SINGAPORE - By 9.30am on Saturday (Jan 23), all the salted egg yolk croissants, recently introduced by a neighbourhood cafe, had been snapped up.

Flavour Flings cafe at Hougang Avenue 1 added the item to its menu on Thursday (Jan 21), and announced it on its Facebook page, claiming it is the first such pastry in Singapore. On Friday, the croissants were sold out within 30 minutes, the cafe said.

There were about 50 customers at the cafe on Saturday morning when The Straits Times visited.

Many of them were waiting for the salted egg yolk croissant, which costs $7.50 a piece.

The sweet-savoury pastry also created a stir in Kuala Lumpur when a food blogger featured it in November last year.

The post went viral and customers flocked to bakery Le Bread Days to try it out. A bakery in Johor Baru Seven Oaks, was similarly swamped when it started baking the croissant.

Chef and Flavour Flings co-owner Shawn Koh, 27, said the response had been "very, very, very overwhelming".

Mr Koh said that a friend, also a chef, had encouraged him to add the item to his cafe's menu. He tried the version in Johor, and took about a month to tinker with the recipe.

He did not expect the response to be so immediate as they announced it only on Facebook.

They will not serve the item on Sunday, as Mr Koh wants to focus on serving the brunch crowd, but it will be back next week, he told The Straits Times.

The cafe will also start limiting takeaway orders of the croissant to two per customer, but given the demand, it will be increasing its production, he said.

After waiting for almost an hour, the croissant arrived, still warm, on a wood serving board.

The salted egg yolk custard filling oozed out when the reporter cut into the croissant. While a little on the sweet side, the sweet and savoury filling went well with the flaky pastry.

But not everyone had an "oozy" croissant. Housewife Nana Haron, 45, said her croissant was not as creamy as expected.

"The filling didn't ooze out, but it's something different as it's a croissant," said Ms Nana, who also commented on the long wait.

While waiting, she and her husband Ran Jantan, 47, a technical officer, had eggs benedict, which she said was "better".

Mr Koh admitted that his kitchen was caught by surprise this week, and asked for customers' understanding.

"We are not a bakery which can mass produce (the croissant). What I aimed to do was for people to dine in and enjoy this dish as a special," he said.

"It's probably going into the core menu, due to the great response."