A Taste of Sichuan in Corporate Singapore

By Lee Yu Kit

Pictures courtesy of Chuan Hung Noodles

Sichuan noodles in the middle of corporate Singapore

The restaurant was barely a week old when I popped by to catch up with Megs, whom I haven’t seen in over a year.  The restaurant was less than a hundred meters from the Teluk Ayer MRT station, located in Singapore’s financial district, with steel and glass towers gleaming in the late afternoon light. 

Inside the restaurant

Tucked into a little corner of another metal-jacketed, tall office complex, was Chuan Hung Noodles.  And there was Megs, looking elegant and cool after a press review and photo shoot of her new restaurant.  The last time we’d met, we were hiking a volcano in Indonesia and were grimy and mud-splattered. 

The restaurant is small within, with barely a half dozen tables, and bar-like seating along the walls, but there’s an airy window and doorway, looking out onto a shaded corridor where you can help yourself to cold or warm water. There’s a small cut-out looking into the kitchen, and the whole set-up throws off warm, cozy vibes amidst the impersonal, corporate surroundings.

Signature Braised Beef Rice Noodles

The restaurant serves Sichuan noodles, sourced from a small village in Sichuan, China, and that includes the cook, noodles and ingredients.  The small menu, with Noodles, Add-Ons and Small Plates, offers a number of options, with either Noodles or Rice Noodles and a choice of Clear, Mixed or Red soups, the latter being of the tongue-tingling, stomach-searing variety that Sichuan cuisine is well known for.

Animal innards and tongue spice up the mix further, but I wisely selected Shredded Chicken with Long Beans (S$11.50), served in a large shallow bowl – narrow-cut rice noodles in a colourful mix of preserved vegetables and shredded chicken.

The white rice noodles had a mild texture, with a spring, slippery yet not slimy, with a middling firmness, and fine enough to slide from the wooden chopsticks. It’s that last two percent which makes noodles memorable or forgettable, and these noodles, which are specially made in a village in Sichuan, were good, with nicely balanced qualities. 

I’d chosen the Mixed soup, with a clear, light-red complexion, not at all oily, with a bit of sting, but not enough to upset the composure overall.  The soup was sweet and clear, in the way that Chinese soups tend to be. A well settled disposition afterwards lent credence to Meg’s claim of not using any MSG. Ingredients enriched the dish, even without the addition of the table condiments of hand-ground Sichuan peppers in oil and shredded salted vegetables, which you can scoop into your noodles for extra oomph.

Sweet Fermented Rice

Desserts are all but unknown in Sichuan cuisine, but the Sweet Fermented Rice (S$3.50) did nicely, a super-smooth gelatinous white gel, with sweet sauce and a few condiments for colour.  What’s interesting is that the cook hand-grinds glutinous rice in a stone pestle and mortar to this smooth paste before further processing.

A bowl of noodles in soup is deceptively simple, yet its very simplicity makes it difficult to master. Chuan Hung Noodles is a modest outlet, worth a visit for its specialization in its niche, of down-to-earth Sichuan noodles, its faithfulness to its roots and its artisanal approach to producing a good bowl of noodles.

King Prawns Noodles Vine Pepper

Chuan Hung Noodles,

51 Telok Ayer Street #01-01 S048441, Singapore

hello@chuanhung.com.sg

Business hours: 11am-8pm daily.