Outram Park Fried Kway Teow Mee’s 3rd-Gen Successor Has To Learn How To Fry 20 Portions At One Go
There are quite a few family-run eateries with perpetual queues in Singapore, like nasi ayam goreng eatery Fiie’s Cafe at Lucky Plaza. Another famous stall is Outram Park Fried Kway Teow Mee, where the line is so long that customers had to be stopped from joining the queue as the food was already sold out.
The longtime stall is run by veteran hawker Ng Chin Chye, 70, and his wife, together with their two sons who are now the third-gen successors of the business. Chin Chye himself had taken over his father who started the stall in 1953, the year Chin Chye was born. “So I have been working here for almost 70 years,” he shares.
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Frying 20 plates of char kway teow at one go
The family serves about 200 to 300 customers a day, which means that Chin Chye has to fry up to 20 plates of his delicious char kway teow at one go during peak hours. “Frying char kway teow is like practising tai chi — you need to know when to push out and pull back. You can’t force it, ’cos you won’t be able to get anything done,” he says.
It took him years to get to where he can whip up 20 orders at a time. “It comes naturally when you have had a lot of practice,” Chin Chye notes. But he remembers facing a lot of pushback from his father’s regulars when he first started cooking.
He recalls: “Some customers tried my char kway teow and cancelled their takeaway orders halfway through eating. When I asked my wife to sample some of my food, it was so bland! So I adjusted my recipe until there was enough flavour.”
But he has had customers requesting for “healthier” char kway teow too. “I said no. If I fry it with less soy sauce or lard, you wouldn’t want to eat it! It must have a balance of savouriness and sweetness,” Chin Chye says.
Third-gen successor
Chin Chye’s son Huang Jun Ming (pictured), 37, is now facing a similar transition issue as the stall’s new successor. But he has an even tougher crowd to impress. “There were customers who saw that it was me doing the frying and said, ‘Oh I don’t want already’,” he shares. “I was sad lah, but I got used to it.”
Jun Ming’s father consoled him, having gone through the same tough handover phase in his own youth. “He told me it was normal lah. But some regular customers were very nice and gave me feedback to improve. There are also many nice people out there who gave me a chance,” Jun Ming says.
It is still uncertain if Jun Jie plans to resume his own business. In 2019, Jun Ming, a SHATEC-trained chef, left his own seven-year job as senior sous chef at a homegrown bakery chain to take over his parents’ stall. “My dad proposed that I work for him instead,” he recounts.
Initially, Jun Ming, who is married with no kids, turned down his father’s offer. Chin Chye recalls: “I asked him, but he didn’t want to. He wasn’t ready. I saw that he was doing fine at his job, so I thought, okay lah. There was nobody to take over me.”
The turning point
Very matter-of-factly, Chin Chye later mentioned this sentiment in a media interview. “I didn’t know my father felt that way, until someone sent me the article. I can’t recall which one it was, but that was a real turning point. That was when I told my wife, I will quit my job and help my father,” Jun Ming shares.
It came full circle for him, as Jun Ming had actually wanted to work at his parents’ stall after graduating from SHATEC, where he discovered his love of baking. “But my parents told me to pursue my own interests. Go out and see the world, gain some life experience,” he says.Chin Chye explains: “He was too young to work here as a hawker. He should go out and make his mark in the world first.”
“There’s no such word as ‘hardship’ in my vocabulary”
But even with third-gen successors, Chin Chye intends to continue working at his stall as his family can take turns to work in shifts. “I have no plans to retire, because I can still work. But I would like to take things easier,” he says. “Now that my sons are helping me, I have time to enjoy my meals. I’m more relaxed. Before that, I ate at 6am.”
Chin Chye is one of the few - if not only - char kway teow hawker who starts serving his customers at 5.30am. “Taxi and bus drivers who are hungry will come to our stall in the morning, because they know we open early,” he says. “I wake up at 2am every day, and I’m here by 3am.”
That is when he starts frying pork lard for his char kway teow. “I finish frying at around 4am. If anyone shows up wanting a plate of char kway teow, I will serve them,” he shares.
Despite the punishing working hours, Chin Chye avers: “There is no such word as ‘hardship’ in my vocabulary. You can’t be afraid of hard work or fear being tired. Human beings tend to give up when they are tired. So you have to keep pushing ahead even when you are exhausted.”
Learning how to fry char kway teow
When he joined his parents’ business in 2019, Jun Ming started out frying two plates of kway teow at a time. Now, three years on, he has become sufficiently proficient and can cook “10 over plates at one go”. But he reckons: “It’s still too little [to cater to the demand]. You need to be consistent with the quality of each plate. My father does that very well, but I still need time.”
Chin Chye chuckles. “My son can fry a few plates, but not 20 plates at one go like me,” he quips. “So my father wasn’t confident that I could cook for our customers during lunchtime,” Jun Ming shares, as Chin Chye swoops in: “Too slow! When he’s more familiar with the frying, I will let go and let him do it.”
What is challenging is that there is no written recipe for Outram Park Fried Kway Teow Mee’s famous dish. “All by feel one. Ehehehehe,” giggles Chin Chye (father-and-son share the exact same infectious laugh).
Jun Ming responds: “So I had to figure out a lot of things by myself when I started learning. Where I went wrong, and so on. I felt very sorry when some plates I fried were not up to standard.”
But Chin Chye is a patient teacher. “I’m relak one lah. Not fierce. You can’t be very aggressive when teaching someone. Just slowly teach,” he says.
On some days, Jun Ming still misses his old job as a baker (he had mainly specialised in making croissants). “I find baking very therapeutic, but it’s nice to work with my parents and spend time with them, and they need the help too,” he reflects.
How to get your Outram Park char kway teow faster
When we ask if he intends to sell char kway teow permanently, he laughs. “Of course. I sold my soul already!” he chortles. While most hawker stalls struggled during the Covid-19 pandemic, the Ngs had “okay” business with steady takeaway orders. “I don’t want to do food deliveries, because the riders would want to collect the food immediately when they get here. Then we can’t serve our walk-in customers who have been queueing up,” Jun Ming says.
There is an average waiting time of 30 minutes in the stall’s queue. “The delay is because we have to cater to different order requests. Like less chilli, more soy sauce. So if you want your food fast, it helps to have fewer requests!” shares Jun Ming.
He also doesn’t have plans to expand his family’s business into a chain like their stall neighbour High Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle. “My focus is to get the hang of this,” he says. “If you open outlets, you will need to find capable people to run it properly.”
Outram Park Fried Kway Teow Mee is at #02-17 Hong Lim Food Centre, 531A Upper Cross St, S051531. Open daily except Sun, 5.30am-3pm.
Photos: Kelvin Chia
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