Ah Chuan Oyster Omelette: At long last!

With Taukwa

Oyster Omelette $4

I have been waiting 3 years to eat at this stall. No kidding. The last 5 times that I visited Toa Payoh Lor 7 food centre, it was either on a day when he was closed, not yet opened or on holidays in China.

When I first starting blogging back in 2006, one of the first group of hawkers that I targeted were the Hawker Legends listed by Makansutra. This was the first batch of hawkers who won the award and I think that most of them deserved the honour. Three years on, I have almost completed the list. After Ah Chuan Oyster Omelette, there is only one more left and that is Mattar Road Seafood BBQ. Ok, must press on to finish what I started three years ago!


Ah Chuan: The most important thing is to control the fire

I have been largely disappointed with this particular dish the last few times I have eaten it. Mind you, this is a high calorie, high cholesterol kind of dish, so when you eat it, you really want to make sure that the calories are worth it. From my point of view, this is a dish with simple ingredients so it is really dependent on skill and experience to get it right. The flavour comes basically from eggs, oil, oyster and fish sauce and I feel a good oyster omelette should not even need to be bathed in chilli to taste good. But even if you prefer it with chilli, the chilli sauce here is well balanced and has the right amount of sourness to cut through the oil.

The texture on the other hand is a bit more complex. There's got to be just the right balance of crispy starchy bits, crispy brown egg bits, chewy starcy bits and sticky starchy bits. And of course it is a given that the oysters must be fresh.

I must say that this is the most satisfactory Oyster Omelette I have eaten since I started blogging. The oysters are big, juicy and fresh and the texture of the dish is just perfect. The only thing I can think of that would make it even better is if he fried it in pork lard. 4.75/5

Conclusion

Oyster Omelette is one of those dishes that I try to avoid eating too much of because it really isn't all that healthy. So if I were to have the craving for oyster omelette, this is the one stall that I will head to gurantee that my calories are not wasted.

What to do next:

After eating the Oyster Omelette, go for Chendol at Dove Dessert!
If you still have the stomach, you must not miss Hai Nan Xing Zhou Beef Kway Teow.
Check out the rest of the Hawker Legends.
Where else to eat Oyster Omelette.

Ah Chuan Oyster Omelette
Toa Payoh Lor 7 Food Centre
Stall #01-25
3pm to 9pm
cloosed on Tuesdays

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Lau Pa Sat Fishball Minced Meat Noodle: Go Go Bak Chor Mee

With smart, liverpool, bashfulhunter, iwatch_ueat, damien and PowerAunty


I am amazed to see just how popular Bak Chor Mee is amongst Singaporeans! Our current "Favourite Hawker Dish" poll shows a very close fight between Bak Chor Mee and Chicken Rice for 2nd and 3rd positions. At this stage, Hokkien Mee seems to be the firm favourite unless a whole clan of Chicken Rice lovers who have not yet voted suddenly decide log on and vote.

Anyway, my favourite hawker dishes where Hokkien Mee, Satay and Char Siew. Bak Chor Mee would have ranked around seventh or eight place. I guess it is because I generally don't add chilli to any of my dishes, and with a lot of Bak Chor Mee stalls, it is the chilli that makes the difference. So I guess that's why I would choose other dishes over Bak Chor Mee on most days.

But three of my makankakis that day insisted that this stall's Bak Chor Mee should be included into this blog so here it is. According to Damien, this Bak Chor Mee is second only to the Tai Hwa Bak Chor Mee. Smart and Bashful Hunter both said that it was really good and the chilli was especially shiok. I tried a bowl of the non-chilli version and agree that it was a good bowl of Bak Chor Mee as far as Bak Chor Mee goes. 4.25/5

Conclusion

Another place to get your Bak Chor Mee fix when you are around the Toa Payoh area.

Lau Pa Sat Fishball Minced Meat Noodle
Blk 22 Toa Payoh Lor 7 #01-02
8am to 2pm
Closed Monday
97387141

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Hai Nan Xing Zhou Beef Noodles: Damien's Favourite Beef Noodles!

With smart, liverpool, bashfulhunter, iwatch_ueat, damien and PowerAunty

Beef Kway Teow Dry $4

According to Damien, this stall sells the BEST beef kway teow in Singapore. Better than all the rest. So we had to make our pilgrimage down to Toa Payoh to try it. The stall is supposed to be opened till 7pm, so we thought that 2.30pm should be quite a safe time to visit. Lo and Behold, there was a queue of some 20 something people lining up for the Beef Kway Teow! It so happens that the day we went there was exactly the day after Channel 8 featured the stall. So by the time we got to the front of the queue, they were already sold out on the gravy for the dry version!

I wasn't going to give up so easily, so I made a return visit the following week just to try the dry Beef Kway Teow. This time I got what I wanted. Or did I?



I was undoubtedly impressed with the stewed beef tendons which were so soft it explodes in your mouth, coating your buccal cavity with its soft and gooey goodness. The beef slices were tender but the beef balls were outsourced, so they were not that special. The sauce itself was good, but maybe my expectations were too high, it did not have that oomph if you ask me. However, one lady who was a regular at the stall confirmed that the gravy that day tasted a bit watered down. I suspect that it could be due to the higher volume sold during the past week. But for now it rates a 4.25/5. Damien and other regulars of this stall might beg to differ.



