I had thought I would write about these hawker food of Toa Payoh in my last post.
As it turned out, Marine Parade Hawker Center had much more to offer and talk about and so here's the Toa Payoh post instead.
There're two hawker centers that we have begun to frequent when at Toa Payoh. One's the hawker at Lorong 7 Kim Keat Palm. The other's the hawker at Lorong 5 Blk 75.
Truth be told, offhand I don't know what the block number of the Lorong 5 one is. I only know it as the evening hawker center, whilst Lorong 7 I know of it as the morning/afternoon one.
I have gradually come to relish the food here at Lorong 5.
First time we came here we didn't know what was good, what was suitable to eat. Now, we know.
There're a couple of stalls here that are very popular. By that, it also means that one has to wait, and wait.
I'm always greeted by what I call the soybean curd chin chow stall. It's the first two stalls one sees when coming through the blocks of the Lorong 6 side. Along this row the popular stalls include the noodle soup stall selling ban mian and fish soup. I haven't had chance to try the ban mian though- the queue is always very long- and I'm not one with plenty of patience to wait, especially when by that time I'm usually hungry.
What I have tried along this row, however, is the herbal soup with rice.
Except that I don't have a picture.
It isn't because the food isn't good.
It is that I was too hungry, I wanted to quickly finish dinner, and well, I didn't think the chicken- in the cool dim hues of the hawker center- would look particularly appetizing with shreds looking like they had been hacked off here and there.
The pictures of the food at this Lorong 5 hawker come from the stalls behind.
This year thus far we've gone for their chicken, and their chicken wings.
We discovered this stall quite by accident.
I had actually hoped to have nasi lemak but my friend thought it better to try something new.
We weren't sure what to have, but then there was this uber long line at the stall- a literal L shape- so off he went to queue, and after almost twenty or thirty minutes, came back bearing two plates of chicken prepared two very different ways.
There was a plate of rice.
There was also a plate of steamed chicken.
Plus a plate of the fried.
The fried chicken wings were remarkably popular, it seems.
After biting into my first piece, I realized why.
Different places may choose to prepare their chicken wings with different flavors and different techniques, but this stall here marinate theirs in a way that makes one reminisce of those school tuckshop chicken wings that we used to buy for 30c in the 80s era of primary schools.
I don't know if it is the seasoning or the way it's fried, but it's done in such a way that the crunch of the skin is perfect- not too hard nor too soggy with the oil spilling out. The skin has the most delicious, perfect crunch, if one might say, and the meat beneath is tender enough that it falls right off the bone.
When I first began eating this chicken, I used a fork and knife.
Halfway through my first piece of chicken drumstick, I gave up and used my hands instead.
More fun that way.
We've had this chicken at least twice now, and by the looks of it, I think we might be having it even more.
The food of Toa Payoh hawker we've had in January isn't only those that come from here at Lorong 5.
There' was also the food at the Lorong 7 hawker which one afternoon we got to go.
To be honest I was glad for the opportunity.
This hawker center seems to be one of those daytime types where there're more stalls open in the day than at night. How or why it is, I don't know, but residents who come down for dinner in the evenings might find more delicious options at the two coffee shops close by rather than at the hawker center itself.
I don't know which the popular stalls here are at Kim Keat Palm, but if there be one, it would be the dessert stall called Dove (or something). It had come recommended by a friend, and I had been eager to try the Chendol and Ice Kachang.
Past few times when I had come in the late evening the stall had been closed.
Thankfully it was open this time.
So I got ourselves a bowl of Chendol, which, I was later delighted to find, had as much gula melaka as I hoped it be possible.
But one can't have only dessert for lunch, can they, so we had wanton noodles dry for mains, with char siew and siew yok all atop.
