#FastFoodFriday: 4Fingers Chick & Shrimp Rice Review: Nice Try But Not Nice Enough

Is 4Fingers better than a random cutlet rice in a kopitiam?

That isn’t really the purpose of this review here, but it might as well be. Ordering the bento was quick, and at about 12:10 pm order was placed. Arrival time according to the app: 12.30 pm.

12:30 pm.: I was waiting in anticipation for 4Fingers to deliver the goods.

Btw, this is what I ordered. The new 4Fingers Chick & Shrimp Rice Box at S$8.45, or S$9.95 with a drink. Hmmm #FriedChickenFridays.

12:35 p.m.: The office idiots walk to the lunch table. They happened to order the same thing: Chicken cutlet with rice, served with creamy coleslaw. Freshly fried, from your friendly neighbourhood western stall unker and auntie at a mere S$3.50.

12:45 p.m.: Deliveroo lied and pushed back the order time. I cursed my boss for renting this ulu place as an office.

12:50 p.m.: No news from Deliveroo. My dumb colleagues are taunting me with their fried chicken and coleslaw. My colleagues chewed slower and slower to make sure I can hear each crunch of the fried chicken. Each drip of the mayonnaise mixture from the coleslaw taunting me…

What if the Deliveroo ran into a PMD-hater uncle? What if they never arrive? Will I starve to death?

1:00 p.m.: Just as the chicken meat containers were taunting me further by packing their boxes and slapping their stomachs, Deliveroo arrived!

So, is this worth the wait? Well, take a look:

Beautiful. The shrimps and chicken somehow looks smaller than the advertisements, but when I sat down to properly eat it, I realised it’s probably because the box is pretty huge.

And to start, I dug into the kimchi.

Yeah, after all the talks about hunger, first thing is kimchi. Good kimchi with rice is a good enough lunch, aight?

4Fingers say this is their “daily-fermented kimchi coleslaw”, which of course isn’t special to this box. Then again, nothing in this box is unique to this set.

The slaw is sour, adequately spicy, but somehow lacks the umami of real good kimchi I can be satisfied with just plain rice. There probably isn’t too long of fermentation time for the kimchi to develop the flavour, and I suspect they didn’t have the addition of fish sauce or something similar. The addition of mayo (it seems) didn’t do much for me.

So let’s move to the main thing: chicken. Nothing much to complain here. Thin crisp skin that’s evenly coated, and a sauce that’s sweet and salty and complements well with the chicken.

Small complain: sauce isn’t evenly coated and not enough garlic.

For the shrimp, the batter seems a little different, but it could be a little soggy from the delivery ride. But this is where I realised that 4Fingers is in the end still fast food (me waiting for delivery aside…).

One shrimp is overly sauced, and another not well coated like the chicken. Here’s the problem: they probably didn’t toss the fried stuff and opted to drizzle the sauce instead.

Look at this gif where fried chicken is tossed and there’s an even coating.

And I might as well talk about the rice as well. It turned out delicious, but 1 or 2 small clumps of rice can still be spotted inside, turning into mush. It’s a problem common with using too much water or not washing the starch off rice thoroughly.

So, in the end, did I win by eating 4Fingers or did my colleagues win by not eating 4Fingers?

It’s about three times the price, with a win in crisp chicken quality and amount of meat while losing in coleslaw/kimchi. I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to eat 4Fingers, but if it’s nearby why not?

Rating: 3.75/5