Food & Hotel Asia 2012 Day 1 – Introduction and Recce
Food & Hotel Asia 2012 is one of the biggest F&B and hospitality related trade shows cum exhibitions in the world. It is most certainly the largest in all Asia. This year, Singapore plays host to the mega event, utilising all the exhibition halls at Singapore EXPO. The scale of the event can be summarised in one word, MASSIVE!!! From machinery and tools for food processing, food storage, down to cutlery and crockery for meal service and presentation, with a wide selection of premium ingredients, like flour and butter, down to wines and spirits, a good display of fabric-related ware from hotel quality bedding to napkins and even chef’s wear and service staff uniforms, to a range of bathroom toiletries, FHA2012 aims to provide an all-encompassing experience, as well as to cater to the needs and wants from all aspects of these industries.
The trade show opened yesterday with incredibly long queues at both Halls 1 and 7, where trade visitors registered and were ushered into the exhibition halls, waiting to be enthralled and overwhelmed by the sheer scale and detail of the event. It most certainly overwhelmed me! Literally flabbergasted. 5+ hours of walking, shopping, browsing, buying, sampling, eating and chatting… I’d covered barely half of the halls. So here’s a flood of photos I’d taken from the event so far. It doesn’t cover everything in the event, basically those aspect which I’m interested in, e.g. cooking, baking and pastry-making. So you would find lots of cakes, lots of ice-cream, lots of pastries, etc. Forgive me as the photos would not be of much artistic merit, since they were snapped in haste and most of the time, balancing the camera with one hand and a cup of gelato, or a freshly baked bun in the other. In fact, I can’t even find a decently appropriate photo for the introduction! But it gives you an idea of the scale and nature of event. Enjoy 🙂
First up, Chocolat World from Belgium, with lots of chocolate moulds! Their in-house chocolatier was there to give a demostration to make bon bons and pralines. Their moulds were sold at SGD25 a piece, with a free piece thrown in if you buy 10!
Frozen fruit puree from Ravifruit and Boiron
And there’s Elle & Vire, with products that i’d never seen before…
And of course, Valrhona
And Amedei
Apart from Chocolat World, there’re also some familiar names, like Flexipan
New moulds as well as piping nozzle kits from San Neng 三能
De Buyer, who makes helluva good mousse rings
De Buyer’s in-house patissier’s demonstration with their silicon moulds
Freshly baked financiers
More moulds, by Pavoni
Matfer was there too. Another familiar brand for their tart rings and moulds
Silicon Mould trees at Deco Relief from France. Quite cheap too at 12 SGD a piece, with a free piece thrown in if you buy 10!
And stashes of polycarbonate moulds as well in all designs…
largely going for SGD20 a piece with the same free one piece offer if you buy 10! I succumbed!
Deco Relief’s in-house patissier demonstrating the use of the moulds with marzipan I think.
But I chatted with this guy most of the time, Christian aka “Juju” as he prefers to be called. A really funny character to talk to. Pardon my bad French!
And there were walls of cupcake cases… literally walls of them, no joke. I could only capture a small fraction as there were people discussing business everywhere.
The fella is the mother of all pots!
Gigantic belgium waffle maker. I like!!!
Kenwood Cooking Chef, I like as well!!! This fella has temperature regulating function from 20 C to 140C. Chocolate tempering, churning kaya, doubling up as a sous vide. I can think of so many possibilities now, despite the price being an overkill. 😦
Selection of confitures and pates from Bonne Mamam
Olive oils, both extra virgin and infused from Le Petit Provence
More commercial grade silicon moulds from Mackies from Down Under
More loaf and cupcake paper cases…
Naturelles’ hazelnut and pistachio paste
Ready to roll colored fondant
Sprinkles!
Manuka honey from New Zealand
Freebies!
Machine which rolls and lines pate sucree into the tart moulds automatically! I like!
And perfectly rolled out croissants ready to be baked
All cut and roll to precision and perfection
Chanel No. 5? Well… not quite…alluring nonetheless.
Lots of bread demonstrations and sampling
This chinese chef was promoting a model of commercial oven and fed us with what it made. I had freshly baked croissant with otah! Oomph!
Rolling out the dough to the right consistency and texture
Cutting out designs…
There’s even one which demo-ed dough fritters aka youtiao.
Rapidly snapped up dinner rolls once they came out from the oven!
baguette!
Jenga a la baguette!
Sausage buns and raisin rolls
Choux buns with croquant in blazing red!
Trays full of macaron… alas not for tasting or purchase!
Big but not so well-made textures! so much for sour grapes huh? DANG!
Roti canai aka roti prata from our neighbours from across the causeway!
Glaces and gelato tasting everywhere! Sorbets, ice-creams, greek yoghurts, smoothies in all thinkable flavours!
Scoop away!
Nice and smooth…
Spoilt for choices!
I think I easily sampled a pint of ice-cream in there, collectively…
I love the orange vanilla gelato from this booth. Really brilliant orange flavours carrying through. The bitter chocolate was really dark and intense as well!
Service with a smile!
Blueberry greek yoghurt. Not too bad but a tad too grainy. The fat and the water seem to have separated somewhat giving it that granita-like texture
designer cakes
This design is cute!
