25ºC Cafe/Bar/Cookbooks/Test Kitchen 
From Singapore Hotels & Singapore Lifestyle
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25ºC Cafe/Bar/Cookbooks/Test Kitchen - this bookshop-bistro has classy fare such as roasted barramundi fillet and duck leg confit on its menu, as well as an extensive range of cookbooks, some of which cannot be found elsewhere in Singapore. There is also an enclosed kitchen where cooking workshops are held and which serves as a space for customers to "test out" their recipes.
Opened recently by three partners with a fondness for cookbooks, 25ºC - which gets its name from room temperature - aims to form a community among people who love anything to do with cooking.
It also wants to make cookbooks affordable to everyone. According to one of its partners, Sally Tsai, the store gets its books directly from the publishers. Prices of about 80 per cent of the books are between 5 and 50 per cent cheaper than elsewhere. Hard-to-find titles include English chef Marco Pierre White's White Heat, blind author Roy Andries De Groot's The Auberge of the Flowering Hearth, and the complete range of Williams-Sonoma encyclopedias.
Among the food items, too, are several unusual offerings: stir-fried spaghetti pasta, Mojito pork, spiced apple-and-chicken rolls and the rather suggestive-sounding Big Australian Sausage Ring with Gherkin Relish.
It would seem that the bites-and-books combination is a recipe for success, for despite it being started only recently, 25ºC has already established a crowd of regulars and is packed at lunchtime. There are 4,000 books on tis shelves, but note that there are only 28 seats in the bistro tucked at the back of the store.
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Visitors' Information
- Phone: (+65) 6327 8389
- Address: 25 Keong Saik Road, #01-01, Singapore
- Opening Hours: Mondays to Saturdays, 11.00am to 11.00pm
