 Review: Student-Owned Cafe At NTU With Lor Bak And Gyudon Bowls From $7

The exception to the rule is Connect 71 (C71) . The co-founders of C71, Chong Qing and Raymond, are current final-year Economics students and are well aware of what students value.

Food at Connect 71 We kicked off our meal with their best-seller, the Gyudon ($9) . The dish features a bowl of Japanese short-grain rice topped with a generous amount of simmered beef and onion slices, an onsen egg, edamame, strips of nori, and pickled ginger. Going to Chong Qing, they prepared the strips of beef ‘shabu-shabu’ style, and then cleared them to rest in the broth for the flavours to be completely absorbed.

This process helped the meat obtain that lovely tenderness Every dish in the Bowls section of the menu comes with an onsen egg. Fortunately, the egg was a fantastic addition to the thin strips of beef. The egg restored that loss of moisture and gave a luxurious mouthfeel as we wolfed down the strips of meat.

If only they were served in more generous amounts, the edamame and nori flakes could have done more to enhance the texture and overall flavour of the dish. The juicy, glistening pieces of pork belly looked so mouth-watering that we couldn’t resist attacking it the moment the bowl was placed in front of us. The pork belly is cooked on low heat for 12 hours, which helps break down the fat cells to achieve that melt-in-your-mouth texture and optimal savour.

That being told reporters, we felt that the pork belly was still slightly lacking on the taste side. Like the gyudon, there was an onsen egg for us to mix in with the rice and meat. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as complementary to the pork belly as it was to the meat in our first dish.

C71 cooked their rice with the same precision as they do with their meats and the result was a soft, pillowy bed of rice that absorbed the sauces and did not mush together into a dense ball of starch. The thin slices of marinated firm tofu gave a pleasant variation in texture to the pork belly. To get the most out of this dish, we had to burst the jiggly onsen egg and mix it into the noodles with all the other toppings.

Ambience at Connect 71 The cafe space was air-conditioned and spacious. It is a godsend compared to the stuffy and crowded environment of the canteens, and I wouldn’t be surprised if students lingered for awhile after eating their meal. The verdict The vision behind the name “Connect 71” is to bring people together to connect over delicious food and a cup of coffee.