For the past few Australian winters, I’ve kept the same routine: complain for a couple of weeks about the mild cold, then fly to Singapore to work remotely. For four weeks, I power through a familiar rotation of meals, walks and listening to my Singaporean relatives debate which hawker centre reigns supreme. Bliss.
Honed by repeat visits and relatives who critique food like it’s an Olympic sport, these are the recommendations I keep ready for the next friend who books a trip.
The search for the perfect dish
Trusting that most visitors will try Singapore’s ubiquitous chicken rice and chilli crab, the cheat sheet I share most is a Notes app list of where to find top-tier versions of other classics.
Take Hokkien mee, a smoky, saucy, fried noodle dish with prawn, pork and squid in a rich stock. Each chef’s version varies – saucier or drier, with plumper prawns, crispier bits of fat or a stronger hit of wok hei (smokiness that comes from the wok). My current favourite is Prawnography, whose wet-style Hokkien mee balances a flavourful gravy, generous proteins and that essential wok hei.
Shui kueh, a criminally underrated snack, are pillowy steamed rice cakes topped with salty-sweet preserved radish. Find excellent ones at Jian Bo Shui Kueh in Tiong Bahru Market. In the same market, early birds can try the freshest, silkiest soya bean milk and tau huey (soya bean pudding) at Teck Seng Soya Bean Milk, handmade every morning since 1985.
For dinner, follow the chef and TV host Audra Morrice’s advice and head to Keng Eng Kee (KEK) in Bukit Merah. A third-generation, family-run zi char (“cook fry”, or home-style) restaurant, KEK is much loved for wok-cooked comfort dishes such as coffee pork ribs, black pepper crab and har jeong gai: deep-fried chicken wings marinated in fermented shrimp paste.
