Oishii Curry Puff

Address 12 Upper Cross Street

Opening Hours 8.30am to 8pm daily

Our humble curry puffs has come a long. Once upon a time, an old Indian man sold his recipe to a local coffee shop owner and it became the most famous snack this side of the equator, Polar curry puffs. It is not quite a samosa nor can you call it a pie.

Then, it came in a baked, flaky and buttery pastry that was stuffed with curried potatoes and meat. It was so easy to love, especially with a hot cup of kopi-o. Love, like they say, is transient and soon people got bored with it and wanted more. So the diligent and clever huffed and puffed and invented a fried up version and modified the texture and taste of the pastry skin and stuffed it with almost anything edible and vaguely spicy.

Today, I have eaten curry puffs that come stuffed with pepper chicken, custard, sardines, vegetables, yam paste, curried beef, kaya and even the simple Malay epok epok.. But although curry puff sellers will tout any version customers ask for, the yardstick of measure in quality is always by the way the “original” version in done.

Chew into it. Is the skin hard, too soft and mushy or feels like it should not be there. Does it blend well with the taste and texture of the fillings. Are the potatoes soft, damp and spicy enough, is it well flavoured with the curry powder during frying. Does the whole thing look like it has that loving imperfect handmade shape, where the edges are finger pressed by a very tired cook churning out a few hundred pieces a day.

Even if all the above meets your criteria, it is still no guarantee of greatness. That’s how being a humble but extremely well loved curry puff can be. Everybody has their idea of just how good one should be.

Enter Oishii Curry Puffs. They tout seven fried versions for seven types of “characters” and are very proud of their original version. Ms Jessie Lim left a good paying, five day week IT job and a marriage and decided to sell her mother’s curry puffs to make ends meet. She realized that there were kids, old folks, chicken pie converts, can’t-take-too-spicy students, chicken fearing foodies, hard core curry puff fans, aunties and Ah Peks.

So they came up with the black pepper chicken, vegetables, happy, Oishii, sardines and prawn versions to supplement the original.

“We originally intended the Happy puffs for children, made with non spicy potato fillings. But the spice allergic adults have become fans too.” said a spunky Jessie. Together with her mummy Mdm Tay Mui Keow and their hired kitchen right hand Kelvin Kwah, they concocted their signature Oishii curry puff which is essentially a disguised chicken pie with cheese, potatoes, peas and mushrooms (like a banana, go figure!). The prawn puffs, which is off the mark for me, was created at the suggestion of a friend who never ate chicken all her life.

When I ventured into the kitchen I noticed Kelvin meticulously making dough balls that weigh in at exactly fifty grams each. “The fillings”, according to him, “ has to be packed and full and without any lobang”. This was what he felt made the difference. “ It is not shiok if you kena a hole in the curry puff, you feel cheated.” But he agrees that the most important aspect is the skin. “With each bite, it should be seamless. The pastry should not taste alien from the stuffing.”

At a dollar each, their original version’s pastry is softly crispy, light, and just buttery enough and holds the spicy curried potatoes well. It is not dry nor wet, just the right side of damp and as Kelvin promised, almost vacuum packed with fillings inside.

Selling curry puffs alone in a huge Chinatown shophouse was a “default’ marketing strategy. “ We had problems looking for another co-tenant selling an item that matched well with curry puffs, so the racks of curry puffs outside made it look like we are some curry puffs specialists and the passing customers stopped to try.” , Jessie deduced. ‘So we stuck to it.”

Yes, they are a curry puff specialist, not by default.