Musings

A couple of weeks ago, Matt asked if February next year would be a good time for him to come visit us in Singapore again. Yep – the ang mo is back, and Ling and I have yet another opportunity to fatten him up LOL.

It’s a pity though that the prata places around The Rivervale have changed somewhat. The Banquet pratas at Compass Point nearby isn’t as good as it was before – the gravy has changed to a slightly watery kind. The ones at Ang Mo Kio hub remain great, though one has to get to the little eatery early on weekends to find a free table. And I’m guessing that the Jalan Kayu ones are as good as ever too though we haven’t been there for a year now.

A new prata shop opened a fortnight ago at the Shifu coffee shop. The pratas are serviceable if nothing fantastic. More important however is that it’s conveniently located just opposite our place. The pratas are also semi-cheaper than those at the foodcourts: $0.80 for a kosong, and $1.40 for those with eggs.

So, 5 minute walk to all the pratas you can eat, bud.:)

Well played, Singapore. Not only at the end of each night did you relentlessly stuff me until I waddled back to The Rivervale like a cross-eyed duck, but your strategy of playfully misplacing my luggage for over 72 hours was a nice touch, the disarming blow that made your initial victory possible. I bow to your tactics and intend to come back from Bangkok poised for sweet revenge. But know this: I still weigh .4 kg less than I did when I arrived. You have much work to do to win the war of the bulge, as I’m prepared at a moment’s notice to skip the MRT and opt instead to run to and fro to destinations, unsightliness be damned.

I know—during my last visit I was smug. Yang and Ling, armed with the knowledge that I ate like a wild hog tied down to a buffet bar serving fresh slop yet still left for home in November 2006 weighing less than I did when I arrived, have stepped up their game a notch.

With little to no sleep and no luggage, my merciless hosts escorted me to Banquet at Compass Point late Sunday morning. I thought it was simply routine when they plunked down a tray heavier than my carry-on bag stuffed with camera contraband upon the seating table. Its contents: roti prata, and a lot of it. It was then, studying their expressions and devilish grins that I realized I was the victim of foul play.

Knowing full well that I would have no other recourse than to scarf it down, chasing it with a cup of teh tarik—and do so with a smile, thank you very much—my hosts had played a card from a truly fiendish hand.

I was overmatched.

And then even dinner at Yang’s mum and dad’s place, a truly lovely gesture for which I am eternally grateful, was the site of unfair treatment of this particular ang moh, feeding into the very nature that may ultimately serve to destroy him.

Yang’s mom prepared the most appetising and visually drool-inducing spread of Asian-style food I’d ever seen in person, yet even this incredibly gracious and hospitable gesture was, in fact, yet another attempt to stuff the ang moh until he could do nothing but submit to the wholesome goodness of homemade Asian cuisine.

At least I was not alone. Yang and Ling were also victims of the very methods in which they wished to delude me. On the ride back home the three of us were so full we took turns tapping each other on the back, burping each other so we could fit into the elevator back home.

So Mrs. Foo, you deserve to share this victory alongside your country. I humbly bow to your expertise, and only hope I may prepare myself for our next encounter. Even your leftover beef rendang over sliced bread, which we ate the next night, decimated any chance of my bounce-back victory on Day Two. I am no match for you! The score for now:

Singapore and Mrs. Foo 1, Matt 0. (Yang and Ling are at approximately 0.5 by my scorecard, so I have the chance to catch up.)

…what would you recommend him? Okay, this is my list of things to do:

Topmost on the list: Must bring him to try our local fare, of course!! I mean, we don’t have much of a natural heritage here, or any man-made wonders of the world (eh, does the Singapore Flyer count?), or dirt-cheap shopping, or nice quaint vintage houses, or tranquil countryside, etc.

