Singapore Hawker Culture is Singapore's Migration Story • A Tour of Singapore Hawker Centres

Origin of Singapore Hawker Culture

Singapore hawker culture is unique in the same way as Singapore history is unique. In particular, the story of Singapore's multicultural hawker culture is Singapore's unique migration story. Singapore is a born migrant society and a country of many ethnicities. We can trace Singapore's complex migration history by eating our way through Singapore's hawker centres. (Image courtesy of flickr.) 

When Sir Stamford Raffles landed in Singapore in 1819, there were about 1,000 inhabitants, mostly sea nomads (or Orang Laut) and fishermen. When Raffles established the trading post for the British East India Company, he needed traders and lots of labourers. These he imported from Indonesia, Malaya, India and China - regions which are cradles of human civilisation.

Instantly, Raffles created the Singapore melting pot of ancient cuisines from Indonesia, India and China. The thousands of labourers from these countries mostly came alone without their families, many without a shirt on their backs. To feed these labourers with warm cooked food, street hawking appeared as soon as the port of Singapore was established.

The British recognised the important essential service these street hawkers provided but the hawkers were dirtying the streets, clogging up drains and obstructing traffic. They were also causing cockroach and rat infestation. Food poisoning was common. To control the hawkers, the British introduced licensing and started moving them to hawker shelters.

Empress Road Market & Food Centre 1976

But, most hawkers remained unlicensed and plied the streets until the post-independence Singapore government's hawker centre building programme started in 1970. Under the programme, the Singapore government built 110 hawker centres in housing estates, the Central Business District and industrial parks. By 1986, the first hawker centre building programme was complete and every hawker in Singapore had his / her own hawker centre stall. (Image courtesy of National Archives of Singapore.)

Chong Pang Market & Food Centre 2021

The hawker centre became one of the central features of Singapore hawker culture.

Singapore hawker culture is born regional and multicultural. The great cuisines of India, Indonesia and China came with the thousands of labourers who came to work in the port city of Singapore.

Singapore hawker culture is urban in that it is closely coupled with Singapore's public housing programme. The Singapore government aimed to provide every Singapore family their own home and every hawker their own hawker centre stall.

Singapore's multicultural hawker centres play a crucial role in bonding our diverse immigrant society. Neighbours from all ethnic communities come down from their public housing flats to mingle over breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper. Barriers are broken and friendships formed in these community dining rooms.

Hawkers are bearers of hawker culture with their culinary skills. They are creators of Singapore hawker dishes like satay bee hoon, kueh tu tu, Roti John, curry fish head, chili crab just to name a few. Hawkers play a central role in Singapore hawker culture with their dishes and skills (not to mention the toil and dedication).

Though diverse, the regional cuisines that arrived at Singapore's shore share certain commonalities. For example, India, Indonesia, China, and Indochina, share a common rice culture.

To illustrate, we shall look a little closer at the influence of rice dishes from China, Indonesia and Thailand on Singapore hawker culture.

Chinese

When Raffles opened Singapore for business, he needed traders and labourers. For traders, Raffles tapped on the business networks of the Peranakan people. (Image courtesy of National Archives of Singapore.)

Peranakan (which means "local born" in Malay) are descendants of Chinese traders who intermarry locals in Malaya and Indonesia. Relations between Ming dynasty of China and the Malacca sultanate thrived in the 1400s, with a large Chinese community settling in Malacca.

After Raffles opened the port of Singapore, he handed the post of Singapore Resident to Major Farquhar who was the Resident of Malacca. Naturally, Farquhar put his Malacca links to good use, bringing Peranakan traders to Singapore.

Peranakan cuisine is a unique blend of Malay / Indonesian and Chinese culinary traditions. Peranakan dishes use coconut milk, spices, and local aromatic leaves and herbs. A Peranakan meal typically consists of rice with many side dishes which include ayam buah keluak, ayam pongteh, itek sio, itek tim, achar fish, etc. (Peranakan cuisine include a wide variety of colourful sweet desserts known as Nyonya kueh.)

