Thai-Style Steamboat : COCA Restaurant @ Ngee Ann City

Friend's birthday and what better way to celebrate than to hotpot/steamboat!? Found COCA Restaurant by perusing on Eatigo for hot pot spots, booked our reservation through the site and got 20% off. (usual price for standard weekday dinner buffet is S$44.80++).
Early dinner at 5:00pm, it's always nice to have most of the place to ourselves.

I was the first one to arrive, the reserved table was set up with the soup already. They ladled their "signature" sauce for each of us and provided a set-up on the side with cilantro, minced garlic, sesame seeds, chopped chilies, and soy sauce if you want to make your own - this is not the place for you if you prefer the sauce wonderland that is more typical of Chinese hot pot.
We actually did not enjoy this signature sauce they provided - found that while when tasted alone the sauce had some decent flavor albeit a bit sweet but when you dip anything into it it just ends up tasting like ubiquitous sweet Thai chili sauce and opted to just make our own concoctions.

The hot pot came with two soup bases, a chicken soup and tom yum soup. Both soups were flavorful, I enjoyed the tom yum soup more than I thought I would, more tangy than spicy not overwhelming at all.  

chicken broth & tom yum broth

I always order a ton of food at AYCE but a main gripe we had was that despite sending in orders several times, the amounts that they brought out were quite scant especially for the vegetables thus we were forced to write 3-4 units of each thing each time and submit orders more often which makes me a bit nervous should they decide to actually give us much more and we'll be unable to finish. I understand that this often happens at hotpot places but the amount we got for single orders seemed smaller than usual.

these are already multiple orders of each piled together which the exception of a few such as corn & eggs, the first round of many

"Fish Glue" and the various pastes seem to be another of COCA's signatures, while we weren't too impressed with the fish glue the "house special" prawn paste was really tasty with a satisfying bouncy texture. 

Other reviews had said that the garlic rice was a must have but it wasn't on the menu (not sure if they no longer offer it or if just the Ngee Ann location does not offer it) that but we did get two bowls of  chicken rice and that was yum. 

Fish Glue

various pastes - cuttlefish, shrimp, pork, fish

We dumped most of the first round of ingredients in like the bunch of super hungry beasts we were

One of the more expensive AYCE hot pot places I've eaten, even though the ingredients were fresh and the tom yum soup decent, I doubt I'll be back unless it is for their premium buffet S$66++ which includes bamboo lobster, scallops, sea cucumber, mussels.
Note: I was also a bit put off that king oyster mushrooms, shiitake mushrooms, quail eggs, and cheese luncheon meat were under the premium buffet and not the regular buffet options with the price tag they're putting on it.



Food: 3/5
Service: 3/5
Ambiance: Casual
Price: $$-$$$

Overall: 3/5 

COCA Restaurant @ Ngee Ann City
391 Orchard Road
#04-23 Ngee Ann City
Singapore 238872
Tel: +65 67347887

Hours 11:15am to 10:30pm
Last Order for Lunch @ 3:45pm
Last Order for Dinner @ 9:45pm

Outlets at Resorts World Sentosa and Leisure Park Kallang