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.

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.

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.

Ode to broth

There are few foods more heart-warming and soul-satisfying than a large bowl of simmering beef broth, with or without noodles. As a respite from the cold, harsh winter, or as a hangover cure, it is one of the more nourishing and nurturing meals one can have. It is curious how this dish exists in multiple incarnations in different countries and cuisines – French consommé, Vietnamese pho, and the Chinese beef noodles, or 牛肉汤面. Slight differences in each, but the theory behind them is the same: beef plus water plus starch equals goodness.

Clearly the most important component of this dish – whatever you call it – is the broth. The basic concept is to take beef bones, or various cuts of beef, and stew them in water with a complex mix of various spices and ingredients. For the Chinese beef noodles these include but are not limited to ginger, garlic, scallions, star anise, and others. One of the secrets in Chinese cooking is the use of dried scallops (conpoy) in sauces, stews or broth. This is not so much the entire scallop but rather the adductor muscle that has been removed and dried. Adding this to soups adds a sweetness but also an increased depth of flavour to them.

Once you have the broth, the rest is self-explanatory. The noodles are cooked in the broth and then doused in cold water to stop them from cooking. A generous helping of broth is ladled over the noodles, and the dish is topped with mung bean sprouts and cilantro. Thinly-sliced pieces of beef – typically a better cut – are dipped into the simmering broth to brown them but not cook them through, and then added to the dish. Other beef-based ingredients – beef meatballs, organ meats such as beef tripe, cheek and the like – are also cooked in the broth and can be added depending on the preference of the person eating.

Hunter and I used to frequent Pho 75 in Rosslyn (coincidentally, in the same strip mall as Ray’s the Steaks, mentioned in the previous post). It was a cafeteria style eatery serving Vietnamese pho, and it was probably the best version of it in DC and one of the cheapest meals possible around town. I always thought it was funny how the menu had 17 different dishes, which were all basically the same pho dish but with different combinations of beef cuts. But in the end when the pho came nobody could really tell which cut of beef was which, so in effect it really didn’t matter what you ordered.

The other day I went to try the Empress Place Beef Noodles in Siglap, located in an unassuming eating-house right next to an even more unassuming supermarket. Clearly, the concept of marketing has not hit the folks at these two establishments, for they were both barely noticeable from the street. You had to feel for the beef noodle place, because even their signboard is obscured by the awning and completely out of sight from anywhere but inside the eating-house. For an establishment that is just one among many eating places proliferating the Siglap stretch, this amounted to professional suicide, perhaps. But I suppose if the quality of your offering shone through enough, you don’t really need the marketing.


The Empress Place beef noodles was, sadly, markedly mediocre. It had neither the heft that you expected of beef stock, nor the acidic piquancy and spice that one comes to expect from Southeast Asian dishes. It wasn't bad, but it was nowhere near spectacular - and I can't afford to waste calories on food that is not spectacular if I want to maintain my girlish figure. I very much preferred the version at Laguna Food Centre at East Coast Park. The one bright spark was that they used a really good cut of meat for the beef slices, which were tender to the touch and an absolute pleasure to chew on. Of course, this also meant that it was a tad more expensive than you might otherwise expect.


So the search continues then – for the best beef noodles in Singapore. I have written about this in the past, but I am still searching for a good version of the dry beef noodles – the gummy, starchy kind. What they do is they reduce the beef broth and thicken it with cornstarch to form a thick, gooey sauce, and then coat the noodles with this sauce instead of serving it in broth. I like this dry version better than the version with the broth, but sadly it is becoming harder and harder to find (except at chain food courts). Onward, then! There is no rest for the weary.



