Fab (& Fit) Bak Chor Mee!

Hi Foodie Friends, our new Makan Kaki is the founder-owner of Taiwanese rice bowl & street food inspired communal dining restaurant, The Salted Plum, as well as pasta pop-up, Pasta Supremo.

Shawn Kishore tells us about his humble beginnings in F&B as an 8-year-old “kopi kia” in Tampines, helping out at his Grandma’s noodle stall and filling in for the drinks stall uncle when he was on break.

An F&B Consultant by training, Shawn became a restaurateur with the opportunity to start a pop-up called FIVE TEN (because everything on the menu was $5 or $10!). It went viral and was such a culinary hit, that after the 11-month lease was up, they decided to look for a permanent space and voila, The Salted Plum was born! This is an affordable, fuss-free, communal dining concept that serves dishes inspired Taiwanese Street Food. They now have 2 outlets, one at Circular Road, and another at Suntec City, which just opened a few months ago. Coincidentally, they also decided to start another pop-up at Suntec called Pasta Supremo, which serves fresh, handmade pasta paired with novel sauces. Do scroll down for some droolsome pictures of the delicious dishes served at both dining concepts!

HEAR:

• Click to listen/ download podcast of Part 1 – get to know our new Makan Kaki Shawn Kishore, The Salted Plum and how he keeps everything in the family business with his brothers.
• Click to listen/ download podcast of Part 2 – more on The Salted Plum, Pasta Supremo’s signature Chicken Rice Pasta and Shawn’s home-cooked obsession with Aglio Olio and Butter Chicken.
• Click to listen/ download podcast of Part 3 – Bak Chor Mee Recommndation!

SEE:

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day for Shawn and it’s the only time he has for himself, so that’s why he’s obsessive about a hearty meal to start his day. Enter excellent Bak Chor Mee  –  in one bowl, you have a complete, fuss-free, affordable meal with the perfect balance of flavour, carbs, fat & protein. So where does a guy who ate it everyday day for breakfast 7 years in a row go for his Teochew Fishball Noodle fix? Shawn’s current favourite is just a one minute walk from his restaurant The Salted Plum on Circular road, which makes both convenient and comforting!

National Day Cake, Sinpopo Coffee & Bak Chor Mee!

All this month of August, in celebration of our Nation’s birthday, we shine the spotlight on homegrown brands and their success stories. We talk to some of the people working behind-the-scenes who work hard to make things tick and of course, get them to recommend their favourite makan places! This week, we warmly welcome back our Makan Kaki, Lyn Lee, one of the owners of local confectionery Awfully Chocolate & heritage-centric Sinpopo Brand. It’s been 3 years since she was last on-air with us, so we have a lot to catch up on, including the latest offerings from Awfully Chocolate and developments with Sinpopo Brand, which has expanded from a cute restaurant in Katong to a coffee bar and a grocer (Scroll all the way down for pictures & more)!

HEAR:

• Click here/ download podcast of Part 1 – Sinpopo Coffee’s $25K Espresso Deck, draft coffees and other unusual beverages.
• Click here/ download podcast of Part 2 – Sinpopo Coffee’s uniquely Singaporean menu, including Durian Bahn Mi!
• Click here/ download podcast of Part 3 – Sinpopo Grocer and the proudly Singaporean brands on offer, including Glory Pineapple Tarts & Nanyang Soy Sauce.
• Click here/ download podcast of Part 4 – More on Sinpopo Grocer, plus Awfully Chocolate’s special, limited edition National Day cake.
• Click here/ download podcast of Lyn Lee’s BAK CHOR MEE Recommendation (not one, but TWO!)

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Lyn says she was never a fan of Bak Chor Mee until she tried the one from a humble stall in the Tiong Bahru coffee shop at the corner of Seng Poh Road (Block 71). This coffee shop is already famous for Loos’ Curry Scissor Rice and the Vegetarian Bee Hoon, but you’ve also got to try the Bak Chor Mee there, with one caveat – it HAS to be prepared by the Uncle. He made a convert out of Lyn. If the Uncle is cooking it, you’ll see a long queue, but if it’s not prepared by him, there’s something not quite right about the flavours & textures – he really does have the magic touch. Both times in the last month that Lyn has been, Uncle hasn’t been there, so she’s been forced to find another Bak Chor Mee which is more central. She was delighted to discover that an excellent stall from Maxwell Market has popped up at Capitol Piazza.

