Singapore Cuisine

Now as some of you may know, I'm a massive food fan. My whole day revolves around what I'm going to eat. So throughout our travels, I'm going to be documenting some of the local cuisines we've sampled, from the tasty to the downright strange! First stop, Singapore.

Singapore food reflects the country’s diverse heritage and consists of a mixture of Chinese, Malay, Indian and Western. Our first night, we had some very tasty chicken, pork and prawn satay skewers from Satay by the Bay. The satay here isn’t just peanuty but also a bit spicy which I very much enjoyed! Food here can be pretty cheap, particularly at food stalls and hawker centres - this meal set us back a total of around £12 for both of us!

In my previous blog, I mentioned about the kaya and peanut butter toast with soft boiled eggs and soy sauce, which we had for breakfast on our first day. While not terrible, we did pop across to the 7-11 afterwards and buy a loaf of bread and some Skippy peanut butter for breakfast the rest of the time we were in Singapore (it’s cheaper than eating out!)

Our second night, we met Erlia and Andreas, friends of friends who have lived in Singapore for over a decade. They took us to a Chinese dim sum restaurant called Mongkok Dimsum in Geylang, which is actually in Singapore’s red light district. Erlia kindly ordered us a range of different foods (see the first photo), including some very tasty bbq pork buns, some custard filled buns (below) and our first ever chicken feet, which actually weren’t too bad! From there we headed back into town to Bugis to sample some local desserts at Ji De Chi Dessert. These included some hot balls filled with peanut paste in a ginger soup, as well as some shaved ice and mango sago (tapioca balls with mango chunks). Finally they introduced us to a variation of bubble tea, which essentially tastes like a cold drink with small Haribo gummy bears in! Quite tasty!

On Wednesday we headed to Boat Quay and had a delicious Indian meal. The starters in particular were very good - deep fried cauliflower and chicken 65 which is small pieces of chicken covered in a range of spices. The mint raita was also fantastic. Finally, on our last night we went to Maxwell’s food centre, a hawker centre in Chinatown. There were many different stalls to choose from, with food ranging from less than $2 (just over £1), to about $6 (£3.50). This was lucky as we had very little cash left, however for around $12 we got two pork buns, two deep fried prawn dumplings and a Korean bbq pork and rice dish, plus a drink. Not at all bad for £7!

Overall, the food in Singapore has been pretty good. Many things are recognisable as things you can get at home, but you can also try new things too if you’re feeling adventurous. We were very lucky to meet Erlia and Andreas, who gave us a good insight into Singaporian cuisine and were very generous showing us round different parts of the city.

One thing I didn’t end up having while I was here is beef redang, but I’m hoping that will be rectified when we travel to Borneo tomorrow.