Saturday, February 28, 2009

Jewels of the East, part 2

I think that the region that you grew up in is an important factor in shaping your attitude to hawker food, and perhaps even food in general. People from the East generally have more elevated standards for hawker fare because there is so much good food in the East; and they tend to be creatures of habit, picking their favourites and sticking to them. People who grew up in the Central or downtown area have no idea of what good hawker food is because there rarely is any around them. People who live in the North are typically indifferent between a version here or a version there because the standards are all about the same wherever you go in the North. (The exception to this is Toa Payoh, which does have a lot of good food and produces the kind of foodie that is so rare in the North). Also, the people in the North are shocked at what people elsewhere pay for food, because everything is cheaper up there. And the people in the West? Well, nobody really cares what the people in the West think anyway.

Seng Kee Bak Chor Mee

It is hard not to take it personally when you recommend something to someone and they do not like it. When they actively dislike it, then it cuts even deeper. I recently took Karen and Victor to Seng Kee to try this bak chor mee, which I had been raving about to anyone who would listen. I had it too, so I didn't think it was an off day. It was just as piquant, just as distinctively tasty as it normally was. But Victor scrunched his nose in disgust and if not for the fact that he is as greedy as I am, would not have finished his plate. I struggled to understand this but finally chalked it up to the heavy use of vinegar and liver - both of which he does not like.


Still, I am a huge fan of this bak chor mee. It is right down the street from the Golden City chye tow kuay, and it is quite difficult not to patronise just one at a time. I usually succumb to the temptation of having two meals, one after the other.

Xin Mei Xiang Lor Mee


I absolutely love lor mee. Taste-wise it is everything that I like - noodles, braised meats, reduced sauces, liberal use of black vinegar and sliced chilies. But in addition to that it is also an adventure to eat, texture-wise. The sauce is reduced to a gummy, starchy consistency so the dish is not quite a "soup" dish, but not quite a "dry" dish either. Also, there will typically be some ingredient that is deep-fried and added as a topping. Most times it is fish slices that have been battered and deep-fried, fritter-style. There is a stall at Tiong Bahru Market (which coincidentally has very good version of lor mee) that deep-fries shark meat and tops their dish off with it. So you bring together the gummy sauce, the crispy fritters, the ngoh hiang (which is wrapped in a thin beancurd sheet), the slippery noodles sliding from your chopsticks - and you have a wonderfully nuanced dish in terms of texture.

This version is from Xin Mei Xiang at Old Airport Road, which was very very good. The problem with lor mee is that there are a lot of bad versions of it, so when you find a good one it is extra special.

Actually the real problem with it is that it is an extremely unhealthy dish.


One of the prerequisites for lor mee is that - like I said - the sauce be of a consistency that sticks to the lining of your mouth as you slurp it down. You can see how it sticks to the spoon here.

Whitley Road Big Prawn Noodles


One of the better versions of hae mee in Singapore - originally from Whitley Road and now at the Old Airport Road hawker centre. (Other contenders include Noo Cheng at Zion Rd Hawker Centre and Wah Kee at Pek Kio Market). We tried this in the afternoon and while still amazing the soup was not as fragrant as it was the last time I had it. Perhaps the trick is to go at night - after the soup has been simmering for the entire day. But then you run the risk of them running out early. Oh, decisions, decisions.

Cho Kee Wonton Noodles


Hong Kongers will complain that what we call "wonton noodles" is a gross deviation from the original dish. There are at least three major differences (that I can think of). In the Hong Kong version of the dish, the noodles are usually served in soup; whereas in Singapore they are more often than not served dry, tossed with a combination of chili oil, ketchup and oyster sauce - with the soup served on the side. Also, what Hong Kongers refer to as wontons usually have shrimp in them whereas the Singapore version is usually made only with ground pork. And finally, Hong Kongers do not add char siew to wonton noodles, but in Singapore what started as an innovation has gradually become the norm - and now almost all versions of wonton noodles are topped with slices of char siew.

The version here is from Cho Kee at Old Airport Road. Cho Kee is one of two famous wonton noodle stalls on the front row at Old Airport Road (the other being Hua Kee), both of which typically involve a wait. Neither of these are that amazing in my opinion - you can see the char siew looks a bit dry here, and the soup was just water and bouillon which just smacks of a lack of effort. The noodles were quite outstanding though - their signature sauce was a blend of fiery and fragrant and the noodles cooked to al dente perfection.

