First, it was the Japanese, then the Thais, followed by the Americans, then Italians and now, the Germans have arrived- at our hawker centres.

It wasn’t so long ago that the strangest things you can find in our beloved hawker centres was a good ramen. I meant, not just a bowl of it, but the entire hawker stall was decked out like a steaming hot ramen cart in Sapporo, complete with cooks in white short sleeved Japanese chef gear greeting you under the half height red curtains flapping at the shopfront. They’ll even offer pork or chicken stock with tempting sides like agadeshi tofu and miso soup, perhaps even a plate of fried chicken or shishamo (roe-laden little fishes). Of course you ordered in English or better still, Singlish or Mandarin (you may take a hawker centre out of Singapore but you can’t take the Singaporean-ess away from a hawker centre. It is an icon we truly own.).Oishi ne!

Then along came that plate of Pad Thai (Thai fried kway teow), as an alternative for our jaded fans of char kway teow. You could have it with a bowl of seafood tom yam, Khao Pad (Thai fried rice) or have Som Tam (papaya salad) with fried chicken. There were some chatter of Thai lingo in the little kitchen and it gave you that false sense of culinary authenticity (they might as well have been truck drivers just before the stint here), although you would still order it in the facto hawker centre lingo with “eh, hot anot, dowan so hot can, one small plate try try, ok”. Of course no one puts on a Southern American drawl when they wanted a big juicy burger at the American grease spoon stall a few door away, it would frighten the aunty flipping the patties and risk having her overdo it and coming in dry. Be cool brudder!

Later a retrenched and disgruntled former ex-Sous Chef of a fancy Italian trattoria is seen flipping pizzas and tossing pasta over tomato paste in Chinatown. He’ll top it with not calamari, but sotong and prawns. He’ll happily serve it to you at $4.50, a fraction of what his former employers did, albeit it came without service (the so-so kind) and atmosphere – the impressive wine racks, open kitchen performance pizza station and the sharp Zegna suits the mangers adorned- which they expect you to happily pay for.

The sight of the whole trotter and its crispiness is arresting.

And now, along comes this porcelain plate of huge crispy German pork knuckles, adorned with sauerkraut and a hearty mash, wet with brown sauce. It was expertly done over a professional full height electric deep fryer (not wok) as he warmed the sauerkraut over the sizzler beside. The hot mash was all ready to be sauced. All very slick, very international, safe for the chap who’s behind it all- a dowdy, fading tee-shirt and jeans adoring hawker chef, Lawrence Ng.

“I just want to sell this kind of stuff at reasonable hawker price mah.” says Mr Lawrence Ng.

“I just want to sell this kind of stuff at reasonable hawker price mah.”, he replied in food centre lingo when asked why he chose to sell this here adding that “ I don’t think there are any others selling this in hawker centre”. At $15 per huge knuckle, it came in its pure glory, uncut and fried to a crisp (which still was after sitting 3 hours in my office), with just enough fat under the crackling to smoothen it. Besides the sauerkraut which he said was “home-made” but actually came off can and was re-fried, the sauced mash, there was an enticing dollop of mustard sitting beside. It was very familiar. “I worked in a German eatery before in the east and learnt how it was properly done” and Lawrence adds that he uses frozen and not chilled trotters. I have to add that on the four prior occasions that I had to test it (we dabao), it came as hearty and mean as it should be. Although he does not use a good French Dijon mustard, it was very forgivable as the, we repeat, the sight of the whole trotter and its crispiness is arresting.

But what’s forgettable is the sausages (supplied stuff) and the “ang mo” fried rice which comes with ham, bacon, French beans and eggs. Lawrence claims its “very popular” but think it’s just the current appeal of rice (rising cost) as he touts it for only $3 complete with salad.

Will we see more international food hawkers in our midst, it looks like we’re getting there, nice, but I hope we never arrive. I shudder to think about seeing our hawker centres flooded with foreign food and knowing that the best chicken rice in the world (ours) has now moved to, perhaps….Perth, Australia.

Reis

Address Maxwell Road Stall 40 Maxwell Food Centre

Opening Hours 12pm to 6am daily