Empress Place Beef Noodles
936 East Coast Road (LTN Eating House)
11am to 11pm daily

A walk down memory lane: Ray's The Steaks

Ray's The Steaks
1725 Arlington Boulevard (at N Quinn)
Arlington, VA 22209
703-841-7297

For my last year or so in DC I was part of an informal association – an invitation-only club that met once a month and still does to this day, only now without me. We called ourselves the Scotch Club, formed as a male-only retaliation to a female-only book club that a friend of ours had set up. We would get together to drink Scotch and compare our tasting notes, but in reality few of us knew anything about the drink, and some even despised it. But we all liked one another, and so Scotch Club became a symbol greater than the drink we celebrated – a symbol of good times, with good friends, living large in the nation’s capital. More than anything it was an experiment in the social nature of man and his proclivity for forming associations and institutions – to make the days and the nights of this passing life a little less lonesome and a little more bearable.

Once a quarter we would organise an outing, be it a scotch tasting event or a trip to Shelley’s Back Room for a good cigar. Sometimes these outings involved scotch, and sometimes they didn’t. One of these outings was so nice, we had to do it twice: making the pilgrimage across the Potomac to Arlington, VA and a restaurant called Ray’s the Steaks for a nice, thick, juicy cut of beef. Scotch, stogies and steak: at the risk of sounding chauvinistic – those form perhaps the Holy Trinity of masculinity. Of course, a mention is also due to the fourth and more unsavoury cousin – strip clubs.

I have always believed that the meat that you can get at steakhouses is far superior to the meat available to the common consumer because restaurateurs (especially the national chains) usually get first dibs on the good, USDA Prime beef. They have access to better distribution channels, and their sheer demand gives them leverage with the top cattle growers both in and out of the United States. It is the sole reason I still go to steakhouses, for I think I can make a pretty damn good steak by myself at home. But because the meat I have to work with was never as good as that which I could get by eating out, I had to go to the Palm, or Morton’s, or Smith & Wollensky. I never really liked Ruth’s Chris, and the Capital Grille was mediocre at best. All that was, of course, before I went to Ray’s the Steaks.

There are many things you have to put up with if you want to eat at Ray’s the Steaks. Foremost and perhaps most annoying, the restaurant does not take reservations. This means that you have to show up the day of, and either hope you are lucky enough to be able to walk in and get a table, or drop by at least two hours in advance to put your name down. My annoyance at this policy abated a little when I found out that this was designed to make things easier for the people living in the immediate vicinity, and to preserve the “local restaurant” flavour of Ray’s. Still, it is rather annoying.

In addition, Ray’s is a no frills, mom-and-pop restaurant. There are no white tablecloths; there are no large Burgundy wine glasses. The décor is nothing to shout about – the walls are painted an unmemorable off-white and are unadorned of any art or artifice. It reminds one of a high school cafeteria, or even a homestyle local eatery in the Jersey suburbs. It is even located in a strip mall. The service is brusque and the waitresses move quickly but surely – focused more on their own efficiency rather than your general comfort. The wine list is sparse but filled with very drinkable wines for very reasonable prices.

If you can put up with all that, then your reward is one of the best steaks I have ever had the fortune of eating, and all the complimentary mashed potatoes and creamed spinach you can stuff your face with. Ray’s ages, cuts and trims all their steaks on-site – and the result is a large, thick-cut, juicy and well marbled corn-fed piece of beef, grilled however you want it and served with whatever sauce you choose. I had the filet, with a peppercorn sauce that was as tart as brandy and as smooth as heavy cream – a sinful but savoury accompaniment to what was a succulent steak.


There are also several nods to the good old days – before nutritionists had their say – when people did not just have seconds or thirds for dinner, but second and third dinners in one sitting. I thought my filet was already a huge hunk of meat, but at Ray's you can also get the "Cowboy Cut" – a 28-ounce bone-in ribeye – or the Chateaubriand – center cut toploin sliced and served with onions, mushrooms and asparagus. The latter is advertised as a meal for two, but originated as a cut for one person – the author and diplomat who served Napoleon and Louis XVIII, from whom it takes its name. They really knew how to eat in those days. I sometimes wonder if I would trade another five years of life expectancy, for the ability (or blissful ignorance) to make stupid decisions or eat and drink to wanton excess. It’s a toughie, that one.

I think I might despise people who eat their meat well-done even more than I despise vegetarians. At least vegetarians have morals. People who eat meat well-done on the other hand, should not be allowed anywhere near the scarce supply of good beef available to the rest of us, and should be refused entry at any self-respecting steakhouse.