Monday, February 09, 2009

In praise of pineapple tarts

We recently celebrated the Chinese New Year here, which means that - in a similar manner to Thanksgiving - we went around visiting our friends and relatives and stuffed our faces with snacks and pastries. Except that according to tradition, there are fifteen days to the Chinese New Year period. That means fifteen days (and usually more) of disregarding whatever visual or physical cues for you to stop putting food into your mouth. I could not possibly do justice to the many traditional Chinese New Year goodies and foodstuffs – which are legion, and probably each deserve their own write-up – so I shall focus on just the one.


Pineapple tarts are perhaps the delicacy most synonymous with Chinese New Year in Singapore and Malaysia, even though they are sold all year round. These tarts are bite-size pastries that either contain or are topped with pineapple jam – which is in turn fresh pineapple boiled and caramelised to a gummy texture and flavoured with lots of sugar, cinnamon, cloves and star anise. I do not have much of a sweet tooth, but I am such a fool for these that it is quite scary. There is something so satisfying about the sweetness of pineapple jam that renders me completely unable to resist popping another one in my mouth. Of course, makers of the really great pineapple tarts do not neglect the pastry as well – which is typically made to a fluffy, buttery texture. It is physically impossible for me to pause and count how many of these I eat in one sitting, and it requires an almost superhuman effort for me to stop.


I am not particularly skilled at pastry, but having tried my hand at it on three continents I have to say that it seems much more difficult in Singapore. The heat and the humidity cause many key ingredients in pastry to behave differently, and one needs to be aware of these in prepping, storing and using dough. It seems that you can make the same recipe, the same way, twice and end up with two vastly different results.

I am thinking especially of the perils of working with butter. There was a recent New York Times article about the home baker and his or her ignorance of the finer points in using butter – with special attention to the melting point of this fabulous ingredient and the importance of not allowing it to melt before using it. In Singapore you have precious little time after taking butter out of the refrigerator and before it melts; so you either need to be able to store it at a temperature just slightly below the optimal temperature to use it (65F according to the article) and then only take it out when you need it, or keep a constant eye on it once it is out. Because of the fragility of these ingredients and their sensitivity to their surroundings, I should think that beating and whisking by hand would not be advised.

In addition I would venture to say that many of the local traditional desserts and pastries are much more time-consuming and labour-intensive than their Western counterparts. One of my all-time favourites – kueh lapis – is a layered cake that has to made layer by layer. This means that it has to be taken out of the oven every 7 or 8 minutes, or once the previous layer has set, for the next layer of batter to be smoothed on top. This step is then repeated anywhere upwards of 20 to 30 times. It is tough work for the home baker, but absolutely worth it.

Making pineapple tarts is not without its difficulties either. You need for the pineapple to break down and then to bind with the flavourings and spices into a mixture that is gummy but not sticky. The former requires time and constant heat, and the latter is usually accomplished by adding cornstarch, and making the jam one day ahead of time and refrigerating.

For some reason, perhaps as aesthetic stimulation, I usually prefer the tarts that have the jam visible as a topping; but they are also made as pastries enclosing the jam, or in a roll with the jam visible at both ends. Whatever the case, if the pastry is light and flaky, if the pineapple jam is hearty and sweet without being cloying – then it is judged a great success and I proceed to consume a prodigious amount of them. Oh, who am I kidding? Even if they are bad, I eat them anyway.

Friday, February 06, 2009

A remembrance of things past

Between recommendations from foodie friends, raves on Internet blogs, and television features, one gets the impression that there is seemingly a vast array of fabulous hawker fare around Singapore just waiting to be sampled. Yet the other day I tried a truly disappointing version of mee pok tar, which when coupled with a conversation with my uncle led me to conclude that the standard of hawker fare these days, sadly, flatters to deceive.

My uncle is a jovial man, quick to smile and always looking for the next opportunity to crack a quip or a witty remark – often at someone else’s expense. But even he sobered a little when the conversation turned to food and his hawker favourites, and he took on an air of resignation as he tried to think of anything he could wholeheartedly recommend. He gave up eventually, and left me with the advice that I would be better off going to Malaysia, where the erosion of quality is happening at a far slower pace than it is here.

I had long had the feeling that hawker fare in Singapore had steadily but noticeably declined since the days of my youth. In a matter of 15 or 20 years, familiar favourites had come and gone, and even the standards had lost some of their lustre. New hawkers in new stalls could not reproduce the wok hei so essential to the dishes I grew up eating, and the versions nowadays were pale imitations of what they should have tasted like. My uncle reminded me that this effect was not just a phenomenon of my lifetime, but one that had been happening since his time and the time of the generation before him. Hawkers come and go, secrets are lost to time; and standard hawker dishes change as one ages, often for the worse.

