Hawker Home Recipes: Fatty Cheong's Char Siew

A trip to Fatty Cheong's Char Siew is regular after-church ritual for the family. The kids love it, the in-laws love it and most importantly, I also love it. Ok lah, we always try to bring the kids to what they like to eat, but it is always a bonus if I also like the food as well. Parents, you know what I mean right?

After blogging a few Char Siew places, we are always drawn back to Fatty Cheong's as his Char Siew is consistently juicy and well charred. Anyway, for those of you who like to try making Char Siew at home, I managed to convince Fatty Cheong to share with us his Char Siew recipe.

According to him, the following are the ingredients he actually uses at the stall. Of course, the big difference is that he has a charcoal oven but many of us don't. So you will have to use your conventional oven or one of those "Xue Di Zi" aka Turbo Broiler if you have one of them. Incidentally, you probably know of the "Xue Di Zi" (Flying Guillotine) if you are about my age (or older) as it was one of those iconic weapons in old Kung Fu films. My mother-in-law affectionately named her Turbo Broiler (also an iconic kitchen weapon in that era) "Xue Di Zi" because of the similarity in shape. I wonder if it is just her or does everyone else also call it a "Xue Di Zi"?

Fatty Cheong's Char Siew Recipe:

1 kg Pork Collar (if you like it juicy) or Pork Shoulder (if you like it leaner)

500g Sugar

300g Oyster Sauce

300g Bean Paste (Dou Jiang)

200ml Soya Sauce

3 teaspoon Rice Wine

2 teaspoon Black Soya Sauce

2 teaspoon Red Colouring

Mix all the ingredients together to make the marinade then use it to marinade the meat for at least an hour or even better if you can marinade it overnight.

Roast in a moderately hot oven for half and hour, turning and basting the meat till it is cooked and slightly charred.

Conclusion

As with all hawker recipes, a lot of "Agarism" (estimation) is involved. So you might have to tweak it a little to suit your taste. And if you find it too tedious, you can always pop down to Fatty Cheong's to get some freshly roasted Char Siew!

Do write in and let us know if the recipe works for you!

Fatty Cheong
ABC Brickworks Food Centre
6 Jln Bukit Merah #01-120 (near POSB ATM)
Open 11am till about 8.30pm
Closed Thursdays
98824849, 94281983

What to do next:

Read more about the Xue Di Zi here

Watch "Master of the Flying Guillotine" here (Get ready for a great 70's Kung Fu flick)

Check out the other famous places for Char Siew

Hawker Home Recipes: Chicken Rice

Can you get that layer of jelly under the skin?

I have been thinking about our poor friends from overseas who can only drool at the pictures in the blog but can't go to the nearest hawker centre to satisfy their cravings. So I am going to lessen the pain a bit by providing some recipes whereby our hawker food can be cooked at home.

However, it won't be much fun just publishing recipes which you can get from the internet or a cookbook. What would be more interesting would be to publish the recipes of famous hawker stall owners so that you can try to replicate their dishes at home.

They are willing to share their secrets because firstly, they are generous people. And secondly, they probably know that after trying to cook your own dishes at home, you'd probably appreciate just how much work goes into preparing the food that you would just head down to eat at their stalls instead!

Anyway, I thought we would start with what is probably the most ubiquitous hawker dish in Singapore, viz Chicken Rice. And to share with us his recipe with is the boss of Five Star Chicken Rice! Many thanks to Mr Li!


Five Star Boss's Homestyle Kampung Chicken Rice Recipe*:

Chicken

• 1 whole kampung chicken
• 70 ml sesame oil
• 60 ml light soy sauce
• Pandan leaves
• 60 ml of concentrated chicken stock
• Sliced ginger
• Finely chopped Garlic
• Chicken bones
  

Rice

• Cooking oil
• Chicken fat
• Salt
• Shallot oil
• Pandan leaves

Chilli

• 1/3 chilli padi
• 2/3 red chilli
• fresh lime
• chicken broth
  
• finely minced ginger.

Procedure

Prepare chicken stock by boiling chicken bones in water for at least 1 hour (the longer you boil the better). Bring another pot of water to boil, making sure that there is enough water so that the entire chicken can be submerged. Once the water is boiling, put all the ingredients listed above into the boiling water. Next, dip the chicken into the boiling water and dip it a few times until the skin is cooked. Once the skin is cooked, leave the chicken under the water to cook. This is to ensure that the skin does not break. The cooking time is about 30 minutes for a 1.5kg chicken. Ensure that the water be kept just below the boiling point during the entire cooking process. Once chicken is cooked, put the chicken immediately into cool water for a few minutes. This will stop the cooking process and ensure that the meat will remain tender and the skin crunchy.

To cook the rice, combine the concentrated chicken stock and the other ingredients listed above with enough water from the chicken broth to cover the rice. The water level should be as per the normal levels for cooking white rice. Cook the rice as per the normal method.

To prepare chilli sauce, first squeeze the lime to obtain fresh lime juice. Next, blend the ingredients in a blender until it is fluid and smooth. Finally, add some salt and sugar to taste and mix thoroughly.

Enjoy your chicken rice! And do write back and tell us if the recipe works or what you did to tweak it!

*You'll have to use a bit of agarism (estimation) because that is how our hawkers cook!

Postscript:

The most important ingredient here is the chicken. If you get a normal chicken from NTUC use it to cook, don't expect to get a super chicken rice. The Five Star boss told me that Kampung Chicken is available at the Supermarket, so go for the biggest chicken you can get your hands on. The bigger the chicken the more flavour you get which is why traditional Hainanese chicken rice people go for mother hens (more specifically they must have laid 2 eggs - no more no less). So the key is to get your hands on a good chicken. I just called Chia from Butcher House and he confirms that they stock a very nice and fat >2kg chicken which are put on special feeds to enhance the flavour of the chicken. If you want super chicken rice, you might just want to spend a little more effort and money and get yourself a good chicken to start with!

Chia is from Butcher House. They are at 464 River Valley Road (opp Valley Point). 68873464 I am sure you can also procure a good chicken from the other specialised butcheries as well.