Latest news with #lorMee
Yahoo
23-07-2025
- Lifestyle
- Yahoo
11 best stalls in Tampines Round Market & Food Centre to tame your hunger
The cluster of malls in Tampines may be convenient, but Tampines Round Market and Food Centre will always be the landmark. Established in 1983, this wet market and hawker centre combo is the spot for food, lifestyle and household necessities. Shaped like a doughnut and filled with the golden promise of good food, Tampines Round Market and Food Centre was on my list for a long time. So join me as I look for the top hits in this oldie-but-goodie spot! 1. 137 Lor Mee Prawn Mee (#01-09) 137 Lor Mee Prawn Mee crowns their lor mee with fried fish, and said dish crowns this list of foodie finds. Is this what they call the circle of life? Either way, the only circle I see is my empty bowl staring back at me. With each bowl made to order, there's no way you're getting soggy fish in your Lor Mee (S$4 for Regular, S$5 for Large). Everything is coated in thick, sultry zhap before finely minced garlic and chilli paste are scooped in. Don't worry about the spice, because this chilli sauce deepens the umami of the lor mee sauce instead of burning your tongue. A generous drizzle of black vinegar seals the deal, and you've got yourself a bowl of silky noodles. Each bite is an intricate connection of flavours and textures: the sweetness of the fish against the crunch of its breading and the creaminess of the boiled egg. Tue to Sun: 6.30am – 1pm Closed on Mon 2. Yummy Sarawak Kolo Mee (#01-45) Yummy Sarawak Kolo Mee is a common name that pops up when you search Tampines Round Market and Food Centre online, and it deserves the spotlight. With 17 dishes on the menu, there's bound to be something you'll enjoy. The Signature Spare Ribs Noodle (S$6/S$7/S$8/S$9/S$10/S$12) features tender chunks of pork ribs simmered in sauce. Based on the portion size you order, the toppings include wantons, mushrooms, vegetables, char siew and more. While the springy and curly kolo mee is always an option, you can opt for other noodles like you mian or yi mee according to your preferences. Tossed in that soy-based sauce enriched with rendered fat, these noodles are bound to be good! The chilli that comes with the noodles shouldn't be overlooked. It's sour, savoury and delightfully spicy, which makes downing each bite easy. If you're not a spice lover, only mix in a little at a time, because this stuff is potent! +65 9866 2244 Daily: 6 am – 2 pm 3. Chai Chee Pork Porridge (#01-39) I am of the firm belief that medicine heals the body while food heals the soul. And when the 2 of them come together, the result is a bowl of Chai Chee Pork Porridge. Thick, creamy and comforting, this meal will help you cope with the flu or the Monday blues. The Sliced Pork Porridge (S$5) served here is a simple bowl of congee topped with spring onions, youtiao and pork. While the amount of porridge you get isn't the best for large appetites, the quantity of sliced pork more than makes up for it. Is there any way to make this congee creamier? Of course! Adding an egg (S$0.60) and stirring it into the piping hot congee creates a golden bowl of silky goodness. Don't worry about eating any raw egg, because the residual heat of the porridge helps to cook it evenly. Wed & Thu, Sat & Sun: 6.30am – 1.30pm Closed on Mon, Tue & Fri 4. Lao Lee Pig's Viscera Pork Ribs Prawn Noodle (#01-43) Viscera refers to internal organs in the main body cavity, and Lao Lee Viscera Pork Ribs Prawn Noodle refers to eating a hearty bowl of it. I'm a pig liver fan, and from the look of this long queue, I've found my people. The collagen-rich Pig's Tail Noodle (S$6 for Small, S$7 for Regular, S$8 for Large) might seem like an acquired taste, but I noticed many ordering this hearty bowl. A light, clear broth is the base for your choice of noodles, spinach and generous chunks of pig tail. Of course, all the internal organs are cleaned thoroughly before the cooking process to ensure each dish's hygiene and taste. If you're not part of the viscera fan club, there are the Prawn Noodle (S$5 for Regular, S$6 for Large) and Pork Ribs Prawn Noodle (S$5 for Regular, S$6 for Large) for you to enjoy