Take for example, the iconic ayam buah keluak. It is prepared by digging out the pulp from a buah keluak nut (black nut), mashed and cooked together with coconut milk, spices, and tamarind juice. Part of the resulting sauce is mixed with minced chicken (or pork) and stuffed back into the hollowed nut. The stuffed nut and more chicken pieces are then stewed together in the sauce. Ayam buah keluak is an acquired taste - to me it tastes like a pungent, bitter, nutty, earthly truffle. Okay, an Asian truffle, so to speak. The robust tasting dish go well with plain white rice. A must in any good Peranakan restaurant.

Singapore have several Peranakan restaurants but one of my favourite places for Peranakan food is actually at a hawker stall - Charlie's Peranakan at the basement level of Golden Mile Food Centre. At his tiny hawker stall, Charlie serves a menu comparable to Peranakan restaurants in range and quality but at hawker prices.

Hot on the heels of Peranakan traders, came labourers from China, mostly from the southern sea facing provinces of Guangdong and Fujian. They were known as sinkeh 新客 or "new guests" to distinguish them from Peranakan traders who arrived in Malaya and Indonesia 400 years earlier. (Image courtesy of National Archives of Singapore.)

Sinkeh consists of Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese, Hakka and Hainanese sub groups, each with their own language, culture and culinary traditions. Each group brought with them many dishes - I shall cite a few rice dishes to illustrate.

The largest Chinese community, the Hokkien brought wa kueh which literally means "bowl cake". It is simply milled rice solution poured into a bowl together with pieces of meat (chicken or pork) marinated with soy sauce and Chinese 5 spice. The bowl of rice solution and meat is cooked by steaming. To serve, the bowl is inverted, releasing the cooked rice cake inside. Wa kueh is eaten with a savoury brown sauce.

Wa kueh is now rarely found in Singapore. There is a wa kueh stall at Chinatown Complex run by Mr Tan whose grandfather sold wa kueh in the 1940s.

The Teochew brought many dishes to Singapore such as bak chor mee, char kueh teow, chwee kueh, etc. Teochew porridge, one of the most popular,  is eaten with many side dishes which could be steamed, stir fried, boiled, stewed and so on.

One of the traditional side dishes is known as "fish rice".

But, "fish rice" is actually fish and has no rice. Back in China, Teochew fishermen used to go out to sea for days bringing no rice with them. At sea, they would eat small fishes that had no market value by simply boiling them with sea water. These they treat as "rice" hence the name "fish rice". This technique of cooking fish was later used to cook larger fish and eaten as a side dish with Teochew porridge.

One of my favourite Teochew porridge place in Singapore is Teo Heng at Hong Lim Food Centre. Making "fish rice" is a dying trade in Singapore. Today, there is only one producer of "fish rice" in Singapore supplying all the Teochew porridge stalls in Singapore. The proprietors at this last "fish rice" shop are in their 70s now. When they retire, there will be no more "fish rice" in Singapore 😔 

The Cantonese have claypot chicken rice which is rice and pieces of chicken cooked in a claypot, traditionally over charcoal fire. The trick with enjoying claypot chicken rice is the layer of crisp rice crust sticking to the bottom and lower sides of the claypot. The crust is mixed with the rice which together gives claypot chicken rice its unique soft-tender, crisp and crunchy texture. But, it takes a lot of skill to get the rice crust just right and not many can get it consistently.

One of my go to places for claypot chicken rice New Lucky at Holland Drive Food Centre.

The Hakka have lei cha rice which you might know as "thunder tea" rice. The Hakka were originally from north China around the Yellow River basin. About 1700 years ago, the Hakka started to move south due to wars (it was the chaotic times of the Three Kingdoms following the collapse of the Han and Jin dynasties). They settled mainly in Guangdong and Fujian provinces but retained their language and culture. Like other sinkeh, Hakka people came to Singapore in the 1800s.