Guan’s Mee Pok is what Lyn calls “fancy”- you can get add-ons like an onsen egg, yaitori on a stick, dumplings, abalone and other luxe ingredients.

Makan Kakis Best of 2018 – Part 1

It’s time once again for Season’s Eatings and as we celebrate the end of another delicious year, welcome to our Makan Kakis special – we’re looking back at 2018’s most popular makan recommendations!

So let’s kick off the festive feasting off with these yummy gems:

• Masterchef Australia 10 Winner, Sashi Cheliah’s favourite Apam and Char Kway Teow in Singapore.
• Owner of Char Restaurant, Anthony Ung’s last meal Kampung Chicken Rice!
• Old Seng Choong and Cat & The Fiddle cakes owner Chef Daniel Tay’s favourite Fishball Kway Teow.

For a little extra fun, head on over to Facebook now and vote for your favourite makan place out of these three selections!
To Listen/ download the podcast of this week’s Best of 2018 episode, CLICK HERE!
And do tune in to Gold 905 every Thursday all this December for our four-part special, featuring the best eats of the year!

Famous, Fantastic Fishballs & More!

HEAR:
Click here for audio of this week’s episode!

SEE:   This week brings a famous fishball joint that really needs no introduction, but is always worth a mention. Our Makan Kaki Chef Daniel Tay reminds us again how delicious Song Kee’s fishball noodles are. It is an institution that plied its trade in Upper Serangoon till it shut unexpectedly, much to loyal customers’ disappointment. Thankfully, they re-opened in the Joo Chiat area last year to much fanfare. For good reason too. Their fishball and fish dumpling (herh keow) noodles are still as good as ever – it’s the perfect balance between great seasoning sauces (especially the chilli), noodle texture and fishy ingredients.

VIDEO: FISHBALL/ HERH KEOW MEE

You heard it first on radio, now catch Gold 905’s popular good food guide on video! We’ve upsized your Makan Kakis experience with this new series featuring themed episodes in which Denise from the Lunchtime Jukebox gives you two choices for a specific local favourite. In this first episode, she takes you from Little India to Newton and offers up two delicious options for Teochew Fish Ball/ Her Keow (fish dumpling) Noodles in Singapore, as recommended by her Makan Kakis Chef Anthony Yeoh & KF Seetoh: 

CLICK to watch the full video!

You can also read more about these two stalls:
Try THIS: Ah Ho Teochew Kway Teow Mee
Or THAT: Soon Wah Fish Ball Noodle

Die-Die Must Try Fishball & Her Keow

HEAR:
Click here to listen to this week’s big, bold bouncing ball of fishy goodness!

SEE:
Our dude with the food, Makan Guru KF Seetoh is back with a recent rediscovery of a fishball noodle stall that has been around forever – hawker legends that hail back to the original Orchard Carpark Hawkers (opposite Centrepoint) in the 1960s. They’ve been plying their trade for decades, doing things old school, the traditional Teochew way. On a recent jaunt to, of all places, Newton Hawker Centre (yes, a bit of a tourist trap, but admit it – there are still a handful of excellent stalls selling excellent food there!), Seetoh decided to try a bowl of fish ball kway teow soup at this stall he’d long forgotten about.

From a pail in which hundreds of dimply golf-ball-sized fishballs floated, the Teochew Ah Hia (big brother) scooped out a few, dumped it into the soup along with a few other choice ingredients and seasonings and served up a piping hot bowl of comfort to Seetoh. First things first, the soup – redolent with the heady aroma of fish bones, which have been roasted, blitzed and added to the stock along with seasonings, this soup is clear, not cloudy and is made even more delicious with a dollop of crispy fried lard bits, a sprinkling of spring onions and tang cai (savoury, pickled vegetable). Next, come the fishballs…

You know a fishball is good when it’s, in Seetoh’s words, “PIMPLY!” The dimply, dappled surface of each enormous fishball is testament to its handmade quality. No machines here! That’s why no fishball looks the same, each is slightly misshapen and yes, “pimply”! Pure fish meat is folded and shaped and kneaded so much so that lots of air (for bounce) and juices get trapped in – the flavour is locked in tight. On first bite, Seetoh noticed just how traditional these fishballs are – fishbones are blended into the fish paste so you get that added fine fishy powder and tiny crunchy bits of extra texture and taste.

