Ben Yeo Has New Chee Cheong Fun Biz; Sells Out Within Minutes At Soft Launch

Though chee cheong fun is one of Ben’s favourite breakfast foods, his foray into the CCF biz was spontaneous. Ben got to know Dickson Woo, a third-generation family member of Kwong Woh Hing, when the latter offered to send him some chee cheong fun and sauces to try during the Circuit Breaker. Being an avid home cook, the father-of-two decided to “play around” with the CCF, adding his own condiments into the mix, and he hit the flavour jackpot.

“It was really good, so I asked Dickson to try this flavour that I created with his sauces as well as those from other brands and he liked it. From there, we came up with Singapore Chee Cheong Fun,” Ben tells 8days.sg. “I think I’ve eaten around 100 rolls of chee cheong fun since I started R&D’ing.”

Ben is no stranger to F&B. The Singapore Hotel and Tourism Education Centre (SHATEC) culinary arts grad and former restaurant boss used to run eatery Hawkerman and fried chicken chain Tenderfresh. Ever since he sold his share of the business last year, he has been looking for opportunities in F&B again.

“I had a few ideas, but nothing concrete. I did some market research and luckily I didn’t start anything ’cos [after that] COVID-19 hit. Which is why we try to be on the safe side with this business. We decided not open a [physical] shop and just sell our chee cheong fun online. From our website design to delivery, we try to DIY as much as we can. We want to take baby steps ‘cos we don’t know what’s going to happen in future. We just plan one or two months ahead,” explains Ben, who reckons he and his partner have each only invested around $5,000 into the business so far.

SGCCF has had four sale launches so far and each time, only around 50 chee cheong fun sets were available so they can “ensure a smooth experience for everyone”. “When it comes to selling online, there are a lot of things to follow up on like delivery and whether our factory can cope with the orders. Currently, Kwong Woh Hing only sells their sauces in big bottles, so we have to repackage them into smaller containers, which is troublesome. We don’t want to over promise but under deliver, so for now we are keeping it to a comfortable quantity,” explains Ben.

The strategy seems to have worked for them. On their first launch in August, all 50 CCF sets were snapped up within 15 minutes. And on the second, they were sold out in eight minutes. Ben says: “My partner and I were shocked by the response. We never expected it to sell out so quickly. The both of us spent three to four days doing the deliveries ourselves.”

He continues: “One reason why they sold out so quickly was because the orders were cash on delivery. [Customers] didn’t have to key in their payment details, so each transaction was very quick. Our credit card payment system was set up after that so the next two launches took a little longer to sell out — 30 minutes.”

To celebrate its official launch on September 23, which is also Ben’s 42nd birthday (is it a trend to launch businesses on hatch days?), SGCCF plans to do a pre-order for their CCF sets and hopefully organise a pop-up collection point for customers to pick up their orders.

It’s no secret that Ben loves his hawker food and he has made it his personal mission to elevate it to a new level. His aim for the business is to shine the spotlight on the humble, underrated chee cheong fun and take it overseas and beyond.

“Chee cheong fun is a very traditional local delight, especially when it comes to breakfast, but it is not as famous as other local delicacies like chicken rice and laksa, so I want to take it to another level,” he shares. “Our dream is to open stores at Changi Airport so that when tourists leave Singapore, they will want to buy our chee cheong fun as souvenirs, or when locals visit friends overseas, they will buy them as gifts like how they buy pandan cake by the boxes. I hope it can be as hot as pandan chiffon cake from Bengawan Solo, which is why we kept the name simple — Singapore Chee Cheong Fun,” he laughs. “But in order to do that, it must first be popular here with the locals, so I hope it will be supported by locals, who will then share it with their friends overseas.”

Despite its name, what Ben terms their “atas” chee cheong fun is different from what’s typically found at kopitiams. Priced at $28, each set consists of 10 handmade rice rolls, a packet of toasted sesame seeds and five artisanal sauces — soya sauce, sweet sauce, peanut sauce, fragrant oil and sambal chilli. You are meant to mix all the condiments together to get the full flavour experience. “We encourage people to eat it this way ’cos I created this unique flavour,” says Ben, who drew inspiration from Singapore- and Hong Kong-style chee cheong fun.

According to Ben, their CCF is a cross between the Cantonese-style rice rolls, which are thinner, silkier and typically served with fillings like prawns and char siew in a light savoury sauce, and the local version that are sans fillings and come smothered in dark sweet sauce and sesame seeds. “Our chee cheong fun is more on the savoury side, but at the same time, you can taste the sweetness of the sweet sauce. The flavours complement each other and you get different levels of flavours in one dish,” he says. “I got feedback that kids really love it and so do my boys. Quan Yifeng was one of the first few who tried it and she encouraged us to start this venture.”

Apart from the sauce, the rice rolls are handmade fresh daily in Kwong Woh Hing’s factory in Defu Lane. “It was love at first bite. I have never tried anything like that before,” raves Ben. “The factory-made ones sold at hawker centres are thick like kway teow, whereas those served at dim sum restaurants are [delicate] and break easily. But the texture of Kwong Woh Hing’s chee cheong fun is in between, not too thick and perfectly chewy,” he gushes. “I don’t know how they make it ’cos they won’t disclose it to me. But it’s artisanal, so that’s why we cannot produce in large quantities.”

Similarly, the five artisanal sauces too are made in small batches by both Kwong Woh Hing and other local brands to ensure freshness. The premium sweet sauce and sambal chilli are from Kwong Woh Hing’s existing line, while the fragrant oil, which consists of ingredients like fried shallots and ikan bilis, is from Artisan Kitchen Food.

Their specially-concocted peanut and savoury soy sauces, created by Ben using “secret ingredients” with peanut paste from Li Kwong Agencies and Kwong Woh Hing’s premium soy sauce respectively, are only available with their chee cheong fun.

There are plans to create more CCF sets with different sauces and they hope to include fillings in future too. Ben shares: “Although it is just chee cheong fun, you can still play around with the sauces and come up with different flavours for festive occasions, even fillings.”

We sample Ben’s chee cheong fun at a media tasting. The soft rice rolls are silky and springy, but slightly thicker than your Hong Kong dim sum variety. The “fragrant oil” came with crispy fried shallots, ikan bilis and bits of sole fish that added pops of texture and flavour to every bite. Tossed together with the other sauces and some of the salty but tasty sambal, the combination is sweet, umami and spicy. Yummy and worth stocking up on, since the CCF can be stored for seven days in the fridge and takes only a minute to steam or microwave.

Pre-orders open on Sept 23. Visit www.sgcheecheongfun.com for details.

Photos: Alvin Teo