The Top 11 Dishes That I Cooked on Singapore Noodles in 2020

I CAN’T BELIEVE IT’S 2021 TOMORROW. It’s shocking how time flies so quickly from Christmas to the new year. I spent some time yesterday recording the final podcast episode of the year, taking stock of what I’ve learnt from Singapore Noodles and how it has enriched my life. To be honest, the amount of love the platform has received is surprising and sometimes I get some emotionally-charged messages telling me about what it means to you ♥️ As I speak about in the podcast, Singapore Noodles has been an exercise in being okay with not being perfect, taught me that showing up and putting work out there is far more important than achieving that idealized version in your head. It also showed me just how beautiful our cuisine is in all its diversity.

Wex and I ate well in 2020 - and when I talk about eating well, often it doesn’t mean eating extravagantly. It just means eating meals that provoke something in us - whether it is nostalgia, comfort, a sense of gratitude or just a feeling that makes you exclaim shiok! Here are some of my favourite dishes and their recipes from 2020.

Fish Briyani
Fish briyani was the very first recipe I tried from the excellent cookbook Mdm Krishnan’s South Indian Recipes. Since it is named ‘briyani’ rather than ‘biryani’, I suppose this is a more localized version of making biryani, where the basmati is cooked in a ricecooker rather than being parboiled. What I love is how light and tangy the briyani is, owing to the use of yogurt in the rice. I could just eat the rice on its own - that’s how good it is.

Adapted from Madam Krishnan’s South Indian Recipes

Serves 4
For the fried toppings:
Roughly 400-500g ghee (homemade or shop-bought)
500g onions, sliced
50g cashew nuts

Place half of the onions in a pan with enough ghee to roughly cover. Heat until golden brown and crispy before passing through a sieve. Return the ghee to the pan and fry the cashew nuts until nicely browned. Remove the cashew nuts from the ghee. Use this onion-infused ghee whenever this recipe calls for ghee.

For the rice:
6 tbsp ghee
½ stick cinnamon
½ star anise
2 cardamoms
2 cloves
1 bay leaf
1 tbsp ginger garlic paste
525g basmati rice, washed and soaked 10min, drain
½ tbsp almonds ground (use ground almonds)
125g yogurt
A handful of mint leaves, roughly chopped
A handful of coriander leaves
1 stalk pandan leaves, knotted
2-3 teaspoons salt
660g water

Heat the ghee with the cinnamon, star anise, cardamoms, cloves and bay leaf. Once the spices smell fragrant, add the ginger garlic paste and saute for a minute. Add the contents of the pan to a ricecooker bowl with the rice, ground almonds, yogurt, mint, coriander, pandan, salt and water. Stir and taste the liquid – adjust with more salt if necessary.

For the fish:
500g fish fillets, about 5-6 slices
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 1/2 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp salt
Rice flour, for coating the fish
Ghee, for frying the fish
4 tablespoons ghee
½ 5cm stick cinnamon
2-3 cloves
2-3 cardamoms
1/2 star anise
1 bay leaves
Remaining half of sliced onions
175g tomatoes, chopped
Handful of coriander leaves
Handful of mint leaves, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon ginger garlic paste
½ tbs smoked paprika or Kashmiri chili powder
½ tbsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp fennel powder
200g canned diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon ground almonds
125g yogurt
270g water
2 teaspoons salt
2 red chillies
½ lemon, squeezed

While the rice cooks, rub the fish fillets in turmeric powder, chilli powder and salt. Allow to marinate for 15 minutes. Coat the fish in the rice flour and deep fry in the ghee until golden brown. Set aside. In a large saucepan or pot, heat the ghee, cinnamon, cloves, cardamoms, star anise and bay leaves. When the spices smell fragrant, add the onions and fry until softened. Add the tomatoes, coriander, mint, ginger garlic paste, paprika, cumin and fennel powder. Fry for a few more minutes. Add the canned tomatoes, ground almonds, yogurt, water, salt and chillies. Bring to a simmer then turn the heat off. Squeeze in the lemon juice and return the fish fillets to the pan.

Assembly:
80g milk, heated with 1 tablespoon turmeric powder or 1 pinch saffron
Handful of mint leaves, roughly chopped
Handful of coriander leaves
200g flour mixed with enough water to form a slightly sticky dough

Add some of the fish gravy to a pot to prevent the rice from sticking and burning. Spread out half of the rice over the gravy, then add the fish fillets and onions with some of the gravy. Reserve the rest of the gravy for serving on the side. Cover the fish with the rice, then spoon over the milk. Top with the fried shallots and cashews, and herbs. Press the dough on the rim of the pot and cover with a lid. Set over low heat for 30 minutes. Remove the lid and serve the biryani with extra gravy from the fish if desired!

