Singaporean food: 10 things we love

Singaporean food: Abby Lee's guide

You must finish your food or everything must go

One thing is for certain, we do not waste food. Whether you’re at a family gathering or eating out, your elders will be making sure you have eaten all your food. When there are leftovers we tend to turn them in to another dish. For example, roast duck at Chinese New Year will become kiam chai ark (salted vegetable duck soup).

Hawker centres

These unique spaces showcase Singapore’s multicultural food options. Our way of life revolves around the hawker centre – there’s loads of them dotted around the city (my favourite probably being Old Airport Road Food Centre). Besides being a place to eat, they often have wet markets on site where we get our fresh produce early in the morning. A must-visit is Tekka Centre. Thousands of people visit it each day and meet friends and family, and it is also great after a night out to get bak chor mee (minced pork noodles).

Singaporean snacks

Singaporeans love a range of snacks that are sweet, salty, sour, crispy and chewy. These are normally based around seafood flavours. When visiting friends and family you’ll be greeted with plastic tubs or biscuit tins filled with favourites such as salted egg fish skin, shellfish-flavoured crisps and spicy prawn rolls.

Monsoon season

The rain is relentless! December to March are especially humid and wet but to experience Chinese New Year in either January or February is worth it. Rain of course doesn’t stop the eating or drinking.

Singaporean breakfast

This is entirely different to how Western culture perceives breakfast. When I touch down in Singapore, I get carrot cake (radish cake, wok-fried with eggs, garlic and preserved radish), congee (Chinese rice porridge), roti prata paired with my favourite fish curry and, of course, nasi lemak. I would be ordering all of the above at once, paired with some kopi (local coffee).

Late-night eating

One thing that we do not have in UK food culture is a great late-night eating scene. From 24-hour dim sum spots and Korean BBQ that runs until 6am, to dessert stalls and roti prata stalls, you can find whatever you fancy eating.

Soft drinks

These could be considered sweet for a Western palate but I adore going for these thirst-quenching drinks: barley water, iced Milo, teh tarik (pulled milk tea), and iced calamansi juice (with a hybrid taste of lime and a tangerine) are all favourites.

Singaporean desserts

To say we have a sweet tooth is an understatement – depending on your taste, there is a dessert shop for you. This is a place to hang out with friends or family, just like we would at a bar in the UK. Desserts range from kueh (cake) from the Malay and Peranakan community (ondeh ondeh, pandan glutinous rice balls filled with coconut palm sugar, covered in fresh coconut, are a favourite) to mango pomelo sago from Hong Kong-inspired cafés.

Festivals

Beyond the obvious Chinese New Year, you should get involved in other ethnicities’ festivals. Deepavali (also known as Diwali, in October or November) is an especially beautiful one. Walking around Little India at night is an impressive sight, with a huge variety of snacks and sweets.

It’s a melting pot

Malaysia, Thailand, India, Indonesia and China. To eat all these different cuisines from different parts of the city is a great treat. My reciep for gulai nangka (jackfruit curry), originally from Padang in Indonesia, is one of my favourites when eating at the Malay rice stalls.