A friend brought me to this particular coffee shop at Serangoon Central, eager to show me where the stall selling his weekly pig trotter rice was, and how it looked like.
Now, I am not a very huge fan of the ter ka pig trotter.
What that means is that I don't mind eating it, I don't mind the rich, herbal flavors of the gravy that the trotter is usually served in, and I do happily eat it, but the dish will not be first up in my mind whenever I want to go downstairs coffee shop for a meal.
It's a different thing for my friend though.
He likes bak kut tehs and pig trotters.
He likes the herbal flavors of the soups and the gravy that they come in.
And as long as the meat is tender, the gravy is nice, and the price is right, he'll go for it.
Me, I like my variety.
At this coffee shop there were a couple of stalls that had a variety of food that I did look at. There was a zichar stall, a prawn noodle stall, a fish soup stall, some other stalls on the other side, but there was only one that really caught my eye.
Ah Ma Chi Mian.
Ah Ma Chi Mian is a franchise of nine outlets all over Singapore. When it was they started, which is their first stall, I don't know- I haven't paid much attention- but only one time a few years ago had I ever had their noodles, and it was at a coffee shop at Hougang Avenue 8.
Mr. Radioman had recommended it to me, said he had seen the queues at the stall whether evening or late night, and since the picture of bak chor mee showed like it was worth a try, that late evening we ordered.
I have not ordered it since.
Today seemed like a good day to have the noodles.
Not so much for the fact that I was already here at Serangoon Central, but because I was truly me right here, right now, wearing what I wanted to wear, eating what I wanted to eat, in the middle of an afternoon waiting to go for a meeting at NEX after.
Fishball noodles isn't always my identity, but it is one that I can choose to go for, and so this afternoon I did.
I'm glad I made the choice.
It isn't always that I get to have firm, springy QQ noodles that come stirred in a sauce that is more than just tomato sauce and vinegar. What's more, I had thought that the noodles would be dry and sticky, hard to chew, hard to swallow, with a distinctive yellow noodle taste.
But, no.
They were smooth, mixed well with the sauce, and every spoonful had a wholesome, shiok kind of feel that brought out not just the texture of the noodles but also the flavors all at one go.
I don't know if I were supposed to mix the fishballs with the sauce or were I supposed to eat them separately. Different people have different ways of mixing their ingredients, I guess. Some people eat their fishballs plain on its own. Some people roll the ball around in the sauce, take a bite out of it, roll it around some more.
I know of people who have their balls with just the soy sauce and the chili.
Then there are those who are expert enough with their spoon and chopsticks that they manage to carve up the whole ball into pieces and swirl it around with the sauce.
I don't know how to do that.
So this afternoon I did what I always do- take a bite out of the ball, take a couple strands of noodles, take another bite of the ball again.
In between all of that I swooped around the soup looking for the bits of bak chor minced meat swimming around inside.
The white, clean-looking balls were springy, by the way.
Simple they might appear to be but they're like a go-to comfort food when one wants something soupy and light but doesn't want fish soup or porridge or ban mian.
The fishball soup was tastier than I thought it would be.
Some are really clean-tasting and light.
Not this one.
I've no idea what went in, but there was that bit of rounded flavor- you tasted that distinctive warmth that comes only when soup is boiled with meat as a base- and then a small piece of salted fish at the bottom, and there was that clear, clean taste which, honestly, I dont' know what makes it so, but leaves one feeling cozy and comfortable.
Maybe that's why some people just go for the soup, nothing else.
Me, I liked the combination of everything- the presence of minced meat, the fishballs, the really good sauce beneath the noodles, and that big piece of lettuce which is one of my favorite vegetables when it comes to soup.