Julie Tan is woke. Over lunch with her one sunny afternoon at her new cafe, Botany by Dazzling Cafe, she tells us all about the virtues of using bamboo straws, in between forkfuls of otah chips. She’s passionate about saving the environment: Julie’s voice turns forceful and her eyes flash fire when she recalls spotting some rubbish in the ocean on a Tioman diving trip. “I was diving and looking at turtles and, suddenly, there was this [expletive] Colgate toothpaste tube floating beside a sea cucumber. It shouldn’t be there!” She also tells us that she had been watching environmental documentaries, eloquently expounding on the trash situation that’s clogging Singapore’s drainage system, which she had learnt about after volunteering in a local waterway cleanup project.

One could argue that Julie, 26, had grown up a lot over the past two years. In 2017, she made the difficult decision to leave Mediacorp after four years as an artiste there. In 2018, she became unwittingly embroiled in one of local showbiz’s biggest sagas: the Pan Lingling VS Hong Huifang spat that hogged headlines for days.

For the uninitiated, the saga started when Hong Huifang had sent a WhatsApp message to a handful of her celeb friends to announce the end of her friendship with Pan Lingling. The trigger? Lingling had apparently made some unflattering remarks about Julie’s dating history and her close relationship with Huifang’s son, Calvert Tay. The ensuing social media hooha dogged Julie like haze from a neighbouring country’s forest fire. Trolls left nasty comments on her Instagram posts. “There were nights when I was crying a lot. I really felt hurt. [What happened] was very damaging to any girl’s reputation,” shares Julie solemnly.

She reckons that some people, when faced with a situation like this, would start plotting their K-drama-worthy revenge. But Julie, post-Saga, is not about nursing petty grudges or curling into a victimised ball. In fact, the incident has made her a better and wiser person. She avers, “It’s for the best. If I’m given a choice to not let this saga happen, I’d still let it happen. It’s going through certain things that makes people see who you really are.”

In a bittersweet turn, it was really the late actor Aloysius Pang’s death that helped dispelled the lingering awkwardness between Julie and Lingling. “I gave Lingling-jie a hug at Aloysius Pang’s funeral, and everything was good,” says Julie. And for the record, Julie and Calvert are not dating. “Calvert and [his sister] Tay Ying went on the Tioman diving trip with me and [our common friends] too. What people don’t know is that I’m very ‘bro’. My guy friends like Shane [Pow] and Ian [Fang] would come over to my house and we’d drink tea and talk.”

Instead of relationship drama, heartache and other people’s business, Julie is now choosing to focus on her own business. Literally. On March 8 this year (“International Women’s Day,” she says with a smile), Julie soft-launched her first F&B venture, Botany by Dazzling Cafe, on the idyllic Rodyk Street overlooking the Singapore River. The elegant 90-seat cafe is an offshoot of the Taiwanese Dazzling Cafe franchise, which Julie’s close friend of over a decade, Serene Tan, 25, had brought into Singapore four years ago.

The franchise saw two short-lived Dazzling Cafe outlets open and shutter at Capitol Piazza and Orchard Gateway in March 2018 and March 2019 respectively, but the brand lives on in its current incarnation called Botany. If you like Dazzling Cafe’s prettily-plated Signature Honey Toasts, you can still get it at Botany. “We wanted to make the cafe more sustainable. Dazzling Cafe was very girly and some guys might not enjoy going there,” Julie muses.

Brightly-lit with gold-accented furniture, Botany is still feminine, pretty and all kinds of Insta-worthy. But even if you’re not a Disney princess, it’s easy to kick back and enjoy a cuppa in the cafe’s chillax, comfortable space.

There’s an adage about never doing business with your friends, but Julie is not spooked by that. It helps that she and her BFF Serene are both outspoken people who candidly resolve disagreements on the spot.