I liked my dinner at Ray’s because I was with good company, but also because of the acceptance that the dinner was not going to be about the service, or the wine, or anything else but the steak. Even the bread and the sides, though solid, were mere distractions. You come to Ray’s because you crave sinking your teeth into a pink and juicy slice of meat, charred on the outside but barely warm on the inside. Accepting that it is all about the meat allows you to focus solely on the enjoyment of that particular experience, and it was not unexpected that conversation came to an abrupt halt once our steaks had arrived. For several minutes there were only the sounds of cutlery clinking on plates and the low, gruff, moans of satisfaction only a steak can elicit.

Ray’s the Steaks has now expanded beyond its modest mom-and-pop beginnings: there are multiple locations, a retail arm, and a burger joint just down the street. I do not know what this means for the Rosslyn location. I do hope, for all our sakes, that it preserves what has made it so unique in the past – a dedication to the local community and the ideals of nourishment over artifice, and not least of all, putting good steaks on the plates of its diners.




Photographs courtesy of Brian T. Hege

Morgan Is A Waiter, Pt. II

Being a server at the very fine restaurant in which I toil has been an extremely interesting and educational experience.  I have met so many friendly people, who really want to enjoy themselves, who are curious about wine, food, or are just plain hungry.  Many are lovely people.  In fact I would say that 98% of the people I've met are anywhere between reasonably pleasant and awesome.  Unfortunately for myself and pretty much every one else in the service industry the other 2% seems to do their absolute best to pick up the slack.  Waiting on a table like this, particularly when they travel in larger groups is at best humorous, ridiculous, and a warning sign screaming "Don't let this happen to you!" at its worst is a soul grating punishment, enough to drive a man to drink, go grey and pull his hair out.  

A table of 5 orders 5 salads, dressing on the side.  4 fish: one no salt, no butter, no fish cake; one sauce on side; one w/ fish cake no sauce; one no butter in sauce; "Can you just make a mixed vegetable plate?"

Yesterday, two men at the bar asked if the chef would make them a creme brulee.  There's no creme brulee on the menu.  "Come on, it's easy... He's a chef right?  Can you go ask him if he'll make it?"

"Can I just have some hot water? I brought my own tea."

The answer to everything is "Of course.  I'd be happy to."  It has become pretty clear to me how and why so many service employees get to be jaded and bitter.  I think that keeping a sense of the ridiculous is the best medicine.  If you can laugh at the requests (not to the customer's face, naturally) then you can keep handling them and keep being accommodating and hospitable.

Really, it's not even the complicated or strange or stupid requests that are truly hard to handle, but the people who become rude when you can't get them whatever weird shit they want, immediately.  Those are the tough ones.  What is it that sucks the joie de vivre out of these people? and how does it seem okay to vent on their helpless and hapless waiter?  I hope I never find out first hand.

A walk down memory lane: Babbo NYC

Babbo
110 Waverly Place (bet. MacDougal & 6th)
New York, NY 10011
212-614-6670

If you want good Italian outside of Italy there is only one place to go, and that place is New York City. When you are there it is perhaps impossible to walk five blocks without coming across an Italian place, and amongst all that quantity there is some quite amazing quality. Insieme and Felidia in midtown, Fiamma in Soho, and Del Posto in Chelsea are all fabulous places to hunker down with a good plate of pasta, mop up the sauce with freshly made bread and wash it all down with a rustic red wine. Apparently Scarpetta in the West Village is worth trying as well. But if you want an experience that is good and true and one that you will remember for months and years to come, then you must go to Babbo.

Babbo is the flagship restaurant of one Mario Batali – he of Molto Mario! fame – who also owns a whole host of other places in New York. Yet Babbo seems to be the one he loves best, and it shows most markedly – from the intimidating menu of dishes, through the excellent wine list, to the faultless and convivial service. Here, more than in his other restaurants, Batali indulges his love of variety meats. It is an offal lover’s paradise – showcasing everything from testa to beef cheek, lamb’s brain to goose liver.

