Zhu Zhu Zai

Stall owner Madeline Chen of Zhu Zhu Zai is not a fan of pork, but chose to sell braised pork in memory of her late father, who often bought the dish and taught her how to enjoy it in her childhood.

The 45-year-old came up with her own version of braised pork through trial and error.

Her signature dish is Braised Pork Knuckle ($7.80). Order this if you want to bite into more chunks of pork as the Braised Pork Trotters ($6.80) has more skin, fat and bone than meat.

Ms Chen’s braising sauce is uncomplicated and tastes homely. She does not use any added monosodium glutamate in her cooking and uses sodium sparingly as part of her mission to provide home-style food.

For diners used to heavily seasoned foods, her level of seasoning can come across a tad bland. But if you taste her dishes carefully, there are other flavours present.

Ms Chen roasts scallions to imbue her braising sauce with deeper aroma and flavour. The sauce is suitably spiced up with galangal and garlic, along with the usual suspects of star anise, cardamom and bay leaves.

An unexpected ingredient is mirin (Japanese sweet rice wine), which imparts a sublime sweetness.

The sauce is slightly gummy from the use of pork skin in the braise. I find it refreshing that Ms Chen refuses to use starch to thicken the braising sauce, allowing the natural flavours in the sauce to shine. 

Ms Chen, who used to work as a regional operations manager at a cyber-security firm, left her job in 2018 to pursue her passion to be a hawker.

Her plans were delayed as she could not find a hawker stall near her home.

She started a home-based catering business in 2019 and took up part-time stints at her former workplace.

She also worked as a kitchen assistant at a restaurant chain from 2021 to late 2023 before opening her stall in November 2023.

For a one-dish meal, go for the Braised Pork Rice ($3.80), which is a filling bowl of glossy plump grains of Taiwan pearl rice topped with braised pork belly.

The dish is garnished with a slight sprinkle of spring onion and accompanied by sliced Japanese cucumber lightly pickled in vinegar and sugar.

The stall offers Braised Pork Jowl priced from $6 to $10, depending on size, but I find it over-braised. I am unable to lift a piece of the meat without it falling apart, but some customers like it that way. 

The Nan Ru Fried Pork ($3) is crunchy on the outside with a moist and tender interior. But the fermented beancurd flavour is too light to be detected and the meat is overwhelmed by garlic in the marinade.

Stick to the braised dishes, such as the slippery and springy slices of braised king oyster mushroom ($1.50).

The Stewed Cabbage ($1.50) is a dish of cabbage, carrot and woodear mushroom, all gently braised to tenderness, with a touch of ground white pepper.

Where: Zhu Zhu Zai, 02-066 (Green Zone) Chinatown Complex, 335 Smith Street
MRT: Chinatown
Open: 11am to 4pm, Tuesdays to Saturdays; closed on Sundays and Mondays
Info: Accepts CDC vouchers

TeaGIF

Takeaway kiosk TeaGIF brews up delectable drinks which can be worth a trip to Compassvale Link, even if you do not live in the vicinity.

It offers three options in its collagen series which are brewed in-house daily.

Owner Eileen Xiang, 47, came up with the recipes. Although the three drinks appear similar, she uses different blends of honey and rock sugar to flavour them. She is so particular about the nuances in flavour that even the type of dried longan used is unique to each concoction.

A spoon is helpful when consuming these drinks, which are almost like dessert soups, as each 500ml bottle is packed with plentiful ingredients. Think of the brews as super-loaded versions of cheng tng.

While the prices seem steep, each $4.90 bottle of collagen drink packs plenty of value as it is tedious to prepare.

The most popular brew is Peach Collagen. While it does not contain any peach, the star is peach gum – prized as a beauty tonic in traditional Chinese medicine. The amber-hued peach gum is the resin of the Chinese peach tree (prunus persica).

It has to be soaked overnight before the concoction is simmered for two hours.

Gelatinous white fungus lends a gummy texture to the brew. 

Gold-coloured dried longan imbues the concoction with fruity sweetness and add crunch. Wolfberries accent the drink, which has a light floral perfume from the blend of honey used as a sweetener.

The Honey Aloe Vera Collagen is prepared from raw aloe vera. You get luscious chunks of slithery crunchy aloe vera, along with white fungus, red dates and light-coloured dried longan, which is believed to be cooling.

The concoction is sweet enough without being overwhelming.

Regulars also go for Snow Pear Collagen, which is said to be soothing for parched throats. Each bottle has a large chunk of tender snow pear, ginkgo nut, white fungus and light-flavoured black dried longan from Zhangzhou in China’s Fujian province.

The brew is sweetened with a small amount of rock sugar.

For a modern and unique thirst quencher, there is Seaberry Baby ($5.40), a tangy sweet blend of sea buckthorn juice, fresh mango and yogurt. Add nata de coco for 50 cents.

Where: TeaGIF, 01-10, 275D Compassvale Link
MRT: Buangkok
Open: 10.30am to 10.30pm daily
Tel: 8941-1307
Info: Accepts CDC vouchers