Yong tau foo ($6)!
Chinatown hawker yong tau foo soup: pick-your-own fried beancurd, fish-paste items and fishballs in a clear soup with coriander and scallion. $6.
Lunch at Chinatown: yong tau foo, $6. Standard Hakka YTF picks bowl. ๐
What was in the bowl:
- Clear YTF soup: the light, savoury broth, scattered with coriander and chopped scallion
- Fried beancurd: the puffed tofu pieces soaking up the soup
- Fish-paste items: stuffed and rolled pieces, the hand-paste bounce
- Fishballs: a couple of the white spheres
- Fried items: the golden deep-fried pieces, half-crisp at the edges
- Chilli sauce side: the red dip in its own saucer
Yong tau foo (้ ฟ่ฑ่ ) done as a clear soup is the purest version of the Hakka dish: the broth, simmered from soybeans, ikan bilis and the YTF trimmings, has to carry the bowl since there is no sauce hiding behind. A good YTF soup tastes of more than it looks, clean and savoury with a faint sweetness from the soybeans and the fish paste leaching into it.
The pick-your-own system is the fun of it: a fridge wall of stuffed tofu, beancurd puffs, fishballs, stuffed chilli and bittergourd, fried rolls, which you select and the stall blanches in the broth to order. The art is in the balance, a few soft soaking pieces (beancurd puffs), a few bouncy ones (fish paste), a couple of fried for contrast.
The fish paste is the quality marker: hand-made paste is springy and clean, the factory stuff dense and over-salted. The pieces here had the right bounce, which is why this bowl earned the higher rating.
At $6 for a generous clear-soup YTF in Chinatown, this is fair pricing for a bowl this clean.
Overall: 4.5 / 5. ๐๐๐ผ The clear soybean broth was the standout, the fish paste bouncy and fresh. Would re-order.
