Guided Food Tour of Old Airport Road Hawker Centre on 2Dec2014

hougang mutton soup - S$6

hougang jing jia mutton soup – S$6

met an old schoolmate for early lunch at old airport road hawker centre 11.30am today 2.12.2014. 🙂

it’s strange. old airport road is such a famous eating place, but i can only remember once i came here with another friend probably 5 years back & he introduced me to a beef noodle stall. it tasted nothing like the hong kong 牛腩面 stalls. i must have been here some other time but there was nothing in my recollections.

this friend comes here like once a month so he gamely walked me round the hawker centre, pointed to the famous hokkien mee stall (no queue yet), past the lor mee stall (already like 15 people in the queue), the fish head beehoon stall (about 6 in the queue).

we ended up at the hougang jing jia mutton soup stall. i went to get 2 bowls 牛杂 mixed rib, tripe, tendon (S$6 each) & he queue for a char kuay teow (S$4 加料 with added ingredients of prawns & squid).

hougang mutton soup - S$6

hougang jing jia mutton soup – S$6

hougang mutton soup - S$6

hougang mutton soup – S$6

hougang mutton soup - S$6

hougang jing jia mutton soup – S$6

it might be that my expectation was a bit high. i was expecting like chai chuan you 柴船头 @ bukit merah view standard. or at least the standard of yu ji@whampoa market or the other stall #01-75 at whampoa market.

but this hougang jing jia mutton soup was quite a let down actually. something was not quite right about the taste. soup was not as flavourful. i felt the meat was overcooked & too soft not the texture i like for mutton ribs and not as tasty, and chilli was simply too dilute.

for me, this was not comparable at all with the other 3 stalls. my favourite is chai chuan you 柴船头 @ bukit merah view but i like the 2 whampoa stalls too.

char kuay teow

dongji char kuay teow – S$4

char kuay teow

dongji char kuay teow – S$4

the dongji char kuay teow was good. very good wok hae. and S$1 加料 for all that added ingredients of prawns & squid was just incredible. this must be the most value-for-money S$4 char kuay teow.

still, my friend prefers this dry char kuay teow, but i prefer the wet one at hai kee teochew char kuay teow at telok blangah with lots & lots of cockles added – 加料.

dongji cha kuay teow

dongji cha kuay teow

cho kee noodles wanton mee

cho kee noodles wanton mee

wanton mee

cho kee noodles wanton mee

wanton mee

cho kee noodles wanton mee

wanton mee

cho kee noodles wanton mee

we ought to be full by then. but my friend wanted to show me the 2 good wanton mee stalls which were just few stalls away from each other. 1 was closed, so we shared 1 bowl from cho kee. 4 wantons were good, soft, skin held together & tasty. char siew was good, and most importantly noodles was qq & taste was good.

for me i felt the chilli was not spicy enough. this was about same maybe slightly less tasty than the wanton mee at KPT coffeeshop 401 hougang ave 10, S530401, and for me the best wanton mee was still kok kee previously at lavendar food square (not sure where it moved too), & the one at temberling road & red ring wanton mee were pretty good too.

c.h.e.f andy

Hawker Tour @ Bukit Timah Food Centre (BTFC) on 19Jul2013

or luah (fried oyster omelette)

or luah (fried oyster omelette)

for zi char tour, see cheap & good zi char on 10.8.2013.

a group of us makan kakis (for this round 4pax) decided to start hawker tours. we picked Bukit Timah Food Centre (BTFC) to start our journey on 19.7.2013. 🙂

food galore @ Bukit Timah Food Centre (BTFC)

food galore @ Bukit Timah Food Centre (BTFC)

for this day we ordered 8 hawker dishes. all were good but not one really stood out.

the HK style beef briskets & offals was very tasty, but actually quite different from those at street beef noodle stalls in HK. the chinese herbal mutton soup was good too, but i would say the amoy street hawker centre one was better & so was bukit merah view.

white fried carrot cake

white fried carrot cake

there were many foodie posts about the white fried carrot cake. it was good, crispy, quite tasty, but…didn’t see much difference from other hawker places or c/w with good black ones, say at ghim moh market. 🙂

if i had to pick, i would say my best was the or luah (but then again,many places did just as well), & after that the HK style beef brisket & offals. 1 friend was missing her favourite “jiu her eng chye” (cuttlefish kang kong) stall which was not open (we were there on a friday 2.30pm to 4pm). 🙂

1004478_10201452533372923_417212902_n 20130719_150958

the fried hokkien mee looked good in the photos, quite good ingredients, but probably rated lower..that could be because we were satiated as we had 8 dishes excluding dessert for 4 of us! 🙂

char kuay teow (fried noodles with cockles)

char kuay teow (fried noodles with cockles)

the char kuay teow had very good “wok hae” & tasty at the start but as it gotten cold it became much less compelling…

1004893_10201452555933487_1568337381_n 20130719_151518

rojak

rojak

both the popiah & rojak were good.

iced cheng chow with aloe vera & lychees

iced cheng chow with aloe vera & lychees

a friend had ice cheng chow with aloe vera & lychee (looked tempting). I had a plain ice jelly.

very satiated… after that 3 of us went to watch Pacific Rim (good enjoyable movie) at Cathay Cineleisure. 2 of my friends had the S$4 movie ticket + free coffee privilege. i had still to bear with paying S$10.50 movie tickets for the next few months. 🙂

c.h.e.f andy