Finally made a trip to Blk 44 Bendemeer Road to taste the no name prawn mee stall at Foodprints Hoe Seng F & B kopitiam. Members of Can Eat! Hawker Food Facebook group know this as the group HQ - an icon of "can eat" hawker food in Singapore ๐
This is a nondescript food stall in a relatively quiet, corner coffeeshop at the ground floor of an old HDB block of flats (block 44) along Bendemeer Road 10 minutes walk from Boon Keng MRT station. There wasn't a queue but a constant trickle of customers at the prawn noodle stall this Sunday morning.
The stall doesn't have any stall name - the signboard just says Prawn Noodle in English and Chinese. Then, the menu - sets 1, 2, 3, and 4 which are various combinations of prawn, pork rib, tail, lean slices and pig skin.
Be a member. Click on photo to join ๐
I wouldn't have known about this "walk pass" (without stopping) stall had it not been regularly featured in Can Eat! Hawker Food Facebook group. It is one of group founder Andrew Tang's favourites - the prawn mee even proudly adorns the group's banner.
Andrew and his foodie generals meet here regularly to plot the next hawker
food conquest, so this is Can Eat! Hawker Food HQ to group members.
As I wanted to save calories and stomach space for a whole day food hunt, I requested for an "all prawn" version. The stall holder obliged without question even though this was not one of the four options in the menu.
Talk about the soup first. It looked brown, was watery and tasted robustly crustacean umami, soy sauce savoury, and just subtly porcine sweet. There was also a layer of peppery heat. All the prawn mee soups that I liked most during my younger days (from 1960s to 90s) tasted like this.
It doesn't have the heavy, thick gao gao
body and trendy over-the-top umami savoury-sweet taste of modern day prawn
mee.
The few shelled and halved prawns the size of my forefinger were fresh, tenderly crunchy and subtly sweet.
I like their house made sambal chili sauce as it has a sharp hot sting and there was plenty of lard which gave the sauce a distinct lardy flavour and some sweetness.
They were generous with the bak pok (lard croutons) and aromatic fried
shallot. I appreciate it that they fry their own shallots rather than
resort to buying pre-fried from suppliers - difference in flavour and
aroma is like between heaven and hell (no exaggeration). Yeah..., I dislike factory shallots that much... ๐
The mee kia noodles were done a little softer than I like but it was well coated with the spicy-lardy sauce, so it was quite tasty. For $4, they gave a lot of noodles.
Mission accomplished! Permission to carry on, Sir!
I couldn't resist taking a picture of another customer's order.
Next time, I shall have yellow noodles (which I like done soft), prawn and pig skin.
Written by Tony Boey on 4 Apr 2021
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