too! Tue to Sun: 7am – 2pm Closed on Mon 5. Rajarani Thosai (#01-33) Rajarani Thosai retains a 4-star Google rating even with 170 reviews, a clear testament to their quality. From spicy and savoury thosai to my childhood favourite puttu mayam, this stall will settle both your lunch and snack cravings. Everything here is cooked in batches to ensure that these paper-thin edges are at maximum crunchiness. The Butter (S$2) enhances the fermented rice batter with the milky fragrance of melted butter. With red sugar for sweetness, this South Indian pancake is an indulgent dessert that's perfect after a savoury main dish. The (S$2.50) topped with flakes of desiccated coconut and jaggery is what my childhood was made of. Every bite is light, sweet and filled with nostalgia. +65 96789371 Thu to Mon: 7.30am to 1.30pm Closed on Tue Facebook | Instagram 6. Yong Huat Chicken Rice (#01-12) It's not every day you find laksa in a chicken rice stall, but Yong Huat Chicken Rice makes it work. It's one of the only stalls selling chicken rice in Tampines Round Market and Food Centre, so you know where to go if you're craving silky slices of chicken! Tender steamed chicken is doused with creamy and spicy soup in the Chicken (S$4) for a change in flavour. It's joined with the usual laksa crew: tau pok, yellow noodles and a thick spoonful of sambal. The tau pok soaks up all that laksa goodness like a sponge, bursting with juices as you bite in. Yong Huat Chicken Rice also offers Rice and Roasted Pork Rice from S$3.50 to S$4.70 a bowl. Pretty worth it, if you ask me! Tue to Sun: 9.15am – 2 pm Closed on Mon My Father's Minced Meat Noodles: Superb soup-style BCM with flavour-packed broth & springy noodles worth the trip to Tampines 7. Jie Shen Shou Gong Bao (#01-42) One look at Jie Shen Shou Gong Bao transports me back to my childhood (or adulthood for some, heh). Everywhere you look, there's bound to be goodies. From steamy bao to colourful gem biscuits and chewy ang ku kueh, this place is nostalgia crammed into a stall. Did you think I'd leave without a slice of that gorgeous 9-layer Cake (S$1)? We can only be friends if you peel and eat this layer-by-layer, too. Just kidding. This kueh was perfectly soft and chewy, made fragrant with coconut milk. I also got an Egg Tart (S$1.50) and White Mung Bean Cake (S$2.30) to bring home. The custard in the tart was creamy without being too sweet, and paired well with the crumbly, buttery pie dough. This soft white gao is my dad's favourite, and I get why. While it's not as well-known as kueh bankit or kueh tutu, this powdery pastry has the texture of a soft, airy cookie. Once you bite down, it gives immediately and melts in your mouth. 10/10 recommend! Daily: 6.30am – 3pm 8. Xing Ji Wanton Mee (#01-35) Xing Ji Wanton Mee sports long lines and sells out by noon. Apart from their colour-coded shirts and bowls, their noodles are also on point. Don't worry about waiting too long, because the queue moves quickly. I was seated with my food within 10 minutes. The broth of the Shredded Chicken Noodle (S$5 for Small, S$6 for Regular, S$7 for Large) was enriched by the savoury smokiness of mushrooms. Slices of steamed chicken and crunchy kailan also adorn this bowl. While the overall taste of the egg noodles was nothing to shout about, there was just something nostalgic and comforting about the warm, soupy bowl. It reminded me of the braised chicken noodles my mum used to make, and sometimes, that's all you need on a busy day. +65 9068 7769 Mon: 6am – 10.30pm Wed to Sun: 6am – 1pm Closed on Tue Facebook 9. House of Dessert (#01-02) Nothing says hawker centre quite like chendol and ice kachang. House of Dessert describes exactly what this stall is — the perfect sweet fix for your day. Looking at the metal containers full of hot and cold sweet treats has got me salivating. Are you familiar with the phrase 'fight fire with fire'? It may sound crazy, but some believe that hot weather calls for hot food. And this bowl of Tau Suan (S$1.80) makes sure you're on fire while your wallet stays cool. The peeled green beans float in a thickened soup that's lightly sweetened. The chefs ensure that the soup is just the right consistency: not