Singapore home cooking

UPDATED: 2020 update

Wow, so my wife and I now rent a HDB maisonette with a kitchen in Eunos. After practically living without a kitchen in a Geylang studio for almost two years.

Since my wife is pregnant I desperately wanted to stop eating out. The Singapore food scene is cheap, fantastic & convenient, but after a while you get sick of the mixed quality, the salt, the sugar and the grease. It's just not healthy!

Now I wanted to record any useful information for Singapore home cooking in the blog post, with my expat tastes.

Fresh bread

Bread from Werner's Oven

Thankfully taken care of by my local German bakery Werner's oven, which is a brisk 10 minute walk away. At 85cents a breakfast roll, I guess it's a luxury. The Brotchen is authentic and their sausages are surprisingly good.

I'm contemplating doing home baking, but it's just another thing I would need to learn and I'm told the process from start to finish takes 6 hrs and you need to practice!

Fresh fish

I'm told the best place is bloody Jurong fish market. Unfortunately it's both very far from Eunos and I'm told you need to get there early, like 2AM early.

My local wet market Geylang Serai has lots of fish that seem to cater to Malay tastes. The market is crowded and tbh, I basically only know Atlantic fish well. There is a lot of fish I have no idea about there. I guess I should meticulously try them all and record how it goes. You get sea fish, firm fish, oily fish, bony fish. My favourite fish is undeniably Salmon. Surprisingly a lot of fish in the market seem to be fresh water fish, which I don't like.

Cold Storage near my work in Lavender some times has offers on whole Atlantic Salmon. Like ~40SGD for a whole Norwegian salmon. The logic is that the customer who probably has NO IDEA how to cut up a fish, is to go home and try cut a fish. The good news for me, is that I do have some experience cutting up fish. Now I need a sharp Swibo knife please!

Ironically I was recommended by my new neighbour to buy fresh everything at my OLD local super market Sheng Siong. Why? It's the only shop in the east that is 24hrs and has a crazy amount of stock movement. Everything is always fresh.

Fresh meat

I've been recommended QB foods and Ben's foods. Unfortunately, both warehouse operations are in ... bloody Jurong. MILES AWAY!

I'm told expat families typically stock up their freezer once a month with a visit to Jurong. A round trip in Uber to Jurong from Eunos I estimate will cost at LEAST 40SGD. QB foods does delivery, so maybe I could setup a repeat order once I know what I want.

Otherwise the only semi-decent butcher place that has good quality Aussie beef steaks is the Foodie Market in Tiong Bahru. Easier to get to, but it's still quite far out.

Update: Found a local deli! http://www.ohdeli.com.sg/our-products.html:

Update: Somewhat nearby to me in the East is https://www.facebook.com/PROteinprofessional which has some pretty good specials!

Fresh vegetables

Thankfully the local Fair Price aka "ntuc" on Joo Chiat road has the cheapest and best fresh produce from Australia I've seen. It's a fraction of the price of Cold Storage for Broccoli and grapes. Pity the rest of the supermarket kinda sucks. Worse part is the service in my local branch is abysmal. There is often long queues...

With any luck we should be getting a helper who I think will be instrumental in taking the pain away from shopping at both Fair Price and Geylang Serai wet market.

Pasta

I haven't found a place that consistently does a wide selection of De Cecco branded pasta, which I swear by. Would be nice if there was a place doing decent fresh pasta, but I haven't found that place.

Foodie marketplace has the best pasta selection I've seen. They even have Alfabeto!

Cheese

I haven't found a place I like yet. Especially since the prices are all quite high. Expats tell me just buy a block of Australian cheddar (from Foodie Market) and STFU. Guess I'm spoilt my awesome Cornish cheeses.

Spices

Best spice selection I've seen unsurprisingly is at Mustafas. Their supermarket is actually pretty good, but it's often busy and it just takes way too long to get in and out of that store.

Dry goods

Since I don't have a car, I think Redmart suits us best. Washing power, cleaning stuff, cereal, various cans of this and that. If I had more time and energy I would shop at cheaper places, but I value my time and I'm willing to pay the premium.

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