Lei cha rice recipe is flexible and adaptable because the Hakka people were always on the move. It is rice with topping of stir fried vegetables, tofu and groundnut. The rice is eaten with a green tea made by grinding vegetables, tea leaves and herbs. The rice toppings and vegetables for the tea vary from place to place depending on what is available.

What has lei cha rice got to do with thunder? Nothing, actually. The Hakka word for grind is "lei" which sounds like the Mandarin word for thunder, hence "thunder" tea 🤷

One of my favourite places for lei cha rice in Singapore is Hakka Thunder Tea Rice at Tanglin Halt Food Centre. This food centre is slated for demolition soon and most of the stalls here (including Hakka Thunder Tea Rice) will move to the new Margaret Drive Food Centre in 2022.

Among the sinkeh, the Hainanese were the late comers to Singapore because the Hainan seaport of Qiongshan was opened to foreign trade only in 1876. When the Hainanese arrived in Singapore, places and occupations were already taken by other sinkeh (who were arriving since the 1820s). Many Hainanese therefore had to settle for jobs as cooks and servants in the homes of wealthy Peranakan traders and colonial officials.

Hainanese learnt to cook Peranakan and Western dishes, and combined these with traditional Hainanese cuisine to create Hainanese curry rice. Hainanese curry rice is a unique combination - rice is eaten with Peranakan curries, Hainanese stews (braised in soy sauce) and Western dishes like chicken and pork chops.

One place I like to go for Hainanese curry rice is Loo's in Tiong Bahru.

Of course, we cannot talk about Hainanese cuisine in Singapore without mentioning Hainanese chicken rice. Hainanese traditionally cook chicken rice at home. In the 1940s, some Hainanese started selling chicken rice in the Hainanese enclave of Purvis Street, Seah Street and Middle Road. The sweet taste of succulent chicken with flavourful rice became popular and today every hawker centre has at least one chicken rice stall. Often there are more than one.

Maxwell Food Centre

At Maxwell Food Centre, there are seven chicken rice stalls, making it chicken rice central of Singapore. The two most famous ones here are Tian Tian and Ah Tai.

If you go to Hainan island in China today, you will not find the same Hainanese chicken rice you eat in Singapore hawker centres. In Hainan, the poached chicken are air cooled while in Singapore, most hawkers dunk their poached chicken in cold or ice water. This makes the chicken more tender and juicy. In Hainan, rice is flavoured with ginger, garlic and chicken oil. In Singapore, we also add pandan leaves and lemongrass for more flavour and aroma.

The latest wave of immigrants from China came around the 1980s as students, professionals and entrepreneurs. They are known as xinyimin and came from beyond the traditional provinces of Guangdong and Fujian. These xinyimin 新移民 immigrants eat more wheat products than rice.

(Xinyimin 新移民 is a generic term referring to the Chinese diaspora following China's "Opening Up policy" in 1978. On the other hand, the term sinkeh 新客 refers to Chinese immigrants to Malaya and Indonesia between 1820s and 1930s.)

Among the dishes which xinyimin brought to Singapore, mala xiang guo is the most prominent - MXG stalls are found in many Singapore hawker centres.

Numbing spicy dishes from Sichuan have conquered the whole of China. Chili culture is more pervasive than rice culture in China. Mala Xiang Guo arrived in Singapore in 2009 and first appeared in People's Park Hawker Centre in 2011. Xinyimin cuisine can be found in hawker centres around Singapore, and the largest collection is in People's Park Hawker Centre.

The customer picks the vegetables and meat such as mushroom, chicken, pork / beef slices, offal, tripe, prawn, squid, meat balls, canned luncheon meat, tofu, lotus root, bean sprouts, leafy greens, black fungus, etc. A chef cooks the chosen ingredients at the specified level of spiciness with peppercorn, dried chili pepper, fermented chili bean paste, chili oil, etc. The Singapore version of mala xiang guo have their spiciness quotient tuned down for local palates. The dish is eaten with noodles or rice.