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Beef Smore
How much I loved this Eurasian dish came as a surprise to me. It seemed like any ol’ beef braise. But what makes it truly special is the use of Christmassy spices like cloves and cinnamon, and vinegar right at the end. A smattering of chillies over the top makes it truly shiok and a beef braise that you would chase with lots of rice.

Adapted from Chef Damian D’ Silva’s recipe
Serves 4-6

8 star anise
2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
2 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons cloves
4 red onions, peeled and quartered
100g peeled ginger, cut into small pieces
1kg beef brisket, cut into large cubes
3 tablespoons kecap manis
4-6 tablespoons oil
4-6 teaspoons salt
4 potatoes, cut into bite-sized pieces
3 carrots, cut into bite-sized pieces
4 tablespoons vinegar
2 red chillies, sliced or cut into small pieces with a teaspoon
2 green chillies, sliced or cut into small pieces with a teaspoon

Grind the star anise, nutmeg, cinnamon, 1 of the red onion and ginger to form a fine paste. If you do not have a powerful blender, you can grind the spices separately in a coffee grinder or pound them to a fine powder with a pestle and mortar. Mix spice paste with beef and kecap manis. Set in the fridge for an hour at least to marinate.

Heat the oil in a pot until the oil shimmers. Add the remaining onion and fry until soft over medium heat. Add the marinated beef and allow to cook for a further 15 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent burning. Top up with enough water to barely cover the beef and bring to a boil. Simmer on low heat for 2 hours or until the beef is almost fully tender (the original recipe called for 1h of cooking, but it wasn’t enough). Add the potatoes, carrots and vinegar. Top up with sufficient water to barely cover the vegetables and meat. Simmer for another hour or until the vegetables and meat are fully tender. The gravy should be thick enough to smother the meat and vegetables. If at this stage the gravy still looks watery, you can bash up some cream crackers and stir it into the gravy to thicken. Garnish the dish with the green and red chillies.

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Mee Soto
Context is very important in eating. Never was particularly fond of mee soto, but I made this when it was raining and cold in Daylesford and having a bowl of gently spiced, robust chicken broth. With noodles. And begedil. I mean what more can you ask for?

Serves 4

Rempah:
150g red onions, peeled and coarsely chopped
20g peeled garlic
10g peeled ginger, coarsely chopped
White parts of 2 lemongrass stalks, thinly sliced
30g skinless galangal, coarsely chopped
30g skinless turmeric, coarsely chopped
30g candlenuts or cashew nuts

Chicken broth:
4 tablespoons oil
5 cloves
2 dried bay leaves
2 star anise
White parts of 2 lemongrass stalks, bruised
4 cardamoms or 1 black cardamom
1 cinnamon stick
1 chicken, cut into 2 pieces  
2L water
1 tablespoon coriander powder
1 teaspoon cumin powder
1 teaspoon white pepper
2-3 tablespoons salt (start with the lesser amount)
Big pinch of sugar

Begedils:
600g potatoes, halve the especially big ones   
2 dried bay leaves
2 spring onions, sliced thinly
3 coriander sprigs or Chinese celery, roughly chopped
80g fried shallots
Salt and white pepper to taste
1-2 beaten eggs for coating

Assembly:
100g beehoon
400g yellow noodles
Shredded chicken meat
Deep-fried shallots
Chopped coriander
Begedils

Kecap manis dip:
Kecap manis
Thinly sliced chilli or chilli padi

Blend the rempah ingredients together, placing the onions and garlic at the bottom of the blender, until a smooth paste forms. In a big pot, heat up the oil, cloves, bay leaves, star anise, lemongrass, cardamom and cinnamon stick. When the oil begins to sizzle, add the rempah and cook for 1-2 minutes over high heat. Add the chicken and water, adding more water to cover the chicken if necessary. Bring to a boil. Add the spices, salt and sugar – taste and adjust the seasoning. Lower the heat to a simmer and cook for 3 hours or until the chicken becomes incredibly tender, to the point of falling apart. Taste again and adjust seasoning if necessary. Strain to separate the chicken from the stock, and pick the chicken meat off the bones when it is cool enough to handle. The soup and chicken can be cooked several days in advance – I recommend picking the chicken meat off while still warm, and store separately from the broth.

