Being vegan in Singapore isn’t hard. If you're vegan, you know the popular misconception that being vegan is more expensive. Vegans don’t subsist on overpriced salads or organic health foods. On that note, you’ll be glad to know that vegan food in Singapore is quite affordable. That’s not all, not everything on this list is from exclusively vegan hawkers, they’re just “accidentally vegan”. Here’s a round-up of vegan-friendly dishes in local hawker centres.
Here are some must-know local phrases to master:
“素” (pronounced as sù) means vegetarian in Chinese. Remember this word, it will be your life preserver. Most Chinese vegetarian stalls will display this Chinese character in green. It’s also important to note that Buddhist vegetarian cuisine may contain eggs, so you’ll want to ask them to omit that if you’re vegan.
Here are some useful phrases for ordering food from Muslim stalls. In Malay, “daging” means “meat” and “tidak mahu” refers to “don’t want”. Piece them together and “tidak mahu daging” translates to “I don’t want any meat”.
Now that we have the useful phrases down, let’s get to the meat of the matter.
Meals
Vegetarian Bee Hoon
This is the chicken rice of vegetarian food in Singapore. Every Chinese vegetarian stall will have this dish on their menu. The dish usually comprises spring rolls, mock barbecued pork, tofu skin, and vermicelli. The soy sauce base gives it a savoury flavour that’s balanced by the sweet and sour notes from the pickled chilli.
Hakka Thunder Tea
Thunder tea or lei cha is the marmite of vegetarian food - you either love it or hate it. The dish has a fascinating origin story. The idea originated from a “waste nothing” principle when the Hakka people were driven from their homes during the Qin dynasty. The “thunder” in the dish’s name comes from the noise made from pounding and grinding the ingredients. A bunch of diced Chinese vegetables like kailan, cabbage, spinach and a spoonful of sesame seeds are ground together to make a herbaceous broth that’s doused over a savoury mix of rice, peanuts, and preserved radish. It’s the perfect dish for health-conscious people.
Lontong
Lontong is an Indonesian rice cake dish that’s served with a spicy and savoury curry broth. In Singapore, it’s typically topped with cabbages and tofu. The coconut milk added to curry intensifies the flavour and balances the spiciness of the broth, pairing well with the chewy rice cake to satiate your hunger. To make it vegan, simply omit the egg (“telur”) by saying, “tidak mahu telur”. Although lontong is generally served without belacan, you can play it safe by checking with the hawker if his or her recipe contains the shrimp paste.
Gado-Gado
Gado-gado is another vegan-friendly Indonesian dish. It’s a hearty salad with a fragrant peanut sauce dressing. The main components are tofu, potatoes, cucumbers, and blanched vegetables. Again, it usually comes with hard-boiled eggs so watch out for that.
Mixed Vegetable Rice
Mixed Vegetable Rice or "Cai Fan" is referred to as "Economical Rice" in Singapore for its variety of fuss-free and wholesome dishes to choose from at an affordable price. Here’s how it works: several containers of foods are prepared and put on display, you simply point to choose. Mixed vegetable rice is a trickier case depending on your stance on cross-contamination.Some tofu dishes are topped with minced meat, vegetable dishes may contain shrimp, and hawkers might use the same pair of tongs for meat and vegetables.The average mixed vegetable rice stall may be a trickier case for a vegan alternative depending on how strict you are with the requirements. That said, every hawker centre has a mixed vegetable rice store so it’s an option you want to think about.
Yong Tau Foo
Like mixed vegetable rice, yong tau foo is a soup dish that allows you to pick and choose. At a typical yong tau foo stall, you can choose ingredients such as tofu, leafy greens, fish balls, eggs, meat, and your choice of carbs (rice or noodles). The ingredients are put to a boil and usually served in a bowl of soup. You may opt for the "dry" option that is eaten with the sweet fermented bean curd sauce. Do note that most yong tau foo soup bases are made with anchovies.
Vegetable Biryani
You can’t beat the explosion of flavours from a good biryani. The long grain basmati rice is cooked with onions, garlic, and an array of spices - which gives the rice a unique colour. While a typical biryani is usually served with mutton or chicken, most hawker stalls will have a vegetarian option served with vegetables and chickpeas to cater to the Indian-vegetarian community. While it’s perfectly safe for vegetarians, vegans have to be wary about ghee. Always ask if it’s prepared with any dairy products, they probably get this question a lot so it shouldn’t be too hard.
Snacks and Desserts
Cendol
Cendol is a blessing on a hot sunny day in Singapore. Cendol is a cold and refreshing dessert that consists of shaved ice topped with green rice flour jelly and red beans, doused with coconut milk and sweet syrup to bind them together. Ask any local for their favourite pick-me-up on a scorching afternoon and they’ll probably say cendol.
Chwee Kueh
Of all the snacks on this list, the savoury chwee kueh gets the most jaw drops when people find out that no meat is used in the making of the dish. Why? That’s due to the savoury and slightly briny taste of the dish that comes from the preserved radish and the chilli paste. It’s not overpowering, however, the plain rice cake perfectly balances the flavour. Note: some chwee kueh stalls may use lard (uncommon), ask before ordering.
Chee Cheong Fun
Chee cheong fun roughly translates to “rice noodle roll”. When cooked in the Hong Kong style, the rice noodles are stuffed with an assortment of meat, shrimp, and crunchy vegetables. Other than the Hong Kong version, hawkers in Singapore also sell the steamed rice rolls plain and solely with sweet or soy sauce on the side; this style can also be found in Penang and Ipoh. With this version, you’re meant to savour the texture of the rolled noodles with a glaze of sweet sauce or soy sauce.