runny and not too clumpy. Mix in the youtiao, coat these crunchy morsels with the soup, and you've got yourself a textural wonder of a snack! Tue & Wed, Fri to Sun: 7am – 1pm Closed on Mon & Thu 10. Song Han Carrot Cake (#01-07) Yep, this is the famous Song Han Carrot Cake that infuses curry powder into their dishes. They're the only stall in Singapore to do so, making their dishes a one-of-a-kind experience! To ensure that you can try out as many dishes as possible, these carrot cakes are sold in 3 portion sizes. The Black Carrot Cake and White Carrot Cake are sold at S$2.50 for Small, S$3.50 for Regular and S$4.50 for Large. Carrot cake for S$2.50? Sign me up. There is a thin line between fragrant and overwhelming when curry powder is involved. These plates of carrot cake toe the line perfectly, leveraging the blend of spices against the soy-based sauces coating the soft carrot cake. However, some reviews mention that the carrot cake isn't as punchy when a different chef takes the wheel. Look out for the OG uncle when you drop by for a bite, guys! Tue & Wed, Fri to Sun: 6am – 12pm Closed on Mon & Thu 11. Shen Li Restaurant (#01-15) If zi char isn't the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the clang of woks and spatulas, are you still Singaporean? But don't worry, you can cure that with a visit to Shen Li Restaurant. With large portions and absolute flavour bombs, they're the perfect end to our Tampines journey! The Claypot '' (S$10) mimics the silkiness of the soy bean dessert. Jiggly chunks of tofu are slathered in a thick, umami-rich sauce. The mellowness of the tofu balances out the strong sauce. As you chew, the tofu melts into creamy goodness that serves as the perfect pairing to freshly-cooked rice. It warms the body from within, a comforting meal that just can't be replaced by anything else. +65 81011004 Tue to Fri: 11.30 am – 2 pm, 4.30pm – 9 pm Sat & Sun: 4.30pm – 9pm Closed on Mon Facebook | Instagram 13 honest durian stores to get the perfect durian fix [Jul 2025 update] The post 11 best stalls in Tampines Round Market & Food Centre to tame your hunger appeared first on
CNA
15-05-2025
- CNA
We went digging for clams in black mud in this Chinese city where Putien restaurants get their fresh produce
Much has been said about the aphrodisiac properties of molluscs like clams, oysters and mussels. But when you are personally attempting to harvest a clam from deep within a bank of black mud, you can only surmise that few things are more unsexy. When Putien, the restaurant known for its seafood-focused Hinghwa cuisine and comforting lor mee, invited me to visit Putian, an actual place in China, to try my hand at harvesting some of the fresh produce that goes into their dishes, I sincerely thought it would be a Li Ziqi-core experience. Loquat-picking at a loquat orchard? Idyllic and lovely. Visiting a salt farm? Dramatically beautiful, no doubt. Clam fishing? Surely an easygoing activity – clams live on sandy beaches, right? Well, maybe ordinary, standard-issue clams – namby-pamby clams unsuited for the rage of war – do. Not the class of superclams that go into Putien dishes. THE CLAM BEFORE THE STORM To get to the clams, we had to drive an hour out from Putian city, to the village of Duotou. Getting there involved traversing unpaved country roads so rustic, our vehicle got stuck. But, we were heading towards literal buried treasure. For 600 years, this village has been cultivating Chinese razor clams in its mineral-rich, nutrient-dense mudflats. This was not just any mud but black mud – thick, squelchy, viscous, deep, black mud. This meant suiting up in chest-high waterproof waders, oversized rubber gloves, a large hat for protection from the blazing sun and a little basket tied with string around my waist to collect my clam harvest. Outfit-wise, it was more functional than sartorial, but it's not what you wear; it's how you wear it. And then I noticed something quite concerning: People who had descended into the mud ahead of me were getting stuck in it, like flies in hot chocolate. This was the point where backing out seemed like a good idea, but then I remembered I was paid to be an intrepid journalist, and my editor probably wouldn't be very happy if I ended this story here and went home. 