To prepare the begedil, place the potatoes in a large pot and fill with water to cover. Add the bay leaves, cover the pot and bring to a boil. When boiling, turn the heat down to a simmer and cook until tender. Depending on the size of your potatoes, this can take anywhere from 40 minutes to an hour. Test with a knife – when it goes through the potatoes with no resistance, it is ready. Drain the potatoes through a colander and allow to sit until the potatoes cool enough to handle (they still have to be warm – don’t completely cool them down). Peel off the skins of the potatoes with a butter or paring knife. Mash with your hands into a large bowl and add all the other ingredients, except the eggs. Mix well and adjust seasoning to your taste. Form little patties – they can be as little or as large as you like. Heat a pot or wok with oil. When bubbles stream from a wooden chopstick inserted into the oil, it is hot enough. Dip the potato patties with the beaten egg and lower into the oil gently. Remove and allow to drain on paper towels when they are a handsome golden brown.

To serve, bring the soup back up to a boil. Add the beehoon and Hokkien noodles (if your Hokkien noodles have an especially strong alkaline flavor, I recommend blanching them in a separate pot). Once the beehoon has completely rehydrated, divide into serving bowls. Top with the shredded chicken, soup, shallots, coriander and begedils. Serve the mee soto with kecap manis dip on the side.

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Hakka Radish Meatballs
What makes these so pleasurable is the element of surprise. You expect these to be dense meatballs seasoned with the usual Chinese seasonings - essentially big versions of dumpling filling. But the moment you pop these into your mouth, you note the glutinous chew which is just like zhang, as one of Singapore Noodles’ followers rightly pointed out. Then you notice the fragrance of all the umami-rich ingredients in it - the haebee, mushrooms, fish sauce. The meat almost plays second fiddle to everything else.

Hakka radish meatballs
340g peeled daikon, cut into thin strips
1 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons oil
55g dried tang hoon, broken up or cut up
1 dried cuttlefish, soaked in hot water, remove backbone and eyes, diced finely
20g dried shrimp, soaked and chopped
5 dried mushrooms, soaked and diced
225g minced fatty pork
1 tablespoon fish sauce
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon white pepper
1/4 teaspoon chicken powder
65g tapioca starch

Mix the daikon with salt and allow to sit for 10 minutes. Squeeze dry and transfer the daikon into a large bowl. Heat up the oil and fry the tanghoon until puffed and light golden. Transfer the tanghoon to a paper towel to drain. In the remaining oil in the wok, fry the cuttlefish, shrimp and mushroom until fragrant. Add pork and fry until the meat loses its pinkness. Add meat mixture and tanghoon to the daikon and mix well. Add seasonings and adjust with more salt if desired. Add tapioca starch and mix well. Press into golf-ball sized balls. Steam 10 minutes on high heat. Cool slightly before eating.

Mango Pachadi
If you love the interplay of sweet and sour, you would love this. This was simply so delicious - fruity, spicy, sweet, sour all in one mouthful. And the texture of raw mango that has been braised is just heavenly, like eating a cooked potato except more silky - Wex was so taken aback.

Serves 6 as a side

4 tablespoons oil
4 cloves
3 cardamom pods
1 cinnamon stick
1 star anise
120g red onion, diced
1-2 green chillies, halved (depends on your spice tolerance)
1 sprig curry leaves, stalk removed
1 tablespoon mild chilli powder (mainly for colour)
¾ teaspoon turmeric powder
1 teaspoon coriander powder
½ teaspoon asafoetida
400g cubed green mango (I used skin-on green mango)
¾ teaspoon salt
380g water
30g vinegar (I used apple cider vinegar)
75g sugar

Place the oil and whole spices in a wok or pan. When the spices begin to turn fragrant and crackle, add the diced onions, green chillies and curry leaves. Fry on medium heat until the onions soften. Add the ground spices and fry for another minute. Add the green mango, salt and water and allow to simmer on low heat until the mango softens, covered. Stir in the vinegar and sugar. Mash the mangoes coarsely. Simmer until the pachadi reduces to a slightly thick consistency. Remove whole spices if desired.

Hor Pau/ Tau Kwa Pau
Hor Pau (literally means ‘purse’) is another name for Tau Kwa Pau, which you can get at Dunman Food Centre. It is a Nonya-Teochew hybrid invented by an enterprising Teochew braised duck hawker who wanted to create something that appealed to superstitious Nonyas who gambled. It is essentially a golden pouch filled with chopped fish cake, cucumber, deep-fried taro, duck offal and pork belly. Each golden purse is topped off with lor zup and chilli sauce. A party in the mouth!

