The Place If you have not yet heard, the inaugural Michelin Guide Singapore was announced last week and two hawker stalls in Singapore has bagged One Michelin Star under in Street Food category, with Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle in Crawford Lane (a 5 to 10 minutes’ walk from Lavender MRT station on the East-West line) being one of the contenders. Singaporeans are definitely no stranger to this newly crowned Michelin-starred eatery, located in a nondescript coffeeshop, where you will almost always spot a long queue with average pre-Michelin days’ waiting time of at least 30 to 45 minutes. We can only imagine it will get worse.

The Food Teochew style noodles, as simple as it sounds. The owner has been selling his signature noodles since 1932 in Hill Street, a history of 84 years which is considered a miracle in Singapore’s competitive food scene. Back to the noodles, it range from S$5 onwards, S$8 and S$10 options are available as well, not exactly cheap by hawker food standards in Singapore. We usually stick to the S$8 size as the S$5 serving is too miserable that we can finish it in one minute.

Observe how the noodles are prepared when it gets to your turn, where all the adding of ingredients, the vinegar, chilli sauce, oil, meats, all seem so arbitrarily on point. We like the overall flavour of the noodles, distinguished by its vinegar taste. Somehow, the noodles itself taste better than the average noodle stalls in other hawker centres or coffeeshops.

Rants Do not come expecting a cosy ambience. And we need not rant further on the long wait.

Will I return again? It’s great to our hawker stalls being recognised by an international authority like the Michelin Guide, which can well be a strong boost to the hawker food industry as a whole. This is one stall which we have been returning frequently for our dose of comfort food, but we may not be able to afford the long wait so often from today onwards.

TheRantingPanda says:
Taste bud: 4.5/5
Hole in the pocket: 3/5
Ambience: N/A
Overall Experience: 4/5

Hill Street Tai Hwa Pork Noodle
Block 466 Crawford Lane
#01-12
Singapore 190465
Nearest MRT Station: Lavender

Opening Hours
Daily: 9.30am to 9pm
(Closed on 1st and 3rd Mondays of the month)

Ranted by The Ranter