Indonesians

The first migrants to Singapore were Indonesians. In 1299, a prince from Indonesia's Srivijaya empire landed in Singapore and established the kingdom of Singapura. Singapura was a thriving sea port facilitating trade between Indonesia, China, India and Arabia. The kingdom of Singapura lasted five reigns (99 years) and was destroyed by either Indonesian or Thai invaders in 1398.

After that, Singapore became a backwater until the arrival of Raffles in 1819 (520 years later). When Raffles opened the port of Singapore, among the first to arrive were the Bugis in 1820. They were warmly welcome by Farquhar as the Bugis were traders and they brought their extensive business networks from across the Indonesian archipelago to Singapore.

Labourers and craftsman from across the Indonesian archipelago came to Singapore. There were the Malays from the Riau islands, Minangkabau from West Sumatra, Javanese from Java, Boyanese from Bawean island (off Java), and Banjarese from South Kalimantan. The Indonesians brought to Singapore, satay, mee rebus, lontong, soto, tauhu goreng, etc., which are commonly found in hawker centres today.

The Indonesian staple is rice and they have many rice dishes. Nasi goreng or fried rice is one of Indonesia's national dishes (which includes also soto, rendang, sate or satay, and gado-gado). There are many variations of Indonesian fried rice - in its most basic form, it is overnight rice stir fried in an open wok with kicap manis or soy sauce sweetened with palm sugar.

The Minangkabau is famous for their Nasi Padang. It is a meal of rice with many side dishes of curries, meat, poultry, seafood, vegetables and the most important is rendang.

Rendang is made by stewing beef in a curry of coconut milk and spices for hours until all the liquid is evaporated and all the flavours are infused into the meat. Biting into a piece of good rendang is like biting into a piece of meat saturated with perfume which explodes in the mouth and shoots up the nose.

Rendang can be found in Nasi Padang stalls in Singapore hawker centres. One of my favourite places for Nasi Padang is Warong Nasi Pariaman in the historic Kampong Glam. Like the better known city of Padang, Pariaman is also a city in West Sumatra. Founded in 1948, Warong Nasi Pariaman is the oldest Nasi Padang stall in Singapore.

Indonesia also has a wide variety of chicken rice dishes which vary from region to region. It's rice, chicken and sambal combined in many ways, so every region's chicken rice dish is different.

In Indonesian cuisine, sambal plays a very big part. The Indonesians have over 200 sambal, a different sambal for almost every dish.

In Padang, there's Nasi Ayam Berlado Hijau - it's rice with side dish of chicken stir fried together with and smothered in fresh green chili sambal. Berlado means "in chili" in Minangkabau dialect.

At Sims Vista Food Centre, there's a Green Chili Chicken Rice stall. Besides fried chicken smothered with fresh green sambal, the stall serves basmati rice cooked in aromatic spices like cloves and cardamon.

The stall was opened in 1999. Since it became popular, many green sambal chicken rice stalls popped up across Singapore. This is still the stall with the longest queue at Sims Vista hawker centre.

In Central Java, there's Nasi Ayam Penyet - it's rice with fried chicken and a red sambal at the side. Ayam Penyet means "flattened chicken" in Bahasa Indonesia language. The fried chicken is flatten with a quick smack with the flat of a chopper or a mallet. The signature "smashing" may seem redundant in Singapore where most people eat with fork and spoon, but breaking up the chicken is definitely helpful when eating it with sambal and rice using our hand.

For nasi ayam penyet, I go to Warong HRH Kamisah, opposite Green Chili Chicken Rice at Sims Vista hawker centre. The huge chicken thigh cooked in mild spices is allowed to cool, then deep fried to a golden crisp outside while inside it remains tender and moist. The winner here is their red sambal. It is rich with savoury umami from anchovy, sweetened with lots of onion and packs a sharp chili punch. 

