SINGAPORE – For almost 30 years, Patrick Tay made a living designing spaces in Beijing. Now, the 60-year-old spends his days working in one measuring just 2.6m by 3.35m.
At Tuan Tuan Yuan Yuan dessert stall in Chinatown Complex, the former interior designer starts work at about 9.30am, preparing his signature Cheng Tng ($3).
The dessert contains nine ingredients, including dried persimmon, winter melon and pang da hai, or malva nut – which takes about four hours to soak and pick through. “I am a foodie. I believe if I want to cook something, it has to be the best version I can produce,” says Tay, who opened the stall in February 2026. He has six items on the menu.
His pursuit of quality extends to the mangoes for his Mango Sago ($4.50). Instead of relying on a fruit supplier, he scouts markets and fruit stalls around Singapore for suitable ones.
Tay spares no effort in procuring the best mangoes for his Mango Sago dessert.
ST PHOTO: NG SOR LUAN
Tay, who usually travels by public transport, has even rented cars from car-sharing platforms to head to The Bedok Marketplace, which opens till late at night, in search of the right fruit.
His attention to detail was honed through decades of training and work as an interior designer.
He attended River Valley High School and graduated from the now-defunct Baharuddin Vocational Institute, Singapore’s first formal design school, with a diploma in interior design in 1986. He later co-founded Singapore interior design firm Embryo Design and became its design director.
A hotel project took him to Beijing in late 1992. Drawn by the opportunities there, he stayed.
He met fellow Singaporean Regina Ong, now 60, at a gathering for Singaporeans in Beijing in 1994. They married in 1997 and have two daughters, Nichole, 28, and Justine, 25.
Nichole, who previously ran an education centre, recently launched her own start-up centred on a storytelling mobile application called Phases, while Justine is a treasurer in the finance industry.
Beijing was the family’s second home. There, Tay ran his own interior design firm and also dabbled in food and beverage out of interest. He opened a pub called Emergency Room in 2002 and ran it for a year. In 2007, he opened dessert stall Sweet Talk, which his wife operated for about a year.
Unexpected homecoming
The family’s return to Singapore was not planned.
They came back to celebrate Chinese New Year with relatives here in 2020, as they did every year, with just two weeks’ worth of clothes in their suitcases. When reports of an infectious virus emerged, they mistakenly thought the lockdowns would be temporary.
Tay returned to China for work, while his wife and daughters extended their stay in Singapore. But when they tried to return to Beijing, flights were suspended and their existing visas were not accepted. Repeated attempts to obtain new visas were unsuccessful.
Their belongings, two dogs and decades-long friendships remained in Beijing.
Tay, meanwhile, travelled within China for work and did not see his family in person for the next 1½ years as his wife and two daughters were not able to obtain visas to return to Beijing.
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