The beef soup on the other hand was wonderfully robust and sweet and definitely one of the best I have tasted. 4.5/5

This Hainanese man has been selling Hainanese Style Beef Kway Teow for over 40 years. He is still remembered as the Beef Kway Teow stall from Cuppage Centre. When I asked where he learned his recipe from, he simply said that he derived it through experimentation.

Conclusion

Another Beef Kway Teow to add onto the Top Beef Kway Teow list! Definitely one of the better ones around which I am sure many fans will write in to support.

Hai Nan Xing Zhou Beef Noodles
Blk 22 Lor 7 Toa Payoh #01-06
8am to 7pm
Monday Closed

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Lai Heng Cooked Food: Economical Economic Rice

Someone mentioned a $2 Economic rice which comes with two meats and two vegetables? Yes, Damien already alerted us to this particular stall. And the food is pretty delicious! I had my usual stir fried cabbage with sweet and sour pork as the yardstick to determine how good the food is. I am glad to report that they pass with flying colours. Damien highly recommends this food stall and is glad to put his neck on the chopping board for it! 4.25/5

Conclusion

You'd be hard pressed to find a better tasting $2 meal anywhere.

Lai Heng Cooked Food
Blk 22 Toa Payoh Lor 7
#01-08
6am to 8pm
Closed on Saturdays

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Dove Desserts: Heavenly Chendol, Traditional Cheng Tng

With smart, liverpool, bashfulhunter, iwatch_ueat, damien and PowerAunty


I have never considered this question before until now. Maybe you haven't too.

This is the question: How should Chendol be taken? With shaved ice like the one in the picture or as a soup-drink with crushed ice, like the ones they serve by the road side in Malaysia? In all my years of eating Chendol, I have never asked the question. In fact, I did not ask the question until I had the answer.

I have decided, after taking this particular Chendol that it should, it must, be taken this way. Let me explain why.

When you eat Chendol as a soup-drink, everything is mixed up and all you get to enjoy is the taste of cold coconut milk with Gula Melaka. When you take it without mixing it all up, you can actually get to appreciate the different elements of the Chendol plus the texture of the finely shaved ice as it melts in your mouth. This is particularly delightful when you have really good Gula Melaka. Oh yes, the lady boss, Helen is so particular about her Gula Melaka that she insists on driving to Malacca to buy the best stuff there to bring home.

Before she started business about 4 years ago, Helen shared with us how she went up to Malacca to taste test several of the top Chendol stalls there so that she has a Gold Standard to compare with. She believes that she has a Chendol that can stand up to the best ones in Malacca. She makes the Chendol herself,using only pandan leaves and passes it through a special Chendol strainer which she also managed to procure in Malacca. Then the other important element is the freshly squeezed coconut milk and the quality extra large red beans. For me the most striking thing is still the shaved ice and the Gula Melaka. So super shiok, it forever changed my thinking about Chendol. Went back twice in a week and still thinking about it. 4.6/5



When Helen set up this stall, she simply wanted to create desserts that she enjoyed as a child ie the traditional way. So she adds dried persimmons and winter melon in her Cheng Tng and not any of the modern stuff like agar agar or jelly. Not easy to find such Cheng Tng nowadays. 4.25/5

Conclusion

Best Chendol I have eaten in years. Make sure when you order that you stress that you want the finely shaved ice. Sometimes after making cold Cheng Tng, they might forget to set the ice shaver back to fine!

Dove Desserts
Blk 22 Toa Payoh Lor 7
#01-21
92725712
11am to 8pm
Closed on Sunday and Monday
Recommended by smart

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Long House Popiah: Good olde Popiah

Poh Piah is like the snack food that you buy to accompany your main meal right? I mean, does anyone here simply go out there and eat Poh Piah and that's it? Usually, we would order a few Poh Piahs as a common "share-share" type of dish.

I sometimes think about hawker dishes along the lines of Darwin's theory of Evolution. Hawkers that have been around for a while tend to have food that is pretty good. It is survival of the fittest after all. And the evolution of Poh Piah has really come to a standstill. There has not been much evolution in the Poh Piah since I was a kid. Does that mean that the Poh Piah is perfect and nothing else can make it better? There are some things like that you know. Like the paper clip. It works so well that nothing can be added to it to make it better. Do you think this applies to Poh Piah as well or can it be further improved?


Poh Piah $1 each

This Poh Piah is almost legendary so I am sure there are many fans out there. The skin is homemade, so it is nice and chewy, the ingredients are fresh and the crispy bits are really crispy. A good Poh Piah, but is this as good as it gets? Or can it be better? 4.25/5

Conclusion

Been searching for the ultimate Poh Piah since the beginning of the blog. Still looking for the 4.75 one.

Long House Popiah
Blk 22 Toa Payoh Lor 7
#01-03
Closed Mon & Tues
91717157 Elvin Ng

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