Cake decorating demo…
Louis Vuitton anyone?
Mousses in multitude of flavours
Most in verrines but some in pastry cases like this
Sliced entremets
Display full of verrines and petit gateaus!
more designer cakes
close up on a rose-motif with a golden sheen
Array of small tea cakes
traditionally presented in boxes to friends and relatives when invitations to attend wedding banquets are distributed.
Lovely fondant decorated layer cake
demonstrating air-brushing techniques
semms pretty easy…
some finished pieces drying out… really realistic
Adding the finishing touches
voila! its done!
collection of tools
more designer cakes and petit gateaus
closeups
some are shaped like lollies
more cakes on display!
latest design for packaging makis aka hand rolls to go!
山寨版 Pirated version of KitchenAid。 Doesn’t take much to figure out where it was made…
and there’s ramen sampling too! A new brand apparently… Yamato Ramen
Truth be told, I didn’t particular enjoyed the texture.
And another Italian pastry chef demonstrating…
And this post ends here abruptly… too tired to continue with the photography. but watch this space for tomorrow’s big event:
Hopefully I would have the finesse to get it properly documented!
Related posts
Food & Hotel Asia 2012 Day 3 – Asian Pastry Cup Day 2 & Finale
Food & Hotel Asia 2012 Day 2 – FHA Culinary Challenge: Petit Fours and Pralines
Food & Hotel Asia 2012 Day 2 – Asian Pastry Cup Day 1
travellingfoodies 
OMG!!! Alan, you are killing me!!! I wish I was there but this month I am really tight with my time. Chef Ryan Khang offered me a free pass to be there but I just don’t have the time because I had so much to do to get ready for my biz trip there on the 24th.
April 18, 2012 at 8:24 am
ah, is Chef Ryan Phang gonna be here? I wish I could meet up with him!
April 18, 2012 at 11:50 am
im gg today!!!! 😀 i hope half a day is enough to cover most of it!
April 18, 2012 at 9:10 am
Michelle, that would be a near impossible task!!!
April 18, 2012 at 11:51 am
yes…killing me too…….
April 18, 2012 at 9:25 am
haha Hody, look out for my photos!
April 18, 2012 at 11:51 am
Thanks for sharing so much photos. Is it open for industrial people only?
April 18, 2012 at 9:40 am
yah, officially its for folks from the trade only.
April 18, 2012 at 11:51 am
Thanks for sharing all these pictures and appreciate your effort! I can spend whole day in this trade show!! A lot of new stuffs to see..about the cupcake liners, i don’t see any liner for Hokkaido chiffon cupcake..
April 18, 2012 at 9:43 am
Sonia, glad you enjoyed it! One day is surely not enough! I could camp in there eating ice-cream! LOL
And yes, lots of new and wierd looking gadgets
April 18, 2012 at 11:52 am
thank you for all the photos! sneak me in your bag pls! i want to go!! x(((((
April 18, 2012 at 10:36 am
LOL, i would if I have such a large bag, Jasmine!
April 18, 2012 at 11:53 am
Ohmigawd! I’m super jealous! I’d be a like a kid in a candy store in that trade fair especially in the section with the baking supplies. Can’t be left alone in a place like that!
Gorgeous shots.
April 18, 2012 at 12:20 pm
Hi amrita! Indeed its like charlie walking.into willy wonker’s! The next couple of days would get progressively intense, owing to the numerous competitions taking place. Watch this space! 🙂
April 18, 2012 at 7:29 pm
I think you are going to get a lot of OMG’s on this post. OMGGGG.
I’ve been a couple times to the Hotel and Resto Expo in Paris and had about the same route. All my favorites. Not being in retail or restaurant business anymore- it’s fun but not the same knowing I’m not buying ‘for real’. But I’d go again in a heartbeat. We actually went to one here in Hamburg but it didn’t hold a candle to Paris or what you are seeing in Singapore.
Better get your feet up!
April 18, 2012 at 11:34 pm
Hi Wendy. Hope you enjoyed the coverage! Did you take photos of the trade show.in Hamburg as well? Would love to see it!
April 19, 2012 at 11:17 am
No- this was more restaurant and hospitality. So you had a few good ones like DeBuyer, Matfer, valrhona, cool equipment etc. but not quite like what you find in Paris or what you are seeing…. or maybe I didn’t have the right ‘eye’ in the moment. I also hadn’t started the blog yet 🙂
April 19, 2012 at 1:48 pm
ah ic ic…:)
April 19, 2012 at 10:10 pm
That is amazing Alan! Thanks so much for sharing all the pics. I really enjoyed seeing them! I want one of everything from the matfer booth thank you. 🙂
April 19, 2012 at 9:26 am
Thanks Jodi! I want everything from Matfer too! Together with De Buyer and Flexipan and a hoard of stuff! LOL
April 19, 2012 at 11:18 am
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hey u should go on the last day as well. usually better deals on the last day when they try to get off stocks.. thats what i do for FHM (malaysia’s)
April 19, 2012 at 12:15 pm
I am I am!!!
April 19, 2012 at 10:10 pm
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