Cheryl Lu-Lien Tan

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May 5, 2014 By cheryl

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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Filed Under: Asian, Hawkers, Indonesian, Malay, Poultry, Singapore, Singaporean, So Good It Must Be Bad For You, Tales From the Road Tagged With: Bedok, Bedok Corner, Food, Indonesian, Malay, Nasi Ayam Penyet, Nur Indah Kitchen, Singapore

May 4, 2014 By cheryl

58 Minced Meat Mee (Singapore): A Bowl To Remember

Bak chor meeSunday morning in Singapore and the neighborhood markets are hopping.

In Bedok, a sprawling satellite town on the East Coast of Singapore, my mother’s ritual on the weekend is to rise early and head to the large wet market at Block 58. Sure, she’s there for visits with the pork uncle and the fish uncle, to snag lotus roots, tofu and more.

For me though, the trip is always driven by one thing: Bak chor mee, a dreamy bowl of noodles that occupies my breakfast fantasies in faraway New York City …

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Filed Under: Asian, Chinese, Meat, Noodles, Singapore, Singaporean, Soup Tagged With: 58 Minced Meat Mee, Bak chor mee, Bedok, Chinese, Minced meat noodles, Singapore, Singaporean, Soup, Wontons

April 13, 2012 By cheryl

Hill Street Fried Kway Teow: True Singapore Noodles

As a New Yorker who has written a fair bit about food in my native Singapore, I’m often asked the question: “Where should I eat in Singapore?”

It’s a head-scratcher. Where to begin? You could have six meals a day for an entire month in Singapore and still stumble upon some delicious morsel you’ve not sampled before.

Even so, I have short list — one that runs through the curry shops, nasi padang (Malay rice smorgasbord) and Hainanese eateries that fill my head when I’m far from home.

The one place I rarely include on this list, however, is a tiny hawker stall located in the neighborhood of my youth — Hill Street Fried Kway Teow …

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Filed Under: Asian, Hawkers, Restaurants, Singapore, Singaporean, So Good It Must Be Bad For You, Tales From the Road Tagged With: Bedok, Brooklyn, Char kway teow, Fried noodles, Hawker, Hill Street Fried Kway Teow, Singapore, Singapore Day

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