And then, as if that’s not enough, next come the Her Keow (or fish dumplings or fish ravioli!). These fat, bulbous dumplings are folded expertly to encase a yummy morsel of meat within – no diet-sized, insipid, flat, all-flour-no-substance factory-made imitations here! These are slippery little nuggets of pure Teochew tradition – hand folded with a “skin” made from actual fish paste and a little bit of flour for resilience (in other words, it’s made from the same stuff as the fishballs!), with a minced pork and tee por stuffing. Tee por is a wonderfully umami ingredient – sundried, smoked sole fish bones that are either roasted or deep-fried, then pulverised into a magic dust that’s sprinkled everywhere for extra deep, smoky fish flavour.

And that, Makan Kakis, is why these guys are still legends. Don’t ever forget them. Seetoh says, “DIE-DIE MUST TRY!”, so head over this evening to Newton and rediscover Soon Wah Fishballs and Her Keow! Seetoh loves the kway teow soup, but for Denise, it’s got to be a bowl of mee pok tah (dry with lots of vinegar and chilli), and a bowl of fishballs, her keow and fishcake on the side. Heaven!

P.S. Read more about these fishballs and her keow on Makansutra.com!

TASTE:
Soon Wah Fish Ball Noodle
Newton Circus Hawker Centre
#01-69
500 Clemenceau Ave North
Open 5.30pm-11.30pm, closed on Wednesdays and Sundays

Perfect for You and MEE

Hello, Makan Kakis! We have a brand new foodie friend joining our rolling panel of gourmands – Lee Chin Sin, who is not only a chef (he was behind Le Bistrot for about 10 years) and a restaurant owner (Lolla & Lollapalooza), he also recently won MediaCorp’s SG50 Gift of Song Songwriting Competition. So you could say, he marries music with makan in the most successful way!

HEAR:
Click here to hear more about Lee Chin Sin.
Click here to hear this week’s episode again!

SEE:

For his maiden makan recommendation, we talk about our favourite noodle dish, Mee Pok Tah – it always has to be dry, because “half of the experience is in the chilli sauce”! In Chin Sin’s opinion this place serves up the most perfectly balanced bowl of noodles – the seasoning is judicious, the noodles are expertly cooked and to use technical terminology, the fishballs are “doiing-doiing” (bouncy yet firm)! So delicious are the noodles, that Chin Sin happily rotates between mee pok, mee kia, kway teow and bee hoon – all are great – the seasoning, the sauce, the ingredients remain top-notch. You get bak chor (minced pork), fish balls, fish cake, her keow (fish dumplings), prawn and bean sprouts for a full-blown, earthy, wholesome, ideal bowl of noodles.

TASTE:
Katong (Jago ) Teochew Mee Pok Kway Teow Mee
Marine Parade Central Food Centre

Best of Both Worlds!

HEAR:
Click here to hear this week’s episode again!

SEE:

When it comes to Mee Pok, there’s your usual bak chor mee or fishball mee, but have you ever experienced the joy of mee pok tah with yong tau fu? This week, our Makan Kaki & Dim Sum Dolly, Selena Tan reveals where you can enjoy the best of both worlds in one glorious bowl!

Selena’s favourite haunt is undoubtedly Tiong Bahru Market and of the many foodie gems there, this one stands out for its awesome combination of fishball noodles AND yong tau fu. Mee Pok Tah (dry) is the gold standard as far as Selena is concerned and the noodles here are served up with just the right amount of bounce & bite (QQ-ness!), along with your choice of the usual yong tau fu ingredients like fishballs, stuffed tau pok (bean curd), stuffed bittergourd and crunchy kang kong. If you’re like Selena, you’ll ask for extra chilli and vinegar for a flavour punch to your mee pok!

TASTE:
Hui Ji Fishball Noodles and Yong Tau Fu
Tiong Bahru Market Food Centre
#02-44
Open Thursday-Tuesday, 7am-2pm
Closed on Wednesdays