Sincere Nest 诚心燕 Bottled Bird’s Nest Drink

In traditional Chinese medicine, the bird’s nest is one of the most popular and coveted tonics. It has been consumed for centuries for its supposed health-giving properties. Besides, it makes a good gift may it be for pregnant ladies, parents with kids or foster goodwill among customers and others.
Sincere Nest, a family operated company based in Klang was generous enough to offer me some samples of their signature bottled bird’s nest for a review. I thought the timing was perfect since Chinese New Year is upon us soon and some of you might want to explore other bird’s nest brands. So here goes.

Currently, Sincere Nest provides free delivery within Klang Valley for orders of 6 bottles and above. The bottled bird’s nest is available in two sizes of 70ml and 120ml. If bought individually they would cost RM23 and RM35 respectively. This was how the bird’s nest was delivered: in a box.

Since the bird’s nest is prepared fresh (using double-boil method) on order without any preservatives, they are best consumed within 3 weeks from the day of receiving. A small block of ice (wrapped in a plastic bag) was placed in the box to ensure they would stay cool during delivery. After unpacking them, the bottles of bird’s nest must be stored in a refrigerator for later consumption.

By now you should probably know that the nests could be harvested from both caves and purpose-built nesting houses. Sincere Nest gets their supply of bird’s nest from the nesting houses in Terengganu because it is a more laid back state with large portions of its natural environment still intact. That means less pollution and the swiftlets that nest there are generally healthier. Regardless of where the nests are harvested, there is no discerning difference in their nutritional value. But some people would perceive the cave harvested nests to have a greater value due to the nature of work involved.
Sincere Nest claims to use 100% pure bird nest in their products and they do not bleach and add any sort of flavouring and colouring. To be honest I wouldn’t be able to verify any of the claims made, so I will just have to take their words for it. But if you are interested to see how they clean and cook the bird’s nest, you could always arrange an appointment with them (contact information at the end of the post) to see the process for your own eyes. I was told that they’d be more than happy to show you around.

Of course, there are many other much, much cheaper brands in the market. I actually bought some before and I bet you already know that they taste nothing more than sugar water with only a few bits of bird’s nest. As you can see from the pic above, Sincere Nest’s bottle bird’s nest has a visibly high content of bird’s nest.

I think this pretty much sums up what you get in every bottle – a good amount of high quality ‘yan tiao’ (燕条) instead of broken ‘yan chui’ (燕碎) which is usually found in cheaper bird’s nest drinks. When you pour the contents into a bowl you could even hear the “plop” sound made by the chunks of bird’s nest.
Flavour wise it’s delicate without any fishy taste, not too sweet with a of faint bitterness from the America ginseng. Personally, I can vouch that each sip you take from the bottle will fill your mouth with strands of bird’s nest. And from what I checked, Sincere Nest’s pricing is very competitive and is definitely one of the more affordable ones given its quality.
However, I feel there is still much room for improvement when it comes to their packaging. I do understand the challenge though considering the extra cost involved. Moreover, their bird’s nest must be kept cool to ensure maximum shelf life. Lastly, besides bottled bird’s nest, Sincere Nest also sells concentrated bird nest, dry and raw bird nest. For more information or any on-going promotion, visit their Facebook page.

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