NTU Dropout Opens Chee Cheong Fun Hawker Stall; Ex-Chef Dad Helps Daily After Initial “Disappointment”
Dad should be proud that the 31-year-old, who worked briefly as an engineer, hopes to expand his biz into a chain of CCF stalls.

New kid on the block Grandpa Homemade Cheong Fun is yet another artisanal chee cheong fun joint. But the three-month-old stall differentiates its rice rolls with a twist plucked straight out of a millennial’s 'camera eats first' playbook: aside from pearly white cheong fun, you can also get it naturally coloured in an attention-grabbing fuchsia or green, using purple dragon fruit and spinach puree. They’re drizzled in the usual soy sauce and stuffed with fillings like char siew and prawn.
After all, the engineer-turned-hawker behind the stall in Toa Payoh West Market & Food Centre is a millennial. Shenzhen-born Zhang Yu Da (above, left), 31, named his business Grandpa Homemade Cheong Fun partly because it “connects better with older folks” and also as a tribute to his retired restaurant chef dad, Zhang Hong Yuan (right), who is grandad to Yu Da’s two kids. The 58-year-old helps out his son, who’s now a Singaporean citizen, at the stall almost daily.
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