If you reside in Boon Lay area or have been a frequent patron of the Boon Lay Food Market, you would have heard of A-Po's lui cha (thunder tea rice). Business is brisk for them. I have heard of how their long queue affected the next stall's business and they had to shift. The stall they are at now, at the first row, is a new stall. Previously, it was at the second row.
Speaking of lui cha, it is the traditional food of Hakkas. Side-tracked a bit. The teochews have their teochew kuehs - Png Kuehs, teochew-style steamed fish and etc. I wondered what does Hokkien has? My mum answered "Ang Ku Kuehs". Is Hokkien mee a hokkien dish? I have no idea. I have heard bak kut teh is a Hokkien dish but is it true. I have no idea too.
Lui cha looked like a simple dish, so healthy with all the greens. Usually with 4-5 types of vegetables. No meat in the dish. In fact, making lui cha is not so easy. The traditional way to make the soup of lui cha, one would have to use a big bowl and wooden grinder to grind all the tea leaves, mint leaves, dried ikan bilis and etc into pulp. But the businessmen wouldn't have time for this. They used blender. All into the electric machine and zzzzinggg.....you get the pulp!
Lui Cha @$3. When I got my bowl of lui cha, I tasted the soup. Excellent! Very smooth and fragrant. Sometimes, the soup has a leafy taste because the seller goes heavy on the mint and basil leaves. A-Po's version has a light leafy taste. It was even better than the stall at Bukit Batok which has closed down (didn't manage to post an entry). I liked my lui cha with lots of chye po and the long beans. I think they went well with plain rice. They even had red beans. It's the first time I saw red beans in lui cha. The lui cha was really very delicious. Yummy!
Boon Lay Place
Boon Lay Food Centre
Blk 221B #01-96
Singapore 640221
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