Chew Chor Meng Opens Hawker Stall Selling $4.50 Lala & $16 Lobster Pao Fan

In his typical witty style, the stall’s Chinese moniker is a lot funnier (“一泡而红”, which plays on the idiom for instant success and pao fan’s name). This coming from a man who called his porridge stall ‘粥出名’ (famous porridge) after the identical phonetic sounds of his Chinese name. Incidentally, there's also another pao fan joint owned by a celebrity — veteran actor Yao Wenlong's Sun Gourmet Kitchen, which he opened in his native Johor Bahru.

Famous Pao Fan is located at a street-level kopitiam at Sultan Plaza, next to Textile Centre in the Jalan Besar area. Its specialty, pao fan (“submerged rice” in Mandarin) has steamed rice, crispy rice puffs and toppings soaked in hot, steaming broth. It has also been gaining popularity here, as more stalls are starting to offer the comforting dish.

Chor Meng’s hawker stall makes the typically fancy, pricey pao fan more accessible for customers. “It’s usually served at banquets,” he tells 8days.sg, adding that the broth at his stall is boiled with “chicken bones, pork bones and prawns” till flavourful.

There are seven types of pao fan here, all with combinations of fish, prawns and lala, plus an all-pork version. The wallet-friendly prices start from $4.50 for the Lala Pao Fan, $6 for the Double Fish Pao Fan (with both fried and sliced fish) and Fresh Prawn with Sliced/Fried Fish Pao Fan, to $8 for the Fried Red Grouper with Lala Pao Fan and Kurobuta Pork with Lala Pao Fan. There’s also a premium option, the signature Lobster Pao Fan ($16 opening promotional price for a whole lobster) if you feel like indulging yourself.

Customers can also order a trio of side dishes for nibbling on, including Spam Fries ($3), Fried Tofu ($3) and Prawn Rolls ($4).

None of the pao fan choices here will hurt your piggy bank, but this pick is the most value-for-money. For under $5, you get a bowl loaded with clams, white rice, crunchy puffed rice and a heaping of fragrant deep-fried egg floss. We find the savoury concoction very homely; it tastes like the wholesome, nourishing fare that our own mum would lovingly cook for us. The broth, though on the lighter side, is clean-tasting with the lingering sweetness of crustaceans, making it very easy to finish a whole bowl of soupy rice without feeling jelak.

It’s not every day that you get a whole lobster meal for $16, so try this while the opening promotion is still going on. It’s lala pao fan served with a large, meaty lobster. A decent treat for those who are feeling extra flush.

If you don’t fancy seafood, there’s a pork pao fan with Kurobuta pork (which is from black Berkshire pigs, which are prized for their exceptionally juicy meat). The pork here is reasonably succulent, though we prefer seafood in our pao fan — the briny sea creatures perk up the broth’s sweet flavour.

We usually don’t fancy grouper’s naturally firmer, flaky texture. But if you like the fish, there’s a lot of fried red grouper crammed into this bowl, along with fresh, springy clams. You can also ask for more fried egg floss and coriander to spruce up your soup. According to Chor Meng, he is planning to “get this [stall] on track first” before he considers opening more outlets for Famous Pao Fan.

Address and opening hours
#01-06/07 Sultan's Kitchen Food Court, 100 Jln Sultan, S199001. Open daily 10.30am-8.30pm. www.facebook.com/famouspaofan.

PHOTOS: LIONEL LAI