Going further east to the island of Lombok, there's Nasi Ayam Taliwang. Nasi Ayam Taliwang stalls are everywhere in Lombok like Hainanese chicken rice stalls in Singapore. The chicken is boiled in spices, then dunked in spicy and sweet sambal Taliwang and flame grilled over charcoal before it is served with rice.

Yishun Park Hawker Centre 2021

In Singapore's Yishun Park Hawker Centre, there is a Nasi Lemak Ayam Taliwang stall. The chicken boiled in spices is flame grilled, then slathered with sambal Taliwang and served with nasi lemak.

Thais

The first contact between Thailand and Singapore could go as far back as 1398. Historians couldn't agree on who caused the fall of the kingdom of Singapura that year - some say it was the Javanese from the Majapahit empire. Others believe it was the Thais from the Ayuthaya empire.

Under foreign attack, the last king of Singapura fled north to Malacca to establish the Malacca sultanate. The Ayuthaya empire came for Malacca in the 1400s but was repelled. The Thais left Malacca alone after the sultanate and the Ming dynasty built close relations.

Many years passed before the Thais returned to Singapore in the 1970s to help us in the construction industry. The centre of Thai culture and cuisine is in Golden Mile Complex. Its heyday was in the 1980s and 1990s when the Thai population in Singapore was at its peak.

The Thai restaurants here serve authentic Thai cuisine from all the regions of Thailand. Thousands of Thais thronged Golden Mile Complex on weekends for supplies, services, and a taste of home town food. Hence, there was an emphasis on familiar comfort dishes like tom yum, som tam, noodles and rice dishes.

Many Singaporeans joined in in Thai culture immersion in Golden Mile Complex too. I like the smells of Thai spices and cooking, the sights and colours, the sound of catchy Thai music, and of course, the taste of Thai cuisine.

One of my favourite Thai restaurants in Singapore is Beerthai in Golden Mile Complex. It serves an extensive range of Thai dishes from soups to salads, meat, poultry, seafood, rice and noodles. 

Thai food stalls also sprouted up in hawker centres, some by immigrants from Thailand and also by Singaporeans who lived or travel often to Thailand.

Rice is synonymous with food in Thai culture. In fact, rice and food share the same word in Thai - Khao.

Many Thais said that they judge a restaurant by how well they cook Pad Thai, Thailand's national dish. Pad Thai was created fairly recently during the Second World War. At that time, Thailand was in an economic crisis and badly needed foreign exchange. To ensure that it could export as much rice as possible, the Thai government encouraged its people to eat more rice noodles.

Rice noodles can be made with lower quality rice, so that better rice could be reserved for export. The Thai government launched the "Noodle is your Lunch" campaign and distributed leaflets of Pad Thai recipe. It was a simple but nutritious dish of rice noodles stir fried with beansprout, fish sauce, preserved radish, dried shrimp, egg, tofu, palm sugar and tamarind juice. All ingredients are easily available in Thailand. The Thai government also encouraged hawkers to set up Pad Thai stalls.

The "Noodle is your Lunch" campaign was a success - today, Pad Thai is served in every Thai restaurant and widely available at street side stalls. In the same way, most Thai restaurants in Singapore have Pad Thai on their menu.

While the Thai population in Singapore has reduced since 2000, the popularity of Thai cuisine is sustained in Singapore. In the past, food culture was carried by immigrants but today returning tourists are also bearers of food culture.

In the global village and digitised world that we live in today, food culture is not only carried by immigrants. Tourists and social media also influence Singapore food culture.

Thailand is a popular destination with Singapore tourists. When they return to Singapore, many miss the Thai flavours they tasted in Thailand. That is why Thai restaurants always enjoy a healthy Singaporean clientele besides Thai immigrants.

Take for example, Thai style chicken rice. Singaporeans are crazy about our own Hainanese chicken rice. When Singaporeans travel to Bangkok and stumble upon Thai chicken rice, they couldn't resist giving it a try and fell in love with it as well.

