Authentic Ipoh Hor Fun and Other Ipoh Favourites
Back in February, I was quite excited to have found an authentic Ipoh hor fun at JM Noodle House. Having just made a trip to Ipoh, it was so good to be able to find a place in Singapore that makes authentic Ipoh hor fun with hor fun specially imported from Ipoh. At the time, I declared it Singapore’s 2nd best Ipoh hor fun, with the best still unknown and out there somewhere.
Well, the same makan kaki who recommended JM just told me he found another even better place!
The place he was talking about was Shan Cheng (山城), and I must confess I was a little surprised. This restaurant has been around for fifteen years, and somehow it had never appeared on my radar. My friend did mention that a few years back, it wasn’t particularly impressive. But on a recent visit, something had clearly changed. The Ipoh hor fun had gotten noticeably better. Better, he felt, than JM. That was enough to get me to make the trip down to the Midview City outlet to see for myself.
Shan Cheng was founded by two sisters, Elaine and Cheryl Tioh, who both hail from Ipoh. They came to Singapore over twenty years ago, worked for several years, and eventually decided to open a restaurant bringing the food of their hometown to Singapore.
It wasn’t just nostalgia. They grew up in a family steeped in the food trade. Their mother ran a noodle stall at the Kampung Simee wet market in Ipoh, and the recipes they use today come directly from her. You can’t get more authentic than that.
The Thing With Ipoh Hor Fun
The thing about Ipoh hor fun is the hor fun itself. Back in Ipoh, the noodles are smooth and slippery because of the city’s unique limestone-filtered water, drawn from the surrounding karst hills. That same water feeds the fat, crunchy bean sprouts Ipoh is equally famous for. Try making Ipoh hor fun with locally produced noodles and something is always just a little off.
Shan Cheng knows this. They take the trouble to import the hor fun directly from Ipoh, and interestingly, they also help distribute that same hor fun to JM Noodle House. So both restaurants are working with the same authentic noodles. That’s half the battle won.
The other differentiator is the soup, and more specifically, the prawns used to make it. The same variety of prawns isn’t available here in Singapore, so they worked with a factory in Malaysia to produce and export it. The moment the bowl arrives at the table, you catch that unmistakable crustacean fragrance. It gives the soup a rich, satisfying prawny flavour.
That said, I did feel the soup could have had more body and a deeper natural sweetness from the crustaceans. The prawns in the bowl itself were a bit of a non-event. But then again, Ipoh hor fun was never really about the prawns. It has always been about the soup. What I did appreciate is that the chicken is thickly sliced rather than shredded, which gives the whole dish a more substantial feel.
Char Siew Hor Fun
This dish is what their mum has been serving at her little stall at Kampung Simee wet market in Ipoh for years. The sisters are determined to preserve her legacy by reproducing it as faithfully as possible. That means making their own char siew using mum’s recipe, as well as their own formulation of the black sauce.
The Ipoh hor fun itself is thin and soft, and works beautifully with the sauce. The char siew is decent, though I wouldn’t say it stands apart from what you can find elsewhere in Singapore. But taken together, everything comes together nicely into a satisfying bowl. Not something I would make a special trip for, but the kind of dish I could have regularly if I lived nearby. 4.25/5
Other Things Worth Trying
Ipoh Golden Platter
One dish that is very popular in Ipoh but rarely seen here in Singapore is turnip fritters. At Shan Cheng, you can order them as part of the Ipoh Golden Platter, which comes with bean curd fritters and other fried delicacies, all specially imported from Ipoh.
The turnip fritters are very good. The turnip is sweet and crunchy, offering a lovely contrast against the crispy exterior. The bean curd fritters are good too, and would pair really well with their curry. 4/5
Ipoh Chee Cheong Fun Mixed Sauce
They also serve Ipoh-style chee cheong fun, where the silky rice rolls are smothered with a combination of curry, sweet sauce and chilli. It is an interesting combination, and if you grew up eating Ipoh food, I think you would appreciate it immediately.
It didn’t quite hit all the spots for me personally, but I can see how this would be deeply comforting to anyone familiar with it. It think it has to do with my personal preference when it comes to the curry. I would have liked it to be more fragrant and lemak. 4/5
The Teh is worth ordering. The tea dust is imported from Malaysia, and it is noticeably better than what you get at most local kopitiams. One of my personal gripes with local teh is that nobody is really trying to do it well. If you want a genuinely good cup, you usually have to seek out a Hong Kong cha chaan teng. The teh here is better than the kopitiam standard, but still doesn’t quite deliver the same level of satisfaction.
The Ipoh kopi is made from their own recipe coffee powder, also imported from Ipoh, and is typical of the Ipoh white coffee style. Decent, though I personally still prefer our local kopi.
They also serve kaya toast, done in the Malaysian style. Similar to Ya Kun in concept but sliced lengthwise, and made with caramel kaya rather than pandan kaya. Very competent, though not something you would make a special trip for.
Conclusion
Conclusion
I started with the question if we had really found the best Ipoh Hor fun in Singapore. Well, to be honest, I can oly say that it is another place where I would head to for a very good Ipoh hor fun. It is, like JM Sisters, Singapore’;s 2nd best ipoh hor fun, but the opening for the best is still out there. At Shan Cheng fragrance of the prawn oil stood out for me. Overall, the hor fun is very good but I felt the depth of flavour in the soup can still be improved.
But, what Shan Cheng has going for it is accessibility. They now have four outlets spread across the island including Bukit Panjang, Ang Mo Kio, Sengkang and Midview City. The seating is ample, the menu is wide, and you can make a proper makan session out of it rather than queuing for a single bowl in a tiny shophouse.
So, if it is legit Ipoh hor fun you are looking for togehter with other Ipoh staples, the, Shan Cheng is the place to go.
