This week's hawker centre stalking target is Taman Jurong Market & Food Centre. I was zeroing in on Ng Kee Teochew Fish Ball Kuay Teow Mee which was recommended to me a few years back 😅 I finally made it today (Jurong a bit far for me lah 😅 ). But, my attitude in life is "better late than never" 😂
Ng Kee is a "walk pass" stall - I mean, if you chiong (dash) the stall looking for it by trying to spot the queue, you will miss it (like I did).
The queue is invisible.
The moment I stepped up to the stall, uncle said "1 hour" 😅 I replied "Okay... no problem". Only then did uncle take my order (after making sure I know what I was in for). I was told to take a walk and come back at 8:45am.
(Normally, I won't wait so long for food. Certainly not those heavily promoted trendy places. But, I have a soft spot for old school, low profile places that command a loyal following. Afterall, I had been wanting to try Ng Kee for years.)
After ordering, I wandered off, wondering and skeptical if uncle can
remember my order or me as he didn't take down any notes at all 🤔 Don't want
to wait 1 hour and later uncle got my order wrong or worse still, say "You got order
meh?" 😂
Anyway, also good, I used the 1 hour to survey the hawker centre for other good
food stalls. Also gave me time for a good kopi (coffee). There are a few coffee
stalls here and Nam Hong Coffee Stall has a constant long queue. Their coffee is cheap and good.
When I wandered back to Ng Kee stall, uncle said "5 more bowls, then your turn". Uncle remembered me 👍 Uncle's memory power 💪
Amazingly, I got my fishball noodles exactly at 8:45am 😮
There's $3, $4 and $5 size servings - I opted for the $4 one to leave
some stomach space to try other food stalls.
With the mound of noodles (I chose mee pok) were (going clockwise) prawns, lean pork, three fishballs, liver, fish cake and fish dumpling (herr kiao). I found out that the $5 serving has all the same ingredients, just more of them.
There's an alluring lard aroma from the bowl even before I began to toss the noodles. The sauce of lard, fish sauce, sambal and vinegar was the old school kind. I love it but it was rather sparse and just enough to coat the noodles, with not much to spare. It had the flavours I like but was somewhat mild and so didn't give me the kick that would thrill me. It's more the comforting, grow on you unknowingly 不知不觉 fall in love that kind of taste 熟悉,习惯的味道.
The noodles were done soft al dente, half a notch softer than my idea of ideal.
The fishballs were generic with likeable soft tender spring to the bite and gentle savoury flavours.
There was hardly any minced pork stuffing in the fish dumpling - just a flap of minced fish meat. But, it turned out to be quite nice. The fish meat was soft tender with a subtle crunch and tasted nicely gently savoury.
The pork liver slices were still soft tender and nicely powdery even though I spent
The prawn was fresh and sweet.
The pork lard and croutons (bak pok) gave Ng Kee's noodles that nostalgic taste.
Clear pork bone soup with savoury salty dong cai (preserved cabbage) providing depth of flavour.
Comforting old school nostalgic flavours with a huge loyal, local following. I think I need time to slowly fall in love with this.
History Tidbit
Taman Jurong Market & Food Centre was previously Yung Sheng Food Centre with the honour of being Singapore's first hawker centre under the hawker centre building programme. Yung Sheng Food Centre opened in 1972 as a pilot project. (Image courtesy of National Archives of Singapore.)
It was later demolished, merged with Taman Jurong Market and reopened as Taman Jurong Market and Food Centre.
Another popular Teochew noodle stall at Taman Jurong Food Centre, 58 Minced Pork Noodle 👈 click
Written by Tony Boey on 1 Oct 2021
Jemmy Yeo said on Johor Kaki Facebook:
ReplyDeleteThis stall is good... Run by 3 brothers.. Simple and very nice.. The long waiting Q is not that they purposely do it slowly.. But the eldest brother who is doing the cooking.. He will make sure every bowl he do it properly..and consistently.. I don't mind waiting to eat fr this BCM stall if I am around that area..
Agree that the fishball noodles are nostalgically old school and well worth the wait. When I first visited, the uncle told me: "45 minutes, can you wait?" I didn't know he was asking me to go back to him after 45 minutes, I thought he'll call me as I was sitting nearby :-)
ReplyDeleteBy the way, my fave kopi is from "Can't Stop Eating Toast" a few stalls away from Ng Kee - 70cts for a fragrant, freshly-brewed cup of kopi O kaw.
Thanks for the tip off. I shall try "Can't Stop Eating Toast" next time :-)
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