No need to miss China’s food

My uncle and aunt took me out for dinner tonight. We were supposed to go to East Coast Park to ‘whack’ the beef noodles, but we ran into the small obstacle of heavy traffic leading to the ECP, compounded by the petrol tank light being on. So we needed to find a Shell, and fast.

Tanjong Katong has one. Tanjong Rhu has one. Oh wait, Geylang should have one.

We drove along, not spotting any petrol stations, until we reached East Coast Road (or thereabouts — since I don’t do much driving in Singapore, I’m pretty clueless about how to get places). A Shell came into view. Having fed the car, it was now time to feed ourselves. There were loads of restaurants we spotted along East Coast Road, and my uncle was particularly curious about one called Charlie’s, although we eventually decided to try someplace new, the Northern & Eastern Dumpling Restaurant (Charlie’s had barely any patrons on a Friday night, while the dumpling place was pretty jumping).

I am truly Singaporean, so I expected that the only thing I would miss about not living in Xiamen is the variety of Chinese cuisines. There are some pretty good Dongbei places in Xiamen, so imagine my surprise to see dishes like Beijing pork rolls (京酱肉丝), shredded potato (土豆丝), braised potato, eggplant, and peppers (地三鲜) — something I did not expect in Singapore. I got a bit excited and sent Neil a text, since he loves the Beijing rolls.

By the way, their menu has a picture of some Chinese basketball player (not Yao Ming) on the front. The same picture, plus a few more, were framed up on the wall near the kitchen. A relative, perhaps?

And damn, was it good. We ordered way too much: for just the three of us (granted, my uncle and I can eat like it’s going out of fashion, but a human body has limits), there was seafood and pork stuffed biscuits (三鲜馅饼), pan fried dumplings (锅贴) soup dumplings (小笼包), minced pork noodles (炸酱面), fried green beans (四季豆), braised eggplant (红烧茄子), hot and sour soup (酸辣汤), mutton skewers (羊肉串), and sweet potato in caramelised sugar (扒丝地瓜) for dessert.

As you can tell by the photos above, we couldn’t wait for me to snap a photo before tucking it, it all smelled and tasted so good. The proprietors (or at least the managers) appear to actually be from the north, which explains the accent and why their food is so damned 正宗 (authentic).

Then I shared a Tsingtao with my uncle and it cost a whole $3.50! With the exchange rate, it’s not much more than a bottle of the same at The Londoner or The House (15RMB).

And the bill? With the 10% service charge and ordering twice what we could realistically manage to put in our bellies (half a wafer thin mint would kill us), it came to $62. Bargain.

It was just about the best Chinese meal I’ve ever had in Singapore! Well, not counting seafood. Seafood is in a league of its own.

Eastern & Northern Dumpling Restaurant
218/220 East Coast Road
Singapore 428917
Tel: 63447002

• 15 Sep 2006

• Thinking