Hip Hotel Wine Bar Now Sells Authentic $5.50 Wanton Mee Due To Covid-19 Slump

Laifabar (mandarin for “welcome prosperity”) is helmed by fresh-faced chef-owner Royce Lee, 26. The self-taught chef, who used to work in banking in Australia, tells us Laifabar operated for less than two months as a gastro wine bar before the Circuit Breaker hit. Between moonlighting as a waiter in Melbourne as a student and experimenting at home in the kitchen, Royce started feeling the pull away from banking. “From choosing poultry and seafood in the market, to crafting my own ingredients, it was during these moments that I realised I would regret it if I did not pursue my dream of operating my own restaurant.” He co-owns the eatery with his siblings.

Though the wine bar was allowed to reopen for dine-in during Phase 2 in June, business remained slow. So, at the start of July, Laifabar relaunched with a completely different concept: as a noodle and dumpling house specialising in wanton mee.

Aside from the fact that Phase 2’s no-alcohol-from-10.30pm rule affected its wine bar concept, the pivot began when Royce started an online initiative during Phase One of the Circuit Breaker called Sg Food Delivery, an islandwide food delivery service to help struggling hawker businesses. He started out with the hawkers at nearby Maxwell Market. “Maxwell Market was practically empty,” Royce says of the initiative, “and we wanted to help them boost sales.” In the process, he got to know many of these elderly hawkers, many of them second-generation hawkers. “I was interacting a lot with the hawkers, and I learned a lot from them. They’re very genuine people, and when they heard I was running a restaurant, they gave me a lot of tips. I was very inspired by them”.

These hawker encounters hit home for Royce because his own 76-year-old grandmother used to be a hawker herself. In the '70s, she delivered home-cooked food to houses, carrying tins of food on her shoulders before she could afford a push-cart. Being Hakka, gran specialised in Hakka home favourites like yong tau foo, but later diversified to include wanton mee, which became one of her signature items.

Royce's interests turned to heritage hawker fare, and he hit upon the idea of rebranding Laifabar as a noodle house featuring his grandmother’s recipes. These hawker encounters got Royce interested in heritage fare, which also offered a lower-cost way to pursue his restaurant dreams. In fact the prices here are modest for the location (compare the $5.50 bowl of wanton mee to nearby hip noodle joint Wanton’s $7.50). Back when Laifabar was still a wine bar, their small plates ranged from $18 to $25 for tapas and pizza. Royce says today’s noodle prices are kept low by having most components made in-house.

The revamped menu now mostly features granny’s signature dishes with a few updates by Royce. When she popped by for a taste (Royce underwent intensive cooking lessons with her over three months), Royce says she was very moved, and the two of them teared a little. "It was touching because she always wanted to own her own restaurant but it never happened, so this helped fulfil her dreams in a way," he shares.

In their opening days, just two weeks before the Circuit Breaker, they were pulling in a modest 20 to 30 people for dinner daily, but even in Phase Two, the restaurant was often completely empty. Thankfully, this noodle house revamp has seen a slight uptick in business, Royce says, but the future is still murky. One thing is clear: he says he eventually wants to open up a casual noodle house selling hawker fare. But in the meantime, staying afloat is all he can focus on. "The rent here is not cheap, but we'll continue to keep Laifabar going for as long as we can".

Traces of the wine bar linger: in the dining area (38 seats with safe-distancing measures), a large shelf with their stock of wine is a reminder of the dramatic changes made. A handsome counter by the entrance that used to serve up cocktails now only offers coffees and soft drinks. There used to be plush velvet curtains to create a more intimate ambience, but those were removed with the revamp. Now, the space is brightly lit, but retains its subtle vintage touches and handsome wooden trimmings, which feel a touch too posh for a humble noodle house — but we’re not complaining as it’s all very comfortable.

Wonderfully springy egg noodles, manufactured by a noodle factory based on a recipe Royce came up with, are topped with slices of sweetly charred and fatty honey glazed char siew. The char siew is Royce's recipe, using Indonesian “bu jian rou”, an underarm cut of pork with a good balance of fat and lean meat, although we find the meat unevenly dry in spots. The noodles are drenched (a la Eng’s wanton mee) in a rather fiery chilli-packed sauce. Made with 15 ingredients, most of which Royce says are secret, it’s an upgrade of his granny’s traditional soy sauce and lard blend. Royce says his gran's sauce was the more Malaysian-style dark soy sauce variety, but he wanted to take it in a more Singapore direction by packing it with lots of chilli instead. The result is a complex spicy flavour and lardy hit. Sadly, the tiny wantons, made with only minced pork and spring onions, are a little bland.

We prefer this lighter number, which we order served in a delicious clear pork bone stock that has a strong savoury hit from a generous smattering of fried lard. This features three very fat shui jiao dumplings, far superior to the wantons, packed with hand-minced pork, black fungus, water chestnuts, and shrimp.

Small deep-fried parcels of pork and spring onions, wrapped in crispy beancurd skin, that come served with a yummy garlic chilli sauce amped up with sweet yong tau foo dipping sauce. Worth ordering.

Also good is the humble fried beancurd puff stuffed with minced pork spiked with fish sauce, and served with sweet chilli sauce.

Apart from char siew, you can get your noodles topped with roast pork belly, which is gorgeously tender and crunchy skinned. Both roast meats are available as sides, if you want to amp up your meal.

Simple, homey fare that's comforting and easy on the wallet. The wanton mee here doesn't quite compare to some of the best hawker versions out there, but the reasonable prices, restaurant’s sleek decor, table service and air-conditioning are good reasons to visit if you're in the CBD and craving noodles.

Laifabar is at The Scarlet Hotel, 33 Erskine Rd, S069333. Open daily 11.30am to 8.30pm. Last orders at 8.15pm. You can also order online at www.laifabar.com, with free islandwide delivery for orders above $30.

Photos: Alvin Teo

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