Makes 20

For the braising sauce and ingredients:
2-3 tablespoons oil
1 onion, peeled and sliced thinly
50g unpeeled galangal, cut into thick coins
1 head garlic
¾ tablespoon five spice powder
1 cinnamon stick or 1 teaspoon cinnamon
5 cloves
2 star anise
1 bay leaf
1 tbs gula melaka
135g light soy sauce
750g water
600g pork belly
350g chicken gizzards
Peeled hard boiled eggs
2 tablespoons cornstarch, mixed with a little water to form a slurry

For the purses:
20 pieces of taukwa, measuring about 5.5cm x 3.5cm x 3.5cm, insides dug out
150g skinless taro, cut into 5mm cubes
150g braised pork belly (see above), cut into 5mm cubes
150g braised chicken gizzards (see above), cut into 5mm cubes
150g deep-fried fish cake, cut into 5mmcubes
150g cucumbers, seeded, cut into 5mm cubes

To serve:
3 red chillies
2 cloves garlic
½ thumb length old ginger, peeled
60ml vinegar or more
½ tablespoon sugar
½ teaspoon salt
Coriander leaves

Heat the oil in a pot or in a wok. Fry the sliced onion until slightly caramelized, then add the rest of the ingredients, except the eggs. Bring to a boil and simmer for 1 hour, turning halfway through to encourage even colouring. You don’t need to braise the pork belly for more than an hour because you don’t want it to be tender to the point of falling apart – you want it to have some bite. Remove the pork belly and gizzards after an hour and turn off the heat. Add the eggs and allow to sit in the braised liquid, turning to colour the outsides evenly. Remove the egg from the braising liquid and cut into eighths lengthwise, then in half crosswise. Bring the braising liquid back to the boil and add the cornstarch slurry to thicken the liquid into a sauce.

Using a knife, trace out a rectangle on the surface of the taukwa and using a spoon, dig out the insides of the rectangle with a teaspoon – be careful to not break the tau kwa. Place the tau kwa in salted water to brine for half an hour. Remove from the water and drain on paper towels. Pat dry thoroughly. Deep fry until golden brown in hot oil (200C). Drain on paper towels to get rid of excess oil. In the same oil, place the taro cubes in a sieve and deep fry until golden and crisp. Drain on paper towels. Toss the taro with the other diced ingredients and fill the taukwa using a teaspoon.

Blend the chillies, garlic, ginger, vinegar, salt and sugar until smooth. Add more vinegar, salt and sugar to taste. Top each filled taukwa with a little braised sauce, then with a coriander leaf and a small piece of egg. Enjoy with the chilli sauce.

Hakka Salt-Baked Chicken
Salt-baked chicken just involves coarse salt and a whole chicken. Because of that you’d think it’d taste simple. And it does. But it tastes of more than just salt and chicken - it also tastes of time and smoke. The direct cooking of the chicken in hot salt allows for the smoky flavour of charred salt to penetrate the chicken. One follower who cooked this recipe told me she had never tasted chicken like this and was mindblown at how something so simple could taste so complex.

A whole 1.8-2kg chicken (best quality, free-range)
3kg coarse sea salt
Dang gui (optional)

For the sauce:
50g peeled ginger
50g peeled shallots
25g peeled garlic
2 tablespoons sesame oil
2 tablespoons oil

If you’re preparing the dipping sauce, remove the pieces of fat from inside the chicken. Rub the chicken with a generous handful of coarse sea salt, inside and outside. Allow to marinate for 2 hours. Wash the chicken to get rid of any salt, then spatchcock the chicken so that it lays flat. Allow to dry on a wire-rack for 2 hours in a windy place, or overnight in the fridge uncovered. Allow to come up to room temperature before proceeding. Wrap the chicken in 4 layers of parchment with dang gui if desired. Secure with twine. Fry the salt in a wok until fragrant. It should turn brown and reach a temperature of 220C, about 20 minutes or stir-frying. Remove all but one inch of salt from the wok, add the parcel of chicken, breast-side up, and pour the rest of the salt over. Spread the salt out to ensure that the chicken is completely buried, before cooking over medium low heat for 45 minutes, covered. Remove the chicken from the salt and allow to rest until cool enough to handle.

To prepare the sauce, blend the ginger, shallots and garlic. Chop the reserved chicken fat and heat gently until rendered. Add both oils and the ginger mixture. Fry for 3-5 minutes or until the ginger mixture loses its sharp, raw flavour. Transfer to a small bowl. Pour in the chicken juices from the parchment parcel and stir to mix. Shred the chicken flesh and arrange in a mound on a plate. Top with the chicken skin to cover the chicken flesh. Serve with hot steaming rice and the dipping sauce.

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And that, my friends, are the best things I cooked on Singapore Noodles in 2020! Thanks for joining me on my cooking adventures - you guys made it so much more meaningful and fun. Hopefully the new year brings more good eating, new revelations and lots of shared meals because food is nothing without the people who gather around the table. Happy 2021 everyone! 🥰