[Food Review] Fremantle Seafood Market

Cuisine: Western / Australian
Address: 3E River Valley Road #01-05 Singapore (179024)
Nearest MRT: Clarke Quay station (Northeast line)

Named after the Australian port city famed for its harbourside seafood markets, Fremantle Seafood Market lives up to its name by offering up a plethora of fresh and succulent seafood delights. With the restaurant having all its seafood air flown into Singapore on a regular basis, diners certainly won’t be complaining about a lack of freshness! Even in Singapore, where restaurants serving seafood are a dime a dozen, this elegant Clarke Quay restaurant manages to stand out from the rest of the pack by the sheer quality of ingredients it uses and the care with which the dishes are prepared and served.

In this hot and humid climate, diners will be sure to appreciate the Make Merry Chilled Seafood Platter, a gargantuan masterpiece piled high with five juicy oysters, several large King Crab legs, half a lobster, assorted sashimi, and four seafood tapas of choice – it’s a rare person who can resist and stop him or herself from salivating at such a luscious combination. Or for something a little closer to home, do try the Fisherman Hot Seafood Platter ($76), which includes some local touches like steamed butter prawns and soft-shell crab served with helpings of piquant chilli crab sauce and fried man tou. With such quality seafood on offer, diners will most certainly be getting a bang for their buck.

Having passed by this restaurant and seeing that it has nice views along the Singapore River, we decided to check out this place on a Sunday lunch. For starters, we had the Crispy Soft Shell Crab ($16), served with spicy pomodoro sauce. The crab was battered and fried lightly, it was quite fresh and crispy with each bite. The salad at the side would remove the excess oil taste in your mouth.

For mains, I had the Fremantle Seafood Market ($28). It has fish fingers, prawn fritters, calamari fritto served with french fries, coleslaw, tartar
sauce and cayenne aioli. When the dish arrived, I was disappointed because I did not expect everything to be deep fried. Compared to the Fish and Co. platter where some of the seafood was grilled, this one was just full of batter. After eating a few shrimps and the calamari, I removed the batter and just ate the seafood. I would not recommend this dish if you are not a fan of fried stuff.

My friend had the Grilled Barramundi ($24) which comes with sauteed seasonal vegetables with baby potatoes and lemon butter sauce. I preferred this grilled fish as it retains the freshness and we could have a better taste of the fish. The carbs by the side helped to supplement the dish.

If you are looking for some fresh seafood by the river, then head over to Fremantle Seafood Market. If you want to taste the freshness of the seafood, then it is better to avoid the fried dishes. There are also vegetarian dishes such as Vegetarian Ratatouille for those who can’t meat or seafood. We skipped desserts because we were planning to visit another cafe in the vicinity. The weather was perfect on that day and we managed to capture a nice photo.