The J Babies: Four-Tier Steamboat Buffet With Free-Flow Drinks & Ice-cream

Media Tasting

Rained cats and dogs the whole day – Craving for some piping hot steamboat? Why not make that four-tier - steam, cook in soup barbecue AND dip in some cheese fondue?

The Flame Cafe, located 3 minutes away from Tai Seng MRT station, offers steamboat buffet packages in this four-tier gigantic pot for as low as $19.90/pax. If you like to have seafood as well, there are more premium packages going at $24.90 and $38.90. We were hosted there for a media tasting last Saturday and my kids made it extremely worth it by spamming crabs, baby lobsters, prawns and clams. Yes, we are seafood lovers and this buffet is great for us!

The most basic package includes free flow of meats, vegetables and all the ingredients in the chiller, along with free-flow drinks (Thai milk tea, Bandung, lemon tea) and ice-cream. I would say that the variety is decent – the usual fare you would see for steamboat buffets, but the marinated meats are worth a mention – Well-marinated and taste great. There’s pork, beef, chicken and fish provided in the meat section, so if you are a meat lover, you would be happy. For this package, you only get to choose one out of four different soup bases – Herbal Chicken, Chicken, Tom Yum and Mala. As for the dip, you can also choose between cheese fondue, peanut sauce or the current craze – salted egg yolk dip! The cheese lovers in my family did not even hesitate and chose cheese right away - It’s great for barbecued meats!

Many different sauces are provided at the side for self-service – They even have a seafood Thai sauce which is quite interesting.

If you opt for the more expensive package which includes seafood, you get to choose two soup bases. The seafood are kept chilled, so you can order whatever you want (ala carte buffet style) on the chit provided, and the staff will serve them to you.

We chose Tom Yum and Herbal Chicken soup bases and both were fragrant and tasty even before we started cooking the ingredients.

The top steamer tier is perfect for steaming prawns, mussels, clams and crabs!

The kids had so much fun barbecuing and dipping their food into the melted cheese fondue. The only pitfall about this style of steamboat pot is that it is a little hard to scoop food out especially from the bottom steamboat tier, as it’s quite narrow. Just need to be careful if there are kids trying to get food for themselves so that they don’t spill on themselves.

We went for the $38.90 package, which included a portion of sashimi for the adults, as well as free flow supply of live crabs and other premium seafood. My favorite was the scallops – So juicy & yummy. For this package, you are also entitled to one dish of crabs prepared in either black pepper, chili or steamed.