Singaporean cuisine is a mix of Chinese, Indian, Malay, Indonesian, Thai and even European. Everything what we had was of good taste and the choice is endless. In food courts you can eat for a good price, and it´s not time consuming. The most common dish would be probably chicken and rice and if you head to the Maxwell food centre you will find a long queue in front of the famous chicken&rice stand, which is usually the sign that the food is good, but can also be just a result of having a good reputation and being mentioned in guidebooks. Other than that, we loved the fresh seafood and Indian specialities.
Usually on the menu: chicken and rice, laksa (similar to curry), chilli crab, kaya toast, satay, dumplings, noodles.
Strange & exotic foods you can try in Singapore: ice cream bread (sandwich toast with ice cream in the middle), cereal prawns, burnt bee hoon (burnt crispy rice noodles, topped with onions), chilli crab ice cream (no clue how it tastes and I think I do not want to find out for myself), any durian sweets and desserts, fish head curry, fried chicken wings marinated in shrimp paste, coffee crab, milk powder pork ribs, raw fish salad, fried cookies.
The most common breakfast dish is the kaya toast. Kaya is some sort of coconut jam, made from coconut milk, eggs, pandan leaves flavour and sugar. You should put also a bit of butter on top of that and eat it with a cup of coffee or tea. It tasted quite interesting and like nothing else I ate before. So if you see a yellowish looking toast at the hotel breakfast – this is it, try it, it´s not bad!
Food courts are great for trying out new foods which will not cost you a fortune. We had some great Indian food and some interesting snacks, like fried taro root or deep fried sweet potato dumplings. They seem to like fried things, so you can also get a fried Mars, or Snickers, Oreo cookie, coconut, pretty much everything!
If you wish to eat something fresh from the sea – you can do so easily. Many restaurants at the river offer fresh lobsters, clams, crabs and other fish. If you wish to try something local, order the chilli crab, it´s a speciality and a real national dish!
My new favourite was fish with black beans, I never had that before and it seemed to be on almost every menu.
Food, drinks (including alcohol) and ice cream is easy to get everywhere, so nobody will stay hungry for too long. There are also many smaller supermarkets, like 7-Eleven.
Last but not least, go to the Raffles hotel and order a Singapore Sling cocktail! We did not do that, does that mean we have to go back one day?