Why, exactly, is this erosion of quality happening? I tried to think of the reasons and could only come up with a few:

Passing of a generation. Hawkers come and go, and truly, the hawker’s business model is not one that lends itself to stable succession planning. First, much of the craft and the skills required to be successful – organisation, timing, an eye and a taste for ingredients – are intangible and do not easily lend themselves to be imparted readily.

Second, the truly successful hawkers, who can make their fortune through their chosen profession, invariably give their children access to greater opportunities thanks to their increased affluence. Their children go to better schools and universities and are exposed to higher education levels as well as a more diverse set of life experiences than their parents ever were. This robs the hawker of a natural heir – for often, their children forsake the family business for endeavours in other fields. Given the long hours, back-breaking work and slim margins associated with being a hawker – it is not hard to see why being a doctor or a lawyer or a banker represents a more comfortable option.

Without adequate heirs to take over their business, most of the great hawkers of generations past hung up their woks without leaving their secrets to the next generation. And over the course of three or four generations, this has contributed to the decline of the overall standards in hawker fare. A plate of char kway teow today is nothing like a plate of char kway teow that my uncle used to eat in his childhood. Even as I lament the fact that kids nowadays are growing up with a diminished conception of truly transcendent hawker food, I cannot help but think that I too, have grown up not knowing what true quality is. It is the curse of the sliding scale, and it is every bit as insidious as it sounds.

Ingredient quality and sourcing. One of the saddest parts about that truly disappointing bowl of mee pok tar was the quality of the noodles. They were factory-made, tasted artificial and were overcooked to compensate for their lack of texture. But what it illuminated was that even in hawker food, as in fine dining, the dish can only be the sum of its ingredients.

Over the years the scarcity of quality ingredients and increase in food prices have driven hawkers to make a multitude of difficult choices. To keep their food costs low, their prices competitive, and to protect their margins – they have been forced to settle for cheaper and lower quality black prawns, for example.

Even more importantly, they have been forced to turn to the dreaded ‘S’ word – sourcing. The hawkers of old made everything themselves, rising at ungodly hours of the morning to hand-roll dough for their noodles, or start basic sauces from scratch. These days, food manufacturers supply most hawkers with prepared foods such as noodles, the radish cakes for chye tow kuay, as well as sauces like char siew sauce for roast pork. Not only does quality suffer, but hawkers lose their ability to differentiate their product from the market. Everything winds up tasting more or less the same – a lowest common denominator down to which the standard of hawker fare is dragged.

Reactions to success. Even if, against all odds, a hawker happens to succeed by dint of a great recipe and a good amount of luck – where he or she goes from there is fraught with uncertainty. What happens more often than not is the onset of complacency. After building up a market reputation and a loyal customer base, many hawkers become complacent or lose their passion for making food that is good, honest and true. They take shortcuts, they cut corners. Without passion and dedication, even the best recipe has little chance of success after that.

But another possible reaction to success is the thought of growth and expansion, which very rarely has favourable consequences in the hawker business. Opening a branch or two, extending hours or increasing volume – all entail a change in the business model. Taking on another chef means that training him or her to replicate the taste of the original product is paramount. Increasing volume means that sourcing for ingredients that are of equal quality is critical. Many successful hawkers have compromised quality in the search for greater market share by opening branches; and more often than not the flavour of the original product is lost forever.

Increased health/hygiene considerations. Admitting this as a legitimate reason necessitates accepting that the best hawker food requires the use of unhealthy ingredients such as pork lard and MSG. It also necessitates acknowledging that solving for food safety is not as important as solving for taste. Neither of these assumptions is very strong, but it is perhaps fair to say that public demand for more healthful hawker fare and the stricter regulation of food safety knowledge and practices that come with urbanisation – have resulted in a changing if not diminished palate of hawker food.

So on the face of it there are lots of reasons for doom and gloom, enough cause for us to throw our hands up in utter despair and move to Malaysia. But my mother, in her infinite wisdom, put everything in perspective nicely. She, like my uncle, had aged through generations of hawkers, had found and lost different hawkers who prepared versions of dishes that she liked. Yet she remained rather more optimistic than despondent, and reasoned calmly to me that the decline of hawker food only made the search and discovery of the good hawkers much more worth it.

She had spent decades traversing the island, discovering stalls and food centres that she liked, keeping a mental picture of what was good where, and when it showed signs of slipping. To her, the excitement was in the chase, in the discovery. The fact that it got progressively more and more difficult as time went by, to locate stellar examples of traditional hawker dishes did not deter her from her quest. In fact, it made it that much sweeter when she finally did find something that tasted the way they made it in the good old days.

I wish I had my mother’s patience and forbearance. But I don’t, and I am destined to be a cranky old man.
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