Attended the tok panjang dinner by Nyonya House by Rempahs yesterday evening. It's a nice spread of Nyonya dishes presented in traditional Peranakan celebratory style and warm hospitality.
Hours: 8:00am - 5:00pm (tok panjang timing by arrangement)
Every Peranakan family have their own recipes of Nyonya dishes which they are extremely proud of. Tok panjang are traditional feasts where Peranakan families invite friends and relatives for a taste of the family's Nyonya dishes. Tok panjang literally means "long table" - "tok" 桌 means table in Hokkien and "panjang" is long in Malay. Hosts and guests gather over a long table with the hosts showcasing the family's culinary prowess and hospitality. As Peranakan families with the means to host tok panjang are usually wealthy merchants, it is a privilege to be a tok panjang guest.
The setting last night wasn't quite like the grand dining hall of a wealthy Peranakan merchant of Venice Malacca. It's the corridor in front of Nyonya House by Rempahs' humble shop in Balestier Plaza. It's like a street food alley in clean, air conditioned comfort. I love it! So casual and fun!
Nyonya House by Rempahs is a simple shop serving authentic home cooked style Nyonya cuisine run by Alice Chua. They are running tok panjang dinners in conjunction with Singapore's national day celebrations in true Peranakan tradition.
We had 10 dishes plus a dessert. This edition has already sold out. Look out for the next edition or call Alice to arrange for your group ☎ 8820 2353.
Here's what we had.
While waiting for everyone to arrive, we were treated to Kueh Pie Ti (also known as Nyonya Top Hat). We filled the shattering crispy "top hat" (outer shell) with sweet savoury juicy stewed yam bean, boiled egg, boiled shrimp and crowned it with parsley and chili sauce.
Ayam Buah Keluak is a unique, iconic Peranakan dish. The key ingredients are buah keluak (black nut) and sourish tamarind juice.
The rempah (spice paste) is a complex blend of stir fried spices such as candlenut, turmeric, chilli pepper, galangal (blue ginger), belacan (fermented prawn paste), etc. The rempah and flesh (pulp) of black nuts, lemongrass, tamarind juice, etc., are simmered together to make a sauce. Part of the pulp of the black nuts is mixed with minced pork, then packed tightly into the cavity of the hollowed black nut. The stuffed black nuts and chunks of chicken are cooked by simmering in the sauce.
Typical of Nyonya cuisine, there's so much preparation and so many steps in the process 😬
To enjoy the black nut, Nyonya House provides little stirrers to scoop out the yummy umami savoury mixture in the nut. The pulp of black nut tastes like truffle to me 😬
Nyonya House's Babi Pongteh is pork knuckle stewed with soy sauce, fermented soy bean paste and Chinese 5 spice (cinnamon, star anise, clove, etc). Babi pongteh has a nice umami sweet aroma and flavour as the viscous sauce thoroughly infused the juicy, tender stewed fatty pork. Chinese 5 spice flavour was subtle and so was the fatty pork sweetness.
Bakwan Kepiting is a Peranakan soup dish usually served during Chinese New Year as well as celebrations like weddings. It's soft succulent pork and crab meatballs in clear, delicately flavoured broth. “Bakwan” is Hokkien for 肉丸 which literally means "meatball". Another important ingredient in Bakwan Kepiting is crunchy julienned bamboo shoots.
I was blown away by the delicate layers of natural umami sweetness of the fresh pork and crab meat in Nyonya House's Bakwan Kepiting.
Nyonya House's Lamb Stew is soft-tender lamb smothered in a blend of spices and infused with mild spice flavours and aromas. I like it for the subtle lamb gaminess in its soft-tender meat though others who don't like gaminess may not appreciate it as much.
Curry Chicken was sweet from coconut milk with flavours and aromas from mild spices. The chicken was tender, juicy and had nice subtle chicken sweetness.
I like this Satay Babi with thin slices of soft-tender sweet pork simmered in rempah (spice paste), onion and coconut milk, enveloping and infusing it with nutty, sweet, mild spice flavours.
Homely Chap Chai or Mixed Vegetables in Hokkien. Carrot, French bean, cabbage and other vegetables stir fried and simmered till soft in its own juices and mildly savoury sauces.
Fried Chili Sotong is a spicy dish of rempah stir fried with spongy crunchy fresh squid. I like this.
Glazy Malaccan Chicken Wings are juicy baked chicken wings which were marinated in a blend of sweet savoury gula Melaka (palm sugar), dark soy sauce, etc.
Nyonya House's Assam Prawns tastes sweet sourish and slightly zesty.
Dessert of the Day to round up the tok panjang on a sweet note. We had a choice of pulut hitam (black glutinous rice porridge sweetened with coconut milk and sugar) and green bean soup.
Peranakan cuisine is notorious for being tedious and time consuming to prepare. For the best flavours, the chef must also be passionate about preserving and sharing Peranakan cuisine.
We are fortunate to have Alice Chua champion Peranakan cuisine, so everyone have a chance to taste affordable, hard to get, home cooked style Nyonya food.
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