[SINGAPORE] (The Original) Katong Laksa, Telok Kurau Rd, Kembangan

This is Kato, I want to share about my lucky finds during my last trip to Singapore recently. I went for a day trip to take care of my living permit and I took the earliest flight as I had to go back the same day.

So because we arrived early, we decided to wander around Kembangan. Why Kembangan? Because we planned to go visiting a cafe in the neighborhood. Of course the cafe wasn’t opened yet (I will write about it later in separated post).

“Changi Road” is full of hawker food stalls and hardware stores for construction everywhere until we weren’t so sure that we were at the right place. Finally after the long walk, we stopped somewhere, trying to find something to drink and have some rest because we felt exhausted. We found intersection around there named Telok Kurau Rd, there are some food court and typical Singaporean street food housing complex.

I went straight to the food court named Kopi Talk Coffee Shop and so happy to find Vanilla Coke!

We met the owner of one of the stalls (coffee stall), Mr. James, and after he knows that we usually blog about food, he started talking about history of food around here. He even kindly offered us Kopi O and Kaya Toast for free as friendly introduction (thank you!). He told us that “o” of kopi o means “black” in Teochew and the coffee usually used is Nanyang (means Southern Ocean) coffee. He told us about the history of Singaporean Chinese heritage and culture. Then the Kaya bread, the bread is known as Hainan bread and he told us that Hainan people had late start compare to other Chinese, and there weren’t much opportunities for them in term of business as Chinese, so they learn lots of stuff from the British, like bakery, cake and other European stuff. So the Hainan bread is part of Hainan people history here in Singapore.

The Kopi O was very nice and aromatic. It was so familiar for me because Thai street coffee also taste and smell like it (maybe same history?).

The Kaya toast was so crispy and not over sweet like in Indonesia. It has lots of butter and some nice sweet and aromatic kaya between the toasts. Perfectly nice with Kopi O. Now we had Singaporean breakfast (lack in half boiled egg only).

Then all of sudden Mr. James offered laksa to us out of nowhere. We hesitated a bit because we are going to eat at other place. He told us that this laksa is one of the oldest and original of its kind and the shop has been selling laksa for 50 years and 2 generations (you can check the article HERE). Since Laksa is one of my favorite noodle, I accepted the offer and challenge.

Mr. James explained that this laksa is called Katong Laksa. He also explains that Katong or Peranakan people are Chinese and Malay descendants. That’s why their culture and culinary is very interesting. So this Katong laksa is part of it. He also told us that there are a lot of Katong Laksa place in Singapore now that are opened by younger generation, with price of typical street food standard to expensive restaurant standard. But he said, unfortunately to find Katong laksa nowadays is as hard to find original Peranakan people in Singapore. 
When it came, our eyes popped out! The smell of laksa can be detected from miles away! The coconut, the laksa paste! We can taste it eventhough we haven’t eat it. Nice and thick coconut milk base soup with thick and fresh rice noodle mixed with lots of prawn and cockles! The flavor was so rich and thick, very satisfying! It was Laksa but it wasn’t Laksa that we know. Felt like history of Singapore flashing into our mind.

 Katong Laksa (Small) SGD 3.50