In a strange twist of fate, the two besties became friends because of an argument. Julie recalls, “We were around 13 or 14 years old and going after this idol band, Farenheit. We were at their meet-and-greet session when Serene cut my queue and I was like, “Eh, why you cut my queue?” But after that I was like, “Okay lah don’t quarrel already, [which band member] are you supporting?” Serene likes Aaron Yan, I like Jiro Wang. And we’ve been friends since then for many many years.”

While Dazzling Cafe focused on desserts, Botany offers plenty of savoury meals on top of Dazzling’s signature toast. Julie has roped in her cousin Cassandra Riene, 30, an avid home cook who crafted Botany’s menu (but the three co-owners have hired a professional chef to do the cooking here). If you wanna know what Julie Tan orders at a cafe, just refer to the menu: the Western-Asian dishes on it, like the Grilled Chicken with Balinese Salsa, reflect Julie’s own tastes.

She explains: “We have Chinese-style chicken congee inside. You may be thinking, why do we have chicken congee in such a setting? But my cousin and I have very different tastes. Sometimes I want Western brunch while she wants porridge, and I didn’t want to compromise. So I thought, it’d be good to have a place where there are both Western and Asian dishes. You get to choose what you want.”

Of course, Julie’s dad, a successful businessman (“it’s not convenient for me to talk about my family’s businesses,” she tells us apologetically), had his reservations about his daughter wading into the notoriously cutthroat business world. “He said, ‘The F&B situation is bad now. You know some of my friends closed their restaurants ’cos the economy is so bad?’” recalls Julie. “But I just told him, ‘Papa, I’m not taking any money from you’ (laughs). So he said, ‘Okay, as long as you’re happy.’” Julie declines to reveal the amount she has invested into her cafe. “There are two things that Julie Tan doesn’t talk about. Money and relationships!” she laughs uproariously.

Haters may say Julie’s cavalier ’tude stems from her privileged background. But not every Crazy Rich Asian is a self-starter like her, or possess her unique spunkiness and a can-do willingness to learn even from pitfalls. After all, she has survived a very public scandal, came out on top, and even gleaned life lessons from it. “I learnt to understand my feelings, and how to cope with it. Is it because of my insecurity? Was I worried about how other people look at me? I start to lay out the things I’m doing, and damn, there’s no time to think about sad things. I need to move on and get going. I don’t hide from my problems, ever,” she declares. A fragile, expensive strawberry? Not this millennial #girlboss.

8 DAYS: Why go into F&B?
It’s really more for my cousin Cassandra and [my best friend] Serene. It was Serene’s dream to bring in the Dazzling Cafe franchise, and she really did it. When my close friends and family need support, I’d definitely help them. Everyone always thinks business is something that I fall back on, but actually, no. Business is for me to try, and my main job is acting (laughs). Acting is my main calling since I was eight.

You also went to China to develop your acting career.
One of the movies that I did in China two years ago is finally showing there on April 12. It’s quite gory; it’s about forensics. There’s a lot of body dissection and it’s quite extreme. The cast came from Korea, US and China, so it’s a big production. But sometimes, things don’t go the way you want. When I was trying to build my career in China, the tax evasion scandal [that affected the whole industry] happened, and it became very difficult for foreign artistes to get management companies. Timing plays a part as well, and I went in at the wrong timing. It was very hard for me ’cos there were a lot of eyes looking at me and I (pauses) failed. But do I let such failures affect me? No, I’ve been through worse. I can pick myself up and continue. Right now, there’s nothing too tough in life for me to do.

You have been through a lot the past year after all.
It’s for the best. If I’m given a choice to not let the [Pan Lingling and Hong Huifang] saga happen, I’d still let it happen. It’s going through certain things that makes people see who you really are.

Because of the saga, people are also scrutinising your friendship with Calvert Tay.
I have my own life, I have my own set of things I want to do. Calvert wants to try acting, and he wants to go to China. As you can see, our life goals are not aligned. From when I started acting till now, everyone has been trying to link any guy to me. Not every guy I go out with is a potential boyfriend. We can also be friends, like me and Shane. There was a time when we were really really close, and people also thought we were together. But dude, no, we’re just friends. Do I really have to bro-zone him like, “Hey bro!” Why do people not believe in friendship between a guy and a girl? I have this inner boy in me. I tend to attract a lot of [platonic] guy friends. I also have my female friends, though they are all like me, very straightforward.

