Hotspot: Gilmore & Damian D’Silva

Right: Damian D’Silva

We’re eating at the National Gallery Singapore? It’s going to be fancy, yes?
Some restaurants announce themselves loudly. Gilmore & Damian D’Silva does the opposite. You’re right that it’s set within the former Supreme Court wing of the National Gallery Singapore, but rather than being full-on jazz hands, it has a quietness about it – understandable when you realise it’s standing on sacred ground, not only architecturally, but personally.

Oooh, what do you mean?
Gilmore D’Silva, an ex police detective, was the first and only custodian of the Supreme Court from 1939 – 1960, safeguarding the building for 21 years. He lived within its quarters, held its keys, and cooked for the judges despite having no formal culinary training. For his grandson Chef Damian D’Silva, putting the restaurant within the same building where his grandfather resided isn’t a coincidence. This is a homecoming and full-circle moment in Chef Damian’s career.

Gilmore’s recipe book

Is Gilmore’s presence felt when you’re there?
Family photographs line the walls and personal artefacts are displayed. One standout is Gilmore’s treasured recipe book, reserved for the most complex dishes – everything else lived entirely in his head! The recipe book now hangs on the restaurant wall, a reminder of how easily culinary knowledge disappears. When a young Damian once asked to learn those recipes, his reason was simple: “So that I can still eat the food you cook when you are not around.” Now Damian honours this daily.

Who was Gilmore beyond the kitchen?
People remember him for his impeccable manners, generosity, and thoughtfulness. He was also an adventurous cook, deeply versed in Eurasian cuisine. His influence shaped Damian’s palate, values, and instinctive sense of hospitality.

Talk us through the food …
The menu centres on heirloom Eurasian recipes, some more than 200 years old, alongside Chinese dishes inspired by Gilmore’s cooking. Everything is made from scratch using traditional methods.

What’s on the menu?
Teochew ngoh hiang, fragrant with five spice and wrapped in caul fat, is about technique rather than reinvention. Chicken soup steamed inside a coconut husk carries the comfort of special-occasion cooking, while Kristang dishes such as cowdang and Christmas Debal surface flavours at risk of slipping quietly into history. The sugee cake for dessert is a pure step-back-in-time. Food arrives family table-style, meant for sharing.

Christmas Debal

With all the history, how’s the vibe?
Service is warm and precise, shaped by the same gentlemanly hospitality Gilmore embodied all those years back.

Final thoughts?
Gilmore & Damian D’Silva is more than a restaurant. It’s a living archive of a grandfather’s influence, and of a cuisine that survives because someone chose to remember. Where Gilmore once safeguarded the Supreme Court, Chef Damian now safeguards Singapore’s Eurasian culinary heritage.

Gilmore & Damian D’Silva
1 St Andrew’s Road, #01-02/03 National Gallery, 178957
gilmore.sg