Stomachs on legs are proud to present

or You Can't Have Your Authenticity and Eat It Too


Of course in Singapore we did manage to sniff out a couple of bad meals in the way that only a western tourist couple can, in a city 99% full of yummy food, I believe that most western tourists have a special propensity to encounter the 1% that's bad and it doesn't take much to lure us in. All you need is a few promises of authenticity and a bit of swanky branding, try a logo like the one below



WikiTravel says.....

"Gluttons Bay, Esplanade Mall #01-15, ☎ +65-63367025. Daily 6 PM-3 AM. Run by famous foodies Makansutra, this outdoor eatery puts together 12 of Singapore's most famous hawkers. Breezy location by the river, great views of the city and good location make this a winner. $5-10."

So we got all excited and headed down there, only to be served rotting prawns, yes rotting...being kiwis we discussed for at least 5 minutes about whether to return them, we did. We were served the dish again this time with fresh prawns. But by then we were far beyond any interest in completing our meal that was over priced (5 - 10 my ass) and not at all fresh.....

And here in lies the lesson. You cannot take the best hawkers in Singapore, give them a charming river side location, gentrified stall carts and logos and expect the food to stay the same, and to expect the hawkers to remain the best in Singapore. What makes hawkers stands excellent and unique is their connection to locals and place. It is the locals that make it good and keep it good, they are the ones that keep coming back, that keep the ingredients fresh, keep the hawker motivated and they are the ones that can elevate some hawkers to fame status. If you remove the hawker from their place and their customers all you get is a bunch of old rotting prawns.

What makes good food is not just the cook or the chef. It is the location, and the community. Good food is as much a product of place as it is the skills of a careful and conscientious chef. That's why airline and mall food will always suck....they are non-place spaces a bit like Glutton's Bay.

Another good meal we had in Singapore was here. It's on Hok Lam St.



They serve an excellent bowl of Teo Chew (Chaozho in Mandarin or Chiuchow in Cantonese) beef noodles.



The noodles are somewhat similar to a bowl of pho bo but much much richer with a far more deep fragrant herbal broth, my guess is probably more cinnamon, more star anise and probably some shaoxing wine.

Teo Chew cuisine is renoun as a herbal almost medicinal version of Cantonese food. Other famous Teo Chew dishes include a herbal pork anise stew, a great steamed fish in herbal ginger broth with wolf berries and chinese prunes, and dishes such as what is known in Thailand as goong woosen, frangrant glass noodle and prawn claypot, goose feet noodles and fried oyster omelette. Teo Chew people hail from Northeast Guangdong, they are the original rice smugglers and triads (yes the original gangstas) of China and make up the majority of the Chinese diaspora of Southeast Asia, thus most of Southeast Asia now has regional variations of Teo Chew dishes, I'm thinking of Thailand's Khai Paloo and Singapore's Ba Ku Teh. Thailand also has a beef noodle dish that is similar to above said noodles, but it's sweeter and they put Thai basil in it.

My Thai/ Chinese side of the family are Teo Chew, that's how come I know this shit.

Anyway, if your interested in learning more wiki has some info although I'm not sure about the fruit carving comment, this is prevalent everywhere in asia, not specific to Teo Chew people

In Singapore I recently had my first Indian mango...and what a revelation it was too.

Indian mangoes are squishy, sweet and delicately fragrant....they have a certain...perfume taste to them which makes them ten times a more exotic mango than your common all garden Southeast Asian mango, which are nice and mangoey but do not possess the same floral undertones as the Indian mango....overall I highly recommend Indian mangoes, they have lifted my enthusiasm for tropical fruits once again, just at the point when I thought there was little else to discover.



Another favourite fruit sampled in Singapore was durian, although Phil describes it "like eating vanilla custard in a latrine". I tend to think that people that say this have not had a perfect durian in season. I agree that out of season they can taste a bit like this, but in season they are like a warm sweet avocado with what I can only describe as a certain nyum nyum -ieness.

The smell that most people complain of is imperceptible to me. I am, it appears durian proof. So I bought one on the street in Singapore. I was all excited until Hock reminded me that I could not take it back to the hotel, in a taxi or on the train. So I opted to eat it on the street.

As I stood there nibbling on large fleshy soft chunks of durian a group of Indian women wandered past and peered inside my polystyrene container and I overheard one proclaim just within earshot


"oh I didn't know that they could eat that"

Hock and I just arrived back from a four day eating excursion to Singapore.

I like Singapore. I never used to. Overall media sentiment and the general vibe on Singapore these days is that "it's changed, it's no longer boring and nerdy". Perhaps.... but I'm more inclined to think that I'm the one whose changed and Singapore is just as boring an nerdy as it ever was, however now I am just more content to eat a good plate of chicken and rice and go to bed early. The best of which in Singapore is located at Maxwell St food court





The stall usually has a queue and we waited around 20 minutes for our plates of chicken and rice. It's good, simple fare and they serve it with a chili sauce and dark soy sauce, not with the salty ginger and spring onion sauce that I prefer.

Of course there are other things to eat at Maxwell street, including an excellent raw fish salad at the congee stand, deep fried silken tofu, also at the congee stand, endless variations of egg noddles, dim sum, fried oyster omelette and so on....

Maxwell St food court is the reason why we have stayed at the Scarlet Hotel twice now. The rooms may be small and dingey, there are no facilities and it is not a great hotel. But it is right in the centre of Chinatown and at any time of the day or night you can get up walk a few steps and put something yummy in your mouth...plus it is just around the corner from the trendy Ang Siang Hill that has bucket sized glasses of Hoegaarden on tap.