11 Westside brings LA-style Mexican fare to the CBD, with margarita Mondays and taco Tuesdays

If you work in the Central Business District (CBD), chances are you would have popped by Asia Square for lunch at some point.

Aside from the wide variety of options in its food hall, Asia Square has also seen some viral concepts from Hong Kong setting up shop on its first floor. 

First there was Mimmo Bakery, which started as a pop-up in Hong Kong, and now, Mexican concept 11 Westside from the same company, which has opened right around the corner.

Given that 11 Westside’s Singapore outlet occupies a prominent spot within Asia Square — where popular after-work drinking venue The Exchange once stood for 13 solid years — we were curious to see if this new-to-Singapore concept would hold its own. 

We sat down with Korean-Canadian chef Yong Soo Do, 39 — or chef Yong as he is more commonly known — the group executive chef of Liberty Group, who’s leading the group’s foray into Singapore. 

The hospitality group, which has a presence in Hong Kong and Singapore, is also behind brands such as Forbidden Duck, Ho Tak Kee, and Qi — House of Sichuan here. 

Why open 11 Westside in Singapore?

“Our group saw the opportunity to expand Chinese brands into Singapore first,” chef Yong explains, citing Singapore’s ethnic Chinese majority as one of the reasons. 

For research, the formerly Hong Kong-based chef began dining at more places on our sunny island, adding: “I tried a few Mexican restaurants here and saw that there was an opportunity for us to set up 11 Westside.”

Its name is a nod to its original address of 11 Davis Street, while the word “westside” is in reference to Los Angeles in the US, where its Mexican culinary traditions inspired its menu offerings. 

11 Westside first opened in Singapore in July as its first international outpost, after operating from its Kennedy Town location in Hong Kong for a decade.

The original Hong Kong outlet has since shuttered, as of July, and the team has said that it has ”shifted its focus towards new opportunities and expansion in Singapore”. It added that it remains excited to continue evolving the 11 Westside brand here. 

What’s on the menu here

Regardless of its origins, we were naturally curious as to what made 11 Westside different from the many Mexican concepts that already dot our tiny city.

To this, chef Yong says proudly: “The pride we take in this concept is that we make everything fresh. We don’t buy anything and we make everything in-house — tortillas, salsas, and so on.”

Chef Yong had developed Singapore’s offerings off the concept’s original menu by chef Esdras Ochoa, a Mexican-born chef with Baja California heritage, and culinary experience in Los Angeles. 

Acknowledging that Singaporean diners are a well-travelled bunch, chef Yong also recognises that “the palates here are more sensitive”, and that diners here “care about the authenticity, culture, and experience, so we’re working on bringing in more exciting elements.”

Off the bat, this is evident in our first dish, the tableside guacamole (S$26) — a quintessential Mexican dish of fresh avocado, combined with lime, onion, cilantro, and chilli, served with crispy tortilla chips — that is served right in front of us.

I ask for it to have a touch less citrus and the crew happily obliges.

“We’re not just trying to provide good food. We want to bring in a good atmosphere and hospitality as well,” chef Yong explains. “Diners don’t just come for food anymore, they come for the experience.”

To that, we concur — the interaction for the tableside guacamole is brief and the room for customisation a small part of the overall experience, but it gets things off on a warm footing. 

Our starter is swiftly followed up by a hamachi ceviche (S$26, available during lunch), where fresh yellowtail is cured in citrus with tomato, onion, avocado, and chilli. It’s bright, refreshing, and whets our appetite for the more hefty protein-heavy mains ahead.

We opt for a Baja fish taco (S$8) and the pollo asado taco (S$7) next to pace ourselves.

11 Westside Singapore serves up a selection of seven types of tacos — there’s pork, chicken, fish, beef, shrimp, and a vegetarian cauliflower one — pricing on its regular menu is per taco, allowing you to pick and choose depending on your appetite and budget. 

If you swing by at midday, its lunch menu offers a trio of 11 Westside’s signature tacos — the al pastor, with achiote-marinated pork, grilled pineapple, salsa roja, and onion, the pollo asado, and the mango shrimp for S$21. 

Of the two we got to try, we preferred the pollo asado taco, featuring citrus-garlic grilled chicken with salsa molcajete, avocado, onion, and cilantro. The chicken was moist and tender while the sauces were deep and flavourful with a tinge of smokiness. 

Chicken is usually not a go-to for me when it comes to tacos, but at S$7 a pop, this is a pocketful of deliciousness I see myself going back to easily. 

The Baja fish taco, which ironically is usually my protein of choice, owing to the varying textures, felt a little less impactful though it still tasted decent. More crunch on the outside and a flakier, softer fish might have helped. 

For quesadillas, 11 Westside has recently updated its selection, offering a quesadilla deluxe (with wild mushrooms, melted cheese blend, and salsa roja, S$22) or Westside quesadilla (with melted cheese blend, pico de gallo, and guacamole, S$25) where you can pick a protein instead. 

We didn’t try these versions, but we did get to try a shrimp & chicken quesadilla — that is no longer on the menu — and I have to say that this was probably the best dish of the afternoon for me. 

It comes with the same tender chicken in the taco, except this time it’s accompanied by chunky pieces of shrimp and melted cheese, and is topped off with avocado and crema. 

The avocado and crema may look cloying but they come together so seamlessly, giving the crispy quesadilla a good dose of flavour without tasting heavy or overwhelming. It also comes with a side of smoky dip, but I barely needed any of it. 

We also got the chance to try another main, the adobo octopus that’s only available with the S$48 three-course executive set lunch, where you get to select a starter, main, and get a chef’s daily dessert. The catch? You’ll have to top up S$15 for this plate. 

It’s a pretty penny, yes, but the tentacle is pretty sizeable while the chargrilled, adobo-glazed octopus is adequately tender. If you still need a splash of flavour, the accompanying salsaI verde, pickled shallots, and fresh herb salad do just the trick. 

We wrap our meal up with the concept’s only dessert at this point of time, the Churros III Ways (S$18). 

The freshly fried churros, served with caramel sauce, popcorn, and vanilla ice cream, may be simple, but it’s a good way to wrap up the meal.

If you need more reasons for dessert, the dish was crafted by chef Domenico Giammarella — the man behind the neighbouring Mimmo Bakery that’s also been going viral for its sweets and bakes — so you can trust you’re in good hands.

With 11 Westside being in the thick of the CBD, it might also interest you that the venue has recently launched margarita Mondays, with free-flow margaritas, on top of its taco Tuesdays, where you can get tacos for half-price. 

If our initial favourable impressions of 11 Westside’s Singapore outpost (and sole operating outlet now, we suppose) are anything to go by, we genuinely hope that this concept is here to stay in Singapore and to continue growing its menu and offerings. 

Chef Yong, who has since moved to Singapore, shares that “there are a lot of concepts that we have been brainstorming — we want to open concepts that are customised to the local market, that Singaporeans will be excited for.”

As someone who grew up around a mother and aunt who were chefs, he hints at the possibility of opening something closer to his Korean roots and heritage.

As for when or where this might be, only time will tell — we hope we’ll be one of the first to bring the news to you if this comes to fruition in Singapore. 

This was a hosted tasting.

For more exciting, new eats, check out KFC’s new surf n’ turf menu and the newly rebranded Paul cafe, which is now known as Maison Paul.