'People pay money for mud spas,' I told myself as I held my breath and plunged waist-deep into the sludge. Clam fishing, in theory, is the simplest of tasks. Clams, having no limbs or any apparent means of self-propulsion through their thick, viscous semi-liquid habitat, simply exist, suspended beneath the mud's surface, waiting to be scooped up. Unfortunately, I, with my limbs (all four of them), also had no means of self-propulsion, as the mud immediately sucked me in like a spoon into an Oreo McFlurry. A lovely fisher-auntie tried to show me the ropes, so I put off panicking for a bit and, following her lead, dug my hands into the mud bank. She, of course, came up with fistfuls of clams; I, of course, came up with nothing. I'm not saying her clams were paid actors, but after about five minutes of this recurring pattern and me showing zero aptitude for clam fishing despite it being literally sticking your hand into mud and grabbing clams out of it, she felt sorry for me and dumped all of her bounty into my basket. By this time, I was huffing and puffing, while she was a lean, mean, serene, clamming machine. And, I was also stuck. Each time I tried to take a step to keep myself from sinking deeper, the mud grabbed my boot and sucked me further down. So, the nice auntie had to help me yank my legs upwards while I clung onto her for dear life and tried to heave myself back to shore. It took an eternity to wade across the three metres to the solid embankment, and during those long, arduous minutes, the moral of the story was clear: Don't skip leg day. Some people were impressed by how I returned with a basket overflowing with clams. But, that's not all – I had also gotten a free mud spa treatment. KEEP CLAM AND CARRY ON From the murky depths, I emerged to glorious delights: A clam feast spread out before us, with rows and rows of shining Duotou clams steamed, baked in salt and even boiled in soup with delicious Hinghwa bee hoon and a glug of yellow wine. The first taste of the fat, succulent clam plucked from its burnished gold shell yielded the immediate understanding of why it is so unique: Fresh, hot and lightly cooked in the simplest of ways, the Duotou clam's plump, bouncy flesh has an intense sweetness, balanced with crisp, briny umami. While sea clams absorb large amounts of water, these clams, which grow for six months in the nutrient-dense black mud, retain intense flavour. From the beginning of April until the end of July is when the Duotou clams are in their sweetest and juiciest season, growing to an average of 6cm long. Putien, working with the farmers who own the farms, gets some of the best of the harvest thanks to its founder, Fong Chi Chung, a native of Putian. Clams from Duotou are shipped in their mud to the restaurant's over 100 outlets in Asia in countries including Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia, where two to three hours are spent cleaning them before they are cooked. From now until Aug 15, there's a special menu of these Duotou clams cooked in eight different ways that bring out the mollusc's natural sweetness, including salt-baked, stir-fried with ginger and spring onion, deep-fried with salt and pepper, steamed with minced garlic, boiled in soup with winter melon and, my personal favourite, steamed in aged yellow wine. And, if you tell the server the secret code, 'Where is cheng liu?', you also get to order the soupy beehoon dish I had that day on the banks of the mudflats, just like how Putian locals would make it at home. With clams of this calibre, you'd think Putian, historically known as Hinghwa or Xinghua, in China's Fujian province, would be known for its fresh produce. It is instead known for two things: The first, as the birthplace of sea goddess Mazu; and the second, for being the counterfeit sneaker capital of the world. Many globally-known shoe brands had once set up factories here, leading to locals picking up the skills and know-how for manufacturing quality sneakers. These days, it's said that the 'replicas' from Putian are better made and longer-lasting than their name-brand versions. I was