Generous meaty ngoh hiang with very mild Chinese 5-spice taste. The tofu skin wrap is fried to a golden brown crisp while the pork, prawn, water chestnut, and scallion filling is juicy and savoury sweet. Other than their homely signature 7-inch meat roll, they have fried prawn fritters, fried chicken wings and fried bee hoon.
Restaurant name: Sim's Ngoh Hiang
Address: Wiseng Food Place, 462 Crawford Lane, #01-29, Singapore 190462
Tel: +65 9456 1018
Hours: 11:00am - 6:00pm (Mon off)
Makan-ing around KF Seetoh's 'hood, the first stop was Sim's Ngoh Hiang which is at Makansutra office's downstairs coffee shop, Wiseng Food Place.
Peeking into the little kitchen, it reminded me of homes where everyone chips in to chop pork and prawn, hand mix it with marinate, assemble and wrap, and deep fry the ngoh hiang meat rolls. Actually, that is exactly what the Sim family is doing, so their food have a decidedly homely feel about them.
They have prawn fritter, fried chicken wing, ngoh hiang, and fried bee hoon (rice vermicelli), all made on the spot with grandma's recipe.
Sim's freshly fried ngoh hiang is the meatiest 5 spice meat roll money can buy. The type which only grandma will lovingly make for the family where she will spare nothing for her children and grandchildren.
I can taste the fatty pork and prawn meat because there was so much of it inside the crisp golden brown fried tofu wrap. The meat is chopped (not minced), so it doesn't have the soft pastey feel of minced meat. Bits of juicy water chestnut added a bit of soft crunchy sweetness and moderated the meatiness. Chopped scallion added a bit of aroma and green taste. Five spice flavour was very mild, if any at all.
Sim's fried prawn fritter and chicken wings were pretty enjoyable too, with the same homely feel to them. They call them drunken fried chicken wings but I didn't notice alcohol in it. Too busy yakking lah.... . (If you tried it, please let us know in the comments.)
The quite sharp spicy hot, garlicky, sourish sweet chili sauce makes everything taste better.
Date visited: 7 Aug 2020