Singapore - Day 5

Breakfast, the Easy Way
It is so easy to find good food here. Matter of fact, each group of apartments share a common hawker center (food court) and market. So, all you have to do is walk about 50 feet to get everything you would ever want. This morning, we made the long trek to another hawker center (about 100 yards away) for breakfast. We took a table at the edge to catch the breeze.


First up, something that is becoming my favorite. If you ever have eaten Indian food, you should recognize it - it is paratha bread. Here, they call it Roti Prata. You can get it plain or with egg and onion inside. You break a piece off, dip it in a vegetable curry sauce and then a bit of sugar. Really good stuff that goes well with coffee.

I also tried the wonton noodles with char siew (barbecued pork) - very tasty.

Next up, vegetarian noodles with crispy bean curd skin. Now, some of you may not find the description very appetizing, but let me tell you - that crispy bean curd skin is very good stuff. I could it eat by itself.

Finally, something called Putu Mayam, a Malay dish that is kind of like a sweet crepe. The outer shell is made from rice flour and coconut milk and the filling is freshly grated coconut. The red stuff is unrefined date palm sugar. My sweet tooth was quite happy with this.

Next Up, Shopping at the Market

I got to see a real pro shop in the local market - Puff's Aunt. She was shopping for dinner - something called a steamboat, which I will explain later. This is a picture of the market at the bottom of a nearby housing complex.

I took this photo for obvious reasons.

Assorted veggies. From left to right, top to bottom: turnips, pumpkin, kertchi pir - which is some kind of Malay cucumber.

All varieties of fruits both known and not-before-seen, such as dragonfruit and jackfruit

A stack of pomelos, also known as Chinese grapefruit.

Dinner at Auntie's House

Turns out the dinner was in my honor, which was really nice of her aunt and uncle. All the shopping earlier in the day was for the event. Her aunt only lives a block away, so we walked over in the early afternoon. Here is a shot from her Aunt's balcony - if you click on the picture and take a closer look you will see how they have pruned the trees to promote thicker growth.

A steamboat is a special kind of dinner usually reserved for Chinese new year. It consists of a boiling pot of water and veggies to which you add all kinds of raw meat and other vegetables to make a nice stew. Here is a shot from one side of the table.

Here is a shot from the other side of the table. It was quite a feast!