It has been almost two years since I went to Babbo, and it speaks volumes that Morgan and I still remember that night – he more vividly than I. I was in New York for my birthday, and had rounded up Camille, Morgan and Elisabeth for dinner. Thinking back, I realise it must have been a last-minute trip, for we had no reservations and our plan was to show up early and wait for a table. There are four tables by the bar at the front of the restaurant for which no reservations are taken, and whether you can walk in and wait for one of those tables depends on how early you show up that evening and stake your claim for them.

I remember meeting Morgan early for a drink and then stopping by Camille’s house – Morgan fretting all the while that we should have just gone to Babbo and staked the place out. As 8 o’clock rolled around he took on that despondent air of a gambler whose last chances are fading fast before his eyes. He did not have much hope of being seated given that we were going to be walking in at what he considered a late hour, and his head was already racing through the possible alternatives, while his heart steeling itself for the disappointment of having to settle for something else.

But then an amazing thing happened that restored his faith in the restaurant gods. We were in a taxi not quite five blocks away when Elisabeth called, saying that she had just stepped into the restaurant and that they could seat the 4 of us immediately, but only if we were all there. I remember her nonchalant tone as she asked our whereabouts, and I don’t think she realised just how big a deal it was because she asked innocently, “Should we take the table?” I also don’t remember if I thought to control the volume of my voice as I yelled at her to take it, take it, whatever you do, for the love of God take it.

We were there momentarily, and there were lots of hugs all around. I would have given the hostess a hug too if it had been socially acceptable. We had what was quite possibly the worst table in the house, but the fact remains that we had walked into Babbo at 8 o’clock without a reservation, and were seated immediately.

Babbo is housed in one of the converted brick townhouses on Waverly Place, and while it doesn’t have the sprawl and elegance of Del Posto, nor the sleek chic of Fiamma – it more than makes up for it with its amber-hued, rustic interior. Tables are set in close proximity to each other, and the restaurant is always packed. The feeling you get is one of coming back to a cabin or a hostel after a long day of hiking or skiing, and finding other hikers or skiers already putting their feet up and kicking back with their beverages. You half expect someone to hand you a hot chocolate, and judging from the smiling faces and warm, generous manner of the waitstaff, that might not be too far-fetched an idea.

The service at Babbo is one of the best I have ever experienced, and I think that stems from not only the technical expertise (which shall be elaborated upon shortly) but also the hospitality of everyone associated with the restaurant. For lack of a better description, it seemed as if everyone, from the hostess to the waitress, from the sommelier to the busboy – everyone felt a simple joy at being able to be part of our night out. It didn’t seem like they treated their duties as a job or a means to pay the rent. Truly, they were entertaining us, and glad to be doing it too.

But what we were there for was the food, and it did not disappoint. The food at Babbo is simple, by New York standards. The pastas are well-made and cooked to al dente doneness. None of the dishes have too many ingredients, and whatever is on the plate is adorned with no more vinaigrette or sauce than it needs. Eating the food at Babbo is uncomplicated, and consists of no more than putting a fork to the food and bringing it to your mouth. But what a pleasurable experience that proved to be.

Morgan started with an antipasto of testa – pig’s head boiled and deboned before it is braised with white wine, carrots and onions, then forced into a gelatin mold and sliced thinly a la salumi. It was served with pickled pearl onions, topped with toasted mustard seeds and came drizzled in a thyme vinaigrette. He offered me a bite of it, which was how I could tell that he liked it. After all these years of eating with Morgan I had come to realise that he only shared his food when it was good and he wanted you to try some. If it was not good he ate it all himself.

I don’t remember my antipasto but I do remember my pasta dish, Chianti-stained pappardelle with wild boar ragu. Like everything else it was simple, hearty, reached into the deepest depths of your being and told you everything was going to be okay. Camille and Elisabeth shared the pumpkin “lune” with sage and amaretti, which I did not try. Morgan followed the testa with lamb’s brain “Francobolli”, with lemon and sage, and admired its simplicity. The brains were mild and subtle and not too offensive, yet Camille still shied away from it with a look of naked terror on her face.

