So, the Business Times reports on where to find LAKSA... Little Miss Resourceful recommends Wei Yi Laksa & Prawn Noodle Stall... =)
Rich pickings
1564 words
23 January 2010
STBT
English
(c) 2010 Singapore Press Holdings Limited
A bowl of good old-fashioned laksa beckons at these longtime hawkers. By Geoffrey Eu
THE problem with popular hawker food stalls is that they sometimes move from one location to another without leaving a forwarding address for their loyal customers to follow up on. As a result, some minor detective work is required to sniff out the new premises of a favourite food stall.
Then there is the issue with similar sounding names, or as is the case when it comes to the popular spicy rice noodle soup dish known as laksa, places that claim to be the 'original' source of a famous stall. 'Katong Laksa' has become synonymous for a particular style of presentation, and there are several laksa variants around the region.
It could all get a little confusing for someone simply in search of a decent bowl of laksa.
While some good versions of Katong Laksa can actually be found in Katong - which remains a popular hot spot for the all things laksa - we decided to skirt potential controversy by focusing our search on other parts of town. It's a strategy that will leave you in absolutely no danger of being short-changed.
Sungei Road Laksa Block 27, Jalan Berseh #01-100 Jin Shui Kopitiam Open 9am to 6pm (closed every 1st and 3rd Wednesday)
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the owners of Sungei Road Laksa should be feeling pretty chuffed - in a Katong Laksa kind of way. There is more than one laksa stall with the same name in this area off Jalan Besar, but the place to head for is this one at the junction of Jalan Berseh and Townshend Road.
Here, smallish bowls of laksa are first soaked with gravy from a large coal-fired pot, and then rinsed a couple more times before being filled with flavourful yet light-tasting gravy for consumption. The noodles have been pre-cut so that only a spoon is required for eating - apparently a concession to female customers with a fear of gravy splatter.
Because successful hawkers tend to keep the names of their original stalls, it should be no surprise to learn that this laksa stall started off in Sungei Road in 1956, before moving to nearby Kelantan Lane and now its current location about six years ago.
According to Wong Ai Tin, daughter of stall founder Wong Yew Hwa, who still runs the stall together with three daughters and his brother Wong Yew Poh, a regular bowl of laksa sold for 20 cents in 1956. Now, a bowl goes for $2, which strikes us as one of the best value deals in town.
At that price, condiments are limited to bean sprouts, fish cake and cockles. A $3 bowl with extra ingredients is available, but purists who want more typically order two bowls of the $2 version.
'The secret is in the gravy, we use fresh coconut milk and no condensed milk,' says Ms Wong, touching on perhaps the single most important aspect in the preparation of laksa - one that separates the contenders from the pretenders. She gets no argument from us - the laksa here is made of the right stuff.
Wei Yi Laksa & Prawn Noodle Stall 20, Tanglin Halt Market Tanglin Halt Road Tel: 9782-1012 Open 5.30am to 2pm (closed Monday)
Ngern Jwee Chye appropriated his mother's home recipe for laksa over 20 years ago and then experimented with it for some time before she gave him the okay to start a laksa stall - he hasn't looked back since.
Wei Yi, which means 'only one', has long been a favourite among residents of the Tanglin Halt neighbourhood as well as regulars from other parts of town, but the stall also attracts its fair share of customers from beyond Singapore's borders, according to Mr Ngern, 57, listing Japanese and Austrian tourists among his clientele.
The basic laksa dish features a generous serving of chicken and tau pok (fried bean curd) is priced at $2.50 - a culinary bargain in any currency. There are several other combinations on offer, involving prawns and cockles, but the maximum price is $5. The gravy is less rich and not as heavy as that found in more conventional laksa places, which makes Wei Yi a good breakfast stop.
'You must understand the character of each ingredient, what its origins are - in particular the coconut,' says Mr Ngern, who has a penchant for wearing baseball caps backwards and who obviously takes great pride in his product. For good measure, he also offers a decent bowl of prawn noodles, but admits it has yet to reach the heights of his laksa.
