Not so long ago, at Bedok Blk 511 Market And Food Centre, there used to be 2 stalls selling Bak Chor Mee in the morning. One stall is called ABC Bak Chor Mee(or something similar) while the other stall(which is the only one there now) is called Tian Nan Xing Rou Cuo Mian.

For those who remember, ABC Bak Chor Mee used to be on the left side of the front row and just situated beside the pau stall. They also used to sell Mee Siam and the cook was an ah hia with a thick moustache and he always walks around in the fishmonger boots. Ring a bell? In my opinion, that was the better Bak Chor Mee stall of the 2 in those days. Their bowl of Bak Chor Mee also used to have that slurpy good effect and their Bak Giao aka dumplings were to die for. Unfortunately sometime back, for some reasons, they decided to close shop and so now the only Bak Chor Mee stall standing at Bedok Blk 511 is Tian Nan Xing Rou Cuo Mian. If anyone happen to see a ABC Bak Chor Mee somewhere, let me know ok?

Tian Nan Xing Rou Cuo Mian is not my favourite Bak Chor Mee stall in the past because I thought their soup had too much of that ikan bilis taste. Not a fan of that taste, so I seldom eat at this stall though I do know of people who rave about soup. It all depends whether you love or loathe the taste of the ikan bilis stock.

Tian Nan Xing Rou Cuo Mian’s Bak Chor Mee

For $2.50 here, you get a mixture of meatballs and bak giaos in your bowl though I requested to have a pure bak giao version. The giao was good though seemed a little small. The noodles in my bowl had very good QQness and seemed to be on par with Xing Ji Ruo Cuo Mian, which I liked a lot. Another thing I liked about this Bak Chor Mee is the minced pork is very finely grinded. The doneness of the minced meat is also good and it’s floating around sporadically, which is how I like my bowl of Bak Chor Mee to be but yet the taste of the soup spoilt it for me. If only the soup can have lesser of that ikan bilis taste and also less salty. This could had displaced Xing Ji Ruo Cuo Mian in overall score if they can get the flavour of the soup to be more balanced.

It wasn’t ’slurpy good’ unfortunately, instead, that common ikan bilis stock which you even can produce at home by boiling ikan bilis in water spoils my bowl of Bak Chor Mee.

Price: $2.50

Conclusion: Terrific in some ways but entire bowl was fatally spoilt by the soup. Not enough sweetness and overuse of ikan bilis in the soup mean it had that ’salty ikan bilis’ taste which is commonly found in many other soup. Not how I like my Bak Chor Mee’s soup to smell like. If you’re a fan of ikan bilis stock, maybe this will score very well for you.

Likes: Noodles had good QQness. Minced meat was very well mixed in the soup. Dumplings push the score up a little.

Dislikes: Soup had too much of the ikan bilis smell. A little too salty. Dumpling is quite small.

Address		Overall Rating
Tian Nan Xing Rou Cuo Mian 添南兴肉脞面 Bedok North Blk 511 Food Centre St 3 #01-10 Morning: 630am to 1pm Evening: 630pm to 1am		Soup: 5/10   Noodles: 8/10   Bak Chor: 8/10   Dumplings: 7/10   Value: 7.5/10   Overall: 7/10

Wanton Mee Dry

Wanton Mee Soup

Price:$2.50 and above

Recommendation: Soup version of Wonton Mee

Conclusion: Not what my favourite Wonton Mee should be but yet this is one of the more popular ones. The dumplings were quite good. The dried version isn’t the best but definitely quite good. The flavours were well balanced. Not my favourite but probably one of my top 10.

Likes: The dumpling and the soup.

Dislikes: Sauce and chili shiokadodo no enough.

Address		Overall Rating
Tong Aik Wanton Noodle Tong Aik Wanton Noodle Bedok North Street 3 Block 511 Market 01-09 Tel: 90694141		Food: 7/10   Value: 7/10   Service: 7/10   Ambience: 6/10   Cleanliness: 7/10   Overall: 7/10

As a matter of fact, ‘Outsourcing’ exists in many areas of our lives. Long long time ago, our forefathers were still catching their own fishes and growing their own greens. Then barter trade became effective because it makes sense to concentrate on developing specific skills. When there is a need to make something a benchmark of value, gold standard was invented and so that’s how this era has developed into a currency world.

Quality unfortunately is offsetted in many cases of outsourcing when emphasis is being placed on delivering value more than anything else and so mediocreness became rampant as is the case with mass produced food. Yet for many hawkers, the risks derive from outsourcing are hard to be quantified because they are only doing small scale businesses.

So that is why stalls that still make their own ingredients like fishballs, noodles or carrot cakes are really a gem in the eyes of many customers. Do you guys think some hawkers who die die must make their own ingredients have that little more passion in delivering quality food? Or do you think they actually care more about earning that few bucks more? The truth is most of the time, these hawkers who choose to produce their own ingredients really do have a certain amount of authenticity in their food, at least the diluted flavour which is so commonly found in factory made ingredients is not visible. So what do you guys think? For passion or for more profit?