Because of how open I had been with my relationships the past few years, I created a certain pressure on myself and it affected my career too. People say I have had a lot of boyfriends, but I only had three. So maybe from now on, I will be a lot more private with my private life, so I can focus on what needs to be focused on (laughs). After my last breakup with my foreigner boyfriend, I just want to focus on myself. I just want to be single now. If I were to meet someone after this, this will be my last [time] being single. I know what I want, and right now I am not going to settle for less than what I want.

Does this mean you’re going to be very low-profile in your next relationship?
When people think of Julie, they think of the saga, relationships and boyfriends. I want people to think of my work and what I do now. I’m happy being low-profile. If they are interested in my personal life, they can watch my YouTube channel. My personal life is in it, but I control the narrative.

You had set up your own entertainment company, 1Wolf Entertainment.
I’m writing some scripts and I’m intending to collaborate with some companies. It handles my social media and all that. But for acting, I’m represented by LNX Global, which is [veteran actor] Li Nanxing’s company. They are currently managing my acting gigs in Singapore and overseas.

Are you also helping out with your family’s business now?
After I left Mediacorp, I’m helping my father out with a little bit of his business. But you know, working with parents, you don’t really get to have a say. You always have to listen to them and you can’t have your own voice. But I need to speak out. I want to have something that I can call my own. I will always be in the shadow of my dad. I want to prove that I can earn my own money. People say we are spoiled rich brats trying to prove something, what is there to prove? But this has nothing to do with my family. I’m using my own money!

WHAT WE ATE AT BOTANY ​​​​​​​

Almost every cafe in town offers Spam fries, but otah chips is a creative Asian take on ang moh fries. Mildly spicy mackerel otah from a supplier (you can see chunks of fish stuffed in the otah) is sliced thinly and fried till crispy. It’s very moreish, and a refreshingly delicious way of eating otah. We wish it was served with some sort of dip, though (you can request for bottled chilli sauce to go with this). It gets dry crunching on it after a while.

Instead of the typical minced pork, this vegetarian-friendly bowl is made with Impossible Meat, the plant-based meat substitute made by viral US company Impossible Foods. We are pretty averse to mock meat and have not tried Impossible Meat, but the plant-based minced ‘meat’ in this is surprisingly yummy and tastes like the real deal. We didn’t even miss real meat at all. The meat bits are tossed with silky tofu cubes in a piquant fermented bean and Sichuan peppercorn sauce, and topped with a gooey-yolked onsen egg, which gives the dish extra flavour. Quite tasty for a meat-free Monday, perhaps.

A succulent slab of spice-marinated boneless chicken thigh served with al dente jasmine rice, a fried egg and tangy ‘Balinese’ tomato-onion relish. We like that our chicken is charred just right, and is tender and juicy. We have often left trendy cafes feeling hungry and an avocado toast poorer, but this satisfies our lunchtime hunger pangs.

What’s a millennial hipster cafe without avocado toast? Botany’s take is the standard smashed avocado on sourdough bread with a poached egg on top, framed by a smattering of lightly sautéed kale, plus pomegranate seeds and pink-hued radishes for extra aesthetics. Not bad, but also unmemorable and expensive for something you can whip up at home.

You get a 250g ribeye steak for this, seared medium-rare and drenched in a red wine veal jus. Fairly tasty with the fluffy mound of buttery mashed potatoes, but don’t order this if you’re a voracious eater. The portion is more for small eaters.

Botany by Dazzling Cafe, 86 Robertson Quay, #01-03, S238245. Tel: 6951-4861. Open daily Sun-Thur 9am-10pm, Fri & Sat 9am-11pm. www.botany.com.sg.

PHOTOS: AIK CHEN