17/11/18 Singapore Food Tour

Today we had booked a small group food tour by Hello Singapore.
We found our way to the location for the start of the tour by catching a bus out towards the Airport and then walking a short way along East Coast Rd. We had been instructed not to eat breakfast.

We met our guide Daryl inside the first place to try the famous Kaya toast. Our small group was a mix of young people (us the oldest by a mile) . We had partners Stanislava and Andrej.  Stanislava is Lukas's sister and the couple were meeting him in Singapore, as they live in Perth (Originally from Bulgaria/ Slovenia)  and he is working in Paris, but was close by for a wedding of a friend. Maria and Daniel were a young couple from Phillipines - possibly on their honeymoon,  and Samantha was here on her own. She was an American, currently working in Malaysia and very pleased to be somewhere where she could walk around without being looked at all the time. All were very pleasant.

Kaya toast is a soft white bread roll, still warm, with a paste of pandan leaf, sugar and egg white spread in it and a large dob of butter added, which slowly melts. A soft cooked egg is broken and served in a plate with soy sauce and white pepper.  You dip the roll into the egg and eat it. A very popular singapore food.

This was chased down by a cup of milky sweet tea (made with condensed milk)

Next were yummy rice dumplings just a little down the street. As we walked to Kim Choo, to have our rice dumplings we passed a street containing some of the traditional Malay houses.

 Very pretty places. The rice dumplings are little tetrahedrons of rice formed around tasty mince, with banana skin wrapping the outside of them to impart its flavour and hold them together as they steam.
Kim Choo sells many different confectionaries, but also has rooms upstairs which are a mix of museum and shop, selling malay costume, memorabilia etc.

Then on to try some excellent Laksa  - possibly the best we have ever tasted.  It didn't look great, but boy was it magnificent.  At this stage we were already stuffed full, and only part way through the tour - which was a bit of a worry. Out tour guide loved taking selfies and made a lot of opportunities for photos- which he thought was great fun. At each place he tried to get the owner/cook to come out and have a shot with us, and also to say thankyou to them for their efforts.

Then it was on to the bus

 and off to the Old Airport Road Food Centre

where there were so many hawker stands that you could have anything pretty much.  Our guide took us around and told us lots about the available foods and then we had a choice of one to try each.

Erica chose a porridge and Trevor chose Wonton Noodle.  We all had sugar Cane juice. The sugar Cane juice was quite refreshing, but (not surprisingly) quite sweet too.

How they make the sugar cane juice.

Then it was back on the bus again.

We hopped off and walked to the Malay Heritage centre.  There we were able to see many of the malay spices growing - including Ginger.  We also heard about how the British bought Singapore for a bargain price (the home of the Sultan was here)

ginger growing

Then it was on to the Turkish area.

A little further on we had Teh (poured from very high up to make it froth a lot) - still very sweet with Condensed milk-

note picture on pillar of old man pouring Teh in the traditional way.( see large version below)

We had a walk in what Daryl called the Hipster Streets before our next stop  - Here there were many hip , retro, brightly painted, groovy shops and murals.  \

Here we saw a cat cafe - very expensive- and a selfie coffee shop, where Sam ordered coffee with her picture on top.

Trying to look Hip

and then walked on into the Indian quarter where we ate Murtabak.  Murtabak is sort of like very large flat pancakes with meat on top and is served with a curry type dish to dip it in to.  It is a traditional Indian dish.

cooking the murtabak

As we entered the Indian district we noticed many coloured decorations (especially on the roads) - It was currently Deepavali (the Hindu festival of lights) and the local shop owners had gone all out promoting the festival to bring people to the area. Even escalators in the subway and the trains themselves had advertising for the festival

A little further on we had Dosa (a pancake dipped in to different Chutney) and more tea- This time a Masala Chai tea which had a lot of sediment, but Erica quite enjoyed the strong cardamon taste. Tea was still sweetened with condensed milk.

By the time Daryl left us here we were very very full up.  We managed to figure out how to find a tube station (buying a couple of light weight shirts for Erica on the way) , and caught a train home to our hotel, where we had a cuppa and a bit of a lie down for a while.
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So to sum it up these were the places and food we had:

Kaya toast, eggs and kopi - Chin Mee Chin Coffeeshop: 204 East Coast Road.

Nonya Bak Chang (rice dumpling) and Nonya Kuehs - Kim Choo: 109 East Coast Road.

Laksa - Marine Parade Laksa: Roxy Square, 50 East Coast Road.

By bus to the Old Airport Road Food Centre

To the hawker stalls for Chicken Rice, Frog Leg Rice, Duck Rice, Port Rice, Wanton Noodle, Prawn Noodle, Porridge and Sugar Cane Juice.

By bus to Kampong Glam

Teh Tarik : 17 Baghdad Street.

Chicken Murtabak - Zam Zam: 699 North Bridge Road.

On foot to Little India

Dosa and Drinks - RW Selmor: 31 Campbell Ln, Singapore 209903.
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The link for the food tour is https://hellosingaporetours.com/food-tour/
The cost was about $300 for the two of us for 5.5 hours. Not cheap, but a good treat.