Hokkien Man Hokkien Mee

The man is very enthusiastic about checking out various iterations of Hokkien mee. I don't think he has a particular favorite type. He just likes to try as many as he can. I'm less fond of it because I find it super oily, and when it involves prawn stock, the thought of eating it makes my skin itch before the first mouthful. Also, while a plate is pure carbs, it's not pasta. I don't feel like wasting calories on it. LOL

We trundled down to Toa Payoh Lorong 7 to check out Hokkien Man Hokkien Mee at the 19 BrewCoffee kopitiam. There has been loads of hype about it, but we didn't feel like squeezing with the crowds to check it out. It was all hype. I really HATE waiting for food, much less an hour for it. So nope. I wouldn't bother eating at the stall till the crowds peter out. Also now, the good thing about keeping masks on till our food and drinks arrive at the outdoor area of the kopitiams- we’re saved from inhaling a ton of cigarette smoke from the next tables. 

Run by Xavier Neo and his wife Alice Lai, Hokkien Man Hokkien Mee has been open for a whole year; there's plenty of time to overhaul their logistics of meeting orders (dine-in and online) versus crowd management, so the dine-in queue now (with a buzzer system) is almost non-existent. We ordered at 1.30pm and got our food in less than fifteen minutes. I don't know how the Hokkien mee used to taste when the stall first opened, especially when they were battling queues and couldn’t fully control quantity or quality. This afternoon, it tasted mediocre. Nothing I would wait an hour for. 

Cooked wetter than usual (apparently to cater to the preferences of the elderly who live in the estate), I found no issues with the texture of the noodles. The stock was lovely and the prawns were super fresh and crunchy. Oddly, we didn't get any squid in this S$8 portion. The pieces of pork within were sad and miniscule. I was glad it wasn't the old-school type with a ton of lard. I HATE THAT. For an extra $1 and $0.50, we got a fluffy omelette and extra chilli. That chilli should have been tweaked. It doesn't taste that much like nasi lemak chilli anymore, which was the main complaint in the early days. But today's version wasn't that spicy. To me, it still leans slightly sweet. Heh. There're so many lists out there 'Best 10', 'Top 20' and all that. So I suppose that at some point, we'll all find a version of Hokkien mee that we like. My favorite is honestly still from Gokul!