Ethan My Prawn Noodles Hawkers Struggle To Keep Prices ‘Affordable’, Shut Stall After Just 7 Months In Business

Cheekily named Ethan My Prawn Noodles, the Amoy Street Food Centre stall specialised in prawn mee, which Ethan’s maternal grandparents used to sell from a trishaw at Old Airport Road in the ’60s and ’70s.

Each bowl comes with your choice of yellow noodles, kway teow or thick bee hoon, pork ribs and medium-sized wild-caught ang kar (red leg) prawns, a relatively harder-to-get and pricier ingredient that Ethan insists on serving.

Business was brisk right from the start, with the couple selling about 160 bowls of noodles within their four-hour operating time.

Closed stall after seven months 

To their fans’ surprise, Ethan and Gina announced via social media on Oct 22 that they are closing their thriving stall.

They explained: “Due to exponential cost increases and inconsistent supply of our wild-caught sea prawns, it becomes unjustifiable for us to keep our price affordable, especially in a hawker centre setting. Hence, we’ve decided to close our stall and our last day of operation is 27 Oct, Friday.”

Ethan tells 8days.sg that the “main character” of his noodles is its prawns, and he is adamant about using only wild-caught ones, which have better flavour than their farmed counterparts. “However, the supply for wild-caught prawns is scarce and prices have become increasingly difficult to handle,” he points out.

The couple initially considered converting their stall to a bakery as Gina is an avid baker. “But due to space constraints and insufficient electrical loading at Amoy Street Food Centre, we decided to look elsewhere,” says Ethan.

They added in their post: “Meanwhile, we like to take this opportunity to announce that @bakingwithgina will be moving out from our home kitchen! More updates will be posted in due course, so see you guys in the upcoming festive seasons [sic]!”

Popular home-based sourdough biz 

Prior to opening their prawn mee stall, the parents-of-three were running a bakery business from home called Baking with Gina.

They sold unique square-shaped sourdough tin loaves in flavours like purple sweet potato and pomodoro, sourdough waffles as well as cakes and cookies.

While the couple dreamt of opening their own bakery, they decided to set up a prawn mee hawker stall instead as, at that time, they could not find a commercial space within their budget that was suitable for a bakery.

But Ethan reveals that he has since found a spot to set up a takeaway bakery, at The Promenade @ Jalan Pelikat mall in Hougang. “Most of our customers are concentrated in the North-East area, so we are planning to open at Jalan Pelikat,” he says, adding that he is signing the agreement next week and is “targeting to open next month.”

Photos: Ethan My Prawn Noodles/ Alvin Teo