My ears always prick up when someone tells me you can find the very 'best' ... dish at a certain stall. For this particular review, I have to thank Peggy for suggesting that I pay San Yuan Vegetarian a visit to try their 'unbeliavably good' kway chap. This stall is located directly opposite from West Coast Plaza (the plaza itself has a Real Food and
Roti Alka's Kitchen inside). This stall is quite famous, and one can often find a long queue of people eagerly waiting for the dishes available at San Yuan.
San Yuan VegetarianLocation: #01-149, Blk 726 Clementi West Market & Food Centre, Clementi West Street 2Contact: 67759083Opening Hours: Daily 5.30am-3.00pmIf you're looking for the typical bee hoon and dishes, then you can find it at San Yuan. I recommend that you go for their made to order dishes instead though.
Before we get to the kwap chap, I decided to get the
Nasi Lemak. This simple dish has one clear superstar on the plate, and that is the red chilli. This chilli paste (which is made from scratch by the stall) is without doubt the best chilli paste I have eaten in Singapore - It is
amazing! The chilli is not spicy at all, and has multi-layers of flavour and a gritty texture. Not only is the chilli to die for, but the coconut rice is also exeptional - Aromatic, full of flavour and perfect slightly firm texture. I did find that the other ingredients, such as cucumber and mock meats were somewhat unimaginative - But this dish is a must order just for the rice and chilli.
Price: $3.00. 8/10So here is the famous
Kwap Chap. This dish wasn't quite as amazing as I was hoping it would be. Firstly, I must emphasise that my preference when it comes to kway chap is for it to come with two plates. The kway soup and the dry ingredients (such as beancurd, tofu and mock intestines) to be on a separate plate swimming in a more intense dark sauce - This is how a good kway chap should look. I simply can't appreciate kway chap when all the ingredients are dumped into one bowl. This is definitely a decent version of the dish, and I really enjoyed the flavour of the broth, and the texture of the kway (which is so often cooked poorly) was perfect. But if compared with
Tian Yi, I still don't find this kway chap to be in the same league.
Price: $3.00. 7/10Conclusion - I've recently been making an effort to seek out great vegetarian stalls in the West of Singapore, and San Yuan is one of those stalls that definitely impressed me. The nasi lemak is a must order, but I am sure that there are many more great tasting dishes at San Yuan that you can explore.Overall Rating
Food - 8/10
Ambiance- 7/10
Service - 7/10
Value - 8/10