We ordered a bottle of Sauvignon, Ronco delle Mele from Venica & Venica. I forget the year but I remember that when the server brought the glasses to us we saw that there was already liquid in the glass. When we asked, she explained that it was their custom to pour a drop of the wine into the glasses when they were brought to the table, so that the glass would be infused with the aroma of the wine. When I poked my nose into the glass I saw immediately what she meant – the glass was filled with a heady bouquet, intense to a degree that full glasses never were. It presented a bouquet that was pure and easy to digest, to pick apart and to enjoy. When you smell a full glass of wine there are a lot of competing flavours that are often too complex for an amateur such as myself to isolate and identify. With that glass, filled only with one drop of the wine – I smelt grapefruit, I smelt grass and I smelt peach, and I smelt them all clearly and distinctly.

When it came time to select another bottle we signalled for the sommelier, who came over almost immediately. We explained our price range and talked a little bit about what kind of reds we liked. He had a couple of recommendations and started into them before we interrupted him – wanting to also tell him what each of us was eating for dinner. Upon hearing this he smiled and said, “I already know what you are having for dinner, I went and looked at your ticket before I came over.” At this point we knew we were in good hands, and that further debate was unnecessary, so we went with the first option he presented.

Sadly, I do not remember what wine it was, but it must have been good because I do remember feeling very happy that Elisabeth did not drink – for that meant more for the rest of us. I also remember Elisabeth’s grouper entrée being the standout. I did not have much faith in the fish dishes at a place renowned more for its pastas and organ meats, but her grouper, with charred leeks and a pancetta vinaigrette, was simple and delicious. I had the duck, which was very solid, and Camille had the beef braised in Barolo with porcini mushrooms. Morgan deviated from his one-man crusade to eat the heads off any animals in his path and got the grilled quail with “Scorzonera alla Romana” and saba – which he said could have been a little hotter but enjoyed heartily anyway. It came with salsify – one of his favourite root vegetables (and one of mine) – which had been roasted in Sambuca and which pleased him greatly.

There are many things I like about Babbo. I like its simplicity, I like its neighbourhood feel. I like the hospitality of its staff and their attention to detail. I like the fact that compared with many of the finer dining establishments in the city, Babbo is a little less expensive. It pains me a little bit that I will not be spending my birthday there this year, so let me just say that among the few places that are in my opinion must-visits in the Big Apple (the Met and the No Malice Palace to name just two), Babbo ranks somewhere up there.

No sign, no soul

No Signboard Seafood Restaurant (Esplanade)
8 Raffles Avenue, The Esplanade Mall
#01-14/16
Singapore 039802
Tel: +65 6336 9959

I have always found it strange how it is only in Chinese restaurants that you get the large round tables of 10 or more people. It seems to me that the more reasonable method of handling large parties – either a long table or combining smaller tables lengthwise – may be more efficient space-wise. At the very least, this naturally creates smaller groups, or “pockets” – making dinner table conversation much easier and more intimate. If I am at a long table, or at one of many four-tops pulled together, I know who to talk to. When I am one of 12 people at a round table, it becomes a little more difficult to manage the conversation.

There are people who have learnt the art of holding court at a dinner table, and I admire them for it. I have seen the very best do this – engage everyone in hearty conversation, offer interesting opinions when it is time to be serious, and laugh when it is time not to be – all the while politely but subtly slipping their food into their mouths and never looking anything but graceful. I could never do it well; I was too interested in the food. In a strange way it was often people that prevented you from truly enjoying your food, except for the rare few that are as good as the food itself.

Britt came to visit Singapore this past weekend, and one of the places we took her to was No Signboard seafood restaurant, for that famous Singaporean classic – chilli crab. It was lovely to see her after so long, and it was a good thing that we had already spent the bulk of the day together – for she wound up sitting across from me at the large round table and we did not exchange a single word the entire time.

