There’s nothing quite like driving a steak knife into a thick medium-well (or however you prefer) cut of meat and savouring the juicy goodness. Well, that’s the experience you get at the cheekily named Once Upon A Flame. The whole place has a typical American steakhouse decor — brick walls, walls lined with pop-culture photo frames, and wooden tables and chairs. Often crowded, the spacious arrangement of the seats makes it easy for you to have private conversations.
A quick scan of the menu throws up a selection of salads, burgers, pasta, steaks, and drinks. You’ll notice that most of the names of the dishes have rather clever puns. For instance, you have a pork steak called The Pork Knight Rises, that almost looks like Christopher Nolan cooked it — perfectly cut shoulder steak featuring a stellar cast of herb and spicy Chimichurri marinade.
We started off with The Hulk, a refreshing drink made of pineapple crush, Blue Curacao, and 7Up. Mains consisted of the Sin By Fire chicken steak and Steakalypse Now, which is a tenderloin beefsteak. The former, a perfectly grilled chicken steak is served with hot paprika sauce. Cutting into the beefsteak was almost like cutting butter — the juicy tenderloin easily caved into the edges of our knives without a fuss. Savour this by pouring copious amounts of the chilli-garlic sauce that’s served on the side.
The menu does throw up quite interesting options for vegetarians such as the Yummy Yammy (yam steak). The dessert section is played safe with options such as caramel custard and baked cheesecake.