The best known Thai chicken rice stall is Go Ang Kaiton Pratunam in the Bangkok shopping belt which is a favourite haunt of Singaporeans. Most Singaporeans simply know it as the "pink shirt" chicken rice because the staff don pink colour uniform.

When Singaporeans come home, they still crave for the Go Ang Kaiton Pratunam experience. Capitalising on this demand, Go Ang opened its first branch in Singapore in 2017 and now has 5 outlets here in various shopping malls.

Thai chicken rice is actually closer to the original Hainanese variety than their Singapore counterparts. The founder of Go Ang came to Thailand from Hainan, started the stall in 1960 and the chicken rice business is now in the third generation.

Go Ang's chicken is done a little drier than Singapore chicken but still tender and moist. It is served without dressing sauce aka Hainanese style. The rice is more garlicky sans pandan and lemongrass, again more like those in Hainan. 

The most Thai thing about Go Ang chicken rice is their dipping sauce. It is a simple Thai style sauce of soy sauce, chili pepper and garlic. 

And, of course, in Thailand we can have chicken blood curd which we cannot have in Singapore 😂

Today, even social media influences food cultures across countries and continents. Take for example, the humble Thai omelette.

Thai omelettes are comfort food for Thais. There are many types of Thai omelettes with different fillings. It could be chicken, pork, squid, prawn, crab, vegetables, or it could be just be eggs. Thai omelette served over rice is a popular, well loved comfort dish.

The dish is very simple and every Thai kitchen has all the ingredients at all times - in its most basic form, it is just eggs beaten with a bit of rice flour, seasoned with fish sauce and deep fried in oil.

Like Pad Thai, every Thai restaurant has Thai omelette dishes but most non Thais don't really pay much attention to it. That's until 2017 when a street corner stall Jaan Jay Fai's version of crab omelette bursted into global fame when it won a Michelin Star in Bangkok's inaugural Michelin Guide. Suddenly, everyone wants a taste of Thai crab omelette. (Image courtesy of Wikipedia.)

Those who could joined the two hour queue in Bangkok to taste the dish. So, Thai restaurants in Singapore offered their versions and attracted long queues. Personally, I like the version at Warm Up Cafe and Nummum Thai Kitchen but hopefully I can have a chance to taste the Jay Fai version in Bangkok.

UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity

Singapore hawker centres are living museums though there are no statues, paintings, pottery or other artefacts. It is a lived experience of regional cuisines from India, Indonesia, through Indochina to China. 

The diversity is unparalleled. For example, the range of Chinese dishes in our hawker centres are more than what can be found in any single city in China itself.

Savouring a hawker dish can be like a communion with our roots. Many of these dishes are ancient and tell the old stories of the people behind them. For example, rendang go as far back as the first century AD when the first Indian traders brought curries to Sumatra 2,000 years ago. Lei cha was invented in the second century AD and arrived in Singapore through five great migrations from the Yellow River basin (one of the cradles of human civilisation) over a period of 1,700 years.

Many dishes are young, locally created reflecting the adaptive and innovative spirit of our pioneers. For example, Singapore's style of Hainanese chicken rice is just 60 to 70 years old. Other young Singapore cuisine are Hainanese style satay, kueh tu tu, Roti John, curry fish head, chili crab, etc.

Every dish tells their stories about cultures and peoples. When we think about it, it takes us to distant places and across time. It promotes mutual understanding and builds bonds between people. All these, while we enjoy a delicious meal at an affordable price in a clean, comfortable environment together with fellow Singaporeans.

Singapore hawker culture is a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity since 2020. As living museums, our hawker centres are valuable national institutions. Visit a hawker centre and do our part to preserve this cultural heritage.

    

       

                     

             

             

               

               

             

           

           

           

                         

           

             

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Written by Tony Boey on 12 Nov 2021