not in the market for some 'Ouitshka Tigors', but if I were, I now knew where to get the latest ones. LOQUAT-IOUS PURSUITS But, clearly, the gems of Putian lay outside the city centre, and one of the motherlodes was a beautiful loquat orchard. If you're like me, you probably think of loquats – if you think of loquats at all – as a sort of made-up fruit: Never seen in real life, and mentioned only in conjunction with Nin Jiom Pei Pa Koa. Turns out, they aren't mythical; they aren't related to kumquats; and they look like little, oval plums with juicy, golden flesh and seeds like soursops. At the orchards in the town of Shufeng where Putien gets their loquats for desserts like an utterly delicious minty loquat jelly, the fruit trees, whose leaves can also be plucked for tea, have been cultivated for over 600 years. At 370m above sea level, the area enjoys mild temperatures as well as plenty of sun and rain. Famers limit the number of fruits to three to five per branch, ensuring each fruit develops a deep, honeyed sweetness with a floral fragrance. These are covered in bags to protect them from birds, insects and the elements until they are ready to be harvested in the springtime. It's said that you should not pick the prettiest fruits as they are never the sweetest, which is advice that applies to loquats and online love scams alike. Harvesttime involves a band of sweet little aunties who must put up with visiting journalists attempting to live out their cottagecore fantasies for half an hour. Bored by the lack of efficiency, the aunties eventually grab the shears and briskly snip the loquats off their branches. This is how I ended up, once again, with a full basket of goods that I could pretend to have harvested myself. And, they were most enjoyable: Sweet, sticky, syrupy and succulent. SALT, SEA, LAND AND SKY While in Putian, we also took a leisurely boat ride to a place called Cucumber Island, where you do not find any cucumbers but you do find yellow croakers, a delicacy of the area and proudly farmed in the pristine waters here. The fish get their name from their golden colour, a result of yellow pigment in their bodies that breaks down under strong UV light. So, they are caught before dawn in darkness, then delivered to Putien restaurants within 24 hours. Fed a diet of small fish and shrimp, they grow at a slower pace and are highly active, so they have leaner and more elongated bodies with firm, springy flesh and a sweetness of flavour. The clean-tasting fish is delectable whether lightly steamed in soya sauce or fried until crispy outside and soft inside. It's said that screen siren Lin Ching-hsia, who wasn't a fan of fish, changed her mind when she tasted the Putian croaker. Then we visited the origin of another of Putian's famous exports: Its premium-grade sea salt, harvested from the largest salt field in Fujian province. Salt from this part of China has been prized since the Song dynasty, and it is still produced according to ancient methods of sedimentation and evaporation, passed down through the generations. Because of its location within three bays, conditions are ideal for harvesting mineral-rich, additive-free salt. Seawater is channelled through terraced salt fields so that the salt is purified while retaining its natural crystalline structure and trace minerals, resulting in a flavour much more dimensional than that of regular table salt. And so, I left Putian saltier than when I had arrived. But I had unearthed so much about fresh produce, beautiful ingredients and what it takes to grow and harvest them – not just clams, fish, fruits and salt, but also through meals in which I got to taste other Fujian treasures like bamboo shoots, Nanri abalone, red mushrooms, oysters and even sea worms, a local speciality eaten jellied, which you can also find on the menu at Putien, if you're feeling a bit brave (they're kind of like a tasteless but chewy vegetable, really – not very offensive at all). It really drove home the fact that even here in Singapore, our understanding of Chinese food barely scrapes the surface of all there is to discover. Like clams, the best things, I guess, are found if you're willing to dig for them.