But however to be fair, certain factory produced ingredients do have some standard and still can be quite shiok. Take for example ingredients like carrot cake, sometimes I do wonder how much better can carrot cake gets since it’s just still the cake of the carrot and also a plate of carrot cake is not all that cake of the carrot that matters but how the seller fries it. And also for food like Char Kway Teow, does it not matters more of how the seller fries it than the quality of noodles or kway teow per se?

This carrot cake stall at Bedok Blk 511 is renting a small space from an evening Cze Char stall to sell carrot cake in the morning because a Cze Char stall obviously doesn’t open in the morning. I do notice that this kind of partnership is becoming more and more popular where stalls are also ‘outsourcing’ their space for their lull period. This kind of arrangement must be a good thing for customers because utilising stalls in this way can infact decrease the overheads for hawkers and lets hope that all these savings are passed on to consumers – fingers crossed!

Now it’s probably for this reason that this particular stall is still selling chai tow kway from $1.50! Forget about the quality, it’ll be hard enough to find a plate of any food for $2 nowadays ok? But yet this stall is dishing out one of the best dark chai tow kway from $1.50, isn’t that a very fantastic deal? Dark chai tow kway is not all about putting the dark soy sauce into the wok only but the timing and the wetness is extremely important. For me this stall has got it right because they actually take the effort to fry the carrot cake till a little crispy before adding the right amount of water and dark soy sauce to form this fantastic texture that can go very very well with your prawn noodle soup or bak chor mee soup. Absolutely a must spend $1.50 if you want to have a fulfilling breakfast in this hawker centre.

Price: $1.50 onwards

Conclusion: This carrot cake is one of the cheapest but yet one of the better ones around. Simply can’t ask for more!

Likes: Crispy and sweet enough.

Dislikes: Would be good if it can go a little more wet.

Address		Overall Rating
Somewhere in Bedok Blk 511 Market		Food: 7/10   Value: 7/10   Service: 8/10   Ambience: 7/10   Cleanliness: 7/10   Overall: 7/10

For a brief period in my life, I was actually stocking up slabs of pork, beef or lamb(chops or ribs) by the dozens. Now if you have lived in any Western countries, you would realised that for some reasons it is actually cheaper to cook Western meals than Asian’s. Say if you want to make a plate of Hokkien Mee or Hor Fun, first you have to buy the mee or hor fun, then you have to buy the ingredients like seafood, fishcakes, spring onions, beansprouts or vegetables. Due to higher material cost in Western countries and possibly smaller customer base, these ingredients unfortunately needed very high markups to keep the business going.

And what’s worse is most stores over there are packaging these ingredients in bulk, meaning gone are the reality where you pay 30cent for a handful of beansprouts, instead you have to buy $2 beansprouts or whole big bunch of spring onions even if you only need just a small amount. If you’re thinking that you can keep those ingredients for other meals, that’s only half true. The fact is ingredients like mee, hor fun, beansprouts, spring onions are perishable goods and so they don’t usually last more than a couple of days.

So unless you don’t mind eating the same hor fun or mee for a couple of days, you are going to have a lot of wastage and chances are you may have to fork out something like $10 to $15 just because you crave for a plate of Hokkien Mee. But yet $10 to $15 can easily get you at least a dozen slabs of pork, beef or lamb in those places. Now even if I can ignore the equation of getting a bigger bang for the buck, unless your father is a Hokkien Mee seller, with that money spent you are still going to produce only a mediocre plate of Hokkien Mee, to put it mildly. So if you need to spend $10 to $15 just because you want a plate of Hokkien Mee, doesn’t it make more sense to trade that money for 10 plates of pork chop instead?

If you’re thinking about the ingredients for the side dishes for your pork chop, then you’ll be glad to know that over there, a 5kg bag of potatoes can be found as cheap as only $2 and other things like cabbage or broccoli are very affordable and so you can really make your own slaws or salads very cheaply. So in a way there’s really no escaping, you really do need to consider eating potatoes when you’re surrounded by people who’s staples are potatoes.

And finally if you don’t know what to do with a slab of pork, just heat up your wok or pan and when it gets hot enough, just sear the pork on it. For first time cookers, you can see for the first time the magical power of the wok or pan turning your raw meat into a piece of delicious pork and you can decide for yourself how charred you want it to be. For the taste, you can use salt and pepper for delicate mild flavour or you can visit your nearest supermarket for those roast gravy powder which you just need to pour warmed water into it to make some fantastic roasted flavoured gravy which you can spread it on your pork. And that might just make you wonder why you have always been paying $5 for it. The value of asian food in western countries unfortunately holds the same truth for western food in asian countries. So you can practically forget about duplicating that same pork chop ‘purchasing power’ when you are back in Singapore.

There seems to be 2 kinds of western food outlets in Singapore. First is the family run business kind where you get a whiff of that authentic flavour which seems to have a culture of it’s own especially in the gravy. Then another kind that has been flooding our markets are something that looked like franchised but yet doesn’t bare any brand names.

