Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan

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Perfect Summer Pesto: A Lazy Al Fresco Lunch

IMG_2913People may wax lyrical about spring and its blossoms and fall or its ripe beauty, but for me, summer is always ma saison préférée.

This may come as no surprise to anyone who knows I grew up on a little tropical island, but my favorite meals always go something like this: Outdoors, at a little table surrounded by dear friends, gorgeous water on the horizon, azure sky above, the promise of a fresh simple feast before us.

So when my trusty Let’s Lunch bunch decided to do al fresco dining for our monthly lunch date this month, I was all over it.

Now, I’m fortunate that New York City and its nearby beaches offer me these ingredients on a plate. And recently, I found myself in the Hamptons enjoying one such meal with one of my dearest friends, chef Simpson Wong.

What was to come? A little summer pesto …

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Hock Thye Noodle House (Singapore): Old-School Wanton Mee

Wanton MeeI am the biggest wanton mee fan.

This simple dish of nicely al dente  yellow noodles tossed in a slightly spicy gravy usually comprising some combination of light soy sauce, sweet dark soy sauce, sesame oil, pepper and more, then topped with thinly sliced roast pork and served with a side of wantons (or wontons, to the rest of the world) — now, this is my true Singaporean comfort food.

I may wax lyrical about my country’s Southeast Asian fried chicken and Hokkien prawn mee, but when it comes down to it, wanton mee is the dish I turn to the most. It’s quick, satisfying and ubiquitous — and in my decades of putting away plates of this stuff all over the country, I’ve found that it’s impossible to find a bad version. Sure, some are better than others, but wanton mee, I’d say, is pretty hard to screw up.

My dear friend Willin knows my obsession with wanton mee — and, I trust his food opinions greatly. (The man cooks for a living, after all.) So when he told me the other day of a little dusty coffeeshop in Singapore‘s old-school Joo Chiat neighborhood where he’d recently stumbled upon a good plate, I knew I had to head over …

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Albert Street Prawn Noodle (Singapore): 51 Years And Counting

Albert Street Prawn MeeI’ve always found that there are two sure ways to figure out whether a hawker stall is good in Singapore:

1. There’s an insanely long and rather slow-moving line in front of the stall, even during off-peak hours.

2. The stall bears the name of a street or neighborhood that’s practically half the country away.

Singaporeans are among the most impatient people I know, so if they’re waiting calmly, quietly, in a snail-paced line, that’s a sign there’s something well worth waiting for there. As for the name, if the stall has made such a reputation for itself at its previous location that it needs to refer to it, well, you certainly need to try its food.

So on a recent night, during my first visit to Old Airport Road Food Centre, a legendary hawker center I’d been hearing about it for years, when I found myself utterly flummoxed by the plethora of choices before me, each one seemingly more delectable and fragrant than the last, I looked around for the longest line.

There it was — in front of Albert Street Prawn Noodle. What sealed my decision? The fact that Albert Street was nowhere nearby …

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Nur Indah Kitchen (Singapore): Indonesian Fried Chicken Perfection

Nasi Ayam PenyetAnyone who knows me even for a nanosecond usually picks up fairly quickly on the fried chicken fanatic that I am.

Besides noodles (and perhaps meatloaf), fried chicken is just about my favorite food. And the kind that I tend to crave is Asian fried chicken, specifically Malay or Indonesian, which usually is marinated in a melange of Southeast Asian spices — turmeric, ginger, cumin, coriander and more — before getting deep-fried to crisp perfection.

While this may be fairly hard to find in my adoptive home of New York City, there’s a plethora of it in Singapore — especially, lucky for me, at the closest hawker center to my family’s home on the country’s idyllic east coast. At the cosy Bedok Corner Food Centre, there is not one but four excellent stalls, all side by side, serving nasi ayam penyet, an Indonesian dish of crispy spicy chicken that’s been smashed for greater tenderness right before serving.

So when I was sitting at home in Singapore today, daydreaming about the perfect lunch, the decision was easy …

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Anna Blume (Berlin): A Towering Brunch

“Brunch,” I was told my first day in town, “is big in Berlin.”

Having just come from New York, a city where weekend brunch is practically a religion, I almost snorted, wondering how different or striking this meal could possibly be in Berlin.

As my host led me down the cobblestoned streets of the city’s fashionable Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood, however, I quickly realized my folly …

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