Singapore - A Complete Food And Eating Guide

Singapore is a melting pot of cuisines from around the world, and many Singaporeans are obsessive gourmands who love to makan (eat in Malay). You will find quality Chinese, Malay, Indian, Japanese, Italian, French, American and other food in this city-state. See Malaysian and Singaporean cuisine for an overview and menu reader.

Eating habits run the gamut, but most foods are eaten by fork and spoon: push and cut with the fork in the left hand, and eat with the spoon in the right. Noodle dishes usually come with chopsticks, and Indian food can be eaten by hand, but nobody will blink an eye if you ask for a fork and spoon instead. If eating in a group, serving dishes are always shared, but you'll get your own bowl of rice and soup.

Keep an eye out for the Singapore Food Festival, held every year in July. During the festival in both 2005 and 2006, all visitors to Singapore smart enough to ask for them at any tourist information desk received coupons for free chilli crab, no strings attached!

Local Delicacies

The following dishes have become national icons and should be on every traveller's agenda:

Roti Prata is a local favourite fit for almost any time of the day and for almost any event. It can be considered to be Singapore's version of the pancake. It is usually served plain, with egg and/or with onion fillings along with a side of curry and/or sugar to improve flavour. There is also a 'paper prata' which is made extra thin and crispy. Roti prata chain restaurants have a wider range of toppings, such as ice-cream, cheese and durian. Its texture is very similar to the Indian "parata", which is like where the roti prata obtained its name.
Laksa, in particular the Katong or lemak style, is probably the best known Singaporean dish: a fragrant soup of noodles in a coconut-based curry broth, topped with cockles or shrimp. Note that Singapore laksa is very different from Penang laksa which is made with a tamarind-infused broth instead of coconut, and has a spicy sourish taste.
Chilli crab is a whole crab ladled with oodles of sticky, tangy chilli sauce. Notoriously difficult to eat... but irresistibly delicious! Don't wear a white shirt! The seafood restaurants of the East Coast are famous for this. For a less messy but equally tasty alternative, ask for black pepper crab.
Char kway teow (炒稞条) is the quintessential Singapore-style fried noodle dish, consisting of several types of noodles in thick brown sauce with strips of fishcake, Chinese sausage, a token veggie or two and either cockles and shrimp. It's cheap ($2-3/serve), filling and has nothing to do with the dish known as "Singaporean (fried) noodles" elsewhere! (And which actually doesn't exist in Singapore.)
Hainanese chicken rice is meltingly smooth steamed chicken served with chicken-flavored rice and 3 dips- hot chilli, thick black sauce and minced ginger.
Fish head curry is just what's you'd think (but tastes much better!). Little India is the place to sample this. Oh, the best part of the fish head is the cheeks!
Durian is not exactly a dish but a local fruit with distinctive odor you can smell a mile away and a sharp thorny husk. Most foreigners cannot tolerate the smell or taste of the fruit, but to the majority of locals this is a delicacy. The rich creamy yellow flesh is often sold in places like Geylang and Bugis and elsewhere conveniently in pre-packaged packs. It can cost S$1 for a small fruit all the way up to S$24 per kilo depending on the season and type of durian. If you are game enough you should try it, but be warned beforehand - you will either love it or hate it. Note: you're not allowed to carry durians on the MRT and buses and they're banned from many hotels. Anecdotal evidence also suggests to avoid alcohol after eating durian. This 'king of fruits' is also made into ice cream, cakes, sweets and other decadent desserts.
Ice kachang literally means "ice bean" in Malay, a good clue to the two major ingredients: shaved ice and sweet red beans. However, more often than not you'll also get gula melaka (palm sugar), grass jelly, sweet corn, attap palm seeds and anything else on hand thrown in, and the whole thing is then drizzled with canned condensed milk or coconut cream and colored syrups. The end result tastes very interesting — and refreshing.
Satay, the popular brochettes of meat sold at hawker centres and other food courts, sold with a side of spicy peanut sauce for dipping, slices of fresh cucumber and onions -- the "Satay Club" at the Lau Pa Sat near Raffles Place is one popular location for this delicacy.

Hawker Centres

The cheapest and most popular places to eat in Singapore are hawker centres, essentially former pushcart vendors directed into giant complexes by government fiat. Prices are low ($2-5 for most dishes), hygiene standards are high (every stall is required to prominently display a health certificate grading it from A to D) and the food can be excellent — if you see a queue, join it! Ambience tends to be a little lacking though and there is no air-conditioning either, but a visit to a hawker centre is a must when in Singapore. However, be leery of overzealous pushers-cum-salesmen (especially at the Satay Club in Lau Pa Sat, and Newton Food Centre at Newton Circus) -- Check to see what is on offer.

To order, first chope (reserve) a table by parking a friend or just a packet of tissues on it, note the table's number, then place your order at your stall of choice. They'll deliver to your table, and you pay when you get the food. Note that some stalls (particularly very popular ones) have signs stating "self-service", meaning that you're expected to get your food yourself — but if it's quiet or you're sitting nearby they'll usually deliver anyway. At almost every stall you can also opt to take away (called "packet" or ta pao), in which case they'll pack up your order in a plastic box/bag and even throw in disposable utensils. Upon finishing your meal, you are not required to assist in clearing your utensils, even in crowded centres with other patrons waiting for your table, since the tables are usually cleared by hired cleaners.

Every district in Singapore has its own hawker centres and prices decrease as you move out into the boonies. For tourists, centrally located Newton Circus (Newton MRT), Gluttons Bay and Lau Pa Sat (near the River), are the most popular options — but this does not make them the cheapest or the tastiest, and the demanding gourmand would do well to head to Chinatown instead. Some of Singapore's favourite eating places (that are cheap and oh so good!) are located in the heartland like Bedok, Toa Payoh or Geylang.