Singapore’s best new restaurants that braved opening during the pandemic, from Indian barbecue to contemporary Korean
- While Singapore’s dining scene has suffered notable casualties during the pandemic – the revolving Prima Tower, Vianney Massot – new ones have stepped in
- Indian barbecue eatery Revolver, Korean restaurant Naeum, the “kappo”-style Willow and French brasserie Claudine have all been drawing hordes of diners
It was April 2020 and Sameer Sain was stuck in his luxury apartment in Singapore, twiddling his thumbs.
Like the rest of Singapore’s 5.5 million population, the Indian entrepreneur was unable to travel for work, let alone step out of his home for non-essential activities like dining in a restaurant.
With time on his hands, Sain began to flesh out what started as fleeting thoughts in his mind some two or three years earlier.
“I’ve been thinking about how I can change the perception and experience that people have as it relates to food in India,” says Sain, an impassioned foodie and co-founder and CEO of private equity firm the Everstone Group. “I want to alter biases and stereotypes, and the pandemic gave me the opportunity to plan and execute a restaurant opening as a project.”
One-and-a-half years later, in September 2021, Sain’s Indian barbecue eatery Revolver opened on Tras Street. At the unique counter-style restaurant, a grill and a copper-tinted tandoor take centre stage in an open-concept kitchen.
A few weeks later, the Singapore government reinstated its on-again, off-again restriction capping dining-in at restaurants at two people per table, to tackle escalating Covid-19 cases in the city state.