Roxy Laksa Stall 48, East Coast Lagoon Food Village Tel: 9630-2321 Open 8.30am to 8pm daily (closed one Wednesday each month)
A sign above Mike Lim's stall proclaims Roxy Laksa to be 'The one and only 3rd generation from the original Roxy Theatre', and there's certainly no arguing with that. This stall has the pedigree, the product and one of the most pleasant settings an outdoor food stall could have, with its back facing the waterski lagoon at the East Coast Parkway.
For $3 or $4 (depending on your appetite), you will get to sample Mr Lim's laksa, which has roots dating to 1952 when his grandfather Lim Bok Seng parked his cart outside the Roxy Theatre. Later, a canteen space inside the theatre was taken up. Mike Lim's father Lim Eng Hock expanded the business to army camps in the early 1970s and later to the Old East Coast Lagoon in the late 1970s, where the younger Lim learned the business until a seamless transition was made.
'The laksa is still the same, although I have improved it a little by using better basic ingredients and spices,' says Mr Lim, 51. 'We are still using fresh coconut but the gravy used to be thicker - our customers are now more health conscious.' The gravy is lemak enough to satisfy most tastes and Lim still adheres to the traditional Peranakan presentation - fishcake and prawns only. He offers cockles as an optional extra to keep some clients happy.
'When I started with my granddad in the mid-1960s, the price was about 50 cents a bowl, but profit margins were still higher then,' says Mr Lim. 'It's not easy now because the cost of ingredients has gone up. My grandfather used to make everything from scratch but it is not possible these days.' Mr Lim says that many of his customers have sampled laksa stalls elsewhere. 'In the end, they come to me and they tell me, 'You're still the best.' '
My Cosy Corner 587 Bukit Timah Road #02-02 Coronation Shopping Plaza Tel: 6463-8286 Open daily 10am to 7.30pm (11 am to 4pm on Sundays)
My Cosy Corner is not, strictly speaking, a hawker stall or located in a food court somewhere, but it is in a hole-in-the-wall joint in a, well, cosy corner and qualifies because, despite the availability of other dishes on the menu - including, improbably enough, Japanese food - it serves a pretty decent laksa.
The place is owned by Leong Swee Meng, who worked in the auto industry until about 12 years ago when he discovered that opening a little corner shop and offering food from recipes by his aunt, popular cookbook author Leong Yee Soo, was a formula for success. Now, the place is frequented by everyone from hardcore foodies to office workers and kids from nearby schools.
A bowl of laksa is priced at $3.80 ($4.50 with prawns). The rich, robust and well-balanced gravy is made fresh each morning and is notable enough, but according to Mr Leong, the popiah, mee siam and mee rebus are equally popular - and that makes My Cosy Corner a one-stop shop to savour.
Penang Kitchen 5 Coronation Road #01-05 Coronation Arcade Tel: 6466-6193 Open 11am to 3pm (lunch) and 4pm to 9pm (dinner). Closed on Wednesday
A good version of the tamarind-based Penang version of laksa, or assam laksa, is a lot tougher to find in Singapore, but Penang Kitchen, a tiny cafe just next door to My Cosy Corner, dishes out an authentic bowl that packs a solid punch. It may be spicier than what you are used to - and pricier too at $7.90 - but don't let that stop you. Those in the know will show up on Thursdays, which is designated Laksa Day, when the price drops to $6.
As advertised, the laksa gravy here is smooth, spicy and very tasty, with mackerel, mint leaf, pineapple and chopped onions, plus of course the signature sweet prawn paste, all playing significant roles. Given the amount of work it takes to make this from scratch, this is worth shelling out the bucks for.
