Hot stuff: One woman’s quest to make a better chilli crisp

SINGAPORE – There was a time when the only brand of chilli crisp people knew about was Lao Gan Ma from Guizhou, China.

As ubiquitous as it is, Singaporean entrepreneur Audrey Yeong is not a fan.

The 46-year-old, who is a restaurant and marketing consultant based in Lisbon, Portugal, says: “I do like a bit of kick in my food. But I find Lao Gan Ma one-dimensional. I am also not drawn to the gritty texture of most chilli crisps in the market.”

A keen home cook, she wondered if she could make a better version. At the time, she was living and working in London. She had moved there in 2018 after marrying a Briton, and continued her work as a restaurant and marketing consultant.

When Covid-19 hit, making her own chilli crisp took on new urgency.

“The need was paramount,” she says. “Unlike Singapore, where restaurants were open and doing deliveries, everything was shut. In Central London, even McDonald’s was shut. So, if you don’t cook, you really didn’t eat well.”

She perfected the recipe and is now launching her chilli crisp, which she calls Crackle, in Singapore and Portugal. It is priced at $13 for a 200g jar, and orders can be made online (

letscrackle.com

).

“Crackle suggests fire and heat,” she says of the name. “And the warmth of a crackling fireplace.”

In recent years, there has been a chilli crisp boom, with entrepreneurs all over the world coming up with their own versions. Ms Yeong had tried other brands, including American chef David Chang’s Momofuku Chili Crunch and Chengdu-born entrepreneur Jing Gao’s Fly By Jing’s Sichuan Chili Crisp.

Closer to home, options include soya sauce manufacturer Kwong Cheong Thye’s Crispy Chilli, noodle manufacturer Twirlee’s Premium Garlic Chilli Crunch and Tais’ Kitchen Chilli Crisp Shiok.

What makes Crackle different is how it is made, says Ms Yeong, who worked with brands such as Da Paolo and Potato Head when she was in Singapore.

She says: “I think the general way people do it is they heat up oil, pour it over fresh and dried ingredients and then let it sizzle into a condiment.

“My approach is to extract flavour from a base of shallots. They give you a lot of sweetness and umami. I bring the oil slowly up to temperature with the shallots before I start building the other flavours. So, rather than putting hot oil on things, I’m adding things into hot oil.”

The heat comes from three elements: hot chilli flakes for direct heat, gochugaru or Korean chilli flakes for its toasted notes, and numbing Sichuan peppercorn powder. Other ingredients include fermented yellow beans, soya sauce, salt, sugar and monosodium glutamate (MSG).

“I don’t shy away from MSG,” she says. “I feel that a small addition to Crackle gives it a flavour boost.”

The final product, she says, is a chilli crisp with a balanced flavour.

“It is not necessarily spicy, and it doesn’t hit the front of your mouth where it makes you cry,” she says. “It’s not going to burn you, but there is a very slow burning heat. It’s almost like drinking a glass of wine with a long finish.”

She started making batches in her London home kitchen and giving it away to friends.

“The requests came in fast and furious,” she says. “They were consuming it quicker than I could make it. And it got to a point where people were offering to pay me to make it. I thought, let’s see where this goes.”

She will be travelling back and forth between Singapore and Portugal, and has hired a chef in Singapore to make Crackle in a rented kitchen. In Lisbon, where she has been living since 2023 after she got divorced, she will be making the condiment.

For the launch, she has teamed up with Mondo, a gelato bar in Amoy Street, to drizzle Crackle on its Smoked L’Eveque n Truffle gelato (from $7 for a single scoop). It is available for the month of March.

She says the condiment she has created is not just for Asian dishes, although she likes it with her comfort favourites such as wonton noodles and economy bee hoon. The condiment, she adds, can accompany soft scrambled eggs, be spooned over burrata, added to hummus and stirred into labneh to make a dip, among other applications. She has also used it in a stuffing for duck at Christmas.

She says: “I enjoy dimensional flavours on a plate. I don’t always need spice on my food, but I do think that it is a condiment that is necessary in the pantry for whenever something does not meet your expectations.

“I stand by the ethos of not having a bad meal. So, if I’m forced to have a bad meal, what could be the solution to fix that?”