As we usher in a brand new year, I’d just like to pay a tribute to a simple old dish which might see its days here in Singapore numbered and heading for dull sunset. It is heartening to see many food shows and write ups about “vanishing” and “dying” food, yet it’s tinged with some disappointment. They paint the love affair Singaporeans have with sat kay ma, of how this hand made malt rice crispy and how its sweet sticky crispiness has that addictiveness, especially with a cup of hot jasmine tea, of how lo kai yik, a chicken wing, pork and offal stew brewed with nam yue, a red fermented tofu, was such a popular snack during the street wayang days of the 70s. And of how nasi ulam, a herb rice meal flavoured with fish stock and fragranced with finely cut fresh herbs punched with sambal belachan and minced fish flakes, was such a refined dish that never saw the daylight as a “mainstream dish” as it slowly vanishes from our food paradise. Good read and great entertainment which proclaims the dearth and pre-empts the death of many local iconic flavours.

But none stop to stem this cancer. It’s like writing about how the death of Elvis comes with the death of rock and roll. End. Many enjoy local traditional bites but not the craft of it. The overwhelming majority shuns it and claims that the business of street food is mentally tough and physically challenging. The long hours, managing supplies, hygiene, cutting, cleaning, boiling, cooking, order taking and serving, washing etc…is daunting. Many naturally prefer the long hours behind a laptop, sedate lifestyle, office politics, potential retrenchment, stress from a repressive boss during performance appraisal, looming deadlines and the yearn for peer recognition, suck ups to clients…all done in the comfort of a climate controlled, environmentally friendly and reduced carbon footprint office set up (ooh, the joys of sitting still and watching a twelve inch flat light box with moving words, sounds and images.)

No wonder I can relate to the joy of slicing garlic to a fine and thin consistency, that when deep fried, it comes out crispy, light, and fragrant, sans the garlicky pong. Watching and controlling how coconut milk, sugar, pandan leaves and eggs turn into a rough creamy kaya with a slow deliberate churn over low fire can be liberating. Or even the art of cleaning offals and chitterlings. Incredible tales about how intestines are soaked in brine and then washed in cola to flush out maggots and bacteria abound, truth is, it’s all done with elbow grease in back bending postures. The sense of destination to turn the “spares” into a stink free delicacy, or as the late Johnny Apple of The New York Times would say “does not taste of s*** and piss”, is a public responsibility one can do with pride.

Pig organ soup accompanied with a dying-out dish of glutinous rice roll with chestnuts stuffed in intestine caul.

In fact, it is that same pork organ soup that Mr Apple ate that I am celebrating today. It the same offal soup in salted mustard vegetables I had enjoyed since I was scooting around hunting for exclusive photo scoops in my news photojournalist days of the Rick Astley pop music era here. Then, it came with cubes of blood cakes, slices of kidney, intestines, liver, lean meat, slices of lung, pork balls, soft stewed skin and stomach, all soaking in a piping hot bowl of porky broth balanced with the tangy and lightly salty mustard leaves. It would be powdered with pepper and come with a vinegarish chilli sauce. Although common, I never usually have it with a bowl of steamed rice. I much prefer it with the, again “dying” dish of a roll of glutinous rice with chestnuts stuffed in intestine caul, which is perfect when dunked into sweet soy sauce.

Sunset business: Mr Koh Kee Teo, 76, is doubtful if
his son can continue the business after he retires.

That was twenty years ago and I am pleased to inform that the same Mr Koh Kee Teo, now at 76, is still serving that same pork offal soup, except that his brother has retired and some stuff like blood cakes and tongue slices are missing, along with a more robustly salty and sourish flavour in the soup. “Offal supplies are limited and the present generation likes this soup with less salt”, and the very tired Mr Koh, who now sits on a bar stool to dish out his servings, won’t even bother to ponder the continuity of his 50 years heritage in the business, “My son is helping out but he cannot cope without my assistance. It is not easy to do and the customers are demanding. I don’t know if he’ll continue when I retire. My knees are weak already.”

Flavour wise, it is still appealing but my take on lifting the appeal quotient can be done with perhaps a stronger hint of tamarind, prunes and a pair of long grained pork ribs which can be dipped into a vinegared chilli smoothened with some sour pineapple puree. But that’s more work, the kind that the unrefined food loving, lazy and apathetic won’t even think about.

Sad, but the death of joy in the primal pleasures of food, a gastronomical umbilical cord that was severed from a previous generation, is the key cause of this cancer of our unique makan culture.

Koh Brothers Pig Organ Soup

Address 02-29. Tiong Bahru Food Centre 30, Seng Poh Rd

Opening Hours 7am-3pm, closed on Mondays.