Chilli crab is, according to many, the unofficial “national” dish of Singapore and consists of hard-shelled crabs stir-fried in a tomato and chilli-based gravy – that is in turn usually laced with spices like galangal and turmeric as well as ribboned with beaten egg. Eating chilli crabs is as much adventure as it is dining, because of the efforts you have to go through to crack the crab shells and pick at, slurp on or suck out the meat. It is served with zha mantou – deep-fried sweet bread rolls with which to mop up the remainder of the gravy once you are done with the crabs.

The No Signboard restaurant chain is one of the success stories within Singaporean hawker fare. Started in 1981 at the Mattar Rd Hawker Centre – without a signboard – it remains a family-owned and run business with four locations in Singapore and several others overseas. Their latest offerings, at the Esplanade and Vivocity, are skewing more upmarket. As is somewhat inevitable when any organisation expands, they have sacrificed quality and market leadership for consistency and increased market reach. They may no longer be the best at making crabs, but to many are still a familiar, reliable and acceptable choice.

(I like Red House at East Coast Park for chilli crab, Eng Seng at Joo Chiat for black pepper crab, and Mellben in Ang Mo Kio for both plain and white pepper crab.)

We ordered some traditional zi char dishes to complement the chilli crabs, which was undoubtedly the main draw of the night. The gu lu yoke (sweet and sour pork) was very disappointing – the batter was not crispy enough and the tomato sauce did not have enough of a sour tang to it. The steamed Soon Hock was actually done quite well and drew rave reviews from Britt, which is saying something because she apparently grew up eating a lot of seafood. The house-made tofu with ground pork - one of their specialties - was well made and well-flavoured. The sambal kangkong was decent, but fell short in that like most of the other dishes it did not have enough wok hei.

To explain: wok hei is a romanticised notion of the flavour, or “essence”, imparted onto the food cooked in a wok at very high heat. True wok hei is a combination of the scientific – Maillard reactions, caramelisation and combustion levels only possible at high heat, increased moisture retention of the ingredients due to the short flash-frying time; and that which is not so tangible – the speed and the skill of the chef in exposing all the ingredients to the heat and to the sauces and flavourings, and the alleged ability of cast iron to retain and impart flavour. It is wok hei that gives wok-cooked food that smokiness, and amplifies its flavour while retaining its lightness.

The bright note was that the bamboo clams were excellently prepared – lightly seasoned with soy sauce, garlic, ginger and chillies – as well as being meaty and succulent. These are also called razor clams, and I had eaten them only once before but made a mental note to always ask about their availability when eating seafood in the future.

The chilli crabs took a while to arrive, by which time we had almost filled up on the other dishes. But when they came we all wordlessly agreed that it looked worth the wait for, and tucked in heartily. I was slightly disappointed – the chilli gravy needed a little more heft and spice – but the crabs themselves were fresh and juicy and an absolute joy to slurp on. I defy anybody with dining table etiquette to look graceful while eating crabs. It may be possible, but then you would not be getting the most out of the meal.


For a chain that has its roots in hawker centre and zi char cuisine – in which wok hei is paramount for the distinctive and soul-satisfying flavour of the food – No Signboard’s fancier locations have really fallen far from grace. Sure, this location is air-conditioned, overlooks Marina Bay and has the feel of a proper Chinese restaurant; but I would trade all that in an instant to be sucking down on chilli crabs on a stiff-backed stool, in a stuffy shack on the beach.

From Russia with love

by Reed Keefe

Cafe Kashkar
1141 Brighton Beach Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11235
718-743-3832

There are two things I, in my very limited experience, love about New York City. One is the fact that so many places, whether they actually are or not, feel like a find, a little secret that only a select few know about. The second, related thing is the fact that so many places feel foreign. Different clothes, different languages, different foods—I like feeling like a subway ride could have been an airplane ride, a short walk a road trip. It’s true that much of this feeling stems from my own ignorance about New York, but I think it also is an actual product of living in New York, where diversity and size mean that the city is constantly re-discoverable. Eating Uighur food in Brighton Beach combined both these elements, but, weirdly, at the same time, made me feel very at home.

