Of course, no visit to another city would be complete without spending time eating and trying the local cuisine. I’ve had my fair share of Nasi Lemak but I also tried new dishes this time.
For instance, char kway teow, which are flat rice noodles stir-fried with lard, dark and light soy sauce, chilli, de-shelled cockles, sliced Chinese sausage, bean sprouts, Chinese chives and sometimes prawns and egg. I’ve tried them for lunch and they were a great snack.
Katong laksa, which is a spicy coconut gravy with thick rice vermicelli – it comes with boiled egg, shrimps and sambal so you can add more spice to it.
Patrick and I also had chili crab (at ‘No signboard seafood restaurant‘ as the queue at the Jumbo Restaurant in Clarke Quey was too long). The spicy chili-tomato gravy splattered everywhere – but it was very tasty and we even ate the gravy with a spoon and mopped everything up with mini mantou buns.
After dinner, we walked along Clarke Quay. It was very busy – but nice to see all the lights in the darkness.
If you want to try lots of different foods, I’ll recommend you go to the Lau Pa Sat Festival Market (previously called Telok Ayer Market) which is close to the Marina and the Central Business District. It is open 24 hours and boasts a spread of food stalls touting famous local delicacies such as satay and barbecued seafood.
It as first opened in 1825, then reconstructed in 1836, moved in 1894 and finally became a national monument in 1973 with its famous octagonal building structure.
Useful info:
- Lau Pa Sat Festival Market is at 18 Raffles Quay and in walking distance from the Merlion (2 streets South). It is open 24 hours and offers a range of snacks and dishes
- No Signboard Seafood Restaurant has a few outlets, we went to the one in the Central, 6 Eu Tong Sen Street, #04-63, Clarke Quay District, Tel. 6221 9959 -> food was fine but I’ve heard that Jumbo Restaurant is even better
bluebalu 
I went on a university exchange to Singapore so I’ve been loving your posts on Singapore. It looks like you made good work on that chili crab!
Glad you got to taste the chilli crab – the queue at the Jumbo is always long, we’ve only managed to eat there once in over four years (we are impatient when it comes to food)! One to try next time is the salted egg crab, it tastes even better to me! Thanks for letting me know about the food market, we never head down there so that’s one to try. Cath
Thanks for the suggestion – salted egg crab sounds interesting. Does it taste anything like the salted eggs they serve with char siu (BBQ pork) here in Hong Kong?
I’m not sure as I never tried one of those eggs, preferring the char siu(!) but it’s a creamy sauce, hard to describe and it sounds awful but I’m glad I was introduced to it!
I’m really curious now – will have to try this next time I’m in Singapore! Any good recommendations where I should go for the salted egg crab?
Our usual place is called Irvin’s but that’s moved out of the centre now and difficult to reach, so I would recommend Red Lantern Seafood which is further up from Clarke Quay at Robertson Quay (please Google as I’ve usually had a few wines by the time I get there)!
Sounds great – that’s on my list now. Thanks for sharing!
You’re welcome, let me know how you get on!