The latter would give you some kind of standard flavours which are easily recognisable in many many Western Food stalls. If your eyes are sharp enough, you would even notice that they have similar signboards displaying the same pictures and in most cases, their prices are even the same and they would usually also have a small display counter where there would be a few chicken wings and a few spring chickens staring at you under some spotlights. These look like another Aston Specialities kind of western food franchise business except that I’ve had difficulties trying to find out the brand name. And usually such western food stalls are halal and from memory I’ve even came across one that was setup by a Malay.

Jet Winds Western Food is a family run business and has been around for a long long time. I remember when I was little and was brought out to meals at Bedok 511 Food centre, they always seem to have the longest queue. Their food had that hainanese western food kind of flavour in the gravy if you know what I mean but I’m not exactly sure if the owners are indeed Hainanese.

The pork chop here is quite authentic to me simply because the taste isn’t very ‘factory’ as oppose to many others that can be found in the market nowadays though the side dishes are very common kind like fries, beans and slaws. Very old school kind of western food outlet where taste seems to be derived from traditional ideas more than anything else. Well so it all depends whether you’re a side dishes kind of person, if you are maybe Aston would deserves your thumbs up but otherwise then you’ll be appreciative towards this type of family run business western food.

Price: $5.50

Recommendation: Pork Chop, Prime Sirloin

Conclusion: Traditional and authentic flavoured western food which seems to be vanishing very quickly in the market nowadays. If you care about how western food were served in the past where there wasn’t any franchised ones yet, then this is it for you.

Likes: Authentic flavour especially in the gravy.

Dislikes: Side dishes a little dull.

Address		Overall Rating
Jet Winds Western Food 511 Bedok North Street 3 #01-29. Singapore 460511		Food: 8/10   Value: 7/10   Service: 7/10   Ambience: 7/10   Cleanliness: 7/10   Overall: 7/10

If you were to sell just 1 kind, your targetted audience will be reduced. If you were to sell more varieties, though you can reach a bigger targetted pool but your quality of food may suffer since you have to spread your concentration among all the food, something akin to ‘jack of all trades and master of none’. So which one is better?

Of course like many other things, there are no absolute answer here. Either situation can turn out good. Mee Pok Tah stalls can make money, Mee Pok cum Hae Mee cum Lor Mee stalls also can make money. Business decisions like this sometime require more than just making the decision. I do wonder will the most successful hawker we can find in the market be also successful if they were to be in another trade, because it is clear that the most successful ones are not those that can only produce delicious food but they can make a lot of right business decisions too.

The fact is whenever I’m in an unfamiliar eating place, I would try to avoid outlets like Char Kway Teow cum Hokkien Mee stall or Chicken Rice cum Western Food kind of stall. Food like Char Kway Teow or Western Food isn’t exactly something that you can have a bad plate and then forget about it. The ‘unhealthiness’ is so great that if I really need to eat one of those high calories meal, I want the best deal possible. And if I were to see a Western Food seller spending half his time chopping chicken, that will undoubtedly make me wonder whether he can give me the best deal.

At first look, Song Chew at Bedok North Street 3 Block 511 Food Centre come across as one of those stalls that are keen to target a big pool of eaters. They sell Lor Mee by day, Char Kway Teow and Laksa by night. Now I already know that their Lor Mee is quite good but yet those kind of food is something people don’t eat at night so they came up with this Char Kuay Teow and Laksa combination at night which I must say is quite mean. One is stir fried and the other is spicy, it’s really one of those combination where you can order one of each and share it with your partner, eat a spoonful of Char Kway Teow and then follow by a spoonful of Laksa soup, slurp!

Now we all know that it is common to see a Hokkien Mee cum Char Kway Teow stall or a Hae Mee cum Mee Pok Tah stall because sellers obviously would like to sell food that has the same cooking method, so they can use the same wok or use the same pot of hot water etc. But yet Song Chew is doing the ultimate! The seller needs to Char the Kway Teow one min and then boil some noodles for Laksa the next. It does seems like he’s doing it for good reasons, so lo and behold I decided to give it a shot.

Absolutely spot on! It was an above average plate of Char Kway Teow which has hits that seem to be quite effective on my umami. There is enough wok hei, enough wetness, enough sweetness and most importantly, enough delicious lards and fresh hums to go around. It is slightly wetter than what I would expect from a Char Kway Teow but it does have it’s own kind of uniqueness and definitely not too far off from being a killer plate. Would be interesting if it had been that little more dry but yet with the same level of wokheiness. This is a rather safe $2.50 spent and I must also say that the photo doesn’t do justice to the taste, it definitely tasted better than how it looked above.

Price: $2.50

Conclusion: You’ll like this if you like your Char Kway Teow to be a little more wet. Though it’s that tad more wet, the wokheiness and sweetness were not compromised.

Likes: Wokeheiness and sweetness comparable to some of the best Char Kway Teow around.

Dislikes: If only it can go that little more dry.

Address		Overall Rating
Song Chew Fried Kway Teow Bedok North Market & Food Centre Blk 511 # 01-34 Bedok North Street 3 Singapore 460511		Food: 7/10   Value: 7/10   Service: 7/10   Ambience: 6/10   Cleanliness: 7/10   Overall: 7/10