Matt, our dear buddy, will be flying all the way from America to Singapore in a few weeks’ time. This will be his second visit here (he was Yang’s best man during our wedding, remember?) He will be here for our local food. He misses the Katong laksa, roti prata and dim sum. Okies, for the sake of our dear foodie friend, I shall draw up a list of must-try foods for him while he’s here again:

1. Paranakan Cuisine: laksa (Katong of course!), nonya curry, mee siam, rojak, popiah, kueh kueh, otah, etc
2. Chinese cuisine: dim sum (e.g. xiao long bao from Din Tai Fung), clear soups, congee (Crystal Jade’s), Hainanese chicken rice, duck rice (A* coffee shop), steamboat, shrimp dumpling noodles (Rivervale Mall’s Foodcourt), beef hor fun (Casaurina Rd), fried carrot cake (Shi Fu coffee shop), fried kway teow, fried rice (Din Tai Fung’s), chilli crabs (Jumbo’s), fried Hokkien mee (Punggol Plaza coffee shop), etc
3. Malay cuisine: mutton / beef rendang (my mother in-law’s one is good), satay, nasi briyani, nasi lemak, lontong, mee rebus, mee soto, mee goreng, etc
4. Indian cuisine: Roti prata (Compass Point Banquet – the best!), naan, teh tarik, teh halia, etc
5. Thai cuisine: green curry, mango and glutinous rice dessert, red rubies, sweet tapioca, etc
6. Local fruits: durian, mangosteen, malay apples, etc.

Pant, pant… did I miss out any ‘die die must try’ dishes? Tell me please ok?

As for places to look-see, here’s my rough plan:

1. Rustic pulau ubin
2. Bukit Timah nature reserve
3. Singapore Flyer
4. Singapore River / Clark Quay
5. Chinatown
6. Little India
7. Marina South (to have steamboat??)
8. Chinese Tea House ??
9. Zoo?
10. Where, where, where? Oh yah, go catch latest blockbusters…cheaper than the States…

This time round, we will still get Matt a tub of bak qua as happy-hour snack and stock loads of chilled green tea in our fridge. Now, haven’t we got something going?

Roti prata @ Banquet (Ang Mo Kio Central)

At the onset, I’ll note that the best, and most unique, prata I’ve had is the prata shop along Casaurina Road. Passerbys of Upper Thomson Road would have seen this shop before. It has a banner proudly claiming that its prata is “Singapore’s answer to the Croissant”. That said, there’re many other prata shops of varying quality. Most of them are situated at the hawker or corner coffee shops in the heartland area. More recently though, prata shops have made their appearance in air-conditioned foodmalls.

Roti prata, for the uninitiated, is a flat pancake made of fat, flour, and water; and depending on its variation, it may be mixed with eggs, onions, minced beef, strawberries, chocolate, cheese, chicken, bananas, even ice-cream. The cheapest ones are still the plain or “kosong” (Malay for ‘empty’) pratas. My personal favourites are the ones with eggs, although Ling prefers the “Kosong” ones. The pratas always are served with curry, which in itself could be one of many varieties.

The one at Casuarina Road is a pretty famous outlet; but my first entry on pratas comes from a fairly new foodcourt at Ang Mo Kio Central, called “Banquet“. From what I’ve observed, it’s really a halal eatery comprising many stalls manned by Malay muslims. As a result, the eatery is hugely popular with them, and we see Malays of all ages and families hitting the place. The eatery as we visited on Sunday evening saw a sizable number of Chinese too, all without doubt going there to enjoy the great food. There was even a group of police constables who joined in the long queue at the chicken rice stall.

On the food itself, that’s a plate of 3 pratas with egg, at a fairly low asking of $1.20 a piece. The pratas were of the common type (the Casuarina Road whips up crispy pratas), but the curry that came with the set sparkled and made the big difference. It was of the right viscosity – not too watery or too thick – and had a pleasant and very mildly sweet flavour to it.

• Food: 7 / 10
• Value: 4 / 5
• Service: 3.5 / 5
• Overall: 3.6 / 5. It’s unhealthy food, but heck, just sweat it out with a 20 minute jog later.