Penang Kitchen has undergone a few changes in ownership since it first landed at this location, but the original chef from Penang is still around. It is now owned by three bankers who obviously appreciate their regular fixes of char kway teow and rojak. As for the laksa, it gets our vote too.
btnews@sph.com.sg
This weekly series is jointly brought to you by The Business Times and Knight Frank Pte Ltd
THE problem with popular hawker food stalls is that they sometimes move from one location to another without leaving a forwarding address for their loyal customers to follow up on. As a result, some minor detective work is required to sniff out the new premises of a favourite food stall.
Then there is the issue with similar sounding names, or as is the case when it comes to the popular spicy rice noodle soup dish known as laksa, places that claim to be the 'original' source of a famous stall. 'Katong Laksa' has become synonymous for a particular style of presentation, and there are several laksa variants around the region.
It could all get a little confusing for someone simply in search of a decent bowl of laksa.
While some good versions of Katong Laksa can actually be found in Katong - which remains a popular hot spot for the all things laksa - we decided to skirt potential controversy by focusing our search on other parts of town. It's a strategy that will leave you in absolutely no danger of being short-changed.
Sungei Road Laksa Block 27, Jalan Berseh #01-100 Jin Shui Kopitiam Open 9am to 6pm (closed every 1st and 3rd Wednesday)
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the owners of Sungei Road Laksa should be feeling pretty chuffed - in a Katong Laksa kind of way. There is more than one laksa stall with the same name in this area off Jalan Besar, but the place to head for is this one at the junction of Jalan Berseh and Townshend Road.
Here, smallish bowls of laksa are first soaked with gravy from a large coal-fired pot, and then rinsed a couple more times before being filled with flavourful yet light-tasting gravy for consumption. The noodles have been pre-cut so that only a spoon is required for eating - apparently a concession to female customers with a fear of gravy splatter.
Because successful hawkers tend to keep the names of their original stalls, it should be no surprise to learn that this laksa stall started off in Sungei Road in 1956, before moving to nearby Kelantan Lane and now its current location about six years ago.
According to Wong Ai Tin, daughter of stall founder Wong Yew Hwa, who still runs the stall together with three daughters and his brother Wong Yew Poh, a regular bowl of laksa sold for 20 cents in 1956. Now, a bowl goes for $2, which strikes us as one of the best value deals in town.
At that price, condiments are limited to bean sprouts, fish cake and cockles. A $3 bowl with extra ingredients is available, but purists who want more typically order two bowls of the $2 version.
'The secret is in the gravy, we use fresh coconut milk and no condensed milk,' says Ms Wong, touching on perhaps the single most important aspect in the preparation of laksa - one that separates the contenders from the pretenders. She gets no argument from us - the laksa here is made of the right stuff.
Wei Yi Laksa & Prawn Noodle Stall 20, Tanglin Halt Market Tanglin Halt Road Tel: 9782-1012 Open 5.30am to 2pm (closed Monday)
Ngern Jwee Chye appropriated his mother's home recipe for laksa over 20 years ago and then experimented with it for some time before she gave him the okay to start a laksa stall - he hasn't looked back since.
Wei Yi, which means 'only one', has long been a favourite among residents of the Tanglin Halt neighbourhood as well as regulars from other parts of town, but the stall also attracts its fair share of customers from beyond Singapore's borders, according to Mr Ngern, 57, listing Japanese and Austrian tourists among his clientele.
The basic laksa dish features a generous serving of chicken and tau pok (fried bean curd) is priced at $2.50 - a culinary bargain in any currency. There are several other combinations on offer, involving prawns and cockles, but the maximum price is $5. The gravy is less rich and not as heavy as that found in more conventional laksa places, which makes Wei Yi a good breakfast stop.
'You must understand the character of each ingredient, what its origins are - in particular the coconut,' says Mr Ngern, who has a penchant for wearing baseball caps backwards and who obviously takes great pride in his product. For good measure, he also offers a decent bowl of prawn noodles, but admits it has yet to reach the heights of his laksa.
