Seng Kee Black Chicken Herbal Soup • Kembangan Changi Road Zhi Char with over 100 Dishes

Every time I passed by Seng Kee Black Chicken Herbal Soup on a bus or in a car, I see a big milling crowd and full house - it makes me hungry 🤤 I told myself that I must come here, one day.

So when I saw buddy Cat shared her visit to Seng Kee on Facebook, we quickly arranged an encore with a few more kakis (buddies).

Restaurant name: Seng Kee Black Chicken Herbal Soup

Address: 475 Changi Rd, Singapore 419892

Nearest MRT: 3 minutes walk from Kembangan station

Tel: 6746 4089

Hours: 11:30am - 2:00am

Seng Kee is a large restaurant spanning two shoplots just steps from Kembangan MRT station - super convenient.

I had always wondered how by just serving black chicken herbal soup Seng Kee can command such a large crowd. Now, I realised that Seng Kee actually serves a wide range of dishes and is more like a zhi char 煮炒 (cook and fry) place. They have over 100 dishes on the menu 😮

They have the ordering process fine tuned down to a T. Give your orders to the order taker at the front. They have a large photo menu covering the entire wall like a fast food restaurant. When in doubt, just pick the signatures on the top row, which was what we did 😬

The spread for five of us. Cat gave us a treat. So nice of you. Thank you 🙏

First things first, the black chicken herbal soup, Seng Kee's claim to fame.

The piping hot herbal soup was just mildly herbal in flavour and aroma. The blend of flavours was nice, balanced and quite smooth. The black chicken was tender from all the stewing in the soup but still had a bit of chew left which I like. It was not overly soft 棉棉 which is the reason why I seldom order such soups.

The kidney mee sua was pretty enjoyable too. The soup felt thick from starch leached from the mee sua and had depth of savoury flavours with subtle herbal taste. The mee sua was slurpy but a little soft probably because of all the time I took to take photos 😝 🙇

The kidney pieces were nicely tender crunchy, fresh and had no off taste at all.

We were all quite excited to see Seng Kee's rendition of the Johor Bahru icon san lou bee hoon which is named "Crispy Panfried Beehoon with prawn, pork, bean sprout" in Seng Kee's menu.

It looked beautifully executed with a nice brown crust on top which looked like it got a good searing from a wok well lashed by flames.

The bee hoon was crisp on top and below they were moist and softer (the way good san lou bee hoon are). The dish was also not overly oily. Though the contrasting textures was interesting, the taste was a little flat savoury salty. I spotted only egg but no prawn, pork or bean sprout. It could be I missed them because I was busy chatting 😬

Fermented beancurd marinated fried pork.

Everyone likes this fried pork as the tender juicy pork was fresh, nicely marinated with nam yu 南乳 and well deep fried to a nice golden crisp outside. For me, I prefer the savoury nam yu marination to be a little more intense, and even exude a little pungent aroma to the bite.

La La in Chinese rice wine.

The fresh clams were very well cleaned, the tender meat was briny and sweet with a bit of Chinese wine taste and aroma. Everyone liked this and I would actually like it better if the clams were made a little more drunk with more wine 😬

Stir fried pea sprouts 豆苗. Nicely done. The pea sprouts were given a quick sear with oil in the wok which took away any green taste but retained the fresh sweet vegetable's crunchiness and juiciness while adding a layer of savoury flavour.

So, Seng Kee Black Chicken Herbal Soup is really a big zhi char place with over a 100 dishes. The dishes we tried were nicely done - flavours were relatively mild (for me) and well balanced in all the dishes we tried today. I am keen to go through the extensive menu and try a few other dishes next time. I spotted stir fried sayur manis with eggs 😬

For black chicken herbal soup, one of my favourite places in Singapore is at Ser Seng in Geylang.