About two weeks ago, Leila invited Sam and me to her Hannukah party in Park Slope. A trip from Morningside Heights to Park Slope is, of course, an invitation to make the most of the long journey and explore Brooklyn for the day. That day, it meant an afternoon at the aquarium and dinner in Brighton Beach (I, by the way, recommend a trip to Coney Island covered in snow—a place I think would strike most New Yorkers as foreign in its extreme quietness).

Exiting the subway at Brighton Beach is, for anyone who hasn’t been, a truly disorienting experience. Much like when I visited Flushing with Jason, I was struck by how abruptly the dominant culture and language changed. Here, that language was Russian, coupled with Cyrillic script on every store and, coincidentally, driving snow and freezing temperatures (Sam swears he saw a Boris Yeltsin look-a-like, birthmark and all). We walked and walked down Brighton Beach Ave., finally finding the tiny Café Kashkar, a place that some people say is the only authentic Uighur restaurant in New York City.

Café Kashkar did feel secret; few people were there, except a group of men toward the back - and without strict attention to the building numbers, anyone could have walked by the place. And, it felt foreign to me too. My knowledge about the Uighurs, or Uyghurs, a people who traditionally live in Central and some of East Asia, came not from food research but from human rights research. I knew about the Uighurs not because of their culture but because of challenges to it. I suppose you could say, that I knew about the Uighurs in a way totally divorced from their food. What I loved about eating at Café Kashkar, though, was the fact that everyone seemed willing to share. Our extremely kind waiter, taught me not only how to properly pour the tea (watch out, I’m apparently ready to be a good wife) and that the design I loved on the teapot represented the cotton grown in Uzbekistan, but also about every dish following that pot of tea.

But, onto the food. Oh my goodness, the food. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten food that was so warming. Everything was rich and meaty, a little spicy. First, the very innocuous sounding house salad (our very kind waiter also recognized my guilt about not eating enough vegetables). The salad was a wild mix of julienned carrots and cucumbers with a spicy, vinegary dressing, transforming what I returned to throughout the meal. Quickly, the samsa also came—flaky dough pies filled with lamb meat—and the pilaf, rice that would have been pretty typical except for the thick, buttery lamb on the bone (restraint was required to keep from gnawing).

Slipped in between the first meat appetizers and, well, the next meat appetizer, was the beautiful, comforting, lagman soup. Lagman really is everything I love in a comfort food—lamb (!), soup that is a little spicy, slightly thicker than normal but not yet a stew, warm, and filled with my very favorite carb—the noodle. The noodles really were revelatory—they stood up to the vibrant tasting broth and the tender lamb; they were still thick and slightly chewy after long intervals of soup slurping. If it were possible, I think I might have enjoyed lagman even more if I had seen those noodles being made. At the end of the meal, Sam pointed out the small window that opened onto the kitchen. There, in all his bald-headed, six foot something, 200 plus pounds glory, was a chef rapidly tossing the noodles before cooking them. I think that man may have personified the idea of “it’s even harder than it looks.”

Finally, we ended with manty. Manty are advertised in the restaurant window, and, therefore, I think a neighborhood selling point—for good reason. I’ve had very few dishes that are both so delicate and so hearty. Manty are meat dumplings. The outside of those dumplings, at least at Café Kashkar, are steamed and translucent, just barely revealing the rich mix of lamb inside. While the outside of the dumpling practically melts away, the lamb remains as substantial but as tender as it was throughout the meal, a perfect reminder of everything that was wonderful about dinner. Eating Uighur food in Brighton Beach did feel like our secret find, our foreign experience, but I think the perfection of each dish reminded me that these dishes are mainstays, not only within a culture but also for the people at the Café who make them so beautifully (those noodles!). I hope we find our way back again.

All in all, everyone should eat at Café Kashkar. And, let’s say, hypothetically, you don’t feel like eating (shame on you!), you should still watch the music videos they play. Uzbeki pop princesses, mark my words, are the next hot thing…


Reed Keefe is a thief of hearts.