Roxy Laksa Stall 48, East Coast Lagoon Food Village Tel: 9630-2321 Open 8.30am to 8pm daily (closed one Wednesday each month)
A sign above Mike Lim's stall proclaims Roxy Laksa to be 'The one and only 3rd generation from the original Roxy Theatre', and there's certainly no arguing with that. This stall has the pedigree, the product and one of the most pleasant settings an outdoor food stall could have, with its back facing the waterski lagoon at the East Coast Parkway.
For $3 or $4 (depending on your appetite), you will get to sample Mr Lim's laksa, which has roots dating to 1952 when his grandfather Lim Bok Seng parked his cart outside the Roxy Theatre. Later, a canteen space inside the theatre was taken up. Mike Lim's father Lim Eng Hock expanded the business to army camps in the early 1970s and later to the Old East Coast Lagoon in the late 1970s, where the younger Lim learned the business until a seamless transition was made.
'The laksa is still the same, although I have improved it a little by using better basic ingredients and spices,' says Mr Lim, 51. 'We are still using fresh coconut but the gravy used to be thicker - our customers are now more health conscious.' The gravy is lemak enough to satisfy most tastes and Lim still adheres to the traditional Peranakan presentation - fishcake and prawns only. He offers cockles as an optional extra to keep some clients happy.
'When I started with my granddad in the mid-1960s, the price was about 50 cents a bowl, but profit margins were still higher then,' says Mr Lim. 'It's not easy now because the cost of ingredients has gone up. My grandfather used to make everything from scratch but it is not possible these days.' Mr Lim says that many of his customers have sampled laksa stalls elsewhere. 'In the end, they come to me and they tell me, 'You're still the best.' '
My Cosy Corner 587 Bukit Timah Road #02-02 Coronation Shopping Plaza Tel: 6463-8286 Open daily 10am to 7.30pm (11 am to 4pm on Sundays)
My Cosy Corner is not, strictly speaking, a hawker stall or located in a food court somewhere, but it is in a hole-in-the-wall joint in a, well, cosy corner and qualifies because, despite the availability of other dishes on the menu - including, improbably enough, Japanese food - it serves a pretty decent laksa.
The place is owned by Leong Swee Meng, who worked in the auto industry until about 12 years ago when he discovered that opening a little corner shop and offering food from recipes by his aunt, popular cookbook author Leong Yee Soo, was a formula for success. Now, the place is frequented by everyone from hardcore foodies to office workers and kids from nearby schools.
A bowl of laksa is priced at $3.80 ($4.50 with prawns). The rich, robust and well-balanced gravy is made fresh each morning and is notable enough, but according to Mr Leong, the popiah, mee siam and mee rebus are equally popular - and that makes My Cosy Corner a one-stop shop to savour.
Penang Kitchen 5 Coronation Road #01-05 Coronation Arcade Tel: 6466-6193 Open 11am to 3pm (lunch) and 4pm to 9pm (dinner). Closed on Wednesday
A good version of the tamarind-based Penang version of laksa, or assam laksa, is a lot tougher to find in Singapore, but Penang Kitchen, a tiny cafe just next door to My Cosy Corner, dishes out an authentic bowl that packs a solid punch. It may be spicier than what you are used to - and pricier too at $7.90 - but don't let that stop you. Those in the know will show up on Thursdays, which is designated Laksa Day, when the price drops to $6.
As advertised, the laksa gravy here is smooth, spicy and very tasty, with mackerel, mint leaf, pineapple and chopped onions, plus of course the signature sweet prawn paste, all playing significant roles. Given the amount of work it takes to make this from scratch, this is worth shelling out the bucks for.
Penang Kitchen has undergone a few changes in ownership since it first landed at this location, but the original chef from Penang is still around. It is now owned by three bankers who obviously appreciate their regular fixes of char kway teow and rojak. As for the laksa, it gets our vote too.
btnews@sph.com.sg
This weekly series is jointly brought to